This was the best decision I have made in a while

It has been about a year since I purchased my Tonal gym and almost a year since I got it. While the price tag initially for the Tonal was a lot, I have gotten so much out of it that I would definitely buy it again. I have not been good about taking any progress pictures, but as you can see from the thumbnail, it has been producing some pretty good results.

I have worked out consistently for 48 weeks now. During that time, I have lifted over 2.5 million pounds and completed 15 programs. Honestly, the programs have been such an amazing thing for me. I liked to consider myself pretty knowledgeable on lifting weights prior to beginning this fitness journey, but I have learned so much over the past 48 weeks and I am learning something new each day when it comes to lifting.

When I first started, my strength score was 603. I wasn't weak back then, but overall, I am almost 140% stronger than I was back then. So much has changed in my body over that time. My back pain is pretty much nonexistent and core is able to support me in anything that I am doing.

My legs have undergone the biggest change. My leg strength was 496 when I started, so I have really been focusing on strengthening my legs. You legs support you in everything that you do, so it is essential to have strong legs.

I always hated leg days when I would lift at a normal gym. Part of it was because the squat racks were always taken and I didn't want to wait forever for one to open up. The other reason I hated training legs was because my core was weak and squats and deadlifts always hurt my back. It has been awesome to build so much muscle that my body is capable of lifting so much weight.

One cool thing about the Tonal is that it tracks so many things, so if you are a stat nerd, you will love it. It will track all of your milestones and the weight of each rep that you ever do. This makes it so easy for you to be able to track your progress with any of the exercises that you do.

So after working out with my Tonal for almost a full year, I can say that there really is no better way to lift weights. There are a few other machines like this one that are pretty similar, and I am sure that they are just as good or even better in some ways. But the fact that each set that you do with this machine is set to the maximum amount of weight that your body can safely lift is amazing. I have tried using different programs in conventional gym, where you have to track the weight and reps completed and then try to guess what the next set's weight should be is, and nothing has ever compared to the gains I have gotten while working out on Tonal.

When my wife found out about the tumor in her leg, she was told that she wouldn't be able to do a lot of the heavy lower body exercises on the Tonal because the weight would aggravate her knee and leg, so we decided to purchase a Peloton Bike. My wife loved going to spin classes a few years ago, so she was pretty excited to be able to have the Peloton so she could continue to train her lower body. Since we got the Peloton, I have been incorporating some of the Peloton workouts alongside my Tonal workouts and I am pretty excited for this next year using both Peloton and Tonal.

I am not a runner, so being able to incorporate the Peloton for some cardio and getting a killer leg workout is going to be awesome. My legs have already begun to tone up a lot since I had started using the Peloton.

As far as what I am doing to gain muscle and shred fat, I have slowly begun to change my diet. One thing that my wife and I were talking about a few nights ago that has really helped us in our journey is that we did not change a bunch of things all at once. We have kept the same diet, but slowly started incorporating more homemade meals and less sugars in our diet. I have gotten rid of energy drinks that I used to drink everyday and now I just drink some BCAAs a couple times a day. I have also increased my protein intake. Once we began to change our diets, we really started to get some amazing results.

Overall, I am very excited about this whole fitness journey my family has started. Before I started working out with the Tonal, I was getting pretty fat and out of shape and I was not really looking forward to getting older. But now, I have begun my 40s in the best shape of my life and I will just continue to get in better shape each month. I have also started to seriously consider competing in amateur body building competitions. I just need to get rid of the last of the fat I have around my midsection and then I will be ready to start competing.