I like a kettlebell. Even the word “kettlebell” is nice. It’s like the alarm I have on my phone that reminds me it’s time for tea. They are good for functional training, using lots of muscles at once, and the best thing is that they are simple, because being a cannonball with handles is a straightforward business. You don’t need to know the wifi code or own a smartphone to use one. Until now! It’s 2019, and everything is awful.
Kettlebell Connect, by the awfully named Jaxjox, is the world’s first smart kettlebell, which sounds as necessary as electric crisps. When I started to look into it, however, I was intrigued. For starters, the website boasts: “You can’t work out working out without workouts,” which is the greatest thing I have ever read anywhere. I wondered if this was a reference to a well-known teaching example from linguistics, “Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo”, a grammatically correct sentence that is used to illustrate homographic complexity. Then I saw the accompanying picture, of a Henry Cavill-type side-lunging in shorts, and decided it wasn’t.
I watched lustrous videos of the matt-black kettlebell sliding and locking into place on its base, like a superhero’s cowl. “Six Weights. One Place. 12-42lb in three seconds.” The manufacturer is obviously pretending it’s a Lamborghini, but forget that. Because I’m not sure I heard right. Have they created a physical body that can change its mass with the press of a button? In defiance of all physical laws? Imagine the implications of such sorcery. You could pick your car up from the garage – with your bare hands. You could swivel your house in a south-facing direction – with your bare hands. You could replace the city’s sewage pipes in a single day – with … well, I’d wear gloves, but you get the point.
Needless to say, this is not what they have done. When I unpack the kettlebell, I see how it works. Five weights are stacked on a base plate with a hollow kettlebell covering them, like Batman’s tea cosy. Selecting one of six weight options on the LCD display causes the bell to pick up or drop the appropriate number of weights. It is very clever, but it’s not magic.
Still, I quite fancy changing the mass of my own physical body, so I give the kettlebell a go, trying a few workouts from the Jaxjox website. The kettlebell cycles through the weight options with a gentle whirr, and integrates itself into circuits easily, even as they get harder. You replace the kettlebell on the base, press the plus button, wait three seconds for a beep, then pick it up again and it’s heavier. I plank and pass the bell across my chest. I squat and swing. I hoist it high, like Simba the lion cub. I am sore for days afterwards, and my thighs take out a restraining order against me.
The main burn I feel is burning disappointment that the Kettlebell Connect is not made of magic, but there are other reasons to dislike it. The heart-pumpingly prohibitive expense at £329.99, for one. The box trumpets benefits such as “work out at your own pace” and “start your workout in seconds”, which could be as easily enjoyed by juggling bags of sugar. But good-quality kettlebells are expensive, and I can’t think of a more space-efficient way to keep this variety of weights in your house. It’s the size of a baby, but you can keep it in the corner. It’s visually clean, yet advanced: motion sensors in the kettlebell track how powerful you are or how long you train and send “personalised workout insights” via the Jaxjox app. (I don’t bother reading them, because I have already hit my disappointment quota.)
Philosophically, the fact the machine picks up the weights rather than you schlepping over to choose them yourself from a rack could be seen as self-defeating avoidance of exertion. But that suits me perfectly. I don’t go to the gym. I love a home workout, as it balances my incompatible desires to be lazy and to keep fit, and this is a perfect piece of equipment for that. It won’t stretch the laws of physics, but it will shrink your waist. And since you’re already at home, you are never far from a cup of tea.
How’s it working out? A week in, and I’m already getting buff. Not buff as a buff buffalo, obviously, but maybe like a buffalo’s calf. We all start somewhere.
Wellness or hellness? Smarter than the average dumbbell. 4/5
