The Bowflex. You’ve heard of it. It’s one of the most enduring home fitness centers in the United States. Advertisements for it air on local television, in magazines and in email every day, week and month of the year. The Bowflex is the personalized home gym center. Make no mistake; a Bowflex for all its benefits is a hefty financial investment.
The cost of the equipment ranges from $899 to $2299 in price. The prices reflect the different types of flexibility and exercises available to the different types of equipment. Bowflex understands that financial burdens and provides a financing option through their credit approval process. Payment for the most expensive equipment can be as little as $38 a month. That’s less than most gym memberships.
Some of the drawbacks to ordering the Bowflex are that the equipment arrives in as many as eight separate boxes and can take about two to three hours to set up. You have to follow the instructions closely and you have to make sure you get the pulleys hooked up exactly right to allow you to perform the exercises prescribed in the Bowflex manual.
So what does a Bowflex offer? The Bowflex is ideal for those who enjoy doing strength or circuit training at home. Strength training requires performing resistance exercises to build up muscle strength. The Bowflex uses resistance bands to help you shape and sculpt your muscles to let you look the way you would want to.
The benefit of the Bowflex system includes their Power Rod system. The Power Rod units are manufactured specifically for Bowflex and are designed to give you all the resistance and weight without the risk of inertia or joint pains that you may experience with free weights. The Bowflex system is ideal for men and women alike, so don’t be mislead by the powerful bodies advertised in the Bowflex commercials.
Does strength training work better than aerobic training? (Walking, jogging, and bicycling) No. Neither is ‘better’ than the other. However, when you combine aerobic and strength training (as you do in circuit training) you can increase your metabolism, your muscle mass as well as energy and strength. Muscles burn more calories than fat. While you are not looking to bulk up like a bodybuilder, you will increase your fat burning rates when you build muscle in conjunction with your aerobic training.
The Bowflex itself offers a lot of different programs that combined give you an overall workout right in your own home. The Bowflex six-week challenge is designed to emphasize all of these areas and help you meet your goals. They challenge you to do one workout, three times a week on the single machine to work abs, legs, arms and chest — the entire body. The Bowflex six-week challenge starts for me on February 1, 2006. I will be reporting here as I go through the challenge!