
Let’s get one thing out of the way first: low-impact workouts do NOT necessarily have to mean low-intensity workouts!
Low-impact workouts are a crucial part of even intense training regimes and need to be incorporated into your exercise schedule no matter your fitness level. Low-impact workouts are beneficial because they raise your heart rate and burn calories while still being gentle on your skeletal system, with minimal jarring of joints or ache-causing impacts. If you’re doing a ton of high-impact sports, like running or boxing, you’re putting yourself at risk of injury if you only train at a heavy impact level.
By mixing it up with low-impact exercise, you’re maintaining your fitness level but giving your body time to recover between sessions. Low-impact exercise is also incredibly helpful if you’re injured and want to maintain a baseline fitness level while still allowing your affected areas to heal, or if you want to reduce your need for rest days. It’s also a great option for people with mobility or pain issues, as low-impact exercise is much less likely to exacerbate flare-ups of uncomfortable feelings.
Want to make a big impact on your health with low-impact workouts? These are the Trojan Health and Fitness team’s top five options!
- Walking
Yes, we know it seems obvious. However, you’d be surprised at how many people overlook the value of this simple, healthy form of low-impact working out. Regular brisk walking can help manage body weight, improve your mood, boost your balance and coordination and prevent or manage conditions like heart disease, high blood pressure, and type 2 diabetes.
Walking is also a great form of exercise for beginners, as it doesn’t require any instruction, and you can set your pace according to your comfort and fitness level. You can increase the intensity of a walking workout by walking up an incline, increasing your pace or increasing your distance.
Walking can also be a social way to do a rest day activity with your gym buddies, letting you get to know each other outside of the gym setting. You can let your walks take you out into nature, in parks or trails, or even use your walks as an excuse to explore your neighbourhood or city and discover hidden gems on foot.
To get walking from the comfort of your own living room, take a look at our wide range of Trojan Treadmills.
- Swimming
Swimming is uniquely beneficial as a low-impact exercise in that it simultaneously provides incredible resistance training and doesn’t strain weight-bearing joints. This is because of the drag force of the water, which creates a phenomenon that’s a great balance of resistance and cardio, making for an excellent all-round workout.
In a study conducted in 2017, participants who took place in a four-month aquatic-resistance training regime were reported to have experienced significant weight loss and greatly improved walking speed. It’s also a great option for strengthening your shoulders, back, core, and legs, which might prove beneficial if your main form of high-impact exercise doesn’t address one or more of these areas.
Make sure those newly moving muscle groups don’t get stiff after your swim when you use the Trojan handheld massage set to work out any muscle tension.
- Cycling
Indoor and outdoor cycling are great ways to incorporate an intense cardio workout without any weight-bearing movements that put stress on your joints. You get the same cardio benefits and legwork of sports like running, with much less risk of injury. This makes cycling the ideal high-intensity sport for those whose anatomy simply says “no” to being a runner. We get it – a lot of it’s about genetics! Cycling is a great way to try out “HIIT,” which means “high intensity interval training.” This is a style of exercise in which you do short bursts of high-intensity movement, followed immediately by rest breaks and builds up endurance very effectively.
To start out, try pedaling as fast as you can for 20 seconds and resting for 10 seconds. Then, repeat that set three more times. Your heart rate will jump up but you won’t tire yourself out to the point of exhaustion too fast.
To give cycling a go, take a look at our versatile range of indoor bikes and spinners.
- Rowing
Because it may not be a form of exercise you’ve explored in depth – it’s not the most popular machine at the gym – you may not have experienced the full-body benefits you can get from a turn on the rowing machine. The exercise provides solid cardio and resistance training, with an hour of rowing typically burning up to 500 calories.
Rowing strengthens the arms, legs and core, and has proven effective in improving posture and strengthening the upper back. Rowing machines are a great way to work in a little shoulder definition, and the muscles in your arms effect can be changed by whether you choose an overhand or underhand grip on the bar.
Paddle out to fitness when you take a look at the rowing machines Trojan Health has on offer.
- Pilates
Pilates is a largely body-weight-focused form of low-impact exercise that has a primary focus on core strength, breath work and alignment. In an article in the Journal of Bodywork and Movement Therapies, published in 2021, almost 30 studies confirmed that Pilates effectively improves muscle strength, balance, and quality of life for those who do it regularly.
Though beginner Pilates probably won’t give you an intense cardio workout, it is scalable as you get more advanced, and can become a calorie-burner of note when you start hitting some of the more intense forms. Pilates is a great form of cross-training to improve your form in other sports, like running, weightlifting, and ball sports.
Get set up for a home Pilates session with our Trojan Yoga Pilates Set.
The trick to attaining your desired fitness level and then maintaining your spot there isn’t 100% intensity at your sport, 100% of the time. That’s a recipe for injury, burnout and losing motivation. By incorporating low-impact exercises into your fitness routine, you’re allowing your body (and mind) to rest and heal while still staying active and keeping your fitness on track. Low-impact activities can also be a fun way to try new things and you can mix and match a combination that suits you! The whole point of choosing health is to have fun with it, so find what works for you and allow your training plan to reflect that!
For more workout inspiration, check out our wide range of exercise guides, suited to every fitness level.