My new torture device

To help with my diet I figured I'd get some home exercise equipment to make it easier on myself. Even though I'm living in the South, it's still not a great time of year to try to go running. Besides, you can't really go running everyday, your legs will burn out.

So with that in mind, I went ahead and bought myself a Stamina 1205 Precision from Amazon.

It took a while for me to put together, especially because I continued with my uncanny ability to put things together backwards when assembling them. I put not one, but both of the handles on backwards while assembling. You'd think I would've paid more attention after screwing up the first one, but you'd be wrong.

I messed around with it a bit yesterday but kept getting text messages/having to fast forward my DVR and I wouldn't really say it was much of a workout in the 15 minutes I did. Even still, I felt it in my quads a bit this morning.

Tonight I really started to put it through its paces. And by put it through its paces, I mean it put me through mine. Unlike rowing machines I've used before, this one has hydraulic cylinders to provide the resistance. I found it to be quite grueling on the upper body and was glad I bought gloves. If I keep up with this thing, I'll have Popeye forearms in no time. Even still, as time went by, I found I was feeling the workout throughout my body. The motion was a bit different than I was used to, so I didn't row at anything beyond a steady pace, but as I sit here typing this, I can feel the workout I got all the way up my arms and behind my shoulders.

I rowed for about 50 minutes (or, to be more precise, about one episode of The Wire) and burned over 350 calories. Rowing while watching TV watching I think is a good way to stay with the exercise while also doing what I want to do in the evenings.