Since I started personal training in 1985, people have basically set themselves the same goals: lose fat and gain muscle, improve athleticism, heal the body, increase movement skills, spend little money, and train when and where they want. I’m pretty sure you want the same thing, but there’s a problem. Maybe you travel, it’s hard to get to the gym, or maybe you don’t like the gym and/or can’t afford to build your own machine-laden gym at home? Then what do you do? Well, the answer has been here for over 30 years. The answer to true fitness is the portable gym equipment from the Monkey Bar Gym! Portable fitness equipment has evolved from the lightweight resistance bands and ankle weights used in aerobics classes. Today, portable fitness equipment is literally all you need to get in the best shape of your life. Whether your goal is basic general fitness, strength, conditioning OR high-level sports performance, you can achieve it all with portable exercise equipment.

How do I know this? It’s everything I’ve ever done and everything my father, Bobby Hinds, has ever done. My Dad kickstarted the beginnings of portable fitness equipment with the beaded jump rope and workout program in 1973, sparking the Jump Rope for Heart program. He followed it up in 1976 with the first portable gym. People used to think my dad was crazy…they still do, but he was way ahead of his time. He saw a great need for people to stay fit while traveling, traveling, exercising at home or outdoors. He knew that not everyone wanted to exercise on machines, or had the money, time, or drive to exercise in a gym or indoors. So, he took it upon himself to change it, and the world of fitness has never been the same.

Today, portable fitness equipment can do everything you want in your physical training: you CAN get stronger, leaner, improve athletic performance, heal and prevent injuries, increase movement skills, spend little money, and work out! where you want, when you want! Portable fitness equipment can also allow you to follow a training program online, almost like having your own personal trainer! Due to all these tremendous benefits, portable fitness equipment is a common term in the fitness industry. I feel like my dad and his company, Lifeline USA, are a big reason portable fitness equipment is such an integral part of the fitness industry today. I have always believed in portable fitness equipment, so much so that I opened my Monkey Bar Gymnasium in 2001. It is the first core strength and conditioning training facility in the country to use ONLY portable fitness equipment!

“Training the entire body anywhere, anytime is all we do and all we’ve ever done,” says Jessica Rucker, certified natural trainer at Monkey Bar Gymnasium. “We teach movement mastery first and then add resistance through portable fitness equipment. The use of resistance cables, kettlebells, jungle gyms, Med and D balls, jump ropes, push-ups, power bridges, vertical bridges and power wheels, all add more challenges to basic bodyweight movements, thus taking them to the next level.It is clearly the main reason why everyone who trains with us, whether online or in the Monkey Bar Gymnasium, is incredibly fit.”

So what exactly is portable fitness equipment? Any piece of exercise equipment that you can easily pack up and take anywhere in the world and get a tremendous workout. That’s why the tagline for my dad’s first portable gym was “a gym in a bag.” Portable exercise equipment gives you a great workout, not just a passable one.

WORKS!! A workout with really good portable fitness equipment improves your strength (functional muscle), conditioning (leaner body), athletic performance, agility, mobility, stability, strength, and power. Do you want proof? At Monkey Bar Gym we have an AVERAGE of 17lbs of fat loss and 5.4lbs of muscle gain in the first 60 days of training…did I mention we only use portable exercise equipment?

More tests. On a recent road trip, Jessica and I brought all of our favorite portable fitness equipment, a Power Push Up, Jungle Gym, TNT Cable, Power Wheel, Power Jump Rope, and even the new Lifeline Kettlebell. Yes, the Lifeline kettlebell. It may not be a true piece of portable fitness equipment, but it’s a heavier version, it’s still portable, and it’s definitely fitness equipment. On our road trip, we really put all the portable fitness equipment to the test.

Could we drive 3,000+ miles and get great workouts at the same time? The answer was definitely YES! Every hour we drove, we would stop and do an amazing set with every piece of gear. One hour we did a set of TNT cable squats, the next hour a brutal set of pull-ups and rows with the Jungle Gym, the next hour 100 double jump ropes as fast as possible, the next hour 40 each arm snatches with the Lifeline Kettlebell. It was honestly amazing! Each set only took us 3 minutes! When we got back to the car we felt amazing! We were totally energized and ready to go and looking forward to the next hour and what we would do. At the end of the day, without a doubt, we had done a great workout and we were both tired but very satisfied to know that we can not only do these workouts anywhere and anytime, but exercise with the fitness equipment. laptop is the best way to achieve peak fitness.

The world is your playground” train anywhere/anytime (AA), indoors or outdoors!

Let’s design a portable fitness equipment backpack for you to train AA!

1) Jungle Gym – Pure Bodyweight Training – Pull-ups (with the help of kip ups), push-ups, dips, rowing, flyes, assist pistols/1-leg squats, leg curls, runners, core rolls, and much more. A piece of equipment that can do a full body workout to strengthen and condition! Weight about 1.5 pounds, fits in pocket.

2) TNT Cable – Pure resistance training: squats, full extensions, cable cleans, presses, Russian twists, diagonal cuts and raises, resisted running and kickbacks, 1-arm punches, rows and much more. Weight about 1 pound, fits in a large pocket.

3) Power Jump Rope – Pure Conditioning Workout – Probably the best tool for general full body conditioning. Weight 1.5 lbs, fits in pocket.

We brought them all together at the Portable Monkey Bar Gym. It even includes a comprehensive training DVD.

Add more fun to your backpack with the following:

The Power Push up: Voted Best Exercise Equipment by Mens Fitness. It can be adjusted from 20 to 270 pounds of resistance for your push-ups. Weight 2.5 lbs., fits easily in backpack.

The Power Jumper: The best jump training device on the market… and it’s portable! Get the jump training DVD, it’s great. You can also do all lower body exercises with it. Athletes average 6-8″ improvements over 12 weeks of training. Weight 2.5 lbs., also fits in backpack.

A note on resistor leads – 3 important points:

1) Unfixed ranges of motion, which means you have to react and balance resistance, this greatly improves motor function and performance.

2) Progressive Variable Resistance – As the cables get longer, their resistance increases, creating excellent balance.

3) Adjustable Resistance: In seconds you can lighten or increase the resistance. This means you can combine bodyweight movements with precision resistance, you can load or resist up to maximum loads, covering all levels of strength training from endurance to power.

In general, portable fitness equipment is in a league of its own. It’s affordable, lightweight, and convenient, but can deliver maximum resistance loads if you need to or maximum exercise challenge if you need to, you can literally do it all! With portable exercise equipment, you’ll never have to interrupt your workouts due to business trips or vacations, and exercising at home with $1,000.00 worth of bulky equipment has become a thing of the past. Compare that to only $100 or so for all of the portable fitness equipment mentioned above. You can use portable fitness equipment to do workouts online with any of the great sites out there and achieve amazing results!

If you are interested or have any questions about our portable fitness equipment, please go to http://www.monkeybargym.com and have fun You can also join our online training, including daily workouts, nutrition, goal setting charts, videos of all exercises, all previous workouts and training and nutrition diaries too. So now you can train with us, anywhere, anytime, using our same Monkey Bar Gymnasium portable fitness equipment. Please look forward to our Road Warriors Training DVD coming soon!