What are the precautions for home fitness?

To be honest, the most important thing to pay attention to when working out at home is not to buy high-end equipment or follow online celebrity tutorials, but to not blindly strive for strength with the mentality of "do whatever you want at home and you won't get hurt." This is a solid lesson learned by several friends around me.

During the lockdown last year, I started practicing with popular fitness live broadcasts as a child. I deliberately put a thin carpet downstairs for fear of being noisy. I put on cotton socks and danced burpees along with me. I only shook my arms casually twice in the warm-up. After three days of dancing, my knees were so swollen that I couldn’t bend them. I went to the hospital to check for joint effusion. It cost me almost 2,000 to get it cured. The doctor said that the problem was caused by him hitting the tile floor with the wrong posture when he landed and no cushioning.

Many people think that the threshold for home fitness is low, unlike going to the gym and having to apply for a card to buy equipment. In fact, this is not the case - there is no coach around to correct the movements at any time, and there is no professional rubber cushioning on the ground. On the contrary, the fault tolerance rate is much lower than in the gym. There is also a controversial point here: some people say that no weight-bearing training will not hurt at all, and some people say that as long as the movement is wrong, even doing plank support can hurt the waist. I have seen the real thing. I once read a girl who shared her experience of stepping on the pit. She followed the tutorial and did 100 crunches every day. After practicing for half a month, her back hurt so much that she couldn't straighten up. When I checked, I found out that she had an anterior pelvic tilt. When doing crunches, she relied entirely on the lumbar spine to compensate. She did not reach the abdomen at all, but instead injured her waist.

In fact, there is really no need to spend thousands on fitness mirrors or a set of dumbbells from the beginning. The most practical equipment is a few yuan of wrist and knee pads, a non-slip yoga mat of more than 10mm, and at most a pair of soft-soled indoor training shoes, which are more effective than any fancy equipment. I bought a thin yoga mat at a bargain price of 9 yuan. The tip of my elbow hurt for several days when I was doing plank support, and I almost sprained my foot when I was doing jumping jacks. After replacing it with a thicker mat, these problems have never happened again.

As for whether to buy large equipment, different people have different opinions. Some people think that it is convenient to buy a squat rack and a barbell set in one step to practice at home and save the need to go to the gym. Others think that the space at home is small and it is easy to hit yourself or your family members if you do not master the movements. My colleague has stepped into this trap before and bought 20kg dumbbells and placed them in the living room. His three-year-old child tripped and hit his forehead while playing, and needed two stitches. After that, the pair of dumbbells have been collecting dust in the storage room. If you really want to practice weight-bearing, you can just use a mineral water bottle filled with water or a 5kg rice bag at first. Once the movements are fully practiced, it is not too late to consider adding weight.

There is another small detail that many people tend to overlook. Don’t just slump on the sofa after practicing. Especially in the summer, when you are sweating and blowing directly against the air conditioner, it is easy for muscle spasm. Last summer, after I practiced shoulder and back exercises, I stood directly at the air conditioner for two minutes. It was difficult to lift my arms the next day, and it took three days to wear plasters before I recovered. If you are following the live broadcast, don’t try to keep up with the host’s rhythm. I have been practicing for several years and can do 30 burpees in one minute. There is no shame in you just starting to practice 10 burpees in one minute. Doing standard movements is much more useful than practicing enough numbers.

To put it bluntly, home fitness is all about convenience and worry-free. Don’t injure yourself just to keep up with the progress. It’s not worth the loss.