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Wife and 2 teenage daughters are after a treadmill for home use as we are into tier 4, gym is shutting and weather is poor. They are all really good runners, if that makes a difference. What works? Lots of choice out there.
Depends how good.... But when i looked during first lock down the only treadmills that can go fast enough for proper runners are huge commercial ones. Most home ones are too slow, i can't remember the exact figures but worth checking.
As above, the cheaper ones are small and not very fast.
My mate works for Beny Sports (supply various places) and they often have some decent deals on the website or ebay page. We bought a semi commercial one from them for the Fire Station probably 3 years ago and it's still going strong despite daily hammering from hairy arsed Firefighters! We are very good at breaking things.
Will take a look at Beny thanks
They are fast but I expect something that would support 40 min 10 k pace would be fine for an indoor run
How fast do you want it to be? I see people often mention the cheap(er) ones being slow but I didn’t find that the case. Or maybe I am slow! (Edit: 40min 10k, yep, I’m slower than that!)
Had a Reebok branded one a few years back. Loads of programs on from easy to very hard. Auto incline etc. Topped out at 10mph so 6min pace.
Found that plenty fast enough. Served us well for 3 years of abuse and several location changes before we finally killed it with probably one too many location changes (no garage so it was forever being moved around the house).
If memory serves we paid £500 for it.
If I had the space I’d have another.
I've bought a couple of good ones off ebay for 200 quid. Would have been a grand new. I'm also a pretty keen runner and didn't fancy the slow cheap wobbly shit that you can buy new at that sort of price. I've never tried flat out sprints but my current one does 20kph which is quick enough for a varied workout.
(The reason I've bought two is that the deck eventually gave out on the first one and the price of fixing was too high to be worth it.)
We have a Reebok Jet 200, daughter is now too fast for it, she’s 13 but a competitive track runner (800 and 1500m).
If your family are doing any intervals you need to make sure that the Treadmill has enough speed, my daughter is similar speed for 10k. The current treadmill is fine for the long distance runs, but it has a maximum of 18kms, this was her 60 second interval, but it’s now too slow.
She’s also not a fan of any of the programmes, they’re very much focused on the novice runner.
I managed to get a Reebok jet 300 from Argos in lockdown had to look every day first thing in the morning. Had to wait about a month for delivery. Been very impressed, 20kph top speed is plenty for us.
Sourcing one at the moment will likely be the challenge. Good luck.
We bought Roger Black treadmill from Argos quite a few years ago now, it's used a few times a week and is still as good as new, cost about £300 and max speed is 14mph
Happy with our JTX Sprint 7, arrived last October. Goes to 20 kph, 15% incline. I'd be slightly happier if Zwift supported it - it does transmit speed over BT but isn't compatible at the moment.
You don't mention budget though - when we looked £1000 got something solid and with a decent motor.
https://www.jtxfitness.com/jtx-sprint7-motorised-home-treadmill
I've got a JTX Sprint 7 as well. £150 off eBay after a life as a clothes horse...
Beware, a lot of consumer grade kit is difficult to get spares for after a couple of years. Our previous £1.5k Reebok jobbie died a premature death for the want of spares.
Either go s/h pro grade with confirmed route to spares or consumer grade s/h off eBay which is effectively disposable. 😕
1. They are heavy, heavier than you think, if you want to put them upstairs you’ll need to hire a block and tackle and bribe the local rugby team 2. They are very noisy, noisier than you think, and you can hear it from all over the house, and probably next door as well if it’s upstairs, the neighbours will report you to the cops 3. They’re big things, bigger than you think. They’ll take up most of any room they’re in, and it’s less of a conversation starter than you think 4. Running on a treadmill is as dull as ****, in scientific experiments they reckoned it takes about 19 mins to realise just how ****ing boring it is, just like rollers or a turbo. 5. You will not look like that bloke in the adverts; running effortlessly on a treadmill by some giant floor to ceiling window overlooking the ocean, no matter how much you squint. 6. Get a fan running indoors is hot. 1 fans are big, bigger than you think....
probs best if you just run outside where God intended
Agree with all that!
Our mitigation - it's in our garage/cellar (house built into a hill so back is underground, front ground level). It is big - we had to shuffle stuff around to make a space for it, but the garage is a decent area. Location also helps with heat (it's 8C in there at the moment, 0C outside) and noise.
Boredom - Zwift run and podcasts for me, running videos and music for MsBeej.
Oh, speakers on the treadmill are pointless, as is the fan.
Boblo - nice deal! How did you get it delivered/installed? We had two burly blokes arrive with ours and it only had to go in the garage.
BTW. None of that is meant to be treated as anything other than a joke...I just got rid of a broken one that I had inherited when I bought a house. Jesus what a PITA that was!!
Good to hear what people are happy with. I'm not encouraging the idea at present and hope they will lose interest and just run outdoors but its been bubbling away for a bit and boredom may yet tip them over the edge. My wife has found aplace locally that does reconditioned gym units so I think she might go and look there.