Hanna in build-up training
11.3.2020
Translation: machine translated
Pictures: Thomas Kunz
She has a new job, a new flat and a new treadmill. Hanna tests the Bowflex BXT 326, starting with the realisation that this 138-kilogram machine makes her break out in a sweat even before her first workout.
Delivery free kerbside. That sounds pretty good at first. Until the postman heaves the box with the dimensions of a bathtub off the Euro pallet and quickly says goodbye. There it is, the longed-for treadmill, whose arrival was still written in the stars 15 minutes ago.
On this rainy grey morning in Bad Ragaz, Hanna greeted us two floors up in her yawningly empty flat just under an hour earlier. Photographer Thomas Kunz and I have arrived as a special set-up team and are greeted with croissants and bad news: "The post office hasn't got back to us yet." The sentence resonates. Not just because the furniture is missing, but because it makes our journey superfluous. "The removal van hasn't left yet either, they're still playing Tetris with the boxes." No conveyor belt, no furniture. Nothing is there. Nothing is safe this morning. Or to put it positively: Anything is possible. Hanna is reorganising her life and we are part of it. That's something.
Treadmill instead of hamster wheel
Hanna took part in our Community campaign and will be able to test the Bowflex 326 in the coming months. She is 30 years old, a self-proclaimed "UX nerd" as a usability specialist and a wonder nose. Talkative, interested in many things, open to new things - but not yet a runner. "I run five kilometres for time or ten kilometres for survival," she wrote to us. Recently, she has mainly been travelling in a professional hamster wheel, which has meant that sport has been neglected: "I keep putting off self-love in favour of my job and friends." That's set to change now. Her plans have already taken on a certain momentum of their own since it became clear that this treadmill was coming into her life.
Instead of the women's run in Bern, she wants to tackle the Davos running series, complete the city run in Chur and she also has a "secret goal", which she doesn't want to reveal to us yet, in the back of her mind. All well and good. But grey theory so far. The reality is an empty flat in which we wait for something to happen. For the mobile to finally ring. For the post office to get in touch, announce the delivery and honour the requested delivery date. At 10.04 a.m. on the dot, and less than ten minutes later the bulky parcel is on our doorstep.
The lift at the end of the tunnel
After the initial joy has faded and the removal men are nowhere to be seen, we retreat, shivering and somewhat perplexed.138 kilograms are 138 kilograms and our intervertebral discs are not impressed by the tentative lifting attempts. In the warm hallway, Hanna talks about her sporting past. She has ridden, played squash ambitiously, tried Latin American dancing, climbing and baseball - and ran ten kilometres for the first time in her life a week ago.
"I was really lame," says the woman, who describes herself as having the enthusiasm of a puppy. "But I wanted to find out what I was letting myself in for." An experiment that is currently blocking the entrance to the apartment block. The front door can just about be opened. Our suboptimal location is a great opportunity to get to know the new neighbours. An elderly lady greets us in a friendly manner, pushes past the huge parcel and says regretfully: "You probably won't be able to get into the lift with it."
Probably not? So maybe you can! There is a lift at the end of the tunnel and the proof of the pudding is in the eating. With our combined strength, we heave the heavy end of our monster package onto a trolley and push it through the door in front of the lift.
If you want to play it safe as a large appliance buyer, you can save yourself the hassle and invest at least 219 francs extra, depending on the journey. The appliance is then not left on the doorstep, but set up at its destination. We are still two floors away from our destination. And the neighbour has a good eye. Whichever way we turn, the lift is actually too small for our parcel. We have to butcher it in the stairwell.
A kingdom for one (or two) movers
Roughly speaking, the Bowflex BXT 326 consists of two elements. There is the console structure with the display, which is made up of several individual parts. Most of them are made of plastic and are nice and light. And then there is the treadmill motor unit, which weighs around 120 kilograms. At 2.15 metres long, it is the big problem. With or without the box. Our hope is that it will fit into the lift individually and arrive at the top in one piece.
We discuss how to move the item gently. After all, it has hard plastic castors on the frame. It can be manoeuvred over them and stowed away at least a little more compactly with the running surface folded upwards. The crucial parts are still hidden under plastic sheeting and labelled with warnings. Just don't break anything.
While we are carefully tinkering with it, the removal men march in with the first boxes and make short work of our problem. "Where does it have to go?" Bang, bam and it's gone. What remains is a lot of polystyrene, plastic and the cardboard box printed with the Bowflex logo. We take the promotional remnants to the basement and see the tape again two floors up. Ready for assembly.
Many screws and a broken cable
"You're saving me, by the way," says Hanna as we sort the individual parts. "When I was out running, I almost died!" Not from exertion, but the first pollen was already flying at the beginning of March. The running itself was enjoyable and she had already studied training plans.
"Without a goal, there's no incentive, but now I have to train," laughs Hanna, who takes her job as a tester seriously and has her first usability complaint as soon as she unpacks the screws: "As soon as I tear open the packet, I can no longer read the labelling on the individual parts!" What is screw A now? And where is washer D?
Because of her job, she scrutinises things very closely, and our biggest problem can be seen with the naked eye. A cable runs through the metal struts that are screwed to the side and support the console structure. A cable whose plug came out of the box crushed and with bent contacts. A cable without which nothing will work. [[image:33686994 "Serious faces..."]] [[image:33704669 "...a fiddly package...",33675310 "...and the GAU - the damaged cable."]]
It's working after all!
We bend the plug with a screwdriver, postpone the problem until later and just get on with it. This tactic has worked well for us all morning. And compared to the transport, the assembly is a piece of cake.
Screw by screw, we are getting closer to the moment of truth, which will come as soon as the electricity flows. Sometimes a stubborn plastic part gets caught, sometimes we mix up the washers, sometimes a thread jams. "You have to do this with feeling," warns Hanna and tightens the screws.
You can't do much more wrong than us. Not much less either.
It doesn't take more than an hour to finish. "The transport was an adventure, but I imagined it would be worse," says Hanna. If the cable doesn't throw a spanner in the works, the job is done. And lo and behold - the electricity is flowing. Hanna is running. The set-up is complete. The build-up training can begin. And she announces: "When I start something, I'm going to see it through."
Three days later, she gets in touch by email. I'm already worried that the cable has given up the ghost. Fortunately not. Hanna already has training and test plans in mind and still has something on her mind.
I wasn't really happy about the chaos of the move. Just imagine the Kermit GIF, that's me with my Bowflex now ;))
Michael Restin
Senior Editor
Michael.Restin@digitecgalaxus.chSimple writer, dad of two. Likes to be on the move, shimmies through everyday family life, juggles with several balls and occasionally drops something. A ball. Or a remark. Or both.
