I know that this is going to get bombarded, but here goes. If a person only wants to ‘Look good Nekid,’ could any means of resistance exercise do the trick? What I am getting here is a machine such as, oh I don’t know, the Bowflex sufficient enough to get the desired results of increased muscle and decreased bodyfat provided everything from diet to supplementation is in order? My wife unexpectedly showed up home with one because of the 90 minute drive both ways to get to and from the gym is severely hampering any kind of “mood” (I mean consistent sex) I love weights but the trade off at this point may not be enough. I just want to look good. Have at it.
I can’t say I really know anything about the Bowflex, but if you live 90 minutes from a gym then I assume that you would be living in a rural area, correct? If this was the case you probably have a fair bit of space around you. In that case I would be building a shed in the backyard and buying a power rack bench and a barbell/plates to put in it so that I could do all the basic compound lifts plus a bit of Oly lifting. You would get more results from this type of training plus save a heap of time travelling 3 hours to get to the gym. All the money you save on petrol and car wear and tear could go towards your home gym costs. Plus you would save on gym membership.
Cheers,
Ben
I certainly wouldn’t consider it optimal, but I’m sure you could do so given time and focused attention just as with weights.
[i]However[/i], I’d opt for a sweet set of dumbells and an incline/decline bench before a Bowflex. I prefer my squat rack, personally, but it could easily be done with heavy dumbells and doesn’t take as much space. And/or get some stuff like a weighted vest and find a place to do chins and some Power Rings. You’d be set sans bowflex (and probably cheaper).
NOW, if you are deadset on the bowflex (though it doesn’t sound like you are “deadset”), make sure you try Ebay, your local paper, and some place like Play-It-Again sports (if they have such a store near you?) first. Otherwise, you will be paying WAY too much for it.
JMO,
Matt
I know what the other guys are saying, but yes, you can do ok with the Bowflex. Especially given your circumstances, any option is better than no option. Put up a pull-up bar somewhere and Bowflex away. I have very limited first hand knowlege, but it can be set to fairly heavy loads. Certainly enough to maintain any muscle mass, and not knowing your current iron level, probably put some on. You’ll just have to adjust your workout around its capacity.
Enjoy the added bonus
Yes, anything can work if you put in the effort.
However, if you have the room you can get a decent rack and 2 cheap 300 pound oly sets for less than a bowfelx.
get a sandbag and a kerb stone.
It sounds like your wife already bought the thing so you better make it work!
My Dad bought one last year; I immediately told my wife to expect to get it within a year, guess what I now have a bowflex collecting dust in my basement. I watched the video on it and it looks like you can make it work. I wouldn’t expect to compete in PL meets but I dont see why you cant use it to add some mass, ours supposedly has 400 lbs of resistance. I would also get some sandbags, a chinning bar and build some sort of dip rack, and something to do farmer’s walks with.
If your only goal is to look good naked then any form of training that builds muscle will do the trick. Any. Free weights. Machines. Bands. Bodyweight. Weight vests, etc… anything really. I have used bodyweight only exercise for the past 8 months now, photos can be seen of my progress on the physique sections under bodyweight training only. Or search under icklemoley. Though many have told me time and time again, YOURE NOT BIG i think i look good naked and that is my goal.
Thanks for the feedback. I am however also in the process of welding a rack and makeshift bench press out of some scrap square tubing laying around. I’ll probably use both the barbell (squats, deads, bench, oly lifts) and supplement with the Bowflex for ‘isolation’ movements.
Check with the manufacturer to make sure that yours is not one of the models produced with a tower that accidentaly collapses on the user. I remember that this was a problem with those.
As far as the goal of lookin good nekkid, good luck! One of the most important factors in achieving a goal is to have a system and sticking to it.
When you complete the fabricetion of the rack, let some folks know about the process. I have seen a lot of people wanting to know about how to get a rack cheap, and I have recomended that they do what you are doing, but I doubt many people have the knowhow or dohow to actualy build a rack.
I actually have the measurements and dimensions of a rack that I used at my gym. I did this so I could fabricate one for myself. My father-in-law is an excellent welder so he will be helping me put it together. When it is done and it looks like I hope it will. I’ll post the details of how it went together.
Hey, the bowflex will give you the appearance of a full gym. Besides, if you can get your wife to work out, make her use the bowflex while you do the other stuff.
I’m sure the both of you working out and getting sweaty together will, umm, lead to conducive situations…
When i first started all i had was a bowflex. One of the original models at that. I put on some muscle till i could pretty much max the thing out on any lift. Then when i hit weights i felt like a little wuss, you get all the resistance at the top of the lift from the bowflex, the further you pull the cable the harder it is. So basicaly i unracked my weight on the benchpress, it felt ok, so i lowered it a little bit, felt ok, so i go to do a full rep and pinned myself, and i workout alone so i had to dump the weight to the side and try to get out from under it.
So if you want to look good naked yeah i guess the bowflex is better then bodyweight pushups and whatnot. But if you plan on hitting weights and all you’ve been doing is the bowflex your muscles are going to screem “WHAT THE HELL?!” just due to the fact that you’ll have consistant resistance all the way through the rep. Climbing out of the hole i dug with the bowflex wasn’t fun, but thats another story.
I beg to differ. I consider pushups superior to Bowflex, bench pressing, and about a half dozen of the more popular gym movements. They’re simply tremendous for building shoulders, chest, and even lats, biceps, and abdominals.
But you can’t be a wuss about it. Banging out 40 reps shoulder-width at a .5/0/.5/0 tempo won’t get you anywhere. You must change where the loading occurs, and to what extent.
To do that, start moving hands closer to your midsection, and keep your elbows in during the movement. If you wear socks, you should feel your feet move forward and your bodyweight start to shift to you arms. Eventually (and few people ever reach this point) your feet lift off the ground and the pushup becomes a planche variant. Then you can slowly widen the hand placement and rotate the hands such that your wrists face forward to spice things up further.
Parallettes make things considerably more interesting, but I’ll save that for another post.
Between pushups and a pullup bar, you can have an exceedingly good routine. A basic rack and bar would allow for bent rows and leg exercises. Plenty enough.
DI
If you are building your own equipment remember this:
“When in doubt, make it stout!”
[quote]BrianS wrote:
I actually have the measurements and dimensions of a rack that I used at my gym. I did this so I could fabricate one for myself. My father-in-law is an excellent welder so he will be helping me put it together. When it is done and it looks like I hope it will. I’ll post the details of how it went together.[/quote]
I would love to be able to do this, but unfortunately I don’t have the space at home, as I live in a townhouse. However, when I eventually get to move into a full size house, room for a home gym will definitely be a consideration! Good luck with this and I’m interested to hear how your “gym” ends up.