Anybody familiar with a Body 20 location or this electro-muscle stimulation bit in general? A random girl cutting my hair today told me she went to this place that apparently doesn't open until June 1st but started explaining it to me and it definitely piqued my interest. She said they gave her a twenty minute session, did a presentation, and she became a member.

For reference, I used to be a workout machine up until about 3 years ago when I tore my shoulder. By machine, I mean I would actually get off the couch, run four miles a day, gym for weights including leg day 5 days a week, and racquetball 4 times a week.

For the last couple of years the most exercise I get is walking/jogging with my dog or dancing at a concert. The idea of this almost sounds too good to be true. Going to this place once or twice a week for 20 minutes at a time hooked up to electricity and getting fit?

Just curious if anybody has experience with this and can offer any pros and cons before I book an appointment to go check it out. Thanks in advance.

https://body20.com/aggieland/

Microwave society.

ukbb2003 said:

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Microwave society.

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If you mean it seems like a quick and lazy way of getting fit again that was my first thought as well (assuming it works).

I've also realized with age that there is no way in hell I am ever getting back to the peak level I was at several years ago (coupled with some injuries along the way preventing me from my old routine) so this seems like a possible good alternative to getting focused on health and fitness (and diet) again.

Any idea of the costs?

zachsccr said:

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Things I notice from their website:
1) Heavily reliant on marketing language and vague on details about what actually happens. (Red flag #1)
2)They do show you wearing some sort of suit and then STILL EXERCISING, so their whole premise is based on "add EMS to exercise= better exercise."

Problems: electrical stimulation of the muscles is not good at building muscle mass. There are numerous studies with patients post stroke/TBI/spinal cord injury that show minimal at best results from these interventions. We've been working on it for years. Now, does this place probably work? Yeah. Because any exercise is better than no exercise and there may be a slight benefit to active movement paired with the EMS. Is it worth any vague amount of money over traditional options? No.

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EMS can be extremely effective. It doesn't completely replace physical or hybrid workouts, but used properly it is MUCH better than physical alone or (obviously) doing nothing. It can absolutely be used to add muscle mass, endurance, raw strength, explosive strength, mitochondrial density, capillary density, and improve a wide range of muscular and cardiovascular (which are mostly muscular) capabilities.

Both a pro & con of EMS is that it does not use the metabolic system as the primary driver, but that's a different conversation.

I can't speak to what this place does, but using the right frequencies with the right program can completely change the trajectory of an athlete (or regular person). It deserves more than a dismissal of "it's better than nothing, but not much".

TxsAggieFn said:

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zachsccr said:

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Things I notice from their website:
1) Heavily reliant on marketing language and vague on details about what actually happens. (Red flag #1)
2)They do show you wearing some sort of suit and then STILL EXERCISING, so their whole premise is based on "add EMS to exercise= better exercise."

Problems: electrical stimulation of the muscles is not good at building muscle mass. There are numerous studies with patients post stroke/TBI/spinal cord injury that show minimal at best results from these interventions. We've been working on it for years. Now, does this place probably work? Yeah. Because any exercise is better than no exercise and there may be a slight benefit to active movement paired with the EMS. Is it worth any vague amount of money over traditional options? No.

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EMS can be extremely effective. It doesn't completely replace physical or hybrid workouts, but used properly it is MUCH better than physical alone or (obviously) doing nothing. It can absolutely be used to add muscle mass, endurance, raw strength, explosive strength, mitochondrial density, capillary density, and improve a wide range of muscular and cardiovascular (which are mostly muscular) capabilities.

Both a pro & con of EMS is that it does not use the metabolic system as the primary driver, but that's a different conversation.

I can't speak to what this place does, but using the right frequencies with the right program can completely change the trajectory of an athlete (or regular person). It deserves more than a dismissal of "it's better than nothing, but not much".

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You just discredited EMS training straight out. ALL exercise is going to have an effect on mitochondrial density, capillary density, and affect muscle mass and composition to some degree (most notably in untrained individuals). This issue is that EMS alone, or a more passive EMS is not effective at doing this. EMS+training has historically shown very little benefit over training alone, because some of the biggest effects of exercise come from the central drive and cardiovascular improvements that EMS basically bypasses for lack of better term.

My biggest issue is places popping up claiming to be the best way to train ever, taking a little bit of science and extrapolating it to literally everyone, marketing the crap out of it, and then seeing what happens.

zachsccr said:

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TxsAggieFn said:

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zachsccr said:

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Things I notice from their website:
1) Heavily reliant on marketing language and vague on details about what actually happens. (Red flag #1)
2)They do show you wearing some sort of suit and then STILL EXERCISING, so their whole premise is based on "add EMS to exercise= better exercise."

Problems: electrical stimulation of the muscles is not good at building muscle mass. There are numerous studies with patients post stroke/TBI/spinal cord injury that show minimal at best results from these interventions. We've been working on it for years. Now, does this place probably work? Yeah. Because any exercise is better than no exercise and there may be a slight benefit to active movement paired with the EMS. Is it worth any vague amount of money over traditional options? No.

---

EMS can be extremely effective. It doesn't completely replace physical or hybrid workouts, but used properly it is MUCH better than physical alone or (obviously) doing nothing. It can absolutely be used to add muscle mass, endurance, raw strength, explosive strength, mitochondrial density, capillary density, and improve a wide range of muscular and cardiovascular (which are mostly muscular) capabilities.

Both a pro & con of EMS is that it does not use the metabolic system as the primary driver, but that's a different conversation.

I can't speak to what this place does, but using the right frequencies with the right program can completely change the trajectory of an athlete (or regular person). It deserves more than a dismissal of "it's better than nothing, but not much".

---

You just discredited EMS training straight out. ALL exercise is going to have an effect on mitochondrial density, capillary density, and affect muscle mass and composition to some degree (most notably in untrained individuals). This issue is that EMS alone, or a more passive EMS is not effective at doing this. EMS+training has historically shown very little benefit over training alone, because some of the biggest effects of exercise come from the central drive and cardiovascular improvements that EMS basically bypasses for lack of better term.

My biggest issue is places popping up claiming to be the best way to train ever, taking a little bit of science and extrapolating it to literally everyone, marketing the crap out of it, and then seeing what happens.

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I didn't say anything to discredit it. Perhaps you simply don't understand it as well as you think you do. Countless scientific studies have shown does all the things you claim it doesn't and more, as well as my real world experience with it.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6480820/#CR18
This is a good place to start

There are a lot of factors at play. This isn't a great place to debate merits.

zachsccr said:

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https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6480820/#CR18
This is a good place to start

There are a lot of factors at play. This isn't a great place to debate merits.

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Start? Should my athletes return their Olympic Medals and Workd Records while you catch up?

Bumping bc wife and I are considering trying out Body 20.

Now that they've been open for a while can anyone give results for us good or bad?

Cost isn't really an issue. We specifically like the time savings and the low impact movements on the joints. We've belonged to multiple gyms in the past and have also worked with personal trainers.

Wondering how this could supplement or replace our current workouts.

Wife and I did a demo today and signed up, month to month. Ill report on my progress. Currently im 42, 207 with 18% body fat. Wife had acl surgery and I used to do cross fit, which resulted in a lingering shoulder issue. Im at the age where I cannot lift heavy weights, for leg exercises...squats and especially deadlifts will cause knee and / or back pain. This is a potential way (maybe) to work muscles that I otherwise cant really push too much.

We shall see. Ill track my progress. The demo was about 15 minutes, and I surprisingly really felt sore doing it. It was a strange feeling actually.

To establish a base, I used to be 12% body fat back in the day, and since being injured haven't gotten back to that.

I still do cardio on my own, and will keep doing what I normally do...so this will only supplement. I do plan to reduce my calories by about 300, and increase my protein.

Looking forward to hearing reports. My wife got me a one month gift card as a gift just to try out for fun. I consistently lift and run 2-3x per week each and plan to supplement with this program for at least the month. I'll report back as well.

In some limited applications, it may be helpful.

But for normal people, want to know what works…. Every time.

Lifting heavy weights (relative to you) and eating to match your goals. And guess what? It doesn't require you to shock the sheet out of yourself.

Following up. I'm now about 7 weeks in. The first 3 weeks I lost about 8 lbs, BUT only 1% body fat. As part of this I also got my calorie count figured out, as well as fat protein carbs breakout. I lost more weight the first 4 weeks because at first body 20 made me so sore I didn't think I could tolerate more weight lifting. But beginning week 4 I re incorporated traditional weight Lifting 3 days a week. I'm doing body 20 twice a week. I'm also walking a lot more. Like while my kids are at basketball practice I walk. So now at 6 weeks...I'm down another 6 lbs, but also another 3% body fat. Starting weight 208 at 18.5%bf. currently at 194 with 14% bf. If things keep progressing getting to 12% is possible but we shall see. Hard to say at this point what sort of credit goes to body 20 vs the other stuff I am doing. But, I'll say it's a full body work out and I get very tired after 20 minutes...so at a minimum it's a change of pace. I will say however I don't get nearly as sore from body 20 now as I did the first few weeks.

How much does it cost?

Bump to see if anyone else has tried it or has any results to post.