CONNECTED EXERCISE DEVICE
The connected exercise device includes a main body member that receives resistance bands attached thereto where the main body member is flexed during such use. The main body member includes a preferably tubular configuration for slidably receiving a force sensing member that is interconnected to the main body member. At least one strain gauge attached to the force sensing member, which provides a live real time output signal associated with the force sensed by the at least one strain gauge due to the flexing of the main body member. Electronic circuitry is configured and arranged for wirelessly transmitting the output signal to an external computing device for use by the user for enhanced understanding of use of the connected exercise device.
This application is related to, and claims benefit from, U.S. Provisional Application No. 63/351,968, filed on Jun. 14, 2022, entitled “CONNECTED EXERCISE DEVICE,” incorporated by reference in its entirety, herein.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTIONThe present invention relates generally to exercise devices. More specifically, the present invention relates to an exercise device that includes resistance, for example, in the form of bands that upon stretching the bands, exercise can be achieved. In particular, the bands are stretched over, for example, the free open ends of a bow-like structure where the bands are pulled, pushed or otherwise manipulated to receive the resistance for exercise.
However, known resistance band devices, such as the Gorilla Bow device manufactured and sold by Gorilla Bow, LLC, provide such as a resistance exercise device using resistance bands and does, indeed, provide a physical workout. However, these resistance band exercise devices suffer from the disadvantage of not being able to measure the exact weight or resistance that they are delivering to the user because, due to their nature of using resistance bands that inherently provide a variable resistance load related to the distance that the band is stretched. These known devices also do not provide the capability of being connected to the user's computer equipment, other electronic device, system or service for ease of measurement and recording/monitoring of the user's exercise history.
There have been attempts in the industry to provide such connectivity and resistance/force measurement to such devices that are difficult to monitor and track, such as bicycles, treadmills, rowing machines, step machines, elliptical machines and personal training equipment.
Therefore, there is a need in the industry to provide a resistance band exercise device with the capability of detect a user's exercise, count the amount of repetition and track the exact weight and power the user is exerting during the exercise.
There is also a need to create a community and gamification around such resistance band exercise devices, such as the above Gorilla Bow device, while connecting the exercise device to the user's computer devices and the Internet to keep users engaged.
There is also a need for a device, system and method to connect and engage the user with a community of similar users to give them a way to save and track their workouts and progress of use of the resistance band exercise device.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTIONThe connected exercise device of the present invention provides a comprehensive and accurate measurement of the resistance during exercise as delivered by the resistance bands, track the exercise carried out by the user, the number of repetitions, speed of the user, and the like. All measured metrics are relayed to an external device, system of servicer, such as an external computer device, such as a smartwatch, phone, tablet, computer, and the like wirelessly, such as via Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, cellular connection or other protocol or with a wired connection. Such a connection may be made also be made either directly or indirectly to another system or service, such a local area network, a private network or to a cloud-based storage service. These measurements give the user an accurate measurement of each exercise, which is an improvement over prior art devices that are only capable of providing the physical exercise with no accurate measurement, monitoring, recording or tracking of the exercise metrics. In other words, in prior art devices, the user must count their own repetitions and track how much resistance they have installed onto the device in the way of resistance bands, and the like. However, precise tracking of the use of the device is not accurate, particularly as to the how much resistance the user is experiencing during use of the exercise device.
In accordance with the present invention, a resistance band device is converted into a smart connected device that has the ability to detect user exercise, count the amount of repetition, track the exact weight and power the user is exerting during the exercise, among other capabilities that are not possible with prior art devices. Since the device is connected to other devices, systems and services, via a wireless or wired connection, there are numerous additional features and capabilities that are possible compared to non-connected prior art exercise devices. For example, a social media connectivity is possible where connected community and gamification of the device is possible where the smart connected exercise device keeps users engaged gives them the ability to save, and track their workouts and progress, as well as share their workouts with others, which was not possible before. Moreover, interconnectivity to cloud based systems and services, enable backups of recorded workouts, preferences, and the like, for enhanced enjoyment and use of the connected exercise device of the present invention.
In view of the foregoing, an object of the present invention is to provide a new connected exercise device.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a smart connected exercise device that is connected, such as wirelessly or by wire, to a computer device.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a smart connected exercise device that connects to a smartwatch, phone, tablet, computer, cloud-based system or service, and the like.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a smart connected exercise device that accurately measures the amount of resistance delivered to the user.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a smart connected exercise device that records metrics associated with the resistance delivered to the user.
The novel features that are characteristic of the present invention are set forth in the appended claims. However, the invention's preferred embodiments, together with further objects and attendant advantages, will be best understood by reference to the following detailed description taken in connection with the accompanying Figures and attachments:
The new and unique connected exercise device 10 of the present invention is discussed in detail below.
With the smart connected resistance band exercise device 10 of the present invention, the user 12 knows exactly the weight resistance they are working and the device 10 will track various elements of their workouts, such as the amount of resistance experienced during a workout, repetitions, and the like with the capability to save these metrics and features experienced to track their progress. A user 12 will also be able to join a community and measure their progress against other users via a social media component of the present invention 10. The present invention 20 preferably has an open application programming interface (“API”) to enable it to connect to other fitness devices and ecosystems. For example, the smart connected resistance band exercise device 10 of the present invention could provide the strength element/component to any of the connected exercise bikes, rowing machines, or the like, or be incorporated into a fitness or health ecosystem, such as Apple's HealthKit. Such interconnectivity of devices, namely, exercised devices, is well known in the art and needed not be discussed in further detail herein.
Referring first to
The smart connected resistance band exercise device 10 of the present invention is shown to include a bow-like member 14 onto which one or more of the different resistance bands 16 are be attached thereto to span across the opposing forked free ends 14a thereof. The different color bands 16 can be attached between the multiple tines of the forked ends 14a. As can be seen in
While not shown in
The loadbar 18 can be configured in many different sizes and shapes as long as it can fit in and be secured in the tubular main body member 14. For example, the loadbar 18 may be about 444.50 mm in length and 12.70 mm by 12.70 mm in cross-section. The recess may be 10.16 mm by 22.86 mm with rounded corners, as seen in the figures. These are merely examples of the different dimensions that may be used in accordance with the connected exercise device 10 of the present invention.
Since the connected exercise device 10 of the present invention is an electrically powered device, it needs electrical power for operation.
It should be understood that the above is one of many different ways the loadbar 18 can be mounted within the exercise device and how the user 12 interacts with the electronics. Therefore, it is not intended for the present invention to be limited to the specific mounting configuration shown.
Thus, flexing of the tubular body member 14 of the exercise device 10 of the present invention causes the loadbar 18, residing inside the tubular body member, to also flex at a substantial mid-point thereby causing the strain gauge(s) 22, attached thereto at that mid-point, to sense such flexing to translate the physical flexing to a digital strain gauge signal. More than one, such as four strain gauges 22 can be used for completeness and accuracy. For example, the strain gauges 22 may be attached to the top outside surface 18a of the loadbar 18 of the exercise device or in the cut-out recess area 30 in the middle of the device, as seen in
Details of the operation and electronics of the exercise device 10 of the present invention is shown in the flow chart of
Via boost converter 62, power is provided to the strain gauge(s) 22 and then an output signal that is then connected/passed to a microprocessor's analog to digital converter 64, with signal processing, so that the input data can be digitized. The digitized data is then transmitted preferably wirelessly, preferably over a Bluetooth connection via a Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) module 66, to an external target device, such as a smartwatch, phone, tablet, or computer device. As shown in
For example, as far as these circuit components used in connection with the present invention, a system on a chip (SoC) with an ARM microcontroller with a BLE radio built into one chip, such as the Nordic NRF-52832 may be employed by the present invention to serve as the “brain” of the system. Firmware monitors the battery 58 and read the strain gauges 22. In addition to a power supply and microcontroller/radio circuits, analog circuitry to read the strain gauges 22 is provided. The circuits preferably amplify the relatively small signals from the strain gauges 22 and allow selecting which gauge is to be read. If space allows, in addition to the gauge circuitry, the present invention 10 may include provisions for a combined accelerometer/gyroscope IC inertial measurement unit 84. This will allow and accommodate motion features to the configuration of the present invention if the data can be valuable for algorithms and tracking in addition to the strain gauges 22.
The target device, such as a smart phone that also has wireless capability, namely, Bluetooth, preferably has an application running thereon to parse and process the incoming stream of digitized data coming from the exercise device. Appropriate authentication can be provided for the transmitted Bluetooth signal. Smart phones and other wireless capable devices and applications thereon are so well known in the art that they do not need to be provided or shown herein. Processing of the data received wirelessly by the external device is carried out via an application on the external device to detect exercise repetitions and convert the strain measurements transmitted to the external computer device to a unit of force. The force data detected can then be stored, compared, viewed or otherwise used by the user 12 to enhance their exercise experience and results using the resistance band type exercise device 10 of the present invention. The data may be kept locally on the external device and/or the data may be stored remotely, such as in a cloud-based storage solution. Appropriate live reporting of the strain detected may be displayed for user reference. Stored force data may be displayed and presented in the form of reports, if desired, to add value of the collected data for the user.
While there is shown and described herein certain specific structure embodying the invention, it will be manifest to those skilled in the art that various modifications and rearrangements of the parts may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the underlying inventive concept and that the same is not limited to the particular forms herein shown and described except insofar as indicated by the scope of the appended claims.
Claims
1. A connected exercise device, comprising:
- a main body member configured and arranged for receiving resistance bands attached thereto;
- a force sensing member interconnected to the main body member;
- at least one strain gauge attached to the force sensing member; an output signal associated with the force sensed by the at least one strain gauge;
- electronic circuitry configured and arranged for transmitting the output signal to an external computing device;
- wherein the transmitted output signal is received by the external computing device for use by the user for enhanced understanding of use of the connected exercise device.
2. The connected exercise device of claim 1, wherein the output signal is transmitted wirelessly.
3. The connected exercise device of claim 1, wherein the output signal is transmitted by wire.
4. The connected exercise device of claim 1, wherein the main body member is hollow and the force sensing member is a loadbar.
5. The connected exercise device of claim 4, wherein the loadbar is made of aluminum.
6. The connected exercise device of claim 1, wherein the force sensing member further defines a recess; at least one strain gauge residing in the recess.
7. The connected exercise device of claim 1, further comprising a processing module that is configured and arranged to parse the output signal into repetitions of flex of the connected exercise device.
8. The connected exercise device of claim 1, further comprising a processing module that is configured and arranged to parse the output signal into force value.
9. The connected exercise device of claim 1, further comprising a processing module that is configured and arranged to save the output signal.
10. The connected exercise device of claim 1, further comprising a processing module that is configured and arranged to transmit the output signal to an external device.
Type: Application
Filed: Jun 13, 2023
Publication Date: Dec 14, 2023
Applicant: Gorilla Bow, LLC (Portsmouth, RI)
Inventors: Thomas Whittington (Portsmouth, RI), Christopher Caouette (Portsmouth, RI)
Application Number: 18/333,732