Pushing the Sport Forward, Torque Tank Debuts at CrossFit Competition
The test of the CrossFit Games season is ever-evolving.
As athletes in the sport push the limits of what is possible, the totality of the test tasked with crowning the fittest on earth must also keep pace — and oftentimes outpace — in order to maintain legitimacy.
- For more than a decade fitness equipment manufacturers like Rogue and Concept 2 have been tasked with providing the equipment and structural means to apply said test, while simultaneously finding new and exciting ways for the athletes at the top of our sport.
- Fans and athletes at the Mid Atlantic CrossFit Challenge (MACC) got a taste of the latest piece of new equipment in the lineup from Torque Fitness: The TANK M4, aka “The Torque Tank.”
Tell me more: The Torque Tank is a push sled on wheels that relies on an entirely different resistance system than the traditional sleds used at the Games or Sanctionals in the past. Utilizing a magnetic flywheel design, as the speed of the sled increases, so does the resistance.
- The Morning Chalk Up team had the opportunity to test the sled out at the MACC on the highest resistance — there are three resistance settings in total on the model brought to the event — and found that there was a “sweet spot,” where beyond a certain speed, the sled had diminishing returns on effort.
Traditional sleds have a resistance factor that is a byproduct of the friction of the sled with the surface it is being pushed on that is amplified by the total weight load added to the sled. The problem with this setup is that there are a ton of variables that can alter the friction such as the composition of the competition surface, creating unfair advantages for some.
- In 2014 moisture on the field of the soccer stadium played a factor as a result of some lanes being in the sun, and in 2019 it was contested that moisture fans at the North Park field made some sled lanes faster as a result of the mist left on the turf.
The torque tank fixes that issue by mechanically standardizing resistance, and allowing event organizers to now program sled pushes and pulls freely regardless of the playing surface or limitations of the venue.
- The friction from traditional sleds can ruin the flooring on indoor facilities, which is a huge liability for event owners and programmers, effectively nullifying sleds as an option for events that need to be indoors to avoid weather interference.
People familiar with the CrossFit Games have come to expect these types of developments. Equipment manufacturereas have continuously innovated internally and sought solutions externally to bring the best they can to the sport of fitness.
- Past creations include the Pig (1.0 and 2.0), the worm, the snail, the cheese curd, rescue Randy, the short barbell, the sprint sled, Zeus and countless other variations of pull-up rig systems and racks, as well as various cardio machines.
Fans and athletes should get used to the Torque Tank, because it is already slated to be used in the programming for the Granite Games in the individual event “So Close Yet So Far Away,” and the team relay barnburner event “Push Race.”
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