It is not necessarily working the lats any better.
But what it does is work the lats without involving the weaker muscles of the biceps and forearms.
Whether this provides better results is open to question.
It is certainly not an essential movement , especially for people who find it difficult to perform in a manner to maximise results on it (that of course can apply to anybody for any particular movement, so I am not saying this in a critical sense of yourself or anybody else)
But it can be a useful tool for many , and for me that is its use. No more and no less.
I remember when I first saw one of those machines I thought it would be the ultimate spinach for lat work but then it gets discontinued? Itās interesting how many what I thought would be great machines got discontinued. I keep hearing it was all about sales but I wonder? I donāt know if youāve seen my thread on the compound bicep but Hutchins did a good write up on the compound bicep. I wish heād do one on the BNTA!!
Scott
Well I got the other book of Hutchins , Evaluations of Arthur Jones Contributions to Exercise . Maybe Iām wasting my breath on here talking about Jones or Nautilus as I donāt think many on here give a fig about Nautilus but this book is interesting . Hutchins critiques many Nautilus machines and the way Arthur Jones did things , etc etc . I found his 1ā10 rating of Nautilus machines very interesting. Some favorites of many people get a 0 rating due to safety and other concerns.
Scott
Is it worth the $30? Ive never been a big fan. Always felt he just stole Jonesā ideas based on his inside knowledge and just rebranded/remarketed them. Living off the coattails imo
Is it worth it? I guess it depends how deep your pockets are and how much you care about the Nautilus years. For me it was a huge expense but it had some stuff in it I really wanted to hear. Itās not Jones friendly but I always like to hear both sides of a story. I never put Jones on a throne like many have including Hutchins himself so hearing negative stuff about Jones is no problem for me. I knew from the first time I visited Nautilus in the early 70s that there was a lot of BS going on.
I think one of my biggest problems with this or any other book about Jones is that itās easy to look back now and say he was wrong about this or that when it was a time of great experimentation and there was no clear answer to a lot of the stuff involved. Sure, Jones was wrong about a lot of stuff but so was Hutchins and many others . Itās easy to dwell on the negative , the eccentric, ha ha ,and much harder to be objective.
I think the bottom line me for me is that Hutchins is one of the few remaining so called old guard members that is still alive and talking that I know of. Right or wrong I want to hear what he has to say!!
Scott
I wonder if anyone has tried to make a copy of the Big Blue Machine, the first Nautilus machine ? Wouldnāt that be a cool centerpiece for a Nautilus museum!!
Scott
A while ago I posted on here that Ken Hutchins had released several books that I found very interesting where he critiques many things about Arthur Jones and his Nautilus machines. As I got very little response to my posts Iām wondering if this is the wrong place to discuss Jones and Nautilus or if people in general just donāt care about that anymore? Iāve posted similar writings on other HIT internet sites that feature Nautilus with the same poor response. With the exception of a hand full of us Nautilus nuts who still obsess over the machines, Is Nautilus pretty much dead ?
Thanks
Scott
Itās not the wrong place to discuss Nautilus and Jones. Thereās a nautilus ab crunch at my gym and itās my favorite ab machine there, but there are just a million other machines nowadays, and besides the āNautilus nutsā, as you say, most people I know like a general mix of machines and donāt find Nautilus machines to be anything particularly special.
I have some hammer strength machines that are my favorite, some cybex machines, some hoist machines that are really cool, the strive machines that we discussed earlier - so much to choose from. So, are Nautilus machines ādeadā? No, but theyāre just another machine brand to the vast majority of gym-goers, and thatās pretty how much I feel about them too.
I donāt think people generally discount Nautilus as being ādeadā or anything,ā¦ they were good machines,ā¦ BUT, they werenāt the be all end all, they were damn expensive, and most people (top level competitors and world class athletes) did just fine without them. Eventually people started viewing them as a gimmick, when indeed they were just decent tools that you could choose to use, or not use.
Way back when, I read every book I could get my hands on, and for a while I too fell into the āI must be doing too much because I donāt look like Arnold yetā trap. In hindsight, I wasted years obsessing over not over-training, when I should have been addressing other elements and variables instead. In that regard, I know Iām not alone.
I think the Nautilus you and I like is far from dead. Its definitely got a niche carved out. I received my copy of Super Slow from Hutchins today and will start reading it tomorrow. Had a great workout on my vintage Nautilus circuit today. To me, still the best ever made
If Iām honest, I flat out have no clue who makes any of the machines at my gym. I know which ones I like, and which ones Iāll never touch again. I couldnāt have much of a sensible conversation about them because I donāt even know who makes the machine. Best I could tell you is that theyāre grey and black and that (for example), the decline press gives me an awesome pec contraction but the incline press feels like its been designed by a reconstructive surgeon looking for repeat business.
Every incline machine seems to require an unnatural movement. I have yet to use an incline machine that felt nearly as good as free weights (best) or a Smith Machine, especially one tilted a few degrees so the press moves further behind where it started.
Like I said thereās a hand full of us who are obsessed with Nautilus but generally I think Nautilus has been forgotten. Heck it wasnāt that long ago , or maybe it was, ha ha, if I had said the Duo Squat got rated a 0 there would have been an uproar! Not today, only one person , you, seemed to care .
I agree with you! Iād like to hear more about those other elements you should have been concerned with instead of what Jones Lead you to focus on.
Scott