Some of us are perfectly happy to head out the door with nothing more than a towel and a bottle of water in hand. Others require the gym bag, full of those essentials that we just wouldn’t be happy to leave the house without.
I am not completely sure that ‘essentials’ is necessarily the right word, but would you really have read a blog post entitled, ‘Gym bag items that you don’t actually need!’? Nevertheless, I’m sure you get the idea of where I am going with this.
The first thing that you shouldn’t even dream of heading to the gym without is your bottle of water, or at least the source of hydration that you prefer to use. When you feel like you have given all that you can and all you want to do is lie down, that bottle of water becomes your best friend and you don’t want to be left wanting.
Next, the towel, which is just as much an item to help everyone else in the gym as it is an item to help you. If you find yourself dripping in sweat then it is obvious that a towel could come in useful but it has another use too. There is nothing quite as annoying as waiting to use a machine only to find that when you get on it that it is covered with sweat. So please, just for everybody else, make sure you have a towel with you so that you can wipe down the machines.
For a similar reason to why you need a towel, a spare shirt isn’t a bad idea either. Especially in this hot weather, walking out of the gym in a dripping wet shirt can be particularly uncomfortable, so having a change of clothes is always sensible.
Other obvious things that you might consider packing are:
Like I say though, all of these things seem fairly obvious, right? Well, yes. The truth is that there isn’t going to be some secret item that you should keep in the gym bag that is going to guarantee maximum results. It’s more about what you need personally.
So think about the things that are going to affect what you need at the gym. Will you have access to a shower there? When are you next going to get the chance to eat? What are you doing after your workout? All those things will tell you exactly what you need to pack in the gym bag.
I’ll be honest, I’m probably less educated in what women should be keeping in their gym bag. The contents of a woman’s bag is something that a man shouldn’t really be aware of and certainly something that we shouldn’t be looking to advise. But I guess what i would say is that asking yourself those same questions should mean that you don’t forget anything essential.
Music is another essential for a lot of us when we are working out. But do you keep your headphones in a bag? So maybe your iPod and headphones aren’t going to be in your actual gym bag but I guess they still qualify.
Lastly you need to consider the actual gym bag itself. You don’t want a huge bag that is getting in the way but you need to make sure that you have enough room for all of your things.
You know what you need to make sure you execute your training plan effectively. So as long as it fits in that gym bag then it is definitely essential.