BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer Review

Okay, right off I’ve gotta tell you.  Before we received the BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer I’d never tried it. I know. Sian and Erica both made fun of me.  Apparently, there’s such a thing as a BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer virgin and I’m it. Yikes!

I did have a little disc-shaped balance board that I picked up a few years ago. I half-heartedly fooled around with it once in a while before one day the kids took it and played UFO with it. I think it got abducted, ‘cause I haven’t seen it since.  And I guess I haven’t really looked that hard, either.

So when Sian, Erica and I unpacked the BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer, I wasn’t expecting anything out of this world.  And it looked harmless enough as we took it out of the box. We received the 55cm size that is sold at Walmart for a suggested retail price of $79.99.

The BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer literature states that it will:

• Strengthen your core
• Give you a total abdominal workout
• Add fun to boring cardio workouts
• Give you better balance for better movement everyday

We grabbed the instruction booklet and headed up to the studio, cameras in the capable hands of Erica and Sian.  Since I was the ‘virgin’ I had the pleasure of being the sacrifice of the day on camera.

The first thing we noted is that it is solid and well constructed.  It’s not going to slip away from you on the carpet or hardwood and it doesn’t make you feel nervous about popping it. But the most important thing is that this thing kicked my butt belly in less than forty minutes.

Yup, for me, it was awesome.  Here’s why:

As a runner, I always use the same few muscles for hours at a time. That leaves a LOT of muscles in my feet, legs and core, as well as almost all of my upper body that don’t get a workout from running.  As well, when you run long distances like I do, you really need a strong core so you can maintain good form and reduce the possibility of injury.  That’s been my biggest challenge, because after four kids, not everything down in my midsection is a strong as it used to be.

There are a wide variety of moves you can do on the BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer.  And, if your form is good, your core is going to get a fantastic workout.

I do have a BOSU® Ball (I’m not a complete virgin, hah!) and while I do like that too, the BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer is more my style.  Both are great tools for any gym or home gym.  I should mention, however, that it is just that. A tool. You are only going to get out of it what you  put into it.  Buying it is not going to make you fitter. Using it will.

Anyway, from balancing to lunges, push ups to bicep curls with light weights, crunches to squats (and gosh, I’m naming just a few exercises) you are going to get a great workout if you take the time. I’m not going to go into specific moves in this review, because there are so many. Which I like, because I tend to get bored easily.  Instead, we’ve got a series of upcoming posts that we’ll be publishing demonstrating some of the different moves and workouts you can do on the BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer.

I think almost everyone could benefit from having the balance trainer as a basic workout tool at home.  Again, as long as you are willing to put in the time and effort, you will see results with the BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer.

Just don’t let your kids play UFO with it. This is one piece of equipment you won’t want to have abducted, lol.

Pros:

• You can do so many different exercises on the BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer and it works many different muscle groups;
• You can use it either side up; (For example: I liked doing push ups on it with the ball-side down for a great upper body and core workout)
• Initial set up is as easy as five minutes with the hand pump that is included;
• You can deflate it for storage if you need to;
• You can adapt many basic moves you do in the gym to work more than one muscle group at a time; (For example, stand and balance on it while doing a set of bicep curls with light weights.)

Cons:

• In this economy, if budget is your first priority, then price may be a factor. Prices I found online ranged from $59 to over $99 depending on the size;
• The BOSU® Sport Balance Trainer is a bit too heavy to be portable if you travel – I’d want to take it everywhere;

BOSU® is a registered trademarks of BOSU Fitness, LLC.

This review was updated on November 23, 2009 with trademarks, sample size, suggested retail price and retail availability.

Reviews on Girlgetstrong.com reflect the personal opinion of the writer, whether it is good, bad or ugly. This product was supplied to GGS by the company for review purposes.  No compensation was accepted by me or GGS Media Corporation for this review.