The Best Ankle and Wrist Weights: Bala Bangles Review
I’m the kind of person who goes to the gym once a year. It’s not because I don’t like to exercise—quite the opposite, actually—but when given the choice, I’d much rather go for an outdoor run or a yoga class with my best friend.
The thing about the gym is that, well, I hate it. It makes me incredibly uncomfortable—I’m tiny (at 5’1″) and there’s something unbearable I find about going to a bro-y weight room and feeling like all eyes are on me as I reach for the lightest dumbbells possible. I’d sooner run in a blizzard or extreme heat (trust me, I’ve done both) than sign up for another gym membership. The feeling that I’m being watched is probably all in my head, but I’d venture to guess that I’m not the only one struck by impostor syndrome anytime they step into a weight room.
So when I came across the weighted ankle and wrist bands from Bala Bangles they changed everything for me. To be honest, I was first interested in them because of how cute they are. As someone who owns a matchy-matchy workout set for every day of the week, I’m in way too deep in the athleisure life to buy old school wrist and ankle weights from the 80s. If I was going to start incorporating weighted ankle or wrist bands into my workouts they’d have to vibe with my * lewk *.
Bala Bangles look like accessories—they come in muted hues (blush, bone, sand, emerald, heather, and charcoal) and have a clean, matte finish. The whole thing is very Instagram-friendly. But there’s more to them than that—there are the health benefits, of course.
The upside to adding ankle and wrist weights to your workout is pretty simple: When you add resistance to a workout, you have to exert more energy. When you use more energy, you increase your heart rate, burn fat, and build muscle. So, seeing that me and my chicken-wing arms could use some extra muscle (I want to hold arm balances for longer!), I immediately incorporated Bala Bands into my routine. They come as 1 pound or 2 pound weights. I went for the 1 pounders, and I like how easily I can move them from my wrists to my ankles depending on the exercise (like planks or bicycle kicks). Plus, I can adjust the size so they don’t slide up down my arm or ankle.
I didn’t know this when I first discovered them, but Bala Bangles have been around for some time now. The idea to modernize the weighted ankle and wrist bands first came to owners Natalie Holloway, a certified yoga instructor, and Max Kislevitz, her now-husband, while they were on sabbatical in Southeast Asia a few years ago. Both passionate about movement and exercise, Holloway says their aha-moment came after a yoga class in Indonesia.