Internet of Jump Ropes (IoJR): Crossrope skips to the beat
Exercise ropes have some different interpretations.
In American English, we say ‘jump rope’, whereas the British English expression refers to ‘skipping rope’… but whether it’s a jump or a skip, the physical action is mostly the same.
Then there’s the macho factor, even in this age of gender neutrality enlightenment. Are males comfortable with using skipping ropes, given the popularisation of ropes in the playground among young girls?
Well, boxers (both male and female) work out with skipping ropes all the time, so we should have no issue with who uses one these days for an intense workout.
Could ropes be about to enter the 21st Century though? Given that you can’t put a whole lot of Internet of Things (IoT) intelligence in a piece of cord, how would this pastime ever progress to digital transformation?
Crossrope thinks it has the answer with its CROSSROPE fitness sets, mats and app.
Promoting upward unity (quite literally) with its #wejump hashtag, the Raleigh, North Carolina-headquartered company may be tapping into the home exercise market at the right time in the wake of the pandemic and gym closures i.e. even as life returns to ‘normal’, many more people may run more of their own exercise programmes.
The Crossrope Lite and Premium apps give the user what are promised to be varied workouts based on an individual’s personal skill level and schedule.
You can choose between jump rope-only workouts (that’s skipping only, if you’re still speaking the Queen’s English), or workouts that include bodyweight movements such as pushups, squats and lunges.
The app works to deliver hands-free guidance that offers encouragement in the form of verbal queues and videos.
The Premium app tracks your progress so you can compare your stats over time.
Internet of Skipping Ropes (IoSR)
It’s probably important to note at this point that users do download an app, they do set up their personal identity and body (age, sex, weight and height) profile in the app, they do workout alongside the app and they do track their workout progress results with this app. But, the app itself does not make some ‘magical’ type of Bluetooth connection to the handles on your skipping ropes to be able to count your actual number of repetitions.
The app element is there to inspire, to modernise the experience and to help you know what you’re doing. Combined with these modern-feel ropes, we get the idea and its certainly more than just a new way of marketing a rope.
Talking of the ropes themselves, the click-in click-out functionality is nice – it means you can use the same handles for different weights of rope. We thought that an artifical plastic-polymer rope would feel weird and not circulate around the head properly, but that misgiving is unfounded and they fly round just like a normal rope.
The people behind Crossrope point to a study from the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, which suggested showed that 41.2% of at-home workers reported low back pain, while 23.5% reported neck pain.
“Thankfully, experts say that these negative health impacts can be at least partly mitigated with short exercise sessions, such as jumping rope with the Crossrope app, throughout the day,” said the company, in a press statement.
The Crossrope Lite and Crossrope Premium apps have workouts ranging in time, difficulty and movements.
You can imagine using this workout in different forms depending upon whether you are home inside, out in the garden/yard or perhaps in a hotel room – or of course you may opt to take it to the gym itself.The bodyweight and weighted jump rope workouts and challenges for Crossrope users range from 12 – 47 minutes, so now you can’t use the ‘I’ve only got 15 minutes’ that’s not long enough for a workout’ excuse.
We liked these units – they are very well made, they are extremely durable and have a high-quality build throughout. Crossrope does make the point that the plasticized ropes could wear out if used heavily on external rough floor surfaces, but that’s why you’d want to use the fancy rubber mat, to preserve the life of these units and give you some focus to get on the spot and burn some calories.
The activity tracking allows users to keep tabs on workout completion, challenge progress and total calories burned with options to sync with Google Fit.
The Crossrope app has had over 500K downloads and more than 8k reviews and counting in the App and Google Play Store at the time of writing.
The prices of the rope bundles cost from around $99 to $239 depedning on whether you opt for the Get Lean Set, Get Fit set, or Get Strong set with details on Crossrope’s home pages here.
