Category: Advice

Categories
Advice Free Stuff Things to Do

How to Learn Salsa for Free

salsa-dancing

Learning a new hobby is fun but can get expensive if you already have a few other hobbies. I recommend dancing as an option that does not hurt your wallet.

Some partner dancing requires lessons that are $15 per one-hour class or $10 for a beginner thirty-minute lesson with a dance social afterward. One type of partner dancing, salsa, is a relatively inexpensive hobby because of its popularity.

Benefits of Learning Salsa

  • Improved Confidence
  • Improved Cognitive Function by Learning a New Skill
  • Improved Dancing at Weddings
  • Develop More Rhythm
  • Lose Weight & Promotes an Active Lifestyle
  • Improve Your Dating Life
  • Make New Friends
  • Community Involvement
  • Better Weekend Plans
  • Better Sex

 

Tips for Learning Salsa

Find Free Classes

The best and most affordable way to learn salsa is researching free classes near you.

Are you a College Student?

Visit your student activities center to see if they offer salsa (or any other type of dance) classes. Having a background in another type of dancing is useful for salsa, too!

Graduated from College?

Ethical Option

  • Ask your circle of friends, dance community or general dance Facebook group for free classes around the area.
  • Use the search box in Eventbrite or Facebook Events to find free classes. Most cities have free social dancing outdoors during the warmer months that include a free lesson before to promote dancing in the community as well as the instructors’ weekly classes.

Less-Ethical Option
Pretend you’re a student and attend these local college dance classes: they won’t know the difference.

Month-Long Classes

Invest $60-100 in a month-long beginner class (around $12-15 per class). This creates accountability and helps you develop a good habit of telling your friends “Sorry, I can’t hang out after work, I have salsa class on Tuesday.” This is relatively inexpensive compared to $15-20 for yoga drop-in classes.

Your friends will understand and hopefully be intrigued to learn a new skill themselves!

YouTube Videos

YouTube is an excellent resource to learn new techniques and partner dancing moves to use at social dances. However, in-person lessons are more practical to learn the fundamentals and build confidence.

My Favorite Salsa Lesson Video: Salsa Dancing Walk-Through – 36 Movements

Dance With Friends

Whenever Louis Fonsi’s song “Despecito” comes on at the bar, grab a friend and practice what you learned in class or on YouTube.

Hope you got a lot out of this article! Start learning salsa and share this page with your friends to get them inspired, too!

Read my other post, How to Survive a Dance Social, for more advice about partner dancing!

Categories
Advice Fitness Free Stuff

How to Save Money on Running and Working Out

fitness-money-savings

Working out is an expensive hobby; each hobby you add will create new costs. These expensive, active hobbies vary from triathlons to CrossFit to cycling to road running. An argument can be made that running is one of the least expensive of the active hobbies.

I compiled this list of ways to save money because it can still be expensive to buy a new pair of shoes ($60-$130) after 300-500 miles (recommended) or the latest moisture-wicking shirt at Nike or New Balance.

Saving on Workout Clothes in Real Life

  • Visit your local running club during shoe “Demo Nights” and buy them online once you get home.
  • Volunteer for local road races and earn a free race entry.
  • Win local road races and make your money back in prize money.
  • Do not buy name-brand workout: Shop at Target. Have a good few pieces that you think you will look good in, and for the rest, buy any moister-wicking piece.
  • Become an ambassador for a small running group.
  • Make friends with people who work at running stores or lifestyle companies and get discounts.
  • Visit your local Goodwill or thrift store for slightly used workout clothes.
  • Fundraisers: During Marathon season, there is a lot of fundraisers for yoga and cycling and other gym group classes.
  • Download Workout Apps: Visit your phone’s app store and search for Sworkit — it’s a free video app that creates a workout based on the time you have available.
  • Become a beta tester for a new running shoe company.
  • Track your mileage via Strava, MapMyRun or another tracking app to get a better understanding of when to buy shoes. Buy shoes when you hit 300-500 miles in a pair or when you start noticing holes.
    • Do not walk in your running shoes.
  • Gym Memberships
    • Get a gym membership during off-peak times or before New Years to get a reduced sign up fees and monthly rate.
    • Negotiate with your gym for a monthly discount; show them competitor prices and see if they will match!
    • Boutique fitness studios are expensive. Sign up for their monthly deals or free promotional classes.

 

Shopping Online for Workout Clothing 

  • Download Amazon plugins to get price comparison and alerts on shoe prices across the web.
  • Shop at nearby outlet stores.
  • Visit Shoekicker.com and select your desired shoes.
  • Search for your workout shoe on Google and use the paid listings to compare shoe prices. Visit Google Shopping for additional insights on shoe prices.

Running is also a great, active date idea!

Let me know if you have other recommendations in the comments section!

Categories
Advice Fitness Things to Do

Buying Your First Road Bike

buying-first-road-bike

How to Buy an Entry-Level Road Bike

Having recently entered the world of recreational biking I thought I would share tips to help you buy your first road bike and get into the sport of road cycling.

STOP READING ABOUT BIKES ONLINE

Don’t make the mistake of googling ‘best bikes under _____.’ You will get an understanding of the type of brands, however, it can get overwhelming with the more obscure European brands that are less likely at your LBS or too expensive to import.
Pro Tip: Visit your local bike store with trusted salesmen and bike-lovers.

Test Ride A LOT of Bikes at Your Local Bike Store

You don’t know how a bike is going to feel on the road until you ride it. You could have a more pleasurable riding experience on a $500 bike than a $1,000 bicycle. Remember to ask a salesperson to analyze your riding position before you test ride a bike.
Most local bike shops have quality entry-level prices under $700. Bike stores sell popular, quality bikes to build shop loyalty and make revenue from repairing their customer’s bikes. Also, there’s not much difference between brands: the components are standard in entry-level bikes.

TRY NOT TO BUY ONLINE

You’ll probably Google “affordable bikes [year]’ in your initial search but most of what you will see are bikes you can ONLY buy online. They may be cheaper but you need to understand you’re going to need a LBS to assemble and tune-it-up it for you (around $80 in major cities).
Pro Tip: If you buy a bike online, I HIGHLY recommended you get a bike store to assemble it–you don’t want anything to go wrong while riding at 20 MPH because you forgot to tighten a bolt.

Shop Craigslist

If you can wait a few weeks (or months) for your road bike, Craigslist is a great website to find a deal. Your success on Craigslist depends on your geographical area; you’ll find more bike postings if you live in a major city.
If you have any friends who have experience with bicycles, ask them to check out the Craigslist posting with you. You are the one who ultimately determines how your body feels on the bike but they can ensure that your body is in the right position (saddle height) and inspect for any damages to the frame/spokes.
Pro Tip: Save time shopping for bikes on Craigslist by making an account and setting up a saved search with filters or set an alert on the Craigslist mobile app so you can respond fast to postings.

Find out if you’re getting a deal 

So…you fell in love with a bike during a test ride. Don’t buy it that day and look at your options online. Most local bike stores have online websites with prices of their bikes, which gives you the opportunity to shop around competitor websites.
Bike shops tend to match their local competitors if you have some form of proof (e.g., photo or website price) but there is no guarantee they will match bike wholesale website prices!
 
Pro Tip: Early spring is usually when bikes stores like to mark down previous year model and display the new models for the spring..

Watch YouTube Reviews

When you whittle-down your bike choice, I recommend you search on Google and YouTube for [prospective bike] + review, to uncover red flags from reviewers.

Editors Note: I bought a Trek 1.1 for about $100 less than the online price at a local bike store (spring sale)
trek-1.1-bike

trekbikes.com/us/en_US/bikes/road-bikes/performance-road/1-series/1-1/p/1400000-2017/