Tonal Introduces "Movement Replacement" Plus Our Interview With India Ashwani

Tonal Introduces “Movement Replacement” Plus Our Interview With India Ashwani

Last Updated: December 20, 2023By Crystal OKeefe (#ClipOutCrystal)Tags: empowerment, managing mental health, Mental Health, The Superset, Tonal

Tim Ferris talks about his love of Tonal.
Coach Jared is featured on the City of Santa Monica’s website.
Tonal now offers Movement Replacement.
There’s a new way to increase and decrease the weight on Tonal.
Tonal has partnered up with 305 Fitness for Dance Cardio.
New Programs including Functional Fitness, family fitness Field Day, and Prenatal Third Trimester Cardio.
New Tonal Talks including Coach Nicolette discussing how to balance cardio and strength, Geno Mallo on bodybuilding with Tonal, and Coach
Allison talks to Dr. Star Knight as Tonal’s Black Excellence series continues.

All this plus our interview with India Ashwani!

—

Watch the episode here

Listen to the podcast here

Tonal Introduces “Movement Replacement” Plus Our Interview With India Ashwani

I just ran home from work. I had to take off my work shirt, so I didn’t look so grown up.

They’ll be like, “Why is Tom now wearing a hoodie? Is he okay?” Monday and Tuesdays, he has to pretend to be professional.

This week, you embarked in a little new Tonal adventure.

I got to try my very first virtual group workout.

How did it go?

It was really fun. I didn’t know what to expect, but it was really cool. There was this anticipation of everybody joining, because I didn’t know who was going to join or who wasn’t going to join. I had just put it out on the Official Tonal Community. Also, I worked out at a weird time for a lot of our Pacific friends. I wasn’t sure. Watching everybody join, it was cool to see the number keep going up. You can have up to ten people. Whenever I finally was like, “Okay, go,” it waits until everybody is ready to start, then you start. Whenever you do a set of whatever exercise, you move to the next set, you wait for everybody. If you don’t press any button, then eventually it will time out. It’s not that a huge pause. It’ll move to the next exercise automatically. Or as soon as you’re ready, you can be like, “Let’s move on.” I think my favorite part was the clapping because you high-five and it makes this clapping sound. It’s like we all instinctively know when to do it. It’s funny because every time I went to go give somebody a high-five, there was a whole row of high-fives coming in.

It almost sounded like applause because you’re all high-fiving at the same time.

Hence, why I called it clapping.

I was confused because I was like high-five would just be one. It’s multiple people you are high-five-ing, so now I’m up to speed.

It was my shorthand too.

What pray tell do you have in store for people?

There are new features that just drop. There are new contents that just dropped. We’ve got all kinds of things to talk about.

Before we get to all that, shameless plugs, don’t forget we’re available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, iHeart, pretty much wherever you get your podcasts, you should be able to find us. If we missed one, be sure to let me know and I will fix it, or let her know, then she’ll let me know to fix it. That’s probably the better or more accurate way to do that.

I’ll put it on my list and be like, “Tom, Tom, Tom,” until he does it.

While you’re in any of your podcast delivery ecosystems, be sure and leave a review, so people know that you like us and maybe they’ll give us a shot. That’s always helpful. If you want to stay up to date on things with us between episodes, you can go to Facebook.com/supersetpodcast. While you’re there, like the page, join the group and we’ll keep you up to date.

I want to add that whenever we are asking people to leave us reviews, please do that through Apple Podcasts, because you guys have been super sweet about putting stuff over on the Official Tonal Community, I very much appreciate that, but we don’t “get credit” from Apple for those. We would love to be able to share those. Also Tom won’t join the community because he won’t exercise.

They’ll ban me. They’ll kick me right out. They’re like, “We know better.”

If you want your review read on the show, which is fun, then you want to leave it over Apple Podcasts.

If you would like to see these, we have a YouTube channel, which we have a custom URL for our other podcast, and everything lives on one place. That’s YouTube.com/theclipout.

There’s a whole playlist just for The Superset.

You can see pretty much all of these in HD video glory. Isn’t that exciting? There’s all of that. Let’s dig in, shall we?

—

Tonal got a nice mention on The Tim Ferriss Show.

That was pretty cool. Have you listened to this guy’s podcast? I know you listen to a ton of podcasts. I didn’t know if you had ever heard of his podcast or any of his comedy.

I had not.

I know he’s a big deal.

It’s like a business podcast, right? Am I misunderstanding it? He was interviewing Naval Ravikant. He is an Angel investor guy. He is Cofounder and Chairman of AngelList, and he’s invested in more than 100 companies, including things like Twitter, Uber, Postmates and Wish. The guy knows what he’s talking about. Tim Ferriss also has a Tonal and loves it very much so.

This podcast that you have up, episode 473 of The Tim Ferriss Show, he talks all about his whole experience for the first three minutes, I believe. You guys might want to check that out. It’s pretty awesome.

While we’re talking about Tonal in the news and whatnot, Coach Jared was in the news.

He had a whole article about him. I thought this article was really cool because it talks about how his fitness is in sync with the Santa Monica brand. That’s very nice. It’s simultaneously like a hometown, feel-good story, but also it’s all about how he’s bringing fitness to Santa Monica. Especially with doing Tonal, it’s beyond Santa Monica. It’s cool to hear about our coaches anytime. I always like all the details in the backgrounds. That’s my favorite. Congrats to Jared. That’s really cool.

—

We have some new features to talk about on the Tonal machine device thing.

It’s a trainer, Tom, because it trains you. The trainer Tonal has some new features and some of which just dropped today. By the time this is posted in a couple of days, it won’t be brand new.

It will still have that new trainer smell.

The very first one was announced last week and it is called The Movement Replacements. This is pretty cool. You can actually go in and swap any move in a workout with another move that is working the same body part. I know that you don’t know any of the workouts, but let’s just say a Bulgarian split squat. Trust me, it’s freaking hard. You have to have one foot up on the bench behind you, then your other knee goes all the way down to the ground. My point is that can be a tough move for people, especially those who are starting out, especially maybe you have knee issues, but maybe you just don’t want to do it because they hurt. I may or may not get mad at the coaches when they throw these in. I know it’s for my own good. Point being that if that happened, I could then swap it out and there are three or four different moves that I can choose from. Maybe you might even have an injury, maybe that’s what’s going on. It’s a good time to replace it. The cool thing is Tonal will suggest those alternative options. You’re still going to get an effective workout, and it’s available for all workouts in less, except for Yoga, High Intensity, off tonal moves. If it’s a move you’re not using Tonal for, then you’re on your own.

I guess they figure at that point, you’re just winging it. If you’re off the machine, they don’t know what you’re doing.

You can swap in the new moves before you begin to work out. Soon, you’re going to have the option to do it right in the middle of the workout. This is cool. I absolutely love this. I cannot stress enough how great it is, especially for people who can’t do the move for some reason. I’m just lazy at times and don’t want to do it, but there are people that can’t do those moves. Having the option to be able to still have your workout, follow along with you and switch it, there’s nothing else in the market that even can think about doing that. That’s pretty cool is all I’m saying.

It’s nice for people to have an option that isn’t just skipping it. They can be like, “I’m going to do this other thing and I’m still doing something. I can still progress. Maybe one day, I’ll be able to actually do the Bulgarian split squats.” While we’re talking about new content, there is more new content.

This is one of the brand new hot off the press. Now, you can have plus and minus buttons on your trainer that you can move the weights up and down by one pound. Before, you could draw a circle which direction you wanted to go, up or down, but this allows you to very pinpoint and it goes down a pound or it goes up a pound. The thing is that you’re going to be able to do this over the next 48 hours because it hasn’t rolled out to everybody’s trainer yet. This will be an update that’s going and rolling waves. You probably will have it by the time this blog is published.

—

They now have Dance Cardio.

It’s brand new, hot off the presses, it literally just happened. They teamed up with 305 fitness. Think of it as guest instructors, but multiple of them. They now have a dance cardio on the trainer, so you can go find it right now on your trainer. It’s going to be in beta mode. The reason for that is that you can give feedback, so they can continue to improve. They want you to tell them what’s working, what’s not working, so they’ll continue to get that just right for everybody. That’s what beta mode means to them. Isn’t that cool that they can take an entire company and just one day, be like, “It’s now out for everybody?” To recap, they’ve added in the last like three weeks: Kickboxing, Prenatal programs, Pilates, and now Dance Cardio. They are bringing the heat.

They’ve been adding stuff left and right, and Little Guy Front and Back.

You cannot forget Little Guy Front and Back.

You can’t, he’s right there in front of you.

Here’s the thing, Little Guy Front and Back is more of a feature and got content.

Still tons of new additions.

I love it. This month, there has been a whole bunch of new content added. There’s a new program with Coach Liz and it is Functional Fitness. This is perfect for beginners because it is all about strength training and corrective exercises, functional movements at any age. Anything you’re bringing to the situation, any issues you have with your body that might be painful or would not work as well as you’d like, this is the class to start with. We also have Family Fitness, a new class. This is not a program, this is a class with Coach Allison, also a beginner. This one is all about getting your teams involved, specifically for helping with their performance in sports, such as basketball, track, baseball, and softball.

That’s probably good too. Right now with many kids doing virtual learning and they got to do PE virtually, it’s something that they can do to be like, “Here’s what I did,” and it’s very quantifiable.

This one is the perfect length of time for that, nineteen minutes. You know kids, they don’t stay involved long. They obviously have the ability to do it, it just that they’re still tweens.

They get distracted.

Socially, women are taught not to take up space, but once they start lifting, they will feel like it’s their space and they belong there. Click To Tweet

There are more Prenatal workouts.

If you think that tweens don’t have attention spans, try to get a baby to work out.

I was actually thinking that the moms prior to having the baby could do the workouts.

I guess you could go that direction too.

Since it’s prenatal, that means the baby hasn’t been born. That’s even going to be pretty hard to get a baby in the womb to do a workout. This is more for mom and it’s the third trimester specifically. There’s a Third Trimester Flexibility. This is with Coach Amy and it’s for beginners. Then there’s a Third Trimester Cardio. I had a kid a long time ago at this point, she’s going to be fourteen, so it’s a long time ago. Back when I was pregnant back in the day, it’s not that you couldn’t do cardio, but they were very concerned when you were pregnant about how high your heart rate got and how much you watched. My point being that for a mom who’s pregnant, it’s very nice to have somebody coaching you through these things, so you know what the appropriate level of activity is. There’s something very comforting about that. That’s another one that you can do. To add even more excitement, Third Trimester Core with Coach Amy. When it comes to being pregnant, it’s scary to do core. You don’t necessarily know what’s okay to do and not to do. That’s really exciting. I love that Tonal is bringing these classes to people at home.

Coach Nicolette did a Tonal Talk back on the 30th of September.

I wanted to circle back to it because we didn’t mention it on the last episode. It had some valuable information. They all have valuable information, but this one specifically stood out to me as something that people need to pin it to something, whatever their social media is. I can see people returning to this over and over again, you would call it an evergreen topic. She talked about how you balance cardio and strength. That is very near and dear to my heart, given that I do so much Peloton and so much Tonal, it’s great to know. This can work for anybody because Nicolette went through the general guidelines of how often you should be doing each. Should you do cardio first? Should you do strength first? How long should your workout be? She even gave different workout templates. Based on your goals like if you’re looking to slim down, she had a whole weekly template for that. If you’re looking to increase muscle mass, there’s a template for that. It’s amazing stuff. I know it’s been up there for a while, but I also know that there’s so much content that Tonal is putting out there, you may not know. You may not see it and remember it. I wanted this one to be at top of mind for everyone. It’s really cool.

While we’re talking about Tonal Talks, this is another one that I wanted to make sure people knew about. There were some technical difficulties. If you go to the Facebook page, it’s under two different posts. You can do that or you can go over to the Tonal YouTube. This one is really cool also. They all are, so I have trouble highlighting certain ones. This one is about a bodybuilder, Geno Mallo, who’s part of the community. He used Tonal to get ready for a bodybuilding competition. It’s fascinating, even if bodybuilding is not your goal. It’s interesting and fascinating to see how people use Tonal in different ways for different goals. Also, he had great advice if that’s something that people do want to pursue. It’s good stuff. You can find that over on Tonal’s YouTube or the Facebook page.

It’s also great because sometimes when you’re talking to people about Tonal, you get feedback from people that are active weightlifters that are like, “Can it do enough strength? Can the weight get high enough for me?” Here’s a bodybuilder saying, “I used it to compete. Yes, they can.” Coming up, but it will be out by the time this episode hits, there’s yet another one.

This is such a cool series that Tonal is doing. It’s the Black Excellence Series. This time, it’s going to be hosted by Coach Allison and Dr. Star Knight. Coach Allison is going to interview Dr. Knight about her experience as an attending emergency medicine doctor at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, and the director of Diversity and Inclusion for the Emergency Medicine Department. That’s very interesting roles to fulfill at the same time for anybody. It will be super interesting to see what her insight is on that. It’s going to also focus on her life as a D1 athlete, her experience to shifting to a career in medicine. That’s a lot of work to move to medicine. It’s super interesting.

Her name sounds like a superhero, Dr. Star Knight. That sounds great. Those are cool parents. Really quick, there are two more upcoming Tonal Talks.

On Thursday, October 22nd at 6:00 PM Central, for Pacific, you’ve got to subtract two hours, there’s going to be Ask Coach Jackson. Then on Thursday, October 29th, there is going to be Ask Coach Francis. It’s your opportunity to ask the coaches all the questions.

I’ve never shared this with you. In my head, I have nicknames for the coaches. Whenever you say Coach Jackson, in my head I’d say, “If you’re nasty.” Whenever you say Coach Francis, in my head I’d say, “Francis, the talking coach.” That one’s a little dated. I might have to explain that to some of our audience who are under 75 years old.

I’ve lived with you a long time, so I know.

You get my old timey references. I just wanted to share that with.

I’m glad that you did. I feel like if I were good at making videos or editing videos, then I would be making some fun stuff. I feel like there are some GIPHYs in there. The coaches are so young. Even the, “Ms. Jackson if you’re nasty,” is getting a little old for reference, which makes me feel super old.

—

Joining us in this episode is India Ashwani. How’s it going, India?

How’s it going you guys? Thank you for having me.

Thank you for joining us.

I see that you’re all decked out in front of your Tonal there.

You have a weight tank top on. It is appropriate.

I’m sitting in my gym room with the Peloton and the Tonal. I am sad that I can’t put them all in one view because I don’t want to show any favoritism to either/or.

It’s a difficult balance because you love them for different reasons. There is nothing better than the Tonal with the way that it can sense how you need to improve and you need to add to the weights. Tom and I were talking about that. There’s no better strength machine.

It’s like children, you don’t want to pick your favorite one, but you secretly have one.

They’re for different reasons. How did you originally find Tonal?

It’s a long story, but I’m going to shorten it for you guys. I suffer from PTSD. I used to be in the military. I used to work out quite regularly and felt strong. I had a traumatic event happened that shook my sense of safety for myself. I went into a deep depression and anxiety. For several years, I didn’t even leave my house. I have a service dog and I still do. My husband would be on one side and my service dog on one side to go to all my medical appointments. I would have sunglasses on. I would be shaking uncontrollably because I had so much anxiety. That was kind of my life.

One day, I was like, “I can’t continue this anymore. This is not me. I’ve never been this person.” I also use a lot of therapy as well. I got to a point where I was like, “I need to do something.” I asked my husband who goes to the gym quite often, like, “Can you take me with you too to the weight room? I feel uncomfortable going alone and I can take my dog with me, but I want you to be with me the whole time.” It got a little frustrating because being in the gym, if you’ve ever been to the gym, it’s a lot of people. People will be walking behind you and in front of you. They’re doing the thing and there is nothing is wrong, but in my world, if you have any understanding of PTSD.

I would like to hear it from your perspective. I know about it from a textbook version. I’ve heard people describe it, but I’ve never heard somebody who has it describe it.

I appreciate it. I’m all about educating people about mental health issues that arise in a lot of people. To be honest, I don’t want to go in the medical field terms, but let’s say you’ve grown up as a child and you have these two friends. They’re like your best friends. One is Andy and the other one is Christy. They’re best buddies and they’re parts of your brain. One is in the front, one is in the back or somewhere in there. Whenever you get in trouble, Christy’s like, “Don’t do this. You’re going to get hurt. Let’s run. That’s fight or flight.” There’s Andy and he’s like, “That’s just a shadow. Look again. You’re fine.” I’m like, “Fine. We’re good.” There’s a voice of reason and there’s a panic side.

You need both.

They’ve not failed you. They’ve got you through a lot of things and now you’re an adult and something shattering happens in your life. Mostly that has impacted your sense of safety, a sense of well-being to the point where the connection of Andy is cut off. All you hear is Christy. Every time there’s something, Christy is like, “We got to run away. This is bad. We can’t be here. You are in danger. Let’s run or scream or cry, whatever you need to do. Get out of this.” Andy is screaming and saying, “No, it’s totally fine. They’re people walking around you in the gym. It’s okay. They’re doing their thing. They’re not even looking at you. They don’t even know you’re here.”

You don’t hear it because the connection is lost so you start running out the gym. My husband was like, “What the heck happened?” After a couple of times, it got quite embarrassing for me. I would push myself, but it didn’t work out for me. Instead of feeling more empowered, I felt worse. I felt like a loser in a way because I couldn’t do this one thing. Why can’t it just work out? I used to be able to lift, why can’t I just be that person again? I just Googled one day. It’s like, “Let’s do fitness at home or whatever, or some kind of lifting system,” and Tonal popped up. Social media starts bugging you with ads, which is great. It worked for me in this case and we went to a popup shop in LA and Tonal public show. We met Jackson and Kelly. They are awesome people. I tried it and I was like, “Let’s do it.”

How long ago was that roughly?

That was in early 2019 when they were just coming out.

You were an early adopter of the Tonal.

People thought I was nuts to even get it. It is such an expensive machine, in their opinion. You could just go to a gym, but I’m like, “Look at this, that’s a personal trainer you’re bringing home. The subscription and the Tonal cost if you even put it all together, I would pay more at the gym.” One session with a personal trainer I used to pay even before the military at that time was $50 per session, which is for 45 minutes. It’s just a no brainer. I can wake up in the morning in my PJ’s rollover, turn the Tonal on and start lifting.

A good thing that comes out of Tonal is the friendship you develop with other users. Click To Tweet

I tell you what, nothing has made me feel more empowered and strong when I look at my reflection in Tonal when I was about to do a deadlift. It’s strange. I stare at myself. I’m like, “Come on. You’ve got this. Let’s just go.” I’m doing the thing. I feel strong. I do have a husband who works out, who’s strong, and can protect me, but I’m getting back to my old self. I’m not going let myself get hurt again because I am strong. I can protect myself to the best of my ability. I’m going to give myself that chance. I don’t have to worry about someone walking around me, me freaking out. To be honest, I have grown so much with Tonal. I don’t know if you’ve ever had that Christy as a woman. It’s a sense of empowerment that you get from watching your muscles are like, “I can lift grocery bags that are double. I can lift dog food that I used to ask somebody to help me put it in the car.”

That is self-sufficiency. Knowing that you can depend on yourself and that you can take up space that feels good. There’s taking up space of being overweight and then there’s taking up space that’s like, “I feel strong with the kind of body I have.”

You felt entitled to space.

It’s a space you’re proud of.

I’m curious. How do men feel when they start lifting? Do they feel the same sense of empowerment? Socially, women are taught not to take up space, and then once they start lifting, they’d be like, “This is my space and I belong here.” Is it the same feeling that men get?

I’m lazy. I don’t do it.

That’s fair, but you can still take up space.

That’s my jam.

You’ve lost a lot of weight so you can’t even say that anymore.

I have been dieting so I’m down about 50 pounds so far.

Do you mind sharing with us your diet?

I’ve been low carbonate and watching my calorie. It’s portion control.

He eats less than 20 grams of carbs a day all the time. For a normal person, it is crazy, but he doesn’t eat any fruits and vegetables, so it’s easier for him.

They gross me out. I don’t think that’s a good idea, to be clear. I can’t stomach it. The low carb thing is easy for me because it means I’m giving up junk and potatoes.

That’s good. If it works for you, congratulations. That’s wonderful. You will hate what I eat then, green juice. I take all the fruits and veggies and I juice them up. I make them into this yummy juice, which you probably won’t agree with.

It’s good for you.

That’s different. My carbs were like Cheetos and cheeses and things like that and hamburgers and French fries. The bun is the carbs. I wasn’t eating the good kind anyway. When I give up carbs, I’m giving up the crappiest of junk food.

I think that’s a good thing. It sounds like you did make some healthy choices there.

We were talking about how you originally found Tonal and what your journey has been. It sounds like since you found Tonal, you feel more empowered. What else have you noticed with Tonal? How else has it impacted your life?

I feel like Tonal has impacted almost every aspect of my life. In Tonal, you would see or feel some physical changes in your body, but mentally, I’m shocked. When I was in the military, I used to feel strong. I used to feel like, “I got this. I can get this done.” I swear, my husband hated it. He had not hated me, but he was like, “You’ve become this gung ho person.” Tonal comes into my life and I go from this person that is terrified if the wind blows to, “Let’s go. What are we doing here?” Honestly, if I go to a meeting, I’m not like this weak person emotionally that goes in and feels like I can’t take up space. That whole same conversation that we just had. Mentally, it has impacted me significantly.

The other thing is my husband, when he bought Tonal, he didn’t care about Tonal. He was like, “It’s just for you. I would still go to gym. I’m still keeping my gym membership.” COVID happens and then came partner workouts. I tell you what, it feels amazing to share something as you guys have this show. I’m sure other interests that you guys share together as a partner and be able to share that moment together, especially when the world is going nuts.

That’s fascinating that it’s had such an impact on other aspects of your life.

Another good thing that came out of the Tonal was my friendship with Pablo and Michelle. Michelle was the Tonal OG. She has the answers. She’s like Kate 2.0. Nevertheless, we have gotten into a conversation about a silly show on Bravo. I don’t know if you guys know, that Coach Pablo loves Bravo. He’s the sensei for all things Bravo. He forced me to watch these Bravo shows. Now, we are this Bravo team that watches all these shows and talk crap about them all day long. That’s a good thing that came out of Tonal and the glamazons, that’s what we call ourselves. We are the biggest critiques. I think we should totally have our own show of us crap talking different shows. It is a great friendship.

You could start a show called The Glamazons.

I’m curious because I am a pop culture nerd, what was the show?

The first show, I don’t usually like watching reality shows, but because it was COVID and we had nowhere to go, we decided to watch Love is Blind. I don’t know if that’s a Bravo show. I thought it was hilarious and it was very intriguing and that’s how Pablo and Michelle and I started talking. He then got into The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. I had so much from Coach Pablo. They forced me to get Bravo. I didn’t even have Bravo. I love those two so much there. Besides all the goofiness, we have been there for each other through crazy times. It has been unpredictable that it’s good to have those connections where you can release and move on.

Our trashy reality show of choice is Love After Lockup. Are you familiar with that one?

Don’t talk to Pablo. He’s going to force me to watch it.

You’ll have to cross the boundaries of Bravo and go over to WE, but it’s basically about people that are in a relationship with someone in prison, and then they get out of prison.

They often meet for the first time or they’ve met before, but never hung out in person without a piece of glass between them. It is such a train wreck. You cannot look away.

That reminds me of 90-Day Fiance. It’s another shows that Coach Pablo, my homework. I can’t get my work done because I have so much homework from Coach Pablo. I mean, 90-Day Fiance is a show that sounds very much like that where you haven’t seen each other and you see each other for the first time. You have to be there for 90 days with each other. It’s a train wreck. I don’t want to give it away, but it is. If you feel like your life is not going anywhere, watch that show and you’re like, “I got my life together.”

It is the same with Love After Lockup.

Love After Lockup is a self-esteem boost.

You’re like, “I really have my life together.”

That’s a good thing that came out of Tonal.

How about the rest of your personal fitness journey? You were saying in the military that you used to work out and lift with weights? Had you always use free weights or did you use machines? How does that compare to how you use Tonal?

Admittedly, in the military, I didn’t do a lot of heavy lifting. I did more calisthenics bodyweight training. I did have some free weights, but it was nothing heavy. It was more about agility than the actual power, which was different. When I started going with my husband to the gym, I did start actual heavyweights. I mean the squat rack. I would be terrified of it because I had horrible balance. I did a Nintendo WII thing a long time ago with some kids where they test her balance. It said I was 82 years old.

That was not my jam, but then when you go on Tonal, it forces you to work on your balance. It forces you to work on your core. It’s a completely different beast. You cannot compare it to the gym. Anyone who says, “I can do this over there.” You cannot cheat this machine. There is nothing helping you here. I find that interesting because I could technically lift more at the gym, but it was not necessarily helping me because it was not helping me learn how to keep myself more stable. I’m sure there are ways to do that in the gym. I’m not saying that it’s not possible, but it was easy to cheat. With Tonal, it forced me to work on my core. I used to do Peloton. I bike a lot. I thought I was strong, but the first month with Tonal, that was a reality check for me. I thought I was stronger, but you got to keep going and you get where you need to be.

With Tonal, as far as forcing it to force you to do strengthened work on your core, anybody could theoretically do that if they knew how to do program design, but that’s the thing about Tonal. You don’t need to be an expert in program design and what kind of exercises you should be doing. That’s part of the beauty for me because I can walk up to it and pick a program and do what it says. I know I’m getting a great workout and I know that it’s well-balanced. I know that it’s helping me make sure that I don’t overuse certain muscles and make sure that it’s keeping my core engaged properly, stabilizing everything the way it should be. It takes all that guesswork out of it. I feel like for me, that’s the beauty of Tonal.

I agree. I swear, my favorite thing when I first started using Tonal was these workouts that Nicolette had, the making muscles and that the fact that it was staged. I’m saying stage one as if I’m playing a video game. There was level one, level two, level three. I did all three. I couldn’t have done it on my own. I don’t think that a trainer, at least the ones that I was training with it, or at least tried. Before the military, I did use personal trainers. I don’t think anyone had that level of tenacity or that level of understanding of someone’s physical fitness to the point where they could design that program for me, that well.

Nicolette designed that program, but the rest was Tonal. The weight gets increased. It exactly knows when to push you and which is exactly why I tell everyone to give it a try. I know you say the machine is too expensive for you, but give it a try. You will fall in love with this. I don’t even know. The last time where I can remember, I thought of it like, “How many weights do I need to slap on my bar now to do a deadlift or a squat.” It’s all there.

That’s such a great feature that it just tracks it all for you because that seems like that would be a lot of work.

I don’t think I would ever increase my weight. I would always be scared and underestimate myself. The fact that it automatically increases my weight, I’ll look back over a few weeks and be like, “I’ve made a lot of progress and I didn’t even realize it.” If I was doing it on my own, there’s no way I would push myself to do that.

Another thing, if you’re doing partner workouts at the gym, when I would go with my husband, he would have to carry all the heavyweights and slap them. Not that he would have to, but he would always do it for me. Over here, we do partner workouts. He gets a good workout of his own and I get my own workout and he doesn’t have to do any extra effort. He can put that extra effort in his own workouts and I have to schlep weights for me and I love that.

Do you have any advice for people just getting a Tonal?

Be patient because I’ve heard the wait times have been crazy, not because of Tonal. It’s just with the supply chain now and everything that’s going on. It is very much impacted but once you have it, you will never look back. I can promise you. There is something in that machine that will drive you to stick with it as much as you can. Gym will never be the same. It will ruin your gym for you.

That’s what Tonal should have as their tagline, “It will ruin your gym experience.” Did you sign up for the leaderboard option that appeared?

I did and I’m doing horribly on it because I have been inconsistent with Tonal. Partially, as I mentioned, with my mental illness, I go through bursts of where I have insomnia for days and I have zero energy. When I’m able to body, then I go hard, but there’s no way I’m getting to in the last 30 days, 30 workouts every day. That’s not happening.

Would you like to share your leaderboard name though?

Yes, it is India Ashwani.

Nice and easy.

Don’t feel bad about the leaderboard. I look at it like this. I do Peloton on the Tread, I do the bike and I also do Tonal. For the month of September, I had fifteen days on the Tonal. I feel like given that I’m doing all those different things, that’s pretty good. You’ve got all these other things going. My guess is that with everything you have going on, I know you said you had a move coming up. You’re probably doing a lot more than you realize too.

Moving is a time suck. It is also just a regular suck.

You got to keep going to get where you need to be. Click To Tweet

To be clear, I’m not moving in the moment, but we’re cleaning the house for it to be staged to be taking pictures to be able to put it on the market.

It’s still stressful. The decluttering portion, that counts. Thank you so much for joining us, but before we go, how can people find you on social media if you would like to be found?

I am on Facebook as India Ashwani and I’m part of the Tonal Community Facebook page so say hello, I’m very friendly.

Thank you for taking the time out of your day to join us. Also, thank you for your service.

Thank you very much.

We thank your husband for being supportive of someone who served and for schlepping those weights, even though he doesn’t have to.

Thank you for having me.

You have a good rest of your day.

—

That brings this one to a close. What pray tell do you have in store for people next time?

We are going to talk to Diane Trantham next time. I’ve known about Diane for a long time because she and I have crossed paths many times in the Peloton world, and it is fun crossing paths in the Tonal world as well.

Until next time, where can people find you?

People can find me on Facebook at Facebook.com/CrystalDOKeefe. They can also find me on Twitter and Instagram, @ClipOutCrystal.

You can find me on Twitter, @RogerQBert or on Facebook at Facebook.com/TomOKeefe. You can find the show online at Facebook.com/supersetpodcast. While you’re there, like the page, join the group. Wherever you’re getting your podcasts from, be sure and subscribe so you never miss an episode. Thanks for tuning in. Until next time, keep lifting.