Working Out while Touring and Camping

Introduction

This post builds on our Previous Post where we introduced ‘consistency’, challenged traditional exercise dogma and outlined our workout protocols.

In this post, we will delve into our workout equipment and routines with insights into our approach to strength and health on the road.

If you are new to resistance training or coming back into it after a lengthy break - DON'T WORRY if it all seems too hard. These initial posts describe how we workout after many years of consistent training. In our Members Area we provide a step-by-step guide to get from 'newbie' to a master of your own workout programs.

Staying Strong and Healthy on the Road

As noted in our Home Page and as avid travelers ourselves, my wife and I have embraced the nomadic lifestyle of vehicle touring and camping. We are fortunate to have close family and friends across Australia.

Our house (which is currently rented) is in Perth, and we have sons / daughter in laws, grand kids and close family living in Sydney, Canberra, Darwin and Brisbane. We often stay or base in Brisbane, Darwin and Sydney.

Our touring lifestyle takes us to all corners of Australia. The map below shows our completed and touring / camping trips since retiring in mid 2022, all while never missing a workout. There is still a lot to see. Australia is a big country.

Minimal Equipment – Maximum Results

Our science-based approach revolves around optimizing your workouts with lightweight, portable and versatile equipment, ensuring that you can achieve your strength and fitness goals wherever you go.

Our portable equipment weighs 5kg and can fit into a backpack.

We do the same workouts with the same equipment when we are based in homes or touring and camping – it’s only the equipment mounting that differs. Age Free Strength proves that minimal equipment can deliver maximum results.

Our workouts extend beyond vehicle touring and camping alone and can fit into various settings, including home gyms and travel destinations, both domestically and internationally. We have taken our full exercise gear with us on flights - bands as check-in luggage and Unitree Pumps as a carry-on backpack.

In the next sections, we will dive into the equipment we use for our workout programs. How the equipment is applied in workouts is detailed in the following links.

Watch this 2-minute video
Read the AD-Curve Free Post
Become a Member → Download the AD‑Curve™ eBook → Follow the Routines → Get Strong and Mobile (and stay that way).

Resistance Bands

Resistance bands are a key component of our minimal equipment at Age Free Strength.

We highly recommend loop style layered latex bands (as opposed to molded rubber bands) for their safety, durability and effectiveness. As you can see from the images below, we have 5 pairs of bands.

Molded bands have a tendency to snap, where-as layered latex bands do not. We have personal experience with molded bands snapping – which can be dangerous.

Layered Latex bands are designed to withstand repeated stretching and, in our experience, offer a more durable option compared to molded rubber bands. We’ve had ours for 3 years and they are still as strong as new.

Resistance bands provide variable resistance (resistance increases as they stretch) and allow you to easily adjust the intensity of your workouts based on your individual strength level.

Although bands do not provide the ideal resistance curve relative to the muscles strength curve (muscles are stronger in their lengthened position i.e. when the band is least stretched), they come with significant benefits. These include being joint-friendly and enabling you to achieve the ideal anatomical motion for our exercises.

With band exercises, we recommend wearing gloves as bands can rub and chafe the skin.

Here’s a table of our bands with the lower and upper resistance of each. Doubling them over doubles the resistance.

Brand	Color	Lower Res	Upper Res
Serious Steel 32″	Orange	1kg	7kg
Serious Steel 32″	Purple	2kg	16kg
Serious Steel 32″	Red	5kg	23kg
X3 41″	White	5kg	23kg
X3 41″	Light Grey	11kg	36kg

Unitree PUMPS

The Unitree PUMP Pros are an absolute game-changer in our minimal equipment workouts. To put it simply, we are blown away by their innovation and effectiveness.

Developed by Unitree, a renowned robotics company that has received numerous awards, the PUMPS harness the power of robotics joint movement technology to deliver cable resistance training.

Equipped with a rechargeable lithium battery-powered built-in motor, the PUMPS offer incredible convenience and versatility.

Controlling the resistance is simple via Bluetooth with the accompanying smartphone app, allowing you to set the desired resistance level in precise 0.5kg increments, with a maximum resistance of 20kg per PUMP. The battery charge status is the blue graphical ring in the app screenshot image below.

While you have the option to combine up to 8 PUMPS for a total resistance of 160kg, we find that 2 PUMPS are sufficient for our minimal equipment workouts while meeting our space saving and portability requirements. When combined with bands with our AD-Curve Protocol we get commercial gym quality workouts, anywhere.

Functionality includes setting various resistance modes such as ‘eccentric’ or ‘concentric’ – but we typically leave it on ‘standard’ which applies constant resistance in both directions of movement.

The PUMPS can anchor to a door or to any solid object with legs, arms, bars or struts. We use our vehicle roof rack, bull bar, camper tray side rails, wheel rims and/or our feet. There is a quick release adjustable latch strap for securing the PUMPS and we also use ‘S hooks’ for fast re-positioning with the roof rack mounted exercises – see the image below.

The standard delivered accessories include ankle / wrist straps, extension leads and door anchors. Each PUMP can fit in your hand and weighs 700 grams.

Optional accessories include suction mounts that can fix to a floor or wall but we keep it simple with the basics.

A full battery charge lasts for at least 3 of our workouts, which are a combination of bodyweight, resistance bands and the PUMPS.

With our workout routines, the PUMP Pros and bands effectively replace a room full of free weights and a cable plate machine.

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Unitree have now released a bigger, heavier and more powerful version called the PUMP Max. The Max has up to 70kg of resistance per unit, but is not as flexible or portable as the PUMP Pro. We will stick with the Pump Pros with our nomadic lifestyle.

Forearm Forklift Strap and Bodyweight

Our minimal equipment traveling gym wouldn’t be complete without the inclusion of a forearm forklift strap and the power of our own body weight.

Forearm forklift straps are commonly used by furniture removalists to facilitate safer and easier lifting and shifting of heavy items. These versatile straps can be obtained from most hardware stores, offering an affordable and convenient addition to our workout arsenal.

With three hoops on each end that allow for length control, a wide range of exercises can be exploited. Their versatility extends beyond traditional weightlifting, as they can also double as a suspension trainer, serving as an alternative to equipment like the ‘TRX’.

Additionally, the straps are excellent for isometric exercises, adding yet another dimension to our workout routines.

In the accompanying GIF images below, you can see examples of forklift strap bodyweight exercises such as the ‘pendulum sissy squat’ (a quads isolation exercise) and the horizontal pull back (middle trapezius / rear deltoid compound exercise).

We should never underestimate bodyweight exercises, with or without the forklift strap. Our routines incorporate numerous bodyweight mobility sequences and exercises including pushups, the reverse lunge, Bulgarian split squats, calf raises and the tibialis retraction (shin muscle).

Our Workout Routines

Rather than listing multiple workout types here, we’ve deliberately simplified this section to focus on how the system is applied — whether you’re travelling and staying in hotels, touring/camping, or training at home.

Our touring workouts are not a separate method. They are all based around the AD‑Curve™ framework and applied with our portable equipment:

• The same optimal exercises.
• The same joint‑friendly biomechanics.
• The same resistance‑curve principles.

The only difference is how the resistance is anchored, not how the muscles are trained.

When we train on the road, we rotate through:

• Upper body–focused sessions.
• Lower body–focused sessions.
• Combined upper/lower or full‑body sessions.
• All of the above are paired with mobility sequences.

The exact structure is flexible and adapts to:

• Available anchor points.
• Time and recovery.
• Travel days and terrain.

What stays consistent is the AD‑Curve™ approach — matching the resistance curve to the muscle’s natural strength curve through combining cables and bands.

The full explanations and demonstrations are available through the following:

Watch this 2-minute video
Read the AD-Curve Free Post
Become a Member → Download the AD‑Curve™ eBook → Follow the Routines → Get Strong and Mobile (and stay that way).

Next Post

Stay tuned for our next post where we will delve deeper into specific exercise bio-mechanics and exercise form with a focus on the shoulders.