Tips and tricks from fitness experts to help you transform condo living into healthy living.

We all know the importance of staying fit.

I, for one, love to run.  I have been doing it for years.  Then I met my personal trainer, Mike.  He introduced me to the world of personal training.  Every week Mike puts me through an hour of intense aerobic and strength building exercises during which we often chat about condo living.

Mike owns a condo and he knows some of the concerns that condo owners have when it comes to working out in the common facilities of their building or in their units.  These are Mike's tips for a healthy and fit condo lifestyle:
Condo boards - get those residents out of their units!

   1. Consider adding various inexpensive but effective exercise tools (e.g. stability balls, skipping ropes, etc.) that allow people to enhance their fitness programs.  A simple solution for making your facility more user friendly.
   2. Have a fitness professional (e.g. certified personal trainer) come to your condominium to do a workshop on how to use the equipment properly.  Holding the workshops periodically may encourage more residents to participate.
   3. Establish a regular maintenance schedule for the exercise equipment (e.g. cardio and weight machines) to ensure they are always in good working order.
   4. Develop 'buddy' training groups to make your workouts more interactive with fellow neighbors.
   5. If you don't have a fitness facility in your building- its no excuse to lounge about!
Try one of these tips for adding a touch of fitness to your daily routine:

   1. Have a fitness professional come to your unit to show you how your space can be used effectively, without disrupting your 'everyday' life.

   2. Stay away from purchasing big and bulky fitness equipment that will only take away from your living space.
   3. Stability balls, resistance tubing and dumbbells are great examples of fitness equipment that will not only give you great diversity in your workouts, but are also easily stored away.
   4. Skip the elevator every so often.  Walking up and down the stairs in your condominium is a great way to add to your cardiovascular workouts.
So get up, get moving and get involved, your body will thank you!