Easy access also means easy interruption.
At the start of the pandemic, Paige Van Otten, a stay-at-home mom in Seattle, loved being able to do a quick Peloton workout while her toddler took a nap.
“You think, ‘Oh, it’s so convenient, I can always do it,'” she said. “But actually I could only do it during the nap. I started to get annoyed at how restrictive that felt.”
Last fall, when her daughter started kindergarten and her gym reopened, Mrs. Van Otten, 34, returned to her gym and started a weightlifting program there. “I like it much more,” she said. “I feel like a real adult and not just a parent.”
Exercising outside of your home can give you “a separate space, free from other responsibilities, where you can spend time doing something just for you,” says Pirkko Markula, a sociologist at the University of Alberta who studies the fitness industry.
The more you limit the chances of interruptions, the more productive your training will be, said Elizabeth Leonard, who teaches at the Barre3 studio in Brookline, Massachusetts. “Wow, I can see under the couch, I have to vacuum,” she said. “If you’re half thinking about something else, it’s much harder to concentrate.”
There is no substitute for a real instructor.
Ms. Taylor said she sometimes slacks off her platoon because “nobody sees me do it.” She works harder in an OrangeTheory class because the coach will find her dialing it in.