Trilobyte,
Sorry, still haven't gotten around to calling IR -- the time difference is such a pain in the butt, but here's something I think you may be interested in: Men's Health had an article in the December 1997 issue -- "Home Fitness Buyer's Guide -- 75 Fitness buffs spent 350 sweat soaked hours trying out the latest in home exercise machines. Trust us, gentlemen: somewhere in these pages is the one piece of equipment that's right for you."
Anyway, they did a comparison of "Strength Gyms" and here's the exerpt:
"The problem with weight stack machines is price: They're simply outside many guys' budgets...The Soloflex Muscle Machine ($1495) uses differenet combinations of thick rubber straps; the Bowflex Motivator XTL ($1049) uses a bunch of plastic rods, and the NordicFlex Ultralift ($1000) uses your own body weight for resistance.
"In this moderate price range, our favorite was the Bowflex. According to product literature, the Bowflex provides 210 pounds of resistance (upgradable to 310 pounds and 410 pounds -- one 100-pound upgrade goes for a hundred bucks). However, several testers were suspicious of the resistance numbers printed on the rods: One said he was able to life more "weight" on the Bowflex than he regularly could in the gym.
"Our testers were less enthusiastic about the NordicFlex Ultralift, a compact but complicated piece of equipment. "I couldn't figure out anything except the most basic exercises," was a typical comment. "Okay, so I didn't read the manual -- but I shouldn't have to." Some of the machine's adjustments are too ard to move or even understand. It took a Herculean effort to change weight settings, with one tester having to bang on the resistance knowb with a barbell in order to move it. Two testers -- one very large, one very small -- felt the Ultralift just wasn't made for people their size.
"None of our testers were impressed with the Soloflex Muscle Machine -- in fact, it rated dead last. The main problems: a limited range of motion and resistance that didn't remain stead throughout the exercise. And for a group of people who rarely agree on anything, out testers were unanimous in their complaints about the constant complicated adjustments it took to go from one Soloflex exercise to the next. In the end, perhaps pumping rubber just didn't do it for our testers"
Back to me speaking:
Actually I was quite surprised that the Bowflex was tested -- in other reports (ie Consumer Reports) they never seem to use Bowflex -- which I guess points to the fact that it had very little market penetration before. Even more impressive was the fact that it scored first (I mean it's not as if you should just trust what the company sends you in promo material) by a more or less independent source (I'd bet by the number of ads that NordicTrack and Soloflex spends more on advertising in Men's Health than Bowflex ever did).
One of the comments when I ask around about these types of weight-simulating machines is that many people don't believe that they actually do what they claim to do or simulate weights very well -- given the commentary re: Soloflex, I think it can be inferred that Bowflex resistance is quite good -- also another surprise.
FYI Men's Health is the leading Men's Fitness Magazine by subscription numbers -- this endorsement, should be positive, even though the review was only a few pages -- it shows to potential buyers (Men's Health caters directly to that demographic) that if weights are too expensive (typically more than double the price of these other machines) it's not a bad idea to consider one of these machines.
So basically I guess what's great about BFX is that not only does it have a superior product but it has a good emerging marketing campaign to back it up...
Clement |
