What I Love About Aaptiv

Aaptiv, for those of you who are not familiar with it, is an app for your phone or computer that provides unlimited access to thousands of audio workouts for a very reasonable price of just over $8 a month. ($8.33 to be exact). This is not an ad for Aaptiv, and they are not a sponsor of anything that I am affiliated with, but it is an app that I use several times a week and I wanted to share why.

I have been working out my entire life. I am a former runner with multiple 5ks, 10ks, half-marathons and even one marathon under my belt. Frankly I would give anything to be able to run like I used to, but I can’t. Various injuries, and yes, just aging, have left me in a place where running regularly or for any significant distance or time is just not possible.

Can’t run, now what?

Without running, my body has changed quite a bit. But what I’ve realized is that I also used the intensity of running hard as a way to burn through worry or negative thoughts. In other words, I ran as a way to ensure that I stayed mentally healthy, too. This is, in many ways, the aspect of running I miss the most. On a bad day, there is nothing like a long run to make you feel better!

Enter Aaptiv. Using Aaptiv with my incline treadmill at home, or the elliptical at the gym, I can get the same level of workout that I had when running, but in a way that is much easier on my body. Like other exercise apps to be used with or without equipment, Aaptiv has thousands of workouts including strength training, yoga, stretching, outdoor running, indoor cycling, stair climber, pilates and meditation, in addition to the elliptical and treadmill I just mentioned. Classes can be filtered by duration, level of difficulty, trainer and even type of music and favorites can be saved.

I like all the choices because inevitably I end up working harder when I am pushed a bit by a trainer, and Aaptiv makes it easy and very affordable to have that motivation.