Or Bowflex vs a weight lifting machine for that matter. In terms of saftey which is better. Everytime I see commercails for Bowflex I always wonder what would happen if the bows or a cable would snap, or if the person would drop a handle. It seems to me that something like that could put the user and/or anyone else in the room in quite a bit of danger? So how safe is a bowflex, could the rods or cables snap? What would happen if you dropped a handle? Would it just spring back, or would it fly back and cause damage if it hit someone in the face on the way? Any ideas? Any (hopefully not) expierences?
Most of the snapping do to grip loss would cause the handle to fly towards the machine and away from you.
Overhead presses and chest presses with a grip slip could cause the handles to graze you as they go by.
I don’t know about equip failure.
For grip issues and techniques, look for ‘lifting straps’ or see if the comp recommends a product. For barbell and dumbells, we use ‘lifting straps’ that make sudden loss of grip very unlikely…and ‘gloves’ don’t even come close to straps.
I should probably add, I don’t lift weights, nor do I intend to. I just always wonder about it when I see the commercial.
I used a friend’s bowflex for about 10 minutes one time, so I’m not exactly an expert on the whole thing. However, I did have some observations.
I don’t think it’s any less safe than most normal weight type gym equipment I’ve used. Though the handles will snap back if let go, that just causes the rods to snap upright, which then whack into the other rods and bounce around a bit. Also, his had little bolt-on clips on the attaching wire to prevent the handle from getting too close to the pulleys.
I suppose the cable (or, more likely, wherever the cable connects to the ends) could break, but I don’t think that would be a big deal. Probably safer than a huge mass slaming down onto another huge mass, which could potentially send bits of metal flying about.
On the other hand, I’m not sure the bowflex is that safe from an excercise standpoint. The rods are round and act like springs. When you’re pulling on the thing, they start shaking/vibrating and that shaking gets conducted to your arms or legs. Notice on the commericals they never show anyone doing more than pulling it, because by the second or third rep those things are all over the place, and it makes for a really uncomfortable workout. I was worried that I was going to pull something when I was using it.