Like Ankle Weights? Try Working Out in Weighted Clothes
Fast Facts
- A company called Omorpho made a full-body version of an ankle weight that you can wear through virtually any workout.
- The company claims wearing said apparel during exercise can increase calorie burn by 8 percent.
Exercising in ankle weights isn’t uncommon at all. You strap weights above the foot on both feet and go for a lengthy walk. Similarly, it’s not uncommon to wear a weighed-down backpack during cardio training to push yourself that much more. Fitness brand Omorpho’s approach, which builds the weight directly into the clothes you wear working out, however, is uncommon.
What Is Omorpho?
Omorpho’s “Gravity Sportswear” is a collection of fitness apparel designed to weigh significantly more than normal gym clothing, and thus create a more challenging and effective workout. The company makes long sleeve shirts, T-shirts, sleeveless tees, shorts, vests, and tights.
The company’s shtick lies in what it calls MicroLoad, which are the little weighted bubbles that cover the gear. The idea is that, unlike other means to carry more weight during an exercise, theirs is evenly spread on the body. The price is high, however, with the heavy gym clothes starting at $159 (T-shirt, sleeveless tee).
How Does Omorpho’s Weighted Clothing Work?
Consider wearing an ankle weight for a moment. You strap it on above the foot and begin your exercise. Except you can’t jog or move too quickly, because the weight will jolt around, throw off your balance, and chafe your ankle. You’re bound to long-distance walking or other low-impact cardio. A similar issue is found with loading down a backpack with weights for a long bike ride; it’s horribly unbalanced, painful on your back, and limited to very specific circumstances. The strength of Omorpho’s solution is its versatility—you could go through a HIIT class, CrossFit session, or five-mile run in it without the added weight messing up the balance of the workout.
Does Wearing Omorphos Work?
Omorpho claims working out wearing its MicroLoad tech makes your workouts more effective by adding enough resistance to eek out extra gains, but not hinder your usual workout intensity or your body’s natural movement. The brand attaches hard percentage figures to this, too: you’ll burn 8 percent more calories, generate 8 percent more power, become 3 percent faster, and so on. It’s difficult to dispute those numbers without meaningful testing, but at the very least the logic holds up: carrying more weight than you’re used to increases the work your body is doing during a workout, making your workout more rigorous and the gains from it greater.
The Bottom Line
A company called Omorphos released a line of pricey weighted workout clothing. The idea is to add a minimal amount of resistance to all your workouts, thereby dialing up the intensity of every workout by just enough to see more gains without overdoing it.
