CrossOver - is it the best of both worlds?
Written: Jun 22 '06
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Combines strength and and elliptical machine in one unit; affordable.
Cons: Some limitation; must change cables and seat often; warranty.
The Bottom Line: For the right person, this is a good choice.
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| jo.com's Full Review: ProForm CrossOver Elliptical Strength Trainer |
First of all this is not the picture. Sorry about that openroad!
You can see this machine at www.proform.com. Click on ellipticals.
At $800 ProForm’s CrossOver Elliptical Strength Trainer seems like a great buy. As far as I know it is the first of its kind by this company. ProForm is made by ICON the company that also makes Reebok and Nordic Track machines.
In one sentence facing forward this machine is an elliptical machine. Turn around, sit down and it is now a strength training machine! Let’s take a look.
Description of the Elliptical Strength Trainer::
The machine is certainly compact. ProForm has essentially taken two machines and combined them into one making it very attractive for those who either want to purchase one unit both for cardio and strength or have limited room.
This machine measures 85 inches high by 37 inches wide by 83 inches deep. It is certainly larger than an elliptical but smaller than many strength trainers. The maximum user weight is 250 pounds which is not a lot. This will limit some users and tells me that it isn’t designed for the body builder.
I don’t consider this a portable machine. It does have wheels though so when tilted it can be moved. Please just plan on putting this somewhere and using it rather than thinking of buying it with the intention of hiding it when you have company. It weighs 275 pounds.
ProForm has a pathetic 90-day warranty on this machine. Give some complaints about ICON’s customer service (Though I have never had a problem with them and I know many people who haven’t) if there is an optional extended warranty where you buy it from I would take advantage of that.
It requires two people to assemble this machine.
Let’s use it as an elliptical machine:
I really find elliptical machines effective. They are one of my favorite cardio-vascular workouts. I also like to be comfortable on an elliptical. It is quite easy, depending on the design, not to be comfortable! ProForm’s Elliptical part of this machine isn’t as comfortable as I would have liked. For one thing because of the design there are no handles on the sides. All this has are two small handles which were at the height of my chest (I’m close to 5’ 5”.) The pro to this is it forced me to stand up straight which is the correct posture. The negative is that I found it to strain my back a little. These handles have built in heart rate sensors so my heart rate showed up on the console in front of me while on the elliptical.
A positive is that it is easy to get on. Some elliptical machines make it a bit scary to try to reach my legs in, get on and start the machine. The CrossOver’s pedals are close to the ground making it easy for those people who don’t like the height of many pedals to use this machine. The pedals have nice treads on them, a lip to keep my feet from going forward. However they are narrower than other pedals I’ve used but adequate.
Like other ProForm machines this one has what they call silent magnetic resistance. This does make the “ride” smooth and quiet.
In order to use the elliptical I had to move the seat that is part of the strength trainer. This wasn’t difficult but it is certainly less convenient than just hopping off an elliptical machine and moving to a strength trainer. Many will find that moving the pieces around is more work than they bargained for. However remember the price of this and if you can get used to it you can get a decent workout.
The machine has to "collapse" to become a strength trainer and then "uncollapse" to become a treadmill. To use the elliptical I had to turn a knob to loosen the seat. I then pulled the seat away from the upright base. I then tightened the knob into the seat base. To collapse it I did the same thing in reverse.
The ramp is fixed on the elliptical machine. I could change resistances but I couldn’t change the height of the ramp.
The Strength Trainer:
I found the seat and back rest comfortable. This back rest was facing me when I was on the elliptical.
You will have to learn how to use this machine. There are lots of aspects of it that I am just touching on. It isn’t hard to figure out but there are many options which I will get to when I talk about the console.
I found arms above me with a high pulley cables; middle and low pulley cables. There are two padded rollers on the leg developer which allowed me to do leg extensions.
You’ll get two handles and an ankle strap. One major pain (after collapsing the machine) in the neck is setting up the trainer after using the elliptical. For example when I wanted to use the high pulley I had to attach the short cable to a rope with a cable clip. When I wasn’t using the short cables I could store them in a bracket on the back. Most machines you will find there will be some switching of attachments. I just found this one to take longer than most.
This process was the same for the middle and low pulley. The handles and ankle strap could be put wherever I wanted.
Another “process” was using the leg developer. I love to work my legs so having this ability was nice. However this machine has to be collapsed (another process) in order to use the leg developer. . Remember that the pedals are in the middle of the machine so in order to have access to the seat as a Strength Trainer I needed to have the seat against the back of the machine making the pedals go on the outside of the machine rather than on the inside.
We are told that we can do over 65 strength and cardio exercises. Some of the strength training I did other than leg extensions include flyes (chest/pectoral muscles using the handles on the middle pulley); low rows (back/lat muscles using the same attachments as for the flyes); lat pull downs (back) using the upper pulley and the handles; tricep kickbacks (the upper back of the arm) using the same handles and pulley as for pull downs and bicep curls using handles attached to the low pulley.
The strength trainer gave me 240 pounds of resistance which I’ll explain below.
The console:
The console was a bit intimidating even for me. It is broke up into 3 sections: elliptical training, crossover training and strength training. I will just go over this briefly. The elliptical training showed me my time, calories, pulse and resistance level. There were plus and minus buttons to change the resistance level at any time. I had 6 programs from which to choose. For example I pressed the elliptical training program button. When I selected that the name of the program showed in the crossover training section. The elliptical training display showed me how long the program would last. One I chose was level 1 Climb.
The crossover training gave me ten crossover training programs. Each crossover training program gave me elliptical exercises with strength training exercises. It showed me time and then a readout with three boxes showing elliptical, crossover and strength. In the middle of this display was a box that showed me the exercise I chose to do.
The strength training section, which gave me 6 programs as well, had a box for the exercise, resistance levels – this is where I could plug in how much weight I wanted, a box showing sets and a box showing repetitions.
The console gave me two abdominal and back strength training
programs, two upper body programs, and two lower body programs. When I was using the strength training and crossover training programs, a resistance setting is programmed for each strength exercise. When I changed the resistance setting, the console remembered my setting for the next time I used the machine. (It gave me 3 users so I could be user 1, 2 or 3.
When I wanted to select one of the crossover programs, let’s say crossover program 1, the number of the program (1) showed in the display. The total time was displayed but I could stop it any time I wanted. When it began I saw the word elliptical with a time period of 3 or 4 minutes. When my time was up the name of the first strength exercise I would do with a time period of 2 minutes showed. I then collapsed the seat base and did as many reps as I could in that time period. I could change the resistance from 20 pounds to 120 if I wanted. Then the word elliptical appeared, etc. This is the crossover option.
For strength training I used the plus and minus buttons to select my resistance. It changes by one pound but if I held it down it changed quickly. This operation was a bit noisy. I put in the number of sets I wanted (3) and repetitions (12). When I began the total time shows. Let’s say I chose chest presses. As I did them the console counted down the number of sets and reps that I did.
Jo’s thoughts:
The CrossOver is a relatively complicated machine with some technology that will make ICON dislikers shiver in their boots especially if you don’t get an extended warranty. However I liked it. This is not a machine I would want to use in a gym but for home use it combines the best of both worlds. Granted it doesn’t give you the kind of strength training you will get in other machines such as a real lat tower but for those just starting out who are not technologically challenged or at least can follow instructions this is a good choice. You can’t beat the price. So many people ask me what machines to buy and for the right person this is the right machine.
If you are a person just starting out who won't mind changing cables and the seat, this makes a great buy or gift for someone who meets that description. It's not perfect, for sure, but a recommend from me.
I enjoyed using it once I figured out the console. I really only touched some of what this machine can do in this review but I hope I’ve given you enough information to make an informed decision. Please feel free to leave me a question or comment.
All my fitness equipment reviews can be found here.
Recommended:
Yes
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