- You've identified that you're gonna buy some
kind of Concept Two Machine,
most likely 'cause your friends are telling you
or you read it in a magazine article somewhere,
hey rowings this really great new thing!
Everybody should be doing it!
- It is perhaps the best thing I've seen
in the last six months!
- Look, at all the things that are popping up
that allow you to do rowing.
But then you go down the rabbit hole
and all of a sudden you see the ski erg, the bike erg,
the rower and now you're stuck.
- Hey (laughs)! - Which one do I buy?
I can only afford one, help, please!
I've spent most of my career using the rowing machine
but back in my crossfit days when I was competing,
I spent a very healthy amount of time getting my butt
kicked by all of these machines
and in fact A, I have all of them in the garage here
but B, I've also done a workout that included
all three actually, check out that video,
I'm gonna link it here,
I did a triathlon with all three machines.
So, I've gotten my butt whooped by all of them.
If this is your first time here welcome to Dark Horse where
we build better humans through rowing.
Ultimately the decisions gonna come up to you
based off of all of your factors for validating
which pieces of equipment,
in today's video I'm going to break down the values
of each of these machines,
why they do what they do, what they do,
how they do it and why you might make a decision on one
over the other, just helping to give you the decision
making power so that you can ultimately make
the right one for you but I do understand that
all of you are gonna have different decision making
variables so that part is pretty personal,
and at the end, I'm gonna give you
my personal favorite of the three!
First up, the rower, the tride, the true,
the machine we all know!
As we stand now,
the model D is kind of Concept Two latest rowing machine,
it has gone through four major iterations,
the A, the B, the C and the D!
There's also the E but it's basically the D just taller,
heavier and more cumbersome.
Anyways, what we're looking at now is the model D rower.
It was the first machine, other than ores,
that was where Concept Two started but it was the first
machine they made which means it's been through
the most iterations, the most testing
and really why it's such an indestructible machine
and why it really got its start is because it's
made out of very simple parts,
the Dreissigacker brothers built this thing
to just be indestructible, they're engineers,
they've engineered it out of bicycle parts essentially
to begin with, so on this machine you can rest assured that
you're getting something that will stand the test of time.
I don't need to expand on why rowing is great thing
but what you're looking at when you talk about rowing
is A, it's lower extremity dominant,
it's primarily a leg push,
B, it's posterior chain dominant,
which means that your backside from your hamstring,
your glutes, your back, your scaps,
all of that are working together to create the movement,
and you're also working core to extremities
so meaning from the midline,
everything radiates out and you're creating this chain
of a movement and it's about as full bodied as one can get!
So that would be the value behind choosing rowing
over the ski erg or the bike erg,
that would be primarily your reason for that
as well as choosing the machine that's been around
the longest, it has the longest track record of movement,
education, workouts, all of that.
The depth around this machine is essentially better
than the other two simply because it's been around longer.
Now the other things to consider with this
would be perhaps the size requirements,
this machine falls at about 93 inches from wheel base
to wheel base, the front to the back.
So, it's also important to know that you can break it
in two pieces for storage so it can possibly fit into
a tighter space then you may be able to get with
a skier for example, it does not break down,
it only has its standing height requirement
whereas this can essentially become smaller so you can
perhaps store it in a closet,
and find an easier way of keeping the machine around.
Another note, and this falls across all the platforms,
you're getting the PM5 monitor on each of the machines
if you were to buy them today,
it's just reworded for the ski erg or the bike erg,
and that's an important note to make as well,
the data screen that you're going to get
will be the same across all machines.
All right, that covers the rower,
that's the first and oldest machine,
but next up would be our second oldest machine,
this was not a late comer,
it's been around for quite a while,
in many iterations in fact the first one,
just took the rower and put it up right against a wall,
the ski erg, this guy.
Right, here!
Come on, let's go look.
Okay, so I mentioned that this things tall
and cumbersome on space, because we can't break it down.
So, the rower, yes, it's taller but you can break it
in two parts for a little bit easier storage,
with this machine, I told you we'd measure it,
let's see how tall it actually is.
We're at, essentially seven feet.
So this things is seven feet tall,
then I'll measure the pad for you,
the pad is four feet, seven feet by four feet,
if you go with this rolling stand,
you need that 'cause you don't wanna attach it to your wall.
Maybe it's a beautiful piece of art,
maybe you have a beautiful Danish modern home,
white walls and leather furniture, rugs on the ground
and you want that simple, black statement piece,
square on your wall.
This could be that!
However, if you have a cluttered home like I do
and I'm sure all of us do, especially, I have kids,
Lord knows I have toys and whatnot everywhere,
I'm not about to put this on the wall in my house,
maybe in my garage but I like the flexibility of having
the rolling floor stand because it just makes my life
a little bit easier so I just have to accept
that I've got a seven by four foot footprint
that is going to always be here,
that's an important note
and just something to be thinking about.
Now another similarity about these machines is
they all share the same fly wheel so you're going to get
essentially the same noise-factor out of each machine.
Whether you think that it's loud or quiet,
that's your decision, but the point being,
each of these fly wheels is the same as what you will find
on every other machine, all machines are equal
on the fly wheel now the thing you will see for example,
on the ski erg is that there's a plastic sheet
over part of the fly wheel and that plastic sheet is there
to change or restrict airflow,
because we're using an upper extremity which is not
nearly as strong as lower extremity,
you're going to find that they lighten the drag factor
by putting that plastic plate on there.
If you were to take that off,
it would get very heavy, very fast which puts a lot
of load and demand on your shoulders,
things that you need to take into consideration,
obviously I don't advise taking that plastic sheet off,
it's there for a reason,
and then understand that again,
upper extremity dominant, anterior chain dominant,
and still core to extremity as with the rower.
That covers the ski erg, that would be option number two
that you could buy of the Concept Two lineup.
About the same price point on these things,
we're not seeing these massive price jumps
so if you're saving for one of these machines,
odds are you're gonna be spending about the same
amount of money so it's not really a money decision here,
it's more of a what you're trying to accomplish.
But next!
Let's get to the newest, the latest, the greatest,
maybe not the greatest, that ones up for decision!
The new kid on the block, the bike erg!
What you've got with the bike erg
is essentially the same components as with every other
machine that Concept Two has made,
the difference, you're on a bike instead of skiing or rowing
It doesn't do anything different than any other bike would
whether you took a standard road bike and put it on rollers,
or if you bought another spin bike,
what is different though is that patented Concept Two
fly wheel feel and that's often what people love
is the fly wheel feel because it's almost
unforgiving but dependable.
It's reliable and torturous.
You get the fly wheel, you get the PM5 in a bike format
that's adjustable, you can swap out the handlebars,
you can move the handlebars forward and back,
up and down, the seat can do up and down,
and you can replace the saddle,
you can replace the pedals to whatever you want
so this is very very customizable!
Unlike the other two machines where you don't have
an opportunity to really customize it the way you want.
With this, you can change up all of the pieces in fact
I've already swapped the pedals for clipless on mine here
and what you get is with the PM5 you can now connect
to apps like Zwift and if you have like some kind of
indoor cycling app, it will most likely connect
to this monitor, you are getting an indoor spin
or cycling experience but on a Concept Two machine
which is often going to put your price point lower
than something like a Pelaton and you can even
work on the Pelaton app with this machine if you wanted to!
I don't know about actual direct connection
but I do know that you can follow along
on the Pelaton app!
There's really nothing fancy here,
the cycling movement is going to be very quad dominant
if you were to switch to clipless pedals,
then you can get some hamstring activation,
because you're pulling up on the pedals at the same time.
But other than that, you're not getting much midline work,
you're not getting a lot of back strengthening,
not much happens from the waist up,
all happening from the waist down,
which is going to prioritize just that system,
that leg drive down.
What I like about the rower and what I like about
the ski erg is it contains a full body element
which is missing when it comes to a bike.
Each of these machines offers it's very own benefit
from cycling where you get very quad dominant
and really, a lot of power production out of the legs
to rowing where it's a full body, still lower extremity
dominant but a little bit more posterior chain activation
or the ski erg, where you're getting anterior chain
and upper extremity dominant work,
all of them are great machines, it just depends
what's the biggest value to you and making sure
that as you choose it, you are picking out the thing
that you value most and that you're gonna get the most
use out of because at the end of the day,
that's what matters most!
So what's my favorite machine?
I know, you want me to say the rower
and yes I love the rower,
because there's so much value to it.
However, for my own personal edification,
what I really love, right now, it's the bike erg!
I like that I can sit on the machine and get some good
spin out of it, it's a little bit more mindless
because I've spent so much time over my life
on the rower, on the ski erg,
I'm enjoying the bike for the time being
'cause it's new and it's fun but like I said,
it's the new kid on the block so I'm having some fun with it
that's my personal favorite at this moment in time.
And after you pick the machine that
makes the absolute most sense to you,
make sure that you go to our website to check out
our workout programs in which we have programs
that help you on every single one of these machines!
And click that subscribe button,
so that you can become a Dark Horse
and join our community and make yourself a better human!
If you want more, check out our latest video!
If you want workouts, check out this workout playlist!
I love you all, go do great things,
I'll see ya on the other side!