Bowflex question

[guids]

This is exactly why the bowflex is worse than freewieghts, you dont want your range of motion to be steady, you want to have to use the stabalizer muscles. I sometimes do bench presses, and military lifts sitting/laying on an exercise ball so I have to steady the weight myself. I once posted on a message board that had some dude doing squats standing on a ball, but that was just retarded.

[Blarg]

What both guids and EricW said.

[lozen]

Some of the newer bowflexes look pretty sweet

[benfranklin]

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What both guids and EricW said.

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Ditto. Using free weights, your entire body has to cooperate in a natural process using all of your muscles and total body balance. Using any machine, it is possible, and often easy, to use isolated muscles in an unnatural manner.

Just envision yourself doing each thing. Standing up and lifting an object is natural, and your entire body moves in balance to make it easier. Sitting on a bench and pulling on a cable is not natural. You instinctively try to immobilize all of the rest of your body while you strain to pull that cable.