Customer Reviews

SPRI 1B4ALL-75 One-Ball-For-All Kit with 75-Centimeter Ball, Pump and Exercise Chart

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

First, this is not a 75" ball, as the Amazon Title indicates. It is a 75cm ball. I'm a big guy and I wasn't sure that it would work for me, but I was pleasantly surprised. The trunk stretches and crunches deliver a real burn in short order. The ball comes with a pump, and a small bag containing plugs and pump nozzles. Pumping up the ball requires about 1000 strokes of the provided small pump, so be ready to work at it.

One of the more challenging aspects of workouts using the ball is the need to balance yourself while doing the exercise. It involves at least another 33% effort to keep your body centered while doing the crunches. I think that makes this a much better exercise than the same thing done on a fixed foundation.

The thing that caught my attention first is that the ball smells just like buble gum.

I bought this ball as a chair for my computer desk, and it works exactly as I expected it to. I'm glad I didn't spend the extra money for a higher quality ball.

That being said, there are definite signs that this isn't a top of the line product:

The pump that comes in the package is horrible. It's unidirectional and very slow. It took me close to an hour (taking breaks) to pump the thing up. Of course, now that it's pumped up, who cares?

It doesn't feel durable. The expensive one my friend bought, it felt like you could hit it with an axe and it would be fine. This one, I think I could pop with a lot of persistence and a fork. Of course, I'm just sitting on the thing and don't plan on being rough with it or keeping forks in its general vicinity.

TWO THINGS TO CONSIDER BEFORE BUYING THIS:

It had a nasty rubbery-chemical smell to it when I firt took it out of the box. This became barely noticable after a few hours and nonexistant after a week of use.

I was scared to pump it up to its full size. The instructions say to pump it up to 29". I wussed out at around 26". It started feeling really full, and (like I said) the material doesn't seem extraordinarily durable. 26" was actually a good size for my purposes, and I didn't want to risk popping the thing by pumping it up further.


All in all I'm happy with the purchase. It does what I want it to do and hasn't given me any troubles. I just wanted to point out some of the possible negatives for people researching what they want to buy.

I bought this as a replacement exercise ball for my teenager. Unfortunately, when I saw it as a gold box special, I was misled by the "one ball for all" description. A 75 centimeter ball, as I discovered, is for those 6'4" and above. Not the case at my house. It would have been better had it come with an exercise mat. The sporting goods stores around me (Sports Authority, etc) sell a set including ball, pump and mat for $19.99. I would have done better buying one of those

bought one of these to use as a PC chair and it already burst in under 2 months. I am not a very heavy guy (180 lbs 6') but this ball didn't last long at all. The thing split in half. Next time I will invest in a higher quality ball. Do not buy one of these unless you will use it less than once or twice a week if you want it to last more than a couple of months.

I bought this for my husband, he is 6'4. At first the ball looked so small, like it could never blow up big enough - but it did. He hasn't used it much so I don't have much feed back on that end. However when he first pumped up the ball, after recieving it, the pump broke.

As others reviewers noted, the chart that comes with this is pretty useless. But, that's not why I bought it. I wanted a large, cheap exercise ball, and that's exactly what I got. I do find it rather strange that the pump comes with several different tips, only one of which actually works with the ball. Ah, well, more little pieces to have lying around.