I Traded Runs For Ergatta Rower Workouts, and After 2 Weeks, My Abs Are Already Stronger

The Ergatta Rower costs $2,199, with the option to pay $107 per month. And for the programming you see on your screen, there's an additional cost of $29 per month or $290 for the year. Once you order your Ergatta, you'll get it within three to five weeks — when I researched ordering another rower, the waiting list was four to six months!

One of the best aspects of the Ergatta Rower is that it can be stored standing up. And because it has little wheels on the base, you can easily pull it out to where you want to work out, then push it back against the wall when you're done. It takes less than two minutes to both set it up and put it away. I was able to set it up in the basement in my tiny workout room/home office, and it barely took up any space in the corner. But it's so gorgeous looking, I wouldn't mind if I had to store it in my living room!

Out of the four programs, the interval workouts were my favorite. I liked how I could customize the type of workout I wanted to do, and it would offer me a few workouts to choose from that varied based on time, number of intervals, and interval pace. I started out with the 10-minute steady-pace workouts and gradually worked my way up to the 60-minute workouts that included sprint-pace intervals.

I also liked that when I chose a workout, it showed a sneak peek of what the pacing intervals looked like (as you can see in this photo). I liked seeing an overview ahead of time to know how many intervals would be race pace or sprint pace, so I could gauge my energy levels that morning. If it looked too hard, I could choose an easier workout, and vice versa.

What I loved most about the interval workouts is that as you can see from this blurry picture (sorry, I was taking it while rowing!), that little yellow circle was me. It would move based on how fast or slow I was rowing, which helped me keep the correct pace for that particular interval.

This was so motivating! In CrossFit, we would do intervals on all the cardio machines, but it was up to me to push myself. With this screen staring back at me and telling me to row faster to keep my pace and counting down the minutes or seconds left in the interval, I was inspired to push hard to meet my target — I honestly didn't think I could row that fast! And I felt so proud after and excited to do more.

This is what the screen looks like after performing a workout. The percent at the top indicates how accurately you reached the pace designated for each interval (wahoo, I got 100 percent!). It also shows the total meters distance you rowed, total time of the workout, average split (pace), best split (fastest pace), average power (in watts), energy (calories burned), and your average heart rate (in beats per minute). My favorite part was seeing how many meters I rowed — 11,651 for this workout!

After you look over your workout summary, you can go to your workout history, which shows the last 13 workouts you've completed. I rowed over 100,000 meters in two weeks, and that made me feel like such a badass! I'm one of those people who likes to track how many workouts I do per month, so seeing these stats definitely motivates me to keep up with my weekly rowing workouts.

Another cool feature about the Ergatta is that after completing 10 workouts, it uses "active intelligence" based on how you rowed to recalibrate your paddle, steady, race, and sprint paces.