Anyone use a indoor rower?

Hi there,

I have used indoor rowers and rowed on the Amstel river too, and it is a super cardio workout. I have a recumbent bike at home, but always use the rowing machine at the gym at my work. Just be sure to spend some time on getting the right / correct rowing technique so you don't mess up your back or arms by going full on to start. I don't know of any forums but hope this personal input helps!

Cheers, Christy

I bought my beloved b/f one last year .... Recumbent bike/rower. He absolutely loves it and has lost lbs and gained some sexy muscle ;-)... If I remember it was around $500.... Fold up to save space and has digital screen (calories burned / distance / speed/ resistance) I've tried it and while I worked up quite the sweat I cant personally justify working out while sitting on my bum. I prefer insanity, spinning, p90x.... Good luck in your search hope this helped

I got tired of the usual stuff at the gym you know the elliptical the treadmill and so I decided to try the indoor rowing machine which just sat in a corner collecting dust and OMG I love it ! I looked at many videos for proper form and I can't say enough about how great IR is ! My arms are taking shape and is such a great stress reliever after a long day at work specially if you have a great music playlist I just lose myself ! I also have bad knees from running so IR is better on my knees. Now it seems I started something at the gym bc folks at the gym now use the IR lol I tell you it is awesome !!!!

One of the best investments I ever made was my Concept2, I'm primarily a runner but use it for cross-training.

C2's website has great information for workouts and they run lots of motivational challenges (if the treadmill makers did the same I'm sure there would be a lot fewer of them being used to dry towels.....)

It's like anything else, you get back what you put into it. It does burn fewer calories than running (10K at a moderate pace takes me about 50 min and burns somewhere around 500 cal, running 10K at a moderate pace takes me a little over an hour and burns about 780 cal) but you could row every day if you wanted (no impact) whereas running every day would be ill advised, at least until you were more experienced.

If I was only able to do one thing I probably would opt for the rower in that it gives you a great cardio & full body workout.

I use one at the gym, it's a concept 2. It's a great low impact total body workout. it gets kind of redundant, though. I usually use it for 5-10 minutes as a warm up. It gets ROUGH after a while hahaha

I've used a Concept 2 Model D rower in various gyms over the years and I finally bought one a month ago. I also have a Lemond RevMaster Pro spin bike that I bought years ago. Bought are great pieces of cardio/exercise gear but, between the 2, I prefer the Concept 2 because it gives me a better overall body workout than the spin bike does.

I use a HRM on both machines and I can get a 250-300 cal burn on both in 30 mins but the spin bike only works my legs/hips while the rower works my legs, hips, arms, shoulders and back. However, both machines can literally create a PITA. The bike is less of a problem in this respect than the rower is for me and I'm still trying to find a solution to it.

This is only a problem when I row longer distances which require me to be in the seat for more than 10-15 mins at a time. I usually row 5000m in 26 mins (which is a very slow time BTW) but by the end of that time I am experiencing significant seat discomfort. I've tried a special seat that hasn't really helped and the best solution I've come up w/so far is just to sit on a small foam filled pillow.

Nevertheless, I am totally sold on the Concept 2 rower as a home exercise device. It takes up a lot more room than the spin bike does; you need a space of about 2.5'x9' to place it in. The bike only needs a space of about 3'x4'. Although it is not recommended, you can stand the rower on end or take it apart (in 2 pieces) which you can stick in a corner to save space. Rogue Fitness even makes a wall hanger for it. So, there are ways to make it fit in more confined spaces.

If you buy one, I suggest you buy it from the factory for $900 plus $40 shipping. Amazon charges $945 with "free shipping" which is actually more than the factory charges. Amazon may also charge you sales tax which the factory will not unless you live in VT, where they are located. Concept 2's customer service is excellent and whenever possible I prefer to buy directly from the manufacturer (than a middle man) in case warranty or service issue arise.

You can also buy a variety of accessories for the Concept 2 directly from the factory. The only accessory I recommend is the Garmin ANT+ HRM that's designed to work w/the PM5 monitor that comes w/the current model of the Concept 2. Other ANT+ HRMs are supposed to work w/the PM5 but the integration of other HRMs is not seemless and may or may not work w/the PM5. I bought the Garmin ANT+ HRM w/my Concept 2 rower and it definitely works.

One of the other benefits of buying the Concept 2 is the ability to log your workouts onto a USB flash drive that you can then transfer to an online logbook on Concept 2's website and/or to an speadsheet. There is also a large user community forum that you can join. The Concept 2 Forum is not as active as the MFP Forum and is heavily oriented (IMO) to people interested in rowing competitively or for the fastest times, which is a bit of a turn off to me, but there are parts of the form for "normal" people who are just interested in using the Concept 2 for general health and conditioning purposes.

Bottomline: I highly recommend the Concept 2 rower. It is a very well built and reliable rower that is widely used by individuals and gyms across the country. You really cannot go wrong buying one and, in the event you decide to sell it, there is very high demand for well cared for used models that sell for very high resale prices.

Just adding my voice to the concept 2 rower fans.
I use it as a warm up before lifting and alternate it with swimming for my cardio.

I would love one at home. I could watch movies as I rowed.

Cheers, h.