After roughly 3 months off the wagon, I just climbed back on! My elliptical broke down a few months ago. I completely rely on it for cardio. It's so hot (and smoky now) out that riding my bike is not a good option. I also tried just running in-place as a stop-gap while I dealt with repair/replacement of the elliptical, but after a couple of workouts doing that I just gave up.

Finding people who can repair these things ain't easy, lemme tell ya. Vendors advertising that they work on ellipticals were telling me no. LOL! Eventually, I discovered that Sears will work on any exercise EQ (well, they say they do). They came out to my house twice and neither time were they successful in accomplishing anything except to identify that the serpentine belt in my unit had come off it's pulley. I was able to pop it back into position, but after 7 minutes, it just popped off again so I'm sure it's worn and stretched and needs to be replaced. Sears couldn't even disassemble the unit enough to access the belt because the tech didn't have a specialty tool. So had I committed to a repair with them there would have been even more delay and cost as they would have had to order the replacement belt AND the specialty tool, charged me a $99 diagnostic fee, PLUS labor, plus the belt, plus pass on the tool cost to me. Around $600, so he left. Happily, they charged me nothing.

I took a risk and started shopping for used units. I saw several on OfferUp, NextDoor and LetItGo. I located a Life Fitness unit (a brand of equipment I have used at a local gym chain). When I Googled the model, I saw refurbished units selling for over $2K! These people were asking $250. I took a look at the unit and spent a few minutes on it and offered them $200, which they accepted. My son and I transported the thing (it weighs around 300LBS) using a small flatbed trailer and I used it for the first time last night. It worked great. I think I just landed the deal of the century and I'm back on the wagon! Sorry for this long and rambling post that you probably don't care about at all. LOL! But I'm excited. Thanks for reading and have a great day!