Bodylastics ***MAX TENSION Heavy Duty Resistance Bands System with User Book

I was and still am a free weight kind of guy ever since highschool. I moved into an apartment with my girlfriend and found myself in the terrible predicament of having to sacrifice my weight bench and various other equipment in exchange for living space. In so doing I needed to find an alternate workout solution. I came across bodylastics on accident. I am a skeptic by nature but read the reviews and decided why not?
Having owned these bands for the better part of a year I have been able to achieve the same results as those of my weight bench. Not only am I satisfied with the quality of the product I am impressed with how challenging these bands really are! After using these bands I found that I was excersizing muscles that I never could with the weight bench! Don't get me wrong the weight bench has it's place. But not for my goals. For my goals these bands, a stability ball and a Iron Gym Extreme workout bar is really all I need to get the results I want. I also mountain bike for cardio. Being a busy person and usually finding it tough to spend much time working out these bands have proven a great fast solution to saving me time. Their construction is superb and truly do make other resistance bands look weak and frail. I will say you should probably use flat shoes or shoes without a lot of tread. This will prolong the life of your bands. There are books out there that provide info on the excersizes and workout schedules on how to use these bands as well. I am going to be trying the P90X workout here soon. Or at least portions of it.

This is really a great product for people who doesn't have time to go to the gym or want an alternative to it.
The product comes with a bag, so you can carry it when on travel. Also comes with 2 handles, 2 ankle straps, a door clip and a book with set of exercises.

Pros: portable, cand do exercises for all your body, you can use the book as a guide for specific exercises. It also comes with complete routines to loose weight and gain muscle. So far, looks very durable. Very high quality product.

Cons: the clip system decreases the range of motion for some exercises, specially if you are short and are doing exercises that requires you to stand on the tube and bend over. Still, that's a minor issue since you can find equivalent exercises in the book.

Conclusion: Overall, it's well designed and a great quality product. I use it when I don't have time to go to the gym or when I'm travelling. I really recommend it.

I purchased these bands to use with the P90X program. I hadn't worked out in a while and I wanted to start with something less intimidating than the dumbbells and pull up bar. I decided to pass on the cheaper bands because I didn't want to worry about them breaking after reading reviews. These bands are great. I am 6'4" and I am able to use them with no problem. Using the looping technique helps with some of the excercises, and being able to add multiple bands to each handle has helped tremendously. Being able to increase tension by using multiple bands has helped make workouts much more effective.

I only have two minor issues with the bands that almost keep me from giving them 5 stars. First, the handle opening seems to be a bit on the small side compared to the bands that I see on the P90X video. I have fairly large hands, so this might not be an issue for all. The smaller openings lead to the cable and/or handle rubbing on my hands which can be annoying during some excercises. Second, the hook and binding (carabiner) sometimes get in the way of modifying excercises. I find that on excercises like the seated back fly I need to grab below the handle to get the correct tension, and the carabiner makes it a little awkward. The awkwardness is a fair trade off for the ability to add multiple bands to the handles though. I'm not reducing my rating for these issues because I don't believe that the quality of the bands are the problem, I think that any similar bands would have the same issues.

I would recommend these bands to anybody in the market for good resistance bands or anyone who wants to start light and work their way up without purchasing an entire set of dumbbells or embarrasing themselves trying to do a pull-up. Also, the bands take up much less space!

Great product if you don't have time to pack your gear and hit the gym. Works perfect for P90X. Bands and accessories seem very well made and should last a long time. Grips have good padding for comfort. Only drawback is you need to get used to the large metal rings and clips rubbing against your arms...

I just got the bands in and started my p90x routine today.... within 5 minutes I snapped a band... Uh oh... I decided to email bodylastics regarding this to see what they would do... I instantly got a reply stating that they figured I was using it with p90x when this happened... ding ding ding..

They offered to send out a replacement part tomorrow with my shipping address and offered this information below regarding using the bodylastics bands with p90x..

overall great product when used properly, and can't beat customer service that replaces a product and replies that fast --

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I am sorry to hear about your experience with the bands. That is very unusual for a Bodylastics band. I will have a new one sent to you, if you respond to this email with your ship to address. I can help but guess that you could be following the P90x routine. If I am wrong, please let me know but...

Here is the must have tip for that workout routine. There are a few exercises that will be less than perfect the way they suggests you do them with the bands. The exercises are the heavy pants, the lawnmower, and the back flies. The tip is simple. The Bodylastics handles can be removed from the bands. Lets do that. Take off the handles and literally grab on to the band underneath the clip system. This will ensure you have no slack at the start of the exercise (the P90X video suggests that you need to start those exercises with a certain amount of slack in the bands because you need a certain amount of elastic to complete the exercise motion). Using this tip will make sure you have enough band length to complete the exercise motion also.

Keep in mind that you may come across an exercise that works a muscle or muscle group and the way the exercise is being performed is not comfortable for you. When this happens, remember that you have a Bodylastics book with a list of exercises that should be used to substitute any exercise used in any given program.

We discovered the tips while reviewing the program with the Bodylastics system. I am sure these will make the difference for you. Although I would again recommend watching the [...]. I hope this helps. Please feel free to respond if you have further question.

Here are the links to the videos of the tips for the P90x program:

all exercises
[...]
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This is my second body lastics that I've bought. they improved the clips, the handle and ring gauge (thicker guage). With enough tension or use, these bands will snap over a few months of use depending on how much you use them. I would say their life span is anywhere from six months (daily use) to two years (once a week usage). The warrantee regarding wear and tear and defect of the item works this way: You pay for the replacement item. It's not a free replacement.
If you can accept the fact that this product will Not last you forever and you will eventually have to replacement, it does a great job in what it does and you will enjoy it to strengthen your biceps, triceps, pecs etc. The best thing about body lastics is the portability factor!

I love these bands. They seem well constructed, with durable material. This was my first time using resistant bands with a door anchor, so it wasn't quite what I was expecting the door anchor to be... because the only down side to it, is constantly having to open and close the door to readjust the height for each exercise you're using it for.

The hand grips are okay (this set is my first real band set, so I'm not sure what to expect), but I find that if my hands get a little sweaty they do start to get a little slippery. Also, just the way the fabric is attached to the metal ring, they are prone to sliding around slightly. It's not major issue, but something I've noticed.

I think the ankle straps have plenty of padding, though they are a bit big for me, and I would say I have an "average" ankle girth for a woman?

I have not tried the online learning center, because so far the book has been good enough for me. To me this is a great place to start with bands. I really tried to look around, and came to the conclusion that these were the best product for the money, without spending a lot on my first set.

I bought these to continue down the path of P90X after wasting money on a cheap set at WM these are the real deal. Really nice handles and seriously heavy duty clips. I am glad I spent the money on these.

Overall, I'm very happy with these bands. They offer a lot of versitility as well as portability. Most of the exercises that you can do with dumbells, you can do with Bodylastics (most, not all). The only downside that I've encountered is that with some of the exercises, the metal clasps rub me. It's not bad, just annoying sometimes. Please take into account that it could be poor technique on my part. Also, the changing of bands detracks a bit from the workout. But that's the price of versitility. I have a Weider Crossbow. However, since purchasing these, I have stopped using the Crossbow. One hint, do as many of the exercises as possible standing. That will automatically engage your core. If you're looking for a set of resistance bands that are durable and can take out of your home with you (workout outside, park, different part of the house, on trips), take a serious look at Bodylastic. If you intend to just keep your bands in 1 room, think about a fixed handle set of bands. That way you don't have to hassle changing bands (downside, ankle attachment is a lot trickier). Bodylastic come with a great warranty.

I've worked out at home for years with dumbbells but I was really wanting to try something new to break out of a rut. These perfectly fit the bill. They are space efficient, affordable, portable, and high quality. But perhaps best of all, you really can get a very good workout with them.
The resistance is quite light at the beginning of any "lift" (or should I say "stretch") but gets progressively heavier as you proceed to the end of the movement. The net effect of this is you find yourself able to do more reps and more sets than you could with free weights. You end up with completely exhausted muscles and an awesome "pump".

The only thing keeping bodylastics from being a household name is a multi-million dollar TV ad campaign with 40 somethings talking about being in the best shape of their respective lives.

Try them, you'll like them.