First time I met the Air Dyne was at the Reebok Crossfit GamesRegionals in 2012. They had this funny looking bike in the corner of the warm-up area. One guy would always be on it, pedalling away at a relaxed, slow pace. I remember thinking to myself “ha! What’s that guy doing? He looks like an old man on that antique bike” I later found out that the old-looking bike was called an Air Dyne…
2 Years later I found myself in the basement of someone’s house negotiating the price for this harmless looking Air Dyne. See, what I didn’t know back in 2012 is how insanely useful this piece of machine happens to be…The Air Dyne is a dual-action bike. Incredibly simple, incredibly easy to use, incredibly painful… You pedal with your feet and use your arms to help you pedal faster… There is no resistance setting, just a fan.The harder you pedal, the more resistance, the harder it is to pedal, the more painful it is!
I have talked to a lot of very solid athletes’, and to the coaches of some very successful athletes (be it Crossfit or other sports). My main question was “why are these guys/girls winning? What are they doing different?”…. The answer? Interval training on the Air Dyne… let me re-phrase; A LOT of interval training on the Air dyne.
As Crossfitters we do a lot of anaerobic exercises, which is wicked and it works… The thing we lack in is aerobic training. Not because it’s boring or difficult or hard to arrange, its because it takes a lot of time and is usually very taxing on our bodies. We are already doing a LOT of work by even doing a couple Crossfit workouts a week. How are we expected to recover and also throw in some aerobic on top of it? Many injuries occur from over training and miles over miles of running can really effect the knees…
(Side note, I’m strictly focusing on Crossfit as a training modal… Ofcourse other training pathways have there benefits and place, this isjust for the Crossfitter in all of us)
So how can we all get better at Crossfit? Lower our WOD scores? Move faster?… It basically boils down to the fact that we need an aerobic alternative to run/swim/biking 100’s of miles, on top of the already taxing Crossfit WOD’s, and the Airdyne is perfect for just that!
Its non-impact and it works your whole body – arms, core, legs, heart and panting muscles. Non-impact! Meaning, although while you’re on the AirDyne it feels like you’re being kicked in the nuts while someone uses a vaccuum to suck the air out of your lungs, you recover fast and will NOT feel it the next day…
Workouts can get done FAST, and offers a very high output of power (not diving into the physics of it)… Force x Distance / Time… Less time, more force and distance equals higher power! And the workouts will train your mind to shut up and move past the suck factor… It is an all around “Love to Hate it” Monster producing Machine!
Get to a Gym…. AND USE THE AIR DYNE!!!
Sample WOD’s (from “easiest” to “hardest”):
-1 minute for calories
-Reverse tabata: 8 rounds of – 10 seconds on 20 seconds off.
-Tabata airdyne: 8 rounds of 20 seconds on 10 seconds off.
-Morning wake up: dyne for 20 minutes increasing calories every minute for 20minutes
-5 minute time trial for calories
-2 miles in less than 5 minutes
-300 FY workout: The goal is to air dyne 300 calories in 10 minutes. If you don’t get 300cal, you haven’t completed the 300 FY. Keeptrying!
The SAR Take 