I swear that for a while a few years ago every time I went yard saling I saw about 1 Thighmaster (usually with Suzanne Somers still on the box) for every 3 sales I went to!:rolleyes: I still see fitness equipment almost every other yard sale and at every flea market.
The research I did (Consumer Reports and lots of health sites) all pretty much say the same thing about fitness equipment: figure out the maximum you can pay and spend it. If you can’t afford more than $400 for a treadmill, join a gym, because $400 treadmills are going to tear up soon and sound like a plane crashing in your living room. If you can’t afford to go to a gym, just walk because it’ll do you more good than the cheapo.
Another piece of advice several sites gave is to NEVER buy those space saver treadmills and ellipticals because the same design that allows you to fold them up and halve their size also makes them not very good or durable. (I got a great deal on my elliptical- it was a $3,000 model that got great ratings and I bought it for $1,000 [with a 3 year policy] at a store in Atlanta that was going out of business, and I do use it- but I don’t expect that lightning to strike twice.)
The piece of fitness equipment I saw in a store that I couldn’t be-lieve: I don’t remember his name, but he’s this short buff guy with a blonde ponytail and it’s a cheap ($200 or so) non-electric elliptical type deal. I would NEVER EVER EVER EVER put my name on that piece of crap and I’m not even in the fitness profession (to put it mildly). The thing’s cheap Third World sweatshop crap that’s not gonna do much of anything other than make you sweaty before falling apart, and it’s reviews were as terrible as I thought they’d be (I looked 'em up just out of curiosity).
I own a set of the POWERBLOCKS and have been using them for the past 6 months. I used to go to the gym all the time but quit after our son was born. I bought the Elite 90 set and they are an excellent solid product. I bought an incline bench elsewhere.
I was using stacked cinderblocks as stands for the things till last month when my FIL bought me the matching stand for my birthday.
(I passed on the Bowflex Select-tech since they could only get up to 50 lbs per hand, were bulkier, and had a lot of plastic on them.)
I thought they were odd at first but when you hold them they feel just like regular dumbells.
Only two drawbacks I have found so far are 1) some of the edges on them catch on loose clothes (however this was solved by improving my form on movements lifting the weights away from my body rather than dragging them against me so maybe it’s a +)
and 2) you can’t drop the things like you can with regular dumbells. I was used to maxing out with dumbell bench presses then droping them to the floor a few inches when done. Can’t do that with these. Gotta keep them in control the whole time. So maybe it is a + in the long run stressing form/control over maxing out.
I swear that for a while a few years ago every time I went yard saling I saw about 1 Thighmaster (usually with Suzanne Somers still on the box) for every 3 sales I went to!:rolleyes: I still see fitness equipment almost every other yard sale and at every flea market.
The research I did (Consumer Reports and lots of health sites) all pretty much say the same thing about fitness equipment: figure out the maximum you can pay and spend it. If you can’t afford more than $400 for a treadmill, join a gym, because $400 treadmills are going to tear up soon and sound like a plane crashing in your living room. If you can’t afford to go to a gym, just walk because it’ll do you more good than the cheapo.
Another piece of advice several sites gave is to NEVER buy those space saver treadmills and ellipticals because the same design that allows you to fold them up and halve their size also makes them not very good or durable. (I got a great deal on my elliptical- it was a $3,000 model that got great ratings and I bought it for $1,000 [with a 3 year policy] at a store in Atlanta that was going out of business, and I do use it- but I don’t expect that lightning to strike twice.)
The piece of fitness equipment I saw in a store that I couldn’t be-lieve: I don’t remember his name, but the guy who hawks them is an annoyingly hyper short buff guy with a blonde ponytail. The device is a cheap ($200 or so) non-electric elliptical type deal. I would NEVER EVER EVER EVER put my name on that piece of crap and I’m not even in the fitness profession (to put it mildly). The thing’s cheap Third World sweatshop crap that’s not gonna do much of anything other than make you sweaty before falling apart, and it’s reviews were as terrible as I thought they’d be (I looked 'em up just out of curiosity).
Dammit, I’m always the guy who comes in these threads to suggest sellectech dummbells!
Anyway, I’ve used them for about six months. Pretty happy with them. Much better than buying all the individual dumbbells. As noted, they only go up to 52.5 pounds, but that’s sufficient for most of my workouts. If you need more, then you can buy a few heavier sets. They’re a bit bulkier than standard dumbbells, so it makes things like pectoral flies a bit harder.
But, for my, “Well, I don’t feel like going all the way to the gym” days, these give me a great workout.
I got them myself about a month ago, and I quite like them. I also got the weight bench to go with them, which makes doing things like the pec fly and calf raises easier but strictly speaking wasn’t really necessary. OK, I can sit on it while doing concentration curls or triceps lifts, or lie on it while doing ab crunches… Whee, like I couldn’t have done those on a chair or the floor.
I was also pleasantly surprised to find that the instructional DVD that came with the dumbbells was actually pretty useful.