Is orange theory good enough for toning and maintaining strength

Any program with some resistance training and cardio involved works. It's DEPENDENT on you. You can have the best program out there but if you can't perform it correctly or have no real desire to, it's NOT the right program.
Orange Theory is just a knock off of a good circuit training program, Crossfit, etc. under a different name.

A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

Just rowing, properly done, will go some way towards being able to "maintain toned muscle and an acceptable level of strength as I get older", but it's a good thing that OT adds other exercises because rowing by itself is unbalanced (all lower body push and upper body pull), and that imbalance can increase injury risk over time.

Whether OT will do this "without getting or staying too bulky" depends partly on individual factors like what you personally mean by "bulky" and what your genetics mean for your response to (adequate) stimulus. (Niner already spoke to the question of OT being adequate stimulus.)

I feel extremely, extremely skeptical about what OT's publicity (and at least some of their trainers) say about calorie burn (in various respects). Also, if the goal were well-rounded fitness or sports performance, I think they're encouraging more intensity more often (if done daily) than may yield best results - it certainly doesn't match up with standard performance coaching advice I've received. If all you care about is appearance and maybe some strength, that may not matter to you, though.

ETA: Out of curiosity, I just looked up how they do HR ranges. The max is estimated with the Tanaka formula, reportedly. If so, one's minimum "orange" HR is ((208 - (0.7 x age)) x 0.84) . . . which may not be all that intense. Reportedly, they use that for the 1st 20 visits, then a proprietary formula. So, this may or may not be too much intensity for fitness/performance. If that's actually how they do it, their starting 84% for me would be about 65% of my heart rate reserve based on a tested max, so not very intense at all - able to converse, even sing a bit.

sgt1372 wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

Just rowing, properly done, will go some way towards being able to "maintain toned muscle and an acceptable level of strength as I get older", but it's a good thing that OT adds other exercises because rowing by itself is unbalanced (all lower body push and upper body pull), and that imbalance can increase injury risk over time.

I agree that rowing alone (which is all that I am currently doing is sufficient to maintain a toned/muscular body w/a sufficient level of strength BUT disagree that rowing alone will result in a musclar imbalance that can increase the risk of injury over time.

Of course, it's better to vary your work out as much as you can but if you look at any dedicated rower (indoors or on water), you'd find it hard to find anyone w/any obvious physical deficiencies or any extraordinary injuries not found in any other athelte.

But that was not the issue raised by the OP, wc was can OT help him/her "maintain toned muscle and an acceptable level of strength as [he or she] gets older without getting or staying too bulky."

The answer is YES provided you can afford it (it's expensive) and like the program wc is not my particular cup of tea.

Most serious rowers cross-train. For sure, the elite ones lift. There are injuries common among rowers that are higher probability in this sport vs. some others. (Rib injuries, especially stress fractures, and various shoulder injuries are relatively common, for example.) Imbalance is one contributor. Cross-training in an overall program is one thing used to combat those injuries, especially off-season for on-water rowers. This is motherhood & apple pie stuff in coaching education.

But you're right, OP didn't ask about it, and *probably* doesn't need to worry about it.