BowFlex Home Gym Workout Systems

I received the product in a timely manner. The delivery people were very thorough and professional in making contact and ensuring it was delivered at a time when I was available. I've been studying different home gyms for about two months before deciding on this one. A couple factors I used was space, simplicity of use, durability, and how much of the body can be worked out effectively. I have been in fitness since the age of 16. I'm 45 now. So while I am not an official expert I have a lot of practical knowledge from reading, experience, and listening to others who know more than I do.Assembly was pretty straight forward. The gym comes in several large pieces and the manual was easy to follow for assembly. The manual suggests using two adjustable wrenches to attach the bolts and nuts. And while that will certainly work I think its better to use a socket and a combination wrench of the correct size. You don't need many. Two maybe three different sized. Can't remember specifically. Its just with using a combination wrench the possibility of it sliding off and slightly stripping the corners is a possibility. I put it together by myself with occasional assistance from my 9 year old (holding something while screwing it in) in about two and a half hours. The instructions are illustrated so you can see what goes where. The only thing i would add is a real size chart for the bolts because it is easy to get a couple of them mixed up. I would suggest reading the length of the bolt used and measuring it with a tape measure to ensure you have the right one. There are two sets of bolts that are very close in length and its easy to get them switched. Assembling the cables can be a little confusing especially since the directions let you figure out that there is a floating pulley. It shows the routing of the cable in a picture that is easy to understand and the pulleys themselves are numbered so you know you get the right order. Its really done well. Other than these few minor improvements that can be made, I was quite pleased.The users manual is what I think is the gem of this package. Someone put a lot of thought into this. If you are an experienced gym rat who lifts for years then just figure out the exercises and do your thing. But say you have never really worked out much in your life, it has really well thought out fitness plans for you to follow that are great and will help you meet your goals. Follow them. You don't need to reinvent the wheel.Now in order to be happy with your purchase and get people to not purchase something they don't need I must explain what this gym isn't. If you are a professional body builder or an extreme fitness person, this really isn't the product for you. On Day one without having lifted in six years, I put on every single band of resistance it had and I pushed it out with ease on the bench press. Obviously I will need to purchase the additional bands to meet my fitness goal. Most men looking to build mass will be better served with free weights. Free weights are better....but they take up a lot of space. Free weights build secondary stabilizer muscles that track workouts don't. And that is ok. That doesn't make this unit bad. I'm just pointing out what it isn't. This unit is for every day people who want to be fit from some light resistance training. Most people are not hard core fitness people or professional body builders. This gym is for you. Now there is another bowflex product similar to this one but this one is superior for one major reason. You don't have to switch out the cables when you change exercises. When doing stamina strength training, rest periods become crucial between sets. You want to keep your heart rate up and you don't want to be taking time switching cables out and cooling off. I super set and I kill it. Less than 15 seconds between sets.So to summarize, great product, easy to assemble, will work for the majority of people's fitness goals, manuals are wonderfully thought out. I would buy this gym again. I am completely satisfied. Even though its not as effective as free weights, you don't need to devote an entire room to the unit. It fits in a 4 x 6 space and 8 foot ceiling. If you are a man and want to do a little mass training, you will need to include the extra resistance package unless you just want to do 25 reps per set and burn out. Its not enough weight for larger men.

After looking at several different Bowflex models, I bought this one. I was unimpressed with the PR1000 because it could not accommodate as many exercises as the Blaze. Other models (like the PR1000) did not have a horizontal bench. The Blaze is more expensive than the PR1000 - when following it for a while, the price usually was around $840; I got it when it briefly decreased to $650. But because I was spending $70 per month for a gym membership, once I received the Blaze, I cancelled my gym membership - so the Bowflex will pay for itself after a year of not having to pay a monthly gym membership.When I ordered the Blaze, I was instructed to select a delivery date and time; the earliest date was about 10 days after my date of order. The deliveryman took it into my home and was on time. Because the it comes unassembled, I took individual parts downstairs to my basement without difficulty (rather than moving the whole heavy box). My friend helped me assemble the Blaze. We did this leisurely over two hours or so while watching a movie on my TV. I could have done it myself in about the same time. Assembly was easy; the instructions were very clear. It only involved the use of allen wrenches (included) and a screwdriver.I also bought a mat for the Blaze at the time that I ordered the Blaze. It was difficult to find a well-rated mat that is as long to accommodate the bench. But I wanted to have the mat protect the carpet that my Blaze sits on. I ultimately found this one that is the right size and works fine:http://amzn.to/Q7r3J7I've been using the Blaze about every other day for 2-3 weeks now. I do about a 20-minute routine of upper and lower body exercises. The equipment itself seems very strong and durable. Most everything seems to be made of metal rather than plastic. I find the bench, handgrips, and leg pads to be comfortable. Some may not be as familiar with the resistance weights of Bowflex - rather than using weights, the metal rods are pulled by you, whereby the higher "weight" rods are really just heavier and thus provider more resistance that simulates more weight. I find it gives a great weight workout. The Blaze comes with an instruction booklet that contains many exercises (with pictures) to show many workout possibilities for the legs, arms, back, triceps, etc. Others can be found online by searching for Bowflex exercises.One disadvantage of the Blaze (and other Bowflex models) is that when you want to move on from one workout exercise (e.g., biceps curl) to another exercise (e.g., triceps pull down), you have to remove the metal clip at the end of one pulley and attach it to the carabiner/clip of another pulley. I find that by ordering your exercises in a logical way, you can minimize this. That is, I do all of my exercises requiring handgrips below, then I do all my exercises that require using the upper handgrps, etc., so to minimize frequent changes in attaching and detaching the equipment. Also, I order this based on weight as well, so I don't constantly have to change from the 50 pound rod to the 30 pound rod, etc. I also minimize changes in equipment structure in that I bought some extra handgrips so I can always keep one set on the bottom carabiners, and another set on the top carabiners. I found these that work well.http://amzn.to/Q7rxySIn theory I like the idea that you can raise the bench and attach it (by screwing in) to the vertical bar, for storage to keep the bench out of the way. But we have young children who sometimes have their friends at our house, so I don't keep the bench up because I'm afraid one of the kids will unscrew the bench and it will come falling down on them.I'm very pleased with this purchase. Actually love it.

Instructions for assembly were relatively easy to follow. It went together without much drama. Some things could be explained better, but should be good enough to get you a fully assembled machine.I went into this knowing the bars aren't "full weight" until fill flexed, but figured it'd be good enough for me for now. I'm not sure of what my actual capacity is with this machine. But what's important is I can get a good solid workout from it that properly stresses my muscles and I have resistance values I can refer to in order to set up my routine.This machine comes with a block that holds the resistance bars with 2 slots empty for an "upgrade". Honestly, for the price, they should just fill this in and stop with the DLC nonsense.Outside of that, I'm enjoying the machine. Yeah, it's expensive. But I looked at the cost of joining a gym in comparison and this is WAY more cost effective, and, at least in the US, I won't have to worry about the long and arduous process of cancelling a gym membership if I decide to change gyms, move, etc.