Pit Shark Photos, Review

[RBLOCK]

http://www.box.com/s/nl1ivhniszeaitmg050k

Man, I love this thing. If you were on the fence, buy one. It came in yesterday, no shipping issues.

I'm also really pleased with the clearcoat finish on the machine--it shows off all the welding coloration, and whatever scars were visible on the metal at the time of painting. Gives the thing a really industrial look.

The 54" platform is the same width as the EliteFTS cable belt squat machine, so you can really enjoy a sumo stance for whatever floorplate exercises you perform. These are being built by Rogers athletic now and the footplate is extremely heavy. Also, the laser etched sharkhead logo is a nice touch; I think that was just a painted logo on the earlier models.

For darkfact: After some belt squats I tried to move out to the edge of the footplate, but I started pitching awkwardly forward. I was afraid that this machine wouldn't work well for donkey calf work, but then I switched to the furthest out fin hole and did them that way. The suspension was perfect that way. I did some high rep sets with shorty lifting bands and plate weight. These thing works just like the massive single use donkeys from commercial gyms, with all the other features as well, so I'd urge you to spring for this over a donkey machine.

Couple of problems with the order: as you might've noticed they sent two left chin handles. lol. A right handle should be shipping to me soon. Also, the people at Rogers didn't include the belt with the speedhook, which makes switching between holes in the fin quicker and easier. I ordered the pushup harness mostly for the harness squat exercises, should be coming in this week sometime. In the videos, the bandpegs are going in toward the center of the machine, but I find it's a lot easier to have them face out and load the bands over the weight horns (this works really well). I'm using Sorinex Outriggers (bandpegs with rotating sleeve surface) in the photos.

Probably my favorite feature is the autospot hook. Once you're really loaded up with weight, pushing up just a bit will cause the spot hook to swing back due to gravity and leave you clear to do the exercise. As long as it's oiled it allows for autospotting at the beginning of any heavy movement (calves, squat, etc).

The fat bars have an aggressive knurl which should be nice, and I had some extra handles lying around that I put on for band storage. Very pleased overall, and at this point I'm just waiting on replacement/additional parts.

[matrix563]

nice. any chance of a video review?

[grumpytude]

If you type in pit shark on youtube- you get a bunch of hits. Rblock- great piece you got there- always been intrigued with this machine. It seems there a great variety of exercises to do on it. From your pics it doesn't seem to take up as much room as I previously thought. Have to keep us updated on the different stuff you can do on this once you get all your parts shipped to you. Very Nice.

[RBLOCK]

If you type in pit shark on youtube- you get a bunch of hits. Rblock- great piece you got there- always been intrigued with this machine. It seems there a great variety of exercises to do on it. From your pics it doesn't seem to take up as much room as I previously thought. Have to keep us updated on the different stuff you can do on this once you get all your parts shipped to you. Very Nice.

Forgot to mention something: I ordered the lat row/neck platform, but one of the rack pins is slightly off square and I couldn't get it to fit in the uprights. I'm expecting a new one with slightly smaller pins soon...

[KBKB]

Thanks for posting your review! (Repped.)

Is there any way we can get some of the better photos posted directly to this thread? I find them easier to look at when scaled to a convenient size for viewing here...

[boxertim]

if i can see into the future a bit here....i'm going to bet that the right handed pullup bar is not going to be the same as the left handed ones you have. Seems like a piece that i would like in my room for a while.

good luck.

tiom

[RBLOCK]

Thanks for posting your review! (Repped.)

Is there any way we can get some of the better photos posted directly to this thread? I find them easier to look at when scaled to a convenient size for viewing here...

That is unfortunately beyond my limited technical abilities...but there are some embed links on box.net if anybody knows how to work it through the forum. They may be too large for that though.

[RBLOCK]

if i can see into the future a bit here....i'm going to bet that the right handed pullup bar is not going to be the same as the left handed ones you have. Seems like a piece that i would like in my room for a while.

good luck.

tiom

Yea I'm hoping I don't get the different diameter chin bar lol...I may need to invest in some axle straps for post-fatigue chins; doing chins with belt weight on fat bars is gonna be brutal.

[KBKB]

That is unfortunately beyond my limited technical abilities...but there are some embed links on box.net if anybody knows how to work it through the forum. They may be too large for that though.

I downloaded them, rescaled them, and then uploaded some of them here...

[KBKB]

A few more...

(Please remember that these are all RBLOCK's photos.)

[KBKB]

Just a note on the rescaling...

When I used to upload photos here, I used to go for 1000 pixels wide because that was the maximum allowed by the forum software. After the forum software upgrade, it allowed significantly bigger photos, but would always scale them for you in some fashion. When I rescaled RBLOCK's photos just now for re-upload to this site, I went for 950 pixels wide because I had noticed in the past that the forum software was scaling my photos down even further.

I see now, in the browser that I use, that the forum software seems to limit the displayed width to 800 pixels. So that 950 pixels (wide) is being scaled down to only 800 pixels for viewing in the browser. It appears that there is a height restriction too, though I haven't checked what that is. So, I guess in the future, I'll rescale to 800 pixels wide because things look better if they're not scaled multiple times.

When I post photos for some of the gear that I review, I'll sometimes show several shots of the same image, just cropped or scaled in different ways. That way, I can show a "close-up" of some part of whatever-it-is, even though it in fact came from the same image. I think this is probably the best we can do when we want to show detail.

[darkfact]

Awesome! I wish you lived in MN I would love to try it out. I feel like I can take your word though that if it works great for donkey raises plus the added benefit of everything else I might have to own this thing! The full version is obviously the way to go to, and it looks great. Thanks for the review dude!

[RBLOCK]

Awesome! I wish you lived in MN I would love to try it out. I feel like I can take your word though that if it works great for donkey raises plus the added benefit of everything else I might have to own this thing! The full version is obviously the way to go to, and it looks great. Thanks for the review dude!

I'd check with Sorinex/ the Hooles at loadthebar.com and see if they've sold one to anyone in your area. You never know when some random dude like me has ordered one for a weight dungeon like mine.

I got my squat harness, band pegs, squat belt, and right side fat grip
chin bar last week. I ran some top-down circuits on the Pit Shark Friday with my training partner after talking with Rick Hoole about his training style. This consisted of 1. harness squats 2. belt squats 3. donkey calf work. We piled a bunch of plates on the horns and some
blue Sorinex bands. Totally brutal. We've been walking stiff legged up till today.

One of the things Rick mentioned is that the row platform turns the PS into a chest supported row contraption that he prefers to the specialized models for lat work. I'm really excited to try that when my new platform comes in, and I've done almost no neck work before (not thrilled about possibly shopping for new dress shirts, but we'll see what happens). Looking forward to lunges and weighted negative chins tomorrow!

[Northernmoris]

I'm.thinking about getting a Pit in the future. How does this ship? Broken down, fully welded? It would be going in my basement through a standard door. I got my Legend rack in no prob.

[mroc17]

You can have it shipped fully assembled or broken down. I believe Rich and I both had it broken down. It's pretty much the two uprights, cross braces, weight arm and power deck...then a bunch of misc pieces like band pegs, weight horns, handles, etc. It's a snap to put together.

[ProtienandIron]

That thing looks so good. Great pics.

[fishpat86]

Wooden pit shark?