Over the last 3 years that I’ve been CrossFitting, and doing double unders, I have had a number of different jump ropes.
When I first was starting out I had a heavy rope that I quickly outgrew. When I say I outgrew it I’m not saying that I actually was growing in height or size. Haha! I mean the weight of the rope was too heavy for a high number of double unders. I would get to around 30 double unders and my forearms would fill up with so much blood that I couldn’t spin the rope anymore.
From there I went to a lighter rope, which solved my forearm problem, but it still took a lot of work to spin fast enough.
I figured that was as good as it was going to get…
That is until one of my training partners show up at the CrossFit gym with this rope that was made of wire with little round handles.
And she was FAST!!! She was good at double unders before, but this was crazy!
I asked her about the rope, and she said it made her twice as fast. Twice as fast! I couldn’t believe it. She said it spun so effortlessly that a minimal wrist flick produced speed like no other rope she’d tried.
The rope she was using was an RPM Speed Rope.
That was all I needed to hear. I knew what my next rope was going to be, and the next review that I wanted to do on AllAroundJoe
I emailed RPMFitness.com, and they gladly supplied me with their newest jump rope. In fact it was literally just released at the 2013 CrossFit Games.
AND they asked what I would like printed on the rope. You can literally send them your logo, and they’ll put it right there on the handle of your jump rope. How cool is that?! You get the fastest rope, and it has your name or branding on it. RPM is going to dominate the jump rope market!
When I get new products I pay close attention to the presentation. This could be packaging, or what is included with the product.
When my (personalized) RPM rope showed up, it was perfectly bundled into a little back pouch with the RPM jump rope logo on it. Very nice!
The next step was to take the rope out of the pouch and fit it for the length that I like. This just took a few minutes of trial and error. I guesstimated a length, took a few jumps, adjusted the length, took a few jumps… I did this until it felt just right, and then clipped the excess wire. Done and done!
How about that performance…
Well, at first the rope spun so fast that I couldn’t get the timing of it. Seriously. I was so used to spinning my rope hard and fast, that when I spun the RPM jump rope it accelerated more than I was used to and threw off my timing. My training partner was right… all you needed was a minimal wrist flick, and the rope will spin like crazy!
With this newest rope release I was curious how things had changed, and here’s what I found….
“The improvements are: the handles are 50% lighter, we have eliminated the caps on the top of the handle so there is no plastic anywhere on the ropes, and we have colors available (black, dark grey, blue, pink, yellow and gold). We will also be offering custom engraving for online orders: $10/per handles with a max of 20 characters.”
So the biggest thing that I took from that was a 50% lighter handle means more double unders without my forearms getting pumped, and you can get awesome colors.
RPM Jump Rope Conclusion
This RPM jump rope is the best rope that I’ve used, hands down. Why… Because it’s light, and spins easier, and faster than any rope that I’ve tried. Period.
Where To Buy
RPMFitness.com – Custom engraving and colors
