Get your home exercise fix without dropping a lot of cash

Posted March 15, 2009 11:00 pm

Associated Press

Don't worry if you are too frugal to spend 10 bucks on a fitness DVD. You don't have to. Here are some tech-savvy ways that you can get a fun workout without spending a lot of money or going to the store.

FitTV: In addition to on-air programs, such as Cathe Friedrich and Gilad's Bodies in Motion, the digital cable channel has workouts through Discovery Networks' video-on-demand service. The workouts are under the "Health on Call" section and include various fitness programming and specific exercises to work various parts of the body.

Cost: FitTV is available in millions of homes across the country. The VOD offerings are complimentary with most digital cable packages.

YouTube: Thousands of people are accessing workouts posted for the people by the people. A search of "fitness videos" produced 161,000 results. Lorie Baker's Pilates Routine has more than a million page views. There are also workouts from popular trainers, such as fitness walking guru Leslie Sansone, celeb trainer Tracey Anderson and "The Biggest Loser's" Jillian Michaels.

Cost: Free.

iTunes: The iTunes Store features a plethora of fitness content. The Nike Sport Music page has coaching runs with Lance Armstrong, Serena Williams and others. Download the audio workouts to an iPod or iPhone and let the athletes motivate you to run farther and faster. The Nike Sport Music Page also features workouts, such as "Yoga for Runners," a 15-minute audio and video workout based on simple yoga poses. Check out the video and audio podcasts under Health: Fitness & Nutrition for more yoga workouts and overall fitness advice, with titles like "Fit Girl: Your Guide to Getting in Shape," and "The FitCast." iPhone and iPod touch applications include iSitups, an exercise training program for abs and PumpOne's iPump Workouts, which are total body workouts.

Cost: Podcasts are free. Songs on iTunes are 99 cents. The Nike Sport Music albums start at $9.99; iPhone and iPod touch applications vary in price, but many are free or 99 cents.

Netflix: Find fitness DVDs through the online movie rental service, from "Carmen Electra's Aerobic Striptease" to "Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred." Fitness enthusiasts can go back in time with workouts from Jane Fonda or exercise with iconic fitness instructors like Denise Austin and Richard Simmons. Subscribers on an unlimited plan can watch some fitness DVDs instantly on their computers; those with high-speed Internet and a Netflix-ready device can stream the videos to their TV.

Cost: A Netflix unlimited plan starts at $8.99 a month. A Netflix-ready device for streaming is $99. Netflix also streams to the TV via the Xbox360, TiVo HD DVR, the Samsung BD-92500/BD-P2550 and LG BD300 Network Blu-ray Player.

Other online fitness sources: There's no shortage of workouts on the Internet. Fitness magazine (fitnessmagazine.com) has more than 20 free workout videos, with names such as "Little Black Dress" and "Get a Bikini Body." The Build a Video Workout tool allows users to customize a video workout based on the body part they want to tone, the time they have and the equipment they own. Yoga lovers who don't have the time or money to take live classes can log on to yogatoday.com for free, one-hour yoga classes, a new one each day, each featuring an instructor and two students. With a subscription to MAKE IT FIT (youcanmakeitfit.com), members can access more than 100 streaming videos, downloadable podcasts and printable workouts, ranging from cardio and strength classes to yoga and meditation.

Cost: Many of the resources are free. A monthly subscription to MAKE IT FIT is $14.95. Downloading the workouts to your iPod requires a membership to the Fitness Download Club, which is $9.95 a month for four downloads, one each week. Join at fitnessmagazine.com.

ExerciseTV: Choose from hundreds of workouts - dance, walking cardio and even striptease - through the on-demand fitness network, which is available to digital cable subscribers. The channel includes more than 200 free workouts, such as "Yoga Fitness Fusion" and "Incredible Abs." The site ExerciseTV.tv features free streaming video for workouts like "Less is More Pilates" and "Billy Blanks Jr.'s Cardio Quickie." There is also an online store (https://store.exercisetv.tv) with thousands of fitness DVDs and workouts that users can download to their iPod or burn to a DVD.

Cost: ExerciseTV is available on digital cable with Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Cox, Bresnan, AT&T U-Verse and Verizon Fios. The cost is free for subscribers. Video downloads start at 99 cents, and consumers can purchase DVDs for as low as $7.99.

Using the Web for your workouts Trina Schwimmer's workout video collection is like a mini fitness museum: Denise Austin, Karen Voight, Mari Winsor, Crunch Fitness. But Schwimmer's collection has been collecting dust as the 32-year-old Marina del Rey, Calif., resident trades in purchasing a DVD each month for streaming fitness videos from Netflix. "It's really allowed me to have more fun with my workouts," said Schwimmer, who was recently laid off and is working on her own business while she looks for a job. She has in her queue workouts from "The Biggest Loser's" Jillian Michaels and the New York City Ballet. The Web is doing to fitness DVDs what the Kindle may do to books as people seek cheaper, more varied workouts that they can access with the click of a mouse and do somewhere other than their living room. Fitness enthusiasts can watch workouts online, download them to their iPods, stream them from Netflix to their television and even create their own workout videos. "With YouTube, it's so easy," said Brandon Jubar, 41, of El Paso, Texas. Jubar estimates he has purchased 20 videos over the years, including "Billy Blanks Tae Bo" and "Hip Hop Abs." "These (YouTube) videos are certainly not as slick and polished as the videos I used to buy, but the quality is good and there is no fluff in any of them." Sales figures are hard to come by because no one source tracks all the sales, says Jill Ross of the consumer catalog Collage Video, which sells exercise videos and workout equipment but declined to release its sales figures. Ross said the multimillion-dollar fitness DVD industry is growing, in part because the economy has people working out at home, and because of the popularity of television shows like "The Biggest Loser." She sees between 500 and 600 new titles each year. But many fitness video producers are already preparing for a possible hit. Fitness video producer Linda LaRue's "Crunchless Abs" videos are available for download on ExerciseTV.tv, and several fitness video producers are looking at purchasing the bandwidth so the digital downloads can happen on their own Web sites, she said. Still, while more people are turning to the Web for workouts, the DVD format won't become obsolete anytime soon, say fitness experts.

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