4 1GT Thursday November 26 2020 | the times
times
Fitness
With anything on your fitness wish
list likely to be in scarce supply this
year, Black Friday bargains provide
a glimmer of hope that it is still
possible to reboot your home
workout equipment.
Since the living room remains our
default gym, at least for now, the
demand for immersive equipment
remains sky-high — there’s reportedly
a waiting list of three to twelve
weeks for Peloton bikes, but the
manufacturer of the Echelon Connect
Sport Bike (down from £799.
to £699.99 from November 25 to
December 3; echelonfit.uk) promises
it will be delivered in two to three
business days.
For that reason alone it’s worth
ordering, but it also comes with
live and on-demand rides, with
workouts from Zumba to
kickboxing, yoga, stretching,
Pilates, HIIT, strength classes
and much more.
Meanwhile, despite colder
days, I’m persisting with my
outdoor jaunts and the Honor
Watch GS Pro (down from £249.
to £199.99; hihonor.com) sounds
hard to beat. It has built-in navigation
technology, including a GPS Route
Back function to guide
you safely back to your starting
point on walks, runs or cycles. It
also has a 25-day battery life on top
of the usual smart watch features.
Beautiful white trainers are no
good at this time of year. You
want something waterproof and
with traction. The British-made,
award-winning Inov-8 Terraultra
G260 (down from £139.99 to £83.99;
innov-8.com) trail shoe would make
it into my basket. The company is
donating 5 per cent of all “Green
Friday” sales to Cumbria Wildlife
Trust for planting trees and restoring
peat bogs, which makes for a
conscientious purchase.
If you can’t get hold of weights
(dumbbells have been the most
searched-for fitness term on Amazon
during lockdown 2), my top choice for
all-round resistance training would be
the TRX Home 2 (down from £169.
to £135.95; trxtraining.co.uk). It is a
suspension home-workout system
that conveniently packs away into a
teeny bag. It comes with a 12-month
subscription to a workout app that
provides free daily classes.
Workouts shouldn’t be all sweat
and tears, and my choice of recovery
tool is the Pulseroll home massage
gun (pulseroll.com), which has four
speed settings and promises to relieve
tight muscles like a dream (down
from £224.99 to £168.74). Slip on a
pair of Oofas, the athlete recovery
footwear (20 per cent off with the
code HOLIDAY20; oofos.co.uk) and
your aching legs and feet will be
eternally grateful.
Peta Bee, health writer for
The Times
Black Friday: read our experts’
What do our shopping aficionados have their eye on?
From home entertainment to fashion and fitness,
here’s what you’ll want to add to your basket tomorrow
Kitchen equipment
Whether you like it or consider it
to be a ghastly American import,
Black Friday is Britain’s busiest
shopping day, overtaking the
Boxing Day sales. Yes, the
majority of offers are overhyped
or understocked, but if you do your
homework there are genuine
bargains to be had.
Ignore the flashing red “MASSIVE
DISCOUNT” sign and look at the
price. Does it look decent? If so, pop it
into your (virtual) basket. If you don’t
know, use PriceSpy, Idealo and the like
— these are price-tracking websites
that will tell you the price of a
sandwich grill or avocado destoner
at any point in the previous year.
With that in mind, here are three
bona fide bargains I have my eyes on.
This has been the year of outdoor
cooking, and Ooni, based in
Edinburgh, is the pre-eminent pizza
oven maker. Every one of its ovens
(guaranteed temperature 500C)
has a 20 per cent discount until
December 2, which will save you
£100 on its pro oven (now £399.20);
uk.ooni.com. Less sexy, but possibly
more useful, is a slow cooker that can
be used on the hob or in the oven.
There’s a Lakeland number that
does that and now costs £39.99, a
£20 saving; lakeland.co.uk.
Now that many of us have had
to ditch our £2.50-a-day office
coffee, you can afford a decent
coffee machine. Sage has one, cut
from £379 to £299, that is genuinely
good value; ao.com.
Harry Wallop, presenter on
The Gadget ShowToys
Black Friday has always had me
panic-buying bread makers and
hairdryers so as not to feel left out.
“How about another fridge?” I think.
“There is 3 per cent off this one, only
nine nine nine nine five!”
I know the smart thing to do is make
a list then search for deals on things
you were going to buy anyway, so
come tomorrow I will be calmly
searching for all the educational
books my children have asked for.
Not really! Kitty wants Splatoon 2
for her Nintendo and Sam has been
asking for Fifa 21 since March; it is
down by 45 per cent at PlayStation
Store (£32.99, store.playstation.com).
I’m ready to pounce on long iPad
chargers (so they stop taking mine)
and Pictionary Air — look it up,
it’s amazing. John Lewis has £
off Bose wireless in-ear
headphones (now £129,
johnlewis.com) and what child
doesn’t need new felt tips?
Stabilo Pen 68s are the best and
Amazon has 34 per cent off a
50-pen set right now (down from
£38.29 to £25.21).
Esther Walker, features writer
and mother of twoFashion
I hate it almost as much as I hate a
pumpkin spice latte. Namely, a lot.
Each year I have just about got over
the first infraction when, a month
later, the second comes around. Black
Friday. It’s just not British. Except now,
somehow, it is.
To be clear, it’s not that I don’t
like to pay less for something. I am
not crazy. But I find it depressing
and devaluing for sales to be the
harbinger of the festive season,
a case not of cart before horse,
but cart without horse.
Still, if you must, this is the
year to do it, given that a lot
of items that retailers were
expecting us to buy and
wear haven’t been bought
and worn. Just remember,
sales are not for buying
more, but for buying better,
for investing in a superior
quality than you could
usually afford, or for
treating yourself to
something that isn’t a
practical essential, but makes
your heart sing.
It’s struck me with new force
this winter, the gamechanger
potential of some incredibleouterwear. To be clear, incredible for
me means quirky, interesting. I would
go as far as to say that if there is one
thing you buy this year it should be a
statement coat. Sling it over your
WFH slobbery and you are dressed to
slay, or at the very least to distract
from your leggings — not to mention,
if you are anything like me, your
legs — having seen better days.
The designer discount website
the Outnet — a good hunting
ground year round — is
offering an extra 25 per cent
on its already punchy
discounts. My pick is the
Diane von Furstenberg
rainbow-hued trench, a snip
— more than that, a snap —
at £432, down from £1,
(theoutnet.com). LK Bennett’s
purple bouclé beauty delivers
more cosy with similar
amounts of clout, down 30 per
cent to £315 (lkbennett.com).
For a more stealth variety of
peroration there’s Boden’s
navy Middleham with
stripe trim, also down 30 per
cent to £161 (boden.co.uk).
Then again, it also comes
in fuchsia.
Anna Murphy, fashion
director of The TimesStabilo pen set; £25.
(was £38.29),
amazon.co.ukHonor watch; £199.
(was £249.99),
hihonor.comBouclé coat;
£315 (was £450),
lkbennett.comSage coffee machine;
£299 (was £379),
ao.comOrson
desk£2,954,
10%saving,
heals.com