Editor Steve Mazzucchi and Staff Writer Tanner Bowden discuss fitness during and after the pandemic, and whether working out from home is here to stay.
Reflections on fitness during and after the pandemic, predictions of future fitness trends, headlines, and gear we're obsessed with.
Mentioned in this episode:
Peloton vs. Wahoo: Who Makes the Better Stationary Bike?
Can New Technology Help You Get Fitter at Home? (Tempo vs Tonal)
7 Awesome Kettlebell Alternatives You Already Have at Home
Apple's Fitness+ Is a Breeze to Use — And It Really Kicked My Ass
How to Build the Ultimate Home Gym, Three Ways
What Running Gear Should You Spend Your Money On?
These Amazon Kettlebells Will Save You a Fortune and Last a Lifetime
Angela Gargano Instagram Workouts
The 6 Best Mini Multi-Tools of 2020
Headlines
iOS (Old School) Gives Your Phone an 8-bit Apple Aesthetic
PopGrip and SOG Make a Mini Multi-Tool That Attaches to the Back of Your Smartphone
Made is a new, Crowd-funded Brand Making Made to Measure, High-End Outdoor Apparel
Kind Of Obsessed
Nemo Chipper Reclaimed Closed-Cell Foam Seat ($20)
Nick:
This is the Gear Patrol Podcast. In this episode, Steve Mazzucchi and Tanner Bowden discuss fitness during and after the pandemic, and whether working out from home is here to stay. Thanks for joining us. I'm glad you're here. Let's get started.
Steve:
You'll be happy to know that I used every piece of the microphone and headphones set up, which is how I have this suspended microphone situation.
Nick:
Yeah, I am happy to know that. It's good. I love the pod equipment. Keeping people talking. Hello everyone. I'm Nick Caruso and you are listening to the Gear Patrol Podcast. Every week I'll be here having conversations with a rotating roster of guests and friends to talk about products and product culture. Joining me today, editor Steve Mazzucchi. Hi, Steve.
Steve:
Hey Nick.
Nick:
Do I assume you know the movie Multiplicity with Michael Keaton?
Steve:
Yes, I am well aware of this film.
Nick:
Okay. I figured. Hi, Steve. We're also joined by Tanner Bowden. Tanner, hello.
Tanner:
How are you?
Nick:
I'm doing all right. Together you two run Gear Patrols' outdoor and fitness content. So everybody's heard way too much at this point about working from home WFH, but we're here to talk about working out from home, which is pronounced WOFH.
Steve:
Thanks for clarifying.
Nick:
So physical and mental health has been particularly top of mind for the last year. It's always important, but a special challenge since last spring, specifically how to maintain health during an extended period of isolation when gyms and fitness classes and the like are not available to anyone. People are working out from home. They're WOFH. And I want to dig into the nitty gritty of what that means in a second, but I'm curious what your normal approach to fitness is. Would you be going to gyms? Would you be going to classes? Would you be doing stuff on your own, and how has that changed over the past year? Steve, can you start?
Steve:
Absolutely. In part because of what I do for a living, part of my fitness routine at one time was literally just like going to gyms and sampling classes that I was invited to, to test out new fitness products. But I do a fair amount of home stuff. I have some adjustable weights that are super handy and I also bike a ton.
Nick:
Have you been doing virtual stuff or?
Steve:
Yeah, definitely. Tanner and I both actually have been testing out some equipment that pairs with an app, The JAXJOX Dumbbell Connect, which is fun and an interesting window into a whole different way of working out.
Nick:
Right. How about you Tanner? You're a marathoner. What would you normally be doing, and what have you been doing?
Tanner:
Yeah, endurance cardio's kind of become my thing in recent years, but pre-COVID times, our job just sort of entailed getting invited to a lot of events and classes and things that took place at gyms. Lululemon, actually, they'd just recently launched a new yoga mat and they would have invited us to go do yoga with some of their ambassadors.
Nick:
Right.
Tanner:
Instead, I did that virtually. So I am doing some of those things virtually still, but my typical routine is just running pretty much every morning, skiing in the winter. I'll do some virtual yoga classes every once in a while.
Nick:
Cool. Yeah. For the past year, the hallmarks of our WOFH, work out from home environment have been that it is really difficult for most people. And basically, that's because no one was prepared unless you have a Malibu beach home with a full gym downstairs, or just are fortunate enough to have equipment already. You've probably had a tough time procuring any. It got really hard to buy stuff after things went haywire. Some people could purchase machinery like Peloton or Tonal or Mirror, that kind of stuff, but most people couldn't. Even so, everyone kind of figured out something. What elements of working out from home do you think will stick around?
Steve:
I think a lot of things will stick around. I definitely think that the past year has really played into the hands of companies like Peloton and Mirror because they are able to provide a lot of things that gyms don't, or sorry, that gyms do, but that people couldn't get from gyms in the past year. I think the live streaming of the classes with real-time feedback and actual trainers has enabled people to get a lot of what a gym provides. I was thinking about this though and one thing that you can only get from a gym that you cannot get from any homework app is the opportunity to get away from your family, which I think is a vital factor for some people. So I was thinking are Gyms just going to be dead. And then I was like, "No, the people that need the gym for that will want to go back to an actual physical gym when they can."
Nick:
Right. That's a main point of this, right? It's sort of dark to say that it's to escape your family [inaudible 00:05:54]. Also, there's that social aspect of a gym. So that you're in a class or next to someone who is either directly or sort of subconsciously motivating you. People are missing it. What about you Tanner? You have any thoughts on what is going to remain after we get closer to normal?
Tanner:
Yeah. In the beginning, when we did have all those year shortages, like the kettlebell shortage was one that really stands out in my memory as just a crazy, unexpected thing. And people were making their own kettlebells at home. Steve, I'm pretty sure you wrote a whole article about this. Did you know?
Steve:
Oh yeah, yeah. It was a bunch of replacement items like milk jugs and gas cans and other things you could use in place of a kettlebell.
Tanner:
Yeah. Yeah.
Nick:
Yeah.
Tanner:
It sounds really goofy, but so that's something I would file in. That's not going to stick around.
Nick:
Right.
Tanner:
But I think this whole app-based virtual fitness, I think really will. There are people who love being at the gym and who use every tool that's at a gym that are going to go back to the gym as soon as possible. I think those people have probably already gone back to the gym, but a lot of people, the casual sign up for a membership on January 1st and forget about it two months later or a month later. I think the app-based fitness program is really convenient for those people.
Nick:
Right. Some surveys I've seen say almost 70% of people who started using online fitness services during the pandemic will plan to continue. And about 25% of Americans, according to another poll, don't want to go back to gyms. And almost 20% of gyms won't reopen. So the alternatives are a must. Are there specific apps that you guys like or I think are notable?
Steve:
I definitely think we should mention Apple fitness plus. I don't necessarily think it's the best one, but it might be the best one for the type of people who would respond to these platforms because it's very accessible. It's probably not for someone who's super hardcore and already has a workout in their head before they start working out. But I do feel like that's a lot of times the person who's already a regular gym goer and probably transitioned pretty smoothly to home workouts with a few pieces of their own equipment.
Nick:
What specifically about Apple plus?
Steve:
Based on my limited experiences with it, it's just designed to be friendly to beginners and intermediate people in terms of the workouts that they have. It's not going to be something that's going to be so difficult the first time you do it with the exercises they are having you do that you get burned out and don't want to try again. They definitely took pains to make it that way. And there's also very much a multicolor multi-gender multi-ability level roster of trainers that they brought on to create the programs, and I think that makes it so that anyone could feel comfortable using it.
Nick:
And also you don't need a spinning bike in your apartment or home.
Steve:
Yeah, a lot of their workouts are little or no equipment. On Apple's website, you can buy through them some pieces of weight equipment and yoga blocks and stuff like... But there is a lot of stuff that you can do just with the app for sure.
Nick:
Tanner, do you have something you would recommend?
Tanner:
Again, I don't have a ton of experience with all of them, and a lot of them are actually really new. I know a new one is the Equinox plus app. Equinox is a fitness club. They would probably not like to be referred to as a gym. It's that sort of place. They own a soul cycle and a rumble. I think they have integration with TB12, so there's a lot there. So I see that one as probably a big upstart competitor in the space. The one I've had experience with is the JAXJOX app, which Steve was mentioning that we have these dumbbells from them. And actually add some of the products that Apple sells our JAXJOX products.
Nick:
Oh, interesting. They're connected.
Tanner:
They're connected, yeah. So the dumbbells are electronically adjustable. So, from my phone, I can change the dumbbells from 50 pound dumbbells down to a 14 pound dumbbell, depending on what I'm doing with it. And the app has tons of different exercises you can store depending on what gear you have with you. Lots of instructors, parts of it I teach you how to do specific moves correctly, so it's pretty robust.
Nick:
What about if you aren't able to pick up the JAXJOX adjustable barbells? Could you do a budget version of just basics?
Steve:
Yeah, you actually can. There's actually a whole set of weights that Amazon does. There are Amazon basics weights that are pretty accessible. The JAXJOX is definitely on the higher end. The dumbbells are $449. It goes up to 50 pounds, I want to say. One thing that's worth mentioning is the fact that the pandemic did motivate a lot of creativity, and we saw that with some Instagram fitness influencers. One of my favorites is Angela Gargano who's... She kills it. She's like a three-time American Ninja Warrior competitor and stuff, but she does these home workouts with like skillets and broomsticks and just a set of chairs that she's doing very difficult variations of dips on. If you have something in your house that's heavy and it has something you can hold it with, you can work out with it. Seeing that kind of stuff online, people have responded to, and have found their own ways to work out, even if they either couldn't afford kettlebells, or literally just could not find them for any price besides $1,500 on eBay.
Nick:
We use this term so much, but it's an interesting application of it. The democratization of fitness has kind of been a strange positive by-product of the pandemic. For people in the North and the Northeast it's getting warmer, which means that there is a natural gym out there. So Tanner, I want to turn to you and can you give people some ideas or tips or maybe share how you begin to use the outdoors more?
Tanner:
Yeah, I would say that running is the most basic form form of fitness... In my mind, the most basic form of fitness that you can do and obviously it's a lot nicer. The app, Strava, a lot of people probably know Strava. It's essentially a fitness tracking app and with the social media element to it. And they recently released a whole 2020 data report from all 70 million users or however crazy amount of people they have on there. And they saw that the things that jumped up the most were outdoor activities. So cycling outdoor running. So that's not on a treadmill. Hiking, kayaking. I think they said three times more people were logging outdoor walks. You can do anything outside. It's not the same as lifting weights. You can take your weights outside maybe [crosstalk 00:14:01]-
Nick:
Or maybe lift some trees and stuff like Arnold and Commando.
Tanner:
Yeah, absolutely. It reminds me of Ben Stiller's character in that movie Heavyweights. I don't know if you remember that, but [crosstalk 00:14:12].
Nick:
I do. Extremely funny offensive movie from the '90s.
Steve:
We can only reference '90s movies on this podcast. I like that.
Nick:
Accessibility is another, I thought, another interesting factor. An element of the WOFH a year we've had because a lot of people don't like going to the gym, but a lot of people also have a difficult time with accessibility in gyms or transport to them, a focus on working out where they live may really improve their chances of being more fit.
Tanner:
On that point, Nick, I've moved from New York to Vermont last year. Where I'm living now, I don't know where the closest gym is. I think it's probably like 45 minutes away. For a lot of people, it might not even be feasible really. What other unexpected benefits of the workout from home year we've had? Can you guys come up with... Steve, do you have any ideas around that?
Steve:
I appreciate that transition because it actually enables me to reference something that I wanted to comment about, which was when we were talking about running the bike group that I mostly ride with in New York City. Riders for black lives, which is an awesome group that's mostly fighting for social justice, but also does a bunch of other cool stuff. We did a marathon support effort for the virtual NYC marathon. And the runner that I was with told me that because there was unlimited ability to sign up for the marathon, there were more people running the virtual NYC marathon than in ever run an actual New York marathon. But a lot of people ended up finishing in central park, which is normally where it finishes. There were a ton of people in central park on just running across this makeshift finish line that they had there. That's definitely a huge unexpected benefit.
Nick:
Now it's spring things are starting to be safer. Do you guys have any tips or prophecies about what we're going to be confronting moving into this new era?
Steve:
This is very general advice, but you do need to find what works for you and not worry too much about what other people are doing. If you want to engage with a platform that has a huge social community and that keeps you motivated, absolutely go for it. But at the same time, if you find your own thing, you can just make your own path. If nothing else, the pandemic has taught us that... Has shown us that there's a lot of different ways to get fit, and you can keep trying stuff until you find something that works for you.
Nick:
Then I guess the ultimate question is, WOFH lifestyle or working out from home has changed the way we approach fitness. Will it stick around? Are Gyms coming back? Will working out from home be the new norm?
Tanner:
Gyms are not going away. I don't think that will happen. I do think that the way we work out has changed permanently. I think a lot of people who maybe went to gyms in the past, won't go back to gyms because they probably realized that they were paying for those memberships and not really using them, or went and were uncomfortable and now they have this new, comfortable way to work out by themself. But I think for people who liked going to classes, I think that stuff is going to come back pretty quickly. And I think I maybe mentioned this before, but people who are super into lifting weights and doing CrossFit and battle ropes and all this stuff where you really do need a full... Half a warehouse worth of equipment and space. Those people are going to go back to gyms. But I think that the apps just create this new landscape, this new... It's like another option that is here to stay, I think. Peloton bikes, connected fitness gear, all that stuff is here to stay.
Nick:
Good insight. Steve, do you have thoughts about how our future will look?
Steve:
We have more options, and the people that dig those options will continue to do them. But yeah, I do agree that gyms won't go away, and it's not just because some people like to get away from their families. There is also the fact that people like to be around other people.
Nick:
Yeah. There are a few reasons, Steve. You don't even have a family. Not to-
Steve:
I know.
Nick:
That's great. Well, look guys, thank you for those insights. I think we are approaching a brave, new, at least modified world in terms of fitness and obviously a lot of other aspects of life. So this is good insight and some good tips from our Outdoors and Fitness fellows. But let's move on to the next segment. Let's talk about some headlines. I want to pick your brains about some recent product news from around the internet. Heard of it? First one. The first product is this a iOS old school, it's a set of iPhone wallpapers and icons that look like original Apple icons from the '80s. It's 110 different icons that can replace all your little app icons. They're black and white, gray scale kind of things. Cost, it's four pounds sterling. It's a British product. So six or seven American dollars. How do you feel about retrofitting your device?
Steve:
I think it's super cool. So I like the eight bit look for sure.
Tanner:
I think it's kind of putting stickers on your water bottle. It's pretty ephemeral. You'll probably do it and then change it a week later, maybe.
Nick:
Right. So stickers on your water bottle is such a Vermont thing to say, but-
Tanner:
It's just a fun thing. Technology is cool that you can just change the way your whole iPhone screen looks. I always wonder how the universal symbol for saving something, which most things just save automatically now, but it's like a little floppy disk icon. And I wonder about kids who grew up after floppy disks. I caught the tail end of it. They probably clicked that and they had no idea what that thing is. So I feel like very shortly, maybe already all this retro stuff coming back is referring to things that people don't even remember at all.
Nick:
Right. It's a pure nostalgia play. Steve, do you have a nostalgia for old technology?
Steve:
Yeah, I would say so. Technology has helped us so much in the past year, but it's also something that can be exhausting, so it can be refreshing to remember it before times.
Nick:
Yeah, for sure. And Tanner that's so sweet that you caught the tail end of floppy disks.
Tanner:
Yeah, it's [crosstalk 00:21:23].
Nick:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). yeah. Good for you.
Steve:
He's probably never even played Oregon Trail.
Nick:
Yeah. You never have a chance to die of dysentery in your third grade classroom. The next product headline is related to phones. It's a pop socket. Everybody knows pop sockets. So it's just little things you stick on the back of your phone to grip it better or use as a kickstand kind of thing to watch videos. But they've partnered with SOG, makers of wonderful knives and multi tools. Tanner, can you name a SOG device?
Tanner:
There's a knife called the Kiku, which is a fun little EDC knife.
Nick:
Okay, perfect. Put you on the spot. You're like an encyclopedia. SOG has partnered with Pop Sockets to make the Pop Grip SOG Multi-tool. It is a $25 small steel multi-tool that sits inside a pop socket. It attaches with magnets. A bottle opener, a mini pry bar, a quarter inch, and a four millimeter hex bit driver. Tanner, you've covered this space before so you're the, you're the right guy to talk about it.
Tanner:
[inaudible 00:22:38]. To me, this thing is like, why not. As someone who has used his phone to open bottles before, not where the case that's meant to open bottles. I see how there's a little bit of utility in this.
Nick:
So you are in favor of mini multi tools? You think it's useful as EDC or?
Tanner:
It's a really fine line and they can go either way. Some of them are so small that they're pointless. And I'd be curious to see how this thing works. It might be as simple as, the shape of it makes it really hard to open a bottle with, even though there's a little bottle opening lever on there. Got to get a hands on with it.
Nick:
By the way, opening beer bottles with your iPhone is another very Vermont thing to do. The last one is a new active wear brand. It's called MADE, a very overfunded Indiegogo campaign. It's successful after just a few days. The product is, and I quote, "A hard shell ski and snowboard jacket that is waterproof, windproof and breathable. It's super durable with a premium finish featuring welded seams, waterproof zippers, three-layer waterproof fabric." The point though, you send in your measurements and they make a bespoke Made-to-Measure jacket for you. And if it doesn't fit, they'll fix it $500 to $650. What are your thoughts on that kind of model for active outerwear?
Steve:
It's probably kind of inevitable. There's so many examples of this in the style world, in terms of getting Made-to-Measure shirts and suits and things like that. We actually covered recently a roundup of the best products coming out of ISPO, which is a big European trade show that covers a bunch of Outdoors and Sports products. And there's another brand doing this as well, launching later this year called [ADVANE 00:24:40], which is based in Germany. So we're one away from officially being a trend. I think it's a fun idea. I think that especially if you feel like the traditional sizes don't quite fit your measurements, it would be nice to have something like that. I think the big deciding factor will be, do you have to pay significantly more to get this Made-to-Measure thing? And if so, that's definitely a bit of a barrier.
Tanner:
I agree. It seems like the price point they've got there is good. Good outerwear and the materials they're using [inaudible 00:25:17] mentioned in their first launch. That's a great outerwear fabric. That stuff can cost $750 in my mind for good high-end outerwear, is average. So it seems like it'll be great, yeah.
Nick:
I have to admit, it seemed kind of gimmicky to me, but I defer to the pros for sure. So I'll be eager to see how that goes. Obviously, they're going to be well-funded and could, like you said, Steve, become a trend. The last segment we have is Kind of Obsessed. This is a listener favorites already. Kind of Obsessed involves our guests sharing a product they're currently obsessing over whether it's new to you, you're on your wishlist, or you're testing something for work. What you've got? Actually, that's an unfair thing to do. Tanner, you go first.
Tanner:
All right. This is actually hard because I really wanted to talk about so many different things. But the one that I just got last week, I'm going to show it to you actually because I have it right here. It doesn't help podcast listeners. But that's from Nimo equipment, it's called the Chipper. It's a $20 butt pad, which is like... So imagine a closed cell foam sleeping pad for camping, which is kind of old school.
Nick:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Tanner:
That's what this is. It's just a lot shorter. So it's like a seat that you can sit on, on the ground or on a picnic table. But they made it with recycled up cycled pieces of other foam pads. So it's-
Nick:
Oh wow. Look at that.
Tanner:
Yeah. It's a really [crosstalk 00:26:56]-
Nick:
It's a [crosstalk 00:26:58], almost.
Tanner:
It's one of those things that is a very simple solution to a very simple problem because when you're... Especially if you're backpacking and you don't want to carry camping chairs because they're heavy, or even if you're camping at a campsite and you don't bring them because there are picnic tables there. Sitting on a picnic table for longer than 20 minutes sucks. And you drop this thing down and it's comfy.
Nick:
And you said that's solid state? It's like a foam pad. It's not inflatable.
Tanner:
Yeah, correct. It's just squishy foam and it kind of folds in on itself so it packs really small, and it only weighs like five and a half ounces, 5.6 ounces, I think. So it's very light and yeah, you can throw it in a pond and you're not going to hurt it, and you can probably run it over with your car and it's going to be fine. It's very basic, but nice.
Nick:
So many possibilities. Steve, what do you think about the name Chipper for something you just sit on? I don't...
Steve:
I guess it keeps you in a chipper mood.
Nick:
Who says, "Tanner seems pretty chipper." Steve, what are you obsessed with? What you got?
Steve:
Lately, I'm super excited about the Chrome Barrage Freight Backpack, which is $200 and it's just super waterproof and tough, but want to say the thing I'm most obsessed with lately is the priority Ace of spades. It's a new bicycle. It's $799, which is a lot less than many of the bikes that I've tested in the past year, and probably the most fun one that I've been on. I have it with a fixed gear setup, and the thing that's really cool about it is that it has a belt drive as opposed to a chain. The belt drive can sometimes add to the cost of a bike because you can only run that with a geared bike if you have an internal hub. But if you're talking about a single speed or a fixed gear and this bike can be both, it can flip and become single speed.
Steve:
It doesn't really add significantly to the cost, and it makes so much sense because on a fixed gear, a single speed, you're very concerned with your chain tension and it can get stretched out, and then you either need to get your chain adjusted or adjust the position of the back wheel, or you need a new chain with. With a belt drive you basically can ride it forever and never loop it or ever have to worry about it. And this thing is just so smooth. It's just immensely satisfying to ride,
Nick:
It's a road bike, right? This is not taking this off road.
Steve:
You could, but you probably should steer clear of potholes because it's... Yeah.
Nick:
Cool. Both really great. We'll drop some links down in the notes and share that with everybody. Chipper and what was the name of the bike?
Steve:
ACE of spades. And they also have an ACE of clubs at a slightly lower price point, that's a little more accessible. [crosstalk 00:30:03].
Nick:
They've still got two more suits to go so who knows what's in the future? All right, that's it for Kind of Obsessed, and that is also it for this episode of the Gear Patrol Podcast. Steve and Tanner, thank you for your time and for your brains, and for talking about WOFH lifestyle. Listeners, everything we talked about today will be linked in the show notes and also in a post on gearpatrol.com. So make sure you're subscribed on your podcast service of choice, so you don't miss a weekly episode and while you're at it, I would really appreciate if you reviewed and rated the pod with five star reviews, especially help more people find us and join in on the conversation. So tell your friends, leave us a review, tell us what you think. And if you are kind of obsessed with a product, email me @podcastatgearpatrol.com, and you'll have a chance to be mentioned on the show, or just tell me what you think about the show. So Tanner and Steve, thank you again. And to our listeners-
Tanner:
Thanks, Nick.
Nick:
You're welcome. Steve, you want to thank me?
Steve:
Thanks, Nick. You gave me a nice break from my secret family here so I appreciate it.
Nick:
Yeah. Well, anytime I'd love to hear more about them never. So guys, thanks again. And to our listeners, thank you for joining us, I hope you're well, until next time, take care.