As a personal trainer and gym owner, I often get asked the question "which is better, the treadmill or the cross trainer?"

The answer is not that simple. The first question I ask in response is, "what do you want to use it for? Or what are you trying to achieve?"

The single most important thing you can do to prolong the life of your treadmill is to lubricate the deck regularly.

Maintaining the lubrication of your treadmill deck is absolutely critical to the lifespan of the machine

Great question!

Short answer: No. We are bad for our backs.

Rowing machines are great for building strong backs and improving our posture as well as being an excellent form of cardiovascular exercise.

Amy Hughes, 28, from Manchester UK broke a Guiness World Record on September 9th 2016 by running 521 miles (834km) in 7 days! That’s the equivalent of 3 marathons a day or 21 marathons in 7 days.

Traditionally, the general opinion within the fitness industry was, to burn fat you needed to do long steady cardio i.e. running, walking, cycling etc. There was also the theory that in order to 'tone up' you had to do high repetitions of a light weight. Cardio equipment and posters in the gym all showed you your target heart rate zone for fat burning of 60-65% of your theoretical maximum heart rate, and aerobic classes introduced very lightweight dumbbells for added toning.

This approach does work for some people, however, it is not the most effective or efficient way to go about changing your body shape.

Strength training in conjunction with some form of higher intensity cardio is proven to be the best approach for the majority of people.

Why should I buy a treadmill if I can just run outside?

Great question. To expand on that, why should we have any home based exercise equipment?