Elliptical, Exercise & Fitness Articles

The Treadmill Sensei fears fads in just about all forms. The thought of fads brings up memories of bad perm-afros in the late 70s (I don’t know why my parents let me get one because it is not a good look for a Japanese man), pet screws, parachute pants (see the above remark about not knowing why I was allowed to get them) and Billy Ray Cyrus. That brings up the latest fad in the fitness industry, home ellipticals with inclines. Up until now home incline ellipticals have been truly frightening and of exceptionally poor quality thanks to the fine folks at Icon Fitness. Thankfully, Horizon Fitness out of Wisconsin has decided to get in on the action and has produced a very solid incline elliptical in their Horizon EX76 elliptical.
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One method fitness manufacturers use to confuse consumers is by classifying a machine as “light commercial” or “commercial,” making buyers think they are getting a heavier duty machine because of this classifications or “grade.” To tell the truth there is no actual difference between a home unit and a commercial unit.
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The 2007/2008 Horizon Fitness ellipticals and treadmills have arrived! Well, they actually arrived about 10 days ago on a truck but this is my first real chance to get to talk about them. Back when the Treadmill Sensei heard the new units were out a month or so ago, I decided I needed to order up a few units to check out and review. So, 2 weeks and $3000 later, we’ve got in a couple of their new ellipticals and treadmills to check out and review.
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The Treadmill Sensei is glad the Gods of heat have heard his pleas because it finally cooled down yesterday. That makes me very happy because the electric bill here at the DOJO should go back down now that we can turn the air conditioner off. It also means that Hikaru won’t be sweating nearly as much as he was, which is good for every at the repair shop.

Every year there is one consistant thing we can all be assured will take place in September. The event is as reliable as the changing of the seasons: Horizon Fitness updates and renames their equipment. This sort of thing normally annoys me a bit even if Horizon always puts out some quality treadmills and ellipticals. It annoys me because most of the time Horizon is just re-releasing the same equipment with a new paint job and some minor tweaks. This year, aside from the Horizon EX56 elliptical I’m reviewing today, it looks like they’ve gone with some major and very exciting changes. I look forward to being able to share those changes with you, my loyal readers, over the next week.

But first, let’s talk about the new Horizon EX56 Elliptical. Not having heard anything from the folks at Horizon for 6 months or more (I guess they don’t like the Sensei), I was very surprised when we received the call to do an inside delivery and set up on a Horizon EX56 Elliptical. I had to check the paperwork twice and call the company who was having us do the installation because I was convinced there was a typo. Not only was I unaware about what the new units were but I had no clue they were already out and available to the public! Like Uncle Chris teases me, I guess that’s why I’m not the Elliptical Sensei!

The Horizon EX56 is the updated version of the Horizon EX55 (and the old Horizon EX22). It uses the same frame that has been perfected by Horizon over the past 3 years or so, a frame which is incredibly sturdy especially considering the under $600 price of the elliptical.

It also has the same 18″ stride, 8 programs, 8 resistance levels, 14.3 pound flywheel (huge for the price) and heart rate monitoring of the previous units. The changes come in their updated articulating foot pedals, which are great to see on an under $600 elliptical. Combined with the sturdy frame and the 18″ stride, the Horizon EX56 we received here at the shop felt a lot more like a $1000 elliptical than one with a budget price.

The only other major change is in the console on the EX56 elliptical. They’ve put on an upgraded and much more powerful console with a better look. While it has the same number of programs as the old EX55, it’s got much more reliable electronics inside and should last a lot longer with little to no maintenance.

I was able to work out on the Horizon EX56 elliptical here at the shop for about 4 days — not as long as I would have liked, but it held up very well. We didn’t tell the owner, but Hikaur gave it a 3 hour work out and it held up even in spite of him being 50 pounds or more over its suggested maximum user weight…something I wouldn’t suggest you doing at home. The listed 250 pound limit is probably about right for any sort of regular or heavy duty use.

This year, the Horizon EX56 elliptical continues Horizon’s streak of producing best buy ellipticals under $600 and ellipticals for people wanting a great workout on a budget. For keeping the best parts and adding on some great new ones, the Treadmill Sensei gives the Horizon EX56 Elliptical 4.5 out of 5 golden buddahs.

An upgraded unit gets an updated 4.5 golden buddahs.

 

**UPDATE** The Horizon EX56 is no longer available for sale, so if you’re interested in a Horizon Fitness elliptical machine you can visit the official Horizon Fitness site and get free shipping on new models or glance at some of the older models still for sale here.

Horizon EX56 Elliptical Specifications
Stride: 18″
Flywheel: 14.3lbs
Display: LCD
Programs: 8
Resistance: 8 Levels
Heart Rate Monitor: Yes
Heart Rate Control: No
Max User Weight: 250lbs
Unit Weight: 125lbs
Price: Under $600

Ohiyo!

The biggest dissapointment for the Treadmill Sensei this year is a company which built a great reputation in the past, but has decided to cut corners and drop quality this year in hopes of being able to save costs by exploiting that reputation. The company in question is Spirit Fitness and their 2007/2008 line of treadmills and ellipticals. I think they’ve decided to cut costs and quality and are praying customers don’t notice before buying some substandard equipment.

Note: The Spirit XE300 is an older model that has since been discontinued. If you’re looking at current options, you can check out our latest Spirit elliptical reviews here.

All I can say about Spirit’s new X-Series line of ellipticals is that I am very confused. For some reason, instead of sticking with tried and true units that were perfected by Sole on their E35, E55 and E95 over the past few years, Spirit has decided the best way to break out from the shadow of Sole by creating an entire line of ellipticals based on the architecture of the shorter profile Spirit XE125 Elliptical. Unfortunately for buyers, the XE125 was recalled this past year due to manufacturing defects and some pretty major problems…and somehow Spirit has gotten the idea to use that design for all their new equipment. This has to get the award for ‘single dumbest idea of the year.” Instead of changing their equipment up Spirit should have instead worked on improving its customer service and quality control process because those were their biggest problems this past year.

As with the rest of their new X models, I was able to get some time on the Spirit XE300 Elliptical this past August, 2007, at the Health & Fitness Expo in Denver. What I saw was a huge disappointment. The XE300 is a perfect example of an elliptical that “looks good on paper” but doesn’t perform up to its specs. I believe Spirit intended for the XE300 to be a replacement for its older Spirit XE550 elliptical, which was based on the incredible Sole E95, but they failed horribly.

What was once a long, elegant and sturdy elliptical has been replaced by a shorter profile frame with a much lighter, flimsier feel to it. Getting on to the Spirit XE300 gave me the impression of standing on a sub-$1000 elliptical. The supposed 20″ stride felt more like an 18.5″ stride to me, and the plastic flywheel didn’t have the smooth start up and slow down of the old XE550 flywheel. Why Spirit has insisted on remaining with a plastic flywheel when metal is the industry standard at this price point is as baffling as their choice of basing the unit on that of a recalled elliptical instead of sticking with the award-winning frame of year’s past. I am still unsure of how the light weight plastic flywheel can be called “30 pounds” when it probably weighs closer to 16 or so pounds in reality.

In my opinion, it looks like Spirit is trying to fool its buyers in to thinking they have a more stable unit by placing a lightweight plastic guide rail shroud on the back of the unit. It is a pity the shroud does absolutely nothing for the Spirit XE300. The plastic on it is much too thin too put any weight on, it doesn’t add any sort of stability to the machine and seems to be a completely cosmetic feature to try and make the XE300 look like more of an upgrade to the Spirit XE200 elliptical which is $300 cheaper.

I was also very disappointed to see a low number of programs on the Spirit XE300…for a near $1700 price I would like to have seen 10 programs or more. On the plus side, the XE300 does have 20 levels of resistance, the very comfortable Spirit/Sole pedals and an upgraded parts warranty of 10 years. The drop in labor warranty down to 1 year is also a huge error in judgment for Spirit. Cutting your labor warranty in half shows a lack of faith in long term performance of the new Spirit equipment. Hopefully, they’ll get wise and raise the warranty back up to where it should be…otherwise, expect to pay a lot for service in 18 months or so when you begin to have problems with that plastic flywheel or shroud.

Overall, the Spirit XE300 is over-priced and under-performing for a $1699 elliptical. For having too much plastic and cutting too many corners, the Treadmill Sensei gives the Spirit XE300 Elliptical 2.5 out of 5 golden buddahs.

-The Treadmill Sensei

The Treadmill Sensei has been very impressed with Lamar Fitness over the past few months. When they first popped on the fitness scene in the early 2000s they produced some fairly forgetful equipment. However, since that time they’ve spend the last 5-6 years slowing improving their quality, their design and their manufacturing to the point where they are no producing some of the best budget and mid range ellipticals and treadmills. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get any of their sales people to talk to me at the fitness expo in Denver this past August, 2007, so my information is limited to the units that either come through the DOJO for setup or repair, or from units we purchase to review. The Lamar Ignite 841 Elliptical is one of those I was so excited about that we went out and bought one to review a couple of months ago (along with the Ignite 821).
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Ohiyo!

The Treadmill Sensei has mentioned a few times about how he attended the Health & Fitness Business Expo in Denver this past August 2007. Going to these shows helps me get on equipment that I haven’t had a chance to look at back at the DOJO, and I get to test out and review a lot more treadmills and elliptical for you, my loyal readers. One of the exhibits I was able to visit and spend quite a bit of time with was the one belonging to Spirit Fitness. I was anxious to see Spirit’s new X series of treadmills and ellipticals as well as their “budget line” which they call Esprit.

Note: The Spirit XE100 is an older model that has since been discontinued. If you’re looking at current options, you can check out our latest Spirit elliptical reviews here.

As I entered Spirit’s booth at the Denver trade show this year, I was a little worried when I saw what was being called the Spirit XE100 Elliptical because of how many problems their Spirit XE125 had last year…to the point of it even having to be recalled back to the manufacturing plant in China due to issues with the entire line. Thankfully, based on what I saw the new unit looks to be more than just a repackaged and repainted version of that recalled unit.

Let’s start with the “upgrades” on the new XE100 elliptical over the problem elliptical of last year. First off, the specs list the unit as having a 20 inch stride. As I mentioned in my review of the Spirit XE200 elliptical, if I had gotten on the unit with no prewarning of a long stride, I would have guessed the stride to be at 18.5 or so inches in length and not the 20 inches listed. This could just be an issue with the elliptical motion due to the shorter frame.

From there the number of resistance levels have been upped from 16 to 20. This is a nice upgrade to get for those of you who like to tweak your workout more — it doesn’t increase the amount of resistance on the machine, it is just increasing the increments you can tweak your workouts by.

The next upgrade seems to be the newly adjustable pedals on the Spirit XE100. Believe it or not, I really like this feature. Having the ability to further customize your workout and make it more comfortable is a great feature. Cudos to Spirit on this one.

The final “upgrade” if you can call it that is a $100 increase in pricing over the XE125. The street price on the Spirit XE100 is going to be about $1099, which is about $100 more than it should be. Spirit should have taken a cue from Sole on its E25 elliptical unit (almost identical with a 20″ stride but without the problems of the XE125). At $999 it would have been a unit to take a look at, but with a price tag of basically $1100 it is most definitely a “pass” in my book.

The last thing I want to mention is the flywheel on the Spirit XE100 elliptical. This is a similar, but smaller, version of the plastic flywheels in the larger Spirit Ellipticals. I’m not exactly sure where Spirit gets its 30 pound weight for the thing but my guess is that they are weighing the entire front drive assembly instead of just the plastic flywheel. If I were to guess a weight on the XE100’s flywheel I would say 10-12 pounds at the max. If I can find an exact weight I will post it here, but I can’t imagine the plastic to weigh much more than that on the XE100 elliptical trainer.

To be honest, the Spirit XE100 isn’t a terrible elliptical, I think it is just a bit overpriced at $1099. If it were priced at under $1000 it would be a very nice budget elliptical. I will post updates as I hear from readers who have purchased the Spirit XE100 elliptical.

For not being a terrible elliptical, the Treadmill Sensei gives the Spirit XE100 Elliptical 2.5 out of 5 Golden Buddahs.

Ohiyo!

The Treadmill Sensei has contacts and spies every where in the fitness industry. I get emails and calls from service techs working at various manufacturers, emails from other fitness writers and lots of emails from retailers and independent repair techs. One of the benefits of those contacts, aside from aiding me in benevolent world domination, is that I am able to get my hands on all sorts of equipment to try out and test. One of my minions came through for me superbly by rounding up a number of SportsArt treadmills and ellipticals from a very kind dealer out in Arizona. The only requirement was that I go out to meet the store owner in person and pick the units up. So, after a “quick” 7 hour drive out, we were able to pick up 4 SportsArt floor models for testing and review over the course of 2 weeks. The units had to be returned once we were finished and they couldn’t be damaged. Thankfully, SportsArt makes their equipment solid enough to endure 2 trips in a freight truck between states.

The first piece off the truck was the SportsArt E80…ok, it may not have been the first one off of the truck but, as the lightest of the line, I wanted to review it first. I don’t really know which unit came off the truck first because I made the younger Senseis unload it because I’m old and broken…and they are young and in need of getting broken.

The E80 was fully assembled so Hikaru and I did a quick breakdown of the machine. I passed assembly along to Mat to watch how someone of average mechanical ability handled putting the unit back together using the instructions. Re-Assembly went off without any major hitches and Mat had the thing back together in about 45 minutes with a little help. SportsArt did an excellent job with its instructions and putting an E80 elliptical together should be around an hour job for most people.

Once it was all back together, Hikaur, Mat and I took turns with 1 hour workouts each over the next 10 days. We all found the unit to be very solid and incredibly well constructed. In addition to a heavy duty frame, the SportsArt E80 elliptical also uses bearings in all of its joints and pivot points. Using steel bearings instead of cheaper, flimsier bushings (made of brass a lot of time) allows for much smoother and quieter workouts as well as extends the lifespan of the elliptical. Plus, you’ll have a much lower maintenance rate.

The thing about the SportsArt E80 elliptical that blew us all away was its “random” workout mode. The version in the E80 literally allows for thousands of possibilities in workout variety. Why this is good is because your muscles do become used to repitition in workout and using the same program over and over because less effective over time. If you step on the SportsArt E80 and hit “Random” every time, you’ll never have the same workout twice. Also, and this isn’t health related, having the ability to change up your workout is a great way to avoid boredome.

The only real downside any of us could find was in the lower number of resistance levels (16 would have allowed for a bit more workout control versus the 10 the E80 comes with) and the non-articulating footpedals. While the footpedals didn’t articulate with the elliptical’s motion, they were still comfortable enough for 30-45 minute workouts. Just make sure to vary your foot position while you are on it.

The best way to describe the SportsArt E80 Elliptical is as the fitness equivilent to a beginner’s Lexus or Mercedes. You get the finest design, components and manufacturing but you lose a few of the bells and whistles in exchange for an affordable price. You’ll notice an almost immediate different in smoothness, comfort and natural motion when you get on a SportsArt trainer versus an elliptical from any other home unit out there. The difference in quality is amazing. Even without the “bells and whistles,” the SportsArt E80 elliptical is a commercial quality unit for a very reasonable budget price.

While the SportsArt E80 is a very solid elliptical made up of high quality components, I would actually suggest upgrading to the E81 Elliptical for another $300. With that you get extra cushioning in your footpedals, additional programs including heart rate control options, as well as some additional feedback options. Even if you stick with it, the SportsArt E80 is an excellent introduction into the world of higher end fitness equipment.

For being SportsArt’s version of a “starter Lexus,” the Treadmill Sensei gives the SportsArt E80 4 out of 5 golden buddahs.

Another great quality unit from SportsArt, the SportsArt E80 Elliptical comes away with 4 gold buddahs.

SportsArt E80 Elliptical Specifications
Stride: 19″
Flywheel: approximately 22lbs
Display: LCD
Readouts: Workout level, strides per minute, time and calories
Programs: 5
Resistance: 10 levels
Heart Rate Monitor: No
Heart Rate Control: No
Max User Weight: 300lbs
Unit Weight: 165lbs
Price: Under $1500

-The Treadmill Sensei

The Treadmill Sensei loves new and high tech gadgets. I’m a sucker for them. Here at the DOJO my office is covered in the things. Anything that is cool and unusual seems to wind up on my shelves or cluttering my desk. I especially love it when fitness manufacturers come out with some spiffy new technology or do something creative with a standard unit. Sometimes they work and sometimes they don’t,

The LifeCore LC21 Elliptical is a prime example of a company that went out of its way to be cutting edge and experimental, but who also failed to achieve what they had intended. The idea of using a smaller, secondary flywheel mounted on the larger flywheel in order to get a longer stride on a small unit is a good one. Unfortunately, the feel when you get on the LifeCore LC-21 just isn’t quite…right. Some just feels off about it. The elliptical motion isn’t as flattened or as smooth as it should be. I wouldn’t compare it the feel to that of a stepper but I will say that it isn’t as natural as a standard elliptical.
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I was looking at a few ellipticals the other day, and I was reminded of an oldie and goody I found in Spirit. Spirit has always had good prices, but there products have improved. While their prices have stayed fairly static, and in the fitness industry this is darn near unheard of (and impossible)! In a sea of products, some old, and some new we find that certain models are always a favorite. The XE200 is one of mine!

The reason I like the XE200 is that the price point is not scary to tell, write or read about when looking to buying new equipment. Read More