Exercise or life fitness bikes are a great way to get in shape, get healthy and even get rid of a few excess pounds if you need to. You have a choice of upright or recumbent exercise bikes, both of which work equally well in helping you increase and improve your cardiovascular fitness.

The main difference between these two types of bikes is that with the upright style you are sitting upright with a normal bicycle saddle and the peddles and below the seat – so it’s just like riding a normal bike.

The recumbent style life fitness bikes are more of a relaxed riding style, where you have a more comfortable chair to sit on, and the peddles are out in front of your legs rather than below them.

Both styles of bikes are great for a cardio workout and will go a long way to helping boost your cardio fitness levels. Good cardio exercise routines involved using your legs a lot because they are such a large muscle group and demand a lot of oxygen once they start working hard. This increased demand for oxygen means your lungs have to start working hard to pull in lots of oxygen, which means your breathing rate starts to increase dramatically. Once the extra oxygen is in your blood stream, your heart then has to work hard to pump that oxygen rich blood round your body and into your leg muscles.

So life fitness bikes are perfect for cardio health as they mainly focus on your leg muscles, which consequently work your lungs and heart. But don’t think these stationary exercise bikes only work your thighs – far from it. As well as using your quadriceps (main thigh muscles) you’ll be getting a great workout for your hamstrings, calves and glutes as well – basically pretty much all your lower body.

When you go shopping for your bike, there’s a few features that will improve your experience of using them and make your workouts a lot more enjoyable:

Adjustability. Look for units that come with a fully adjustable seat and handlebars. We are all different shapes and sizes, so being able to adjust your seating arrangement will make it a lot more comfortable.

Resistance Settings. Ideally you should look at fitness bikes that come with a variable resistance setting. This just means that you have a dial where you can turn the resistance up or down easily and match it exactly to your strength and fitness levels.