Sometimes it’s hard finding the perfect gift for a friend or family member. This holiday season, why not give the gift of fitness? Whether you are shopping for your nephew who is a fitness enthusiast or your grandma who just needs to do some gentle exercises; we’ve got gifts that the whole family will love. We recently surveyed our staff of fitness experts, and here is our list of the top 10 perfect holiday gifts for under $100:

High Intensity Interval Training, commonly referred to as HIIT, can be completed in a shorter amount of time than traditional strength or cardio sessions making it a very efficient workout for those with limited time. It is also more effective for fat burning and cardiovascular health than a traditional, steady state cardio session.

Getting into or staying in shape is a very simple process: eat healthy and be active… always. Simple, but not easy. People start exercising with the best of intentions, but usually end up quitting within the first six weeks. Overhauling one’s lifestyle is not an easy thing to do and the typical method of hitting the reset button is to get a gym membership and start grinding out workouts three to five days a week. Unless the gym atmosphere and new routine really clicks, motivation wears thin and the best of intentions can’t compete against what ends up becoming a dull slog through endless repetitions and cardio signup wait times.

So what is a Kettlebell and why is it so popular? We get this question all the time! Kettlebells exercises check all the boxes, cardio, strength and flexibility training. First of all Kettlebells are named very appropriately. They are a large cast iron ball shaped weight with a single handle. It resembles a cannon with a handle. It is used to perform many types of exercises ranging from weight lifting to power training exercises that combine cardio, strength and flexibility training.

Fitness trackers and bands are all the rage these days. It seems like everyone is trying to achieve their 10,000 step goal per day. It keeps us moving and accountable to ourselves to push a little harder! Here are the top 6 benefits of Fitness Trackers and Bands

The best way to describe Water Rowing is high intensity, without the impact. Water Rowing is an excellent full body workout that can help you burn calories faster than other cardio workouts without putting excess strain on your joints.

Fitness Town Fitness Expert Cartoon One of the most common questions I get is “if you were to pick one piece of equipment to stay fit, what would it be?” That’s a bit like saying “if you had to pick between the engine, steering wheel, and seats of your car, which would you keep?” You can’t really drive a functional car without all of these components, just like you’re not really fit if you don’t have a healthy metabolism, and are strong and flexible. Picture the following scenarios:I speak to a number of clients every week who tell me that they want to buy a piece of cardio equipment –treadmills, bikes, ellipticals or rowers – because they want to “keep fit.”

Customer's come in every week asking about the Max Trainer. People want to know if we carry it, whether or not it’s a good product and if it actually does burn more calories than other machines. Parent company, Nautilus Inc., to Octane Fitness, has done a great job marketing this product but if you pay attention to the infomercial, the focus is really on the idea of the “quick workout”. Fourteen minutes is all you need to melt the pounds off, they say and they are correct.

Whether you are using therapy bands to recover from injury or adding a new degree of difficulty to your lifting, bands provide a great deal of benefits to help you reach your fitness goals. Resistance bands can be used for a comprehensive, full-body workout that challenges virtually every major muscle group in your body. Resistance bands work to strengthen and elongate the muscle fibres increasing your flexibility tremendously.

This is a short blog on why it’s a good idea to do cardiovascular exercise first thing in the morning. I like to keep my mind focused on simple fundamentals (in fitness and in life), and doing cardio first thing in the morning is a nice little principle that can really make a big difference. It’s a success first thing in the morning! Wake up, make a trip to the washroom and then get on your exercise bike, elliptical or put on your shoes and get outside for a brisk walk/jog.