JTX Cyclo Studio Review

Upright cycles deserve their place in any gym or home gym. They represent an incredibly accessible way in which to improve your cardiovascular fitness, build lower body strength and endurance, and burn through calories.

You can go hard and brief, using them for sprints to really push your heartrate up and work your muscles hard, or slow and steady, keeping your heartrate at a more moderately elevated state whilst training your legs for longer distances. Either way, you will be able to get good use out of your bike.

JTX are always a good company to go to if you want a mid-rate, mid-range cardio machine.

Their Cyclo Studio is one of the best upright cycles in its price bracket – well-built, intelligently designed, with a wealth of added extras to keep you moving forwards in your fitness journey. Let’s find out all it has to offer in our JTX Cyclo Studio review.

First Impressions Of The JTX Cyclo Studio

The JTX Cyclo Studio looks like a professional piece of kit. It’s made from sleek black moulding and stainless steel (meaning that it’s durable as anything and looks gorgeous).

A good quality, weighty flywheel takes centre stage. I always like to see this. A bike can have as much going for it as you like, but without a decent flywheel, it is fundamentally flawed.

This kind of mechanism – the kind of flywheel the Cyclo Studio boasts – means that you can be fairly confident of a really nice, smooth ride.

Other than this, it’s a bit lacking in media, but has a tablet holder to make up for it. It’s none too big, so you will be able to live with it well, and seems to be incredibly comfortable to sit on. It’s an inviting prospect.

Check Latest Price Of The JTX Cyclo Studio

JTX Cyclo Studio Specs & Features

The JTX Cyclo Studio is a gym standard, upright indoor training bike, built for practical performance, stability, and durability.

With this in mind, it features a weighty, high functioning 25kg flywheel with infinity resistance.

This is all delivered in part through a heavy-duty crank with a sealed bearing system. The steel frame is extra-large, at 2” x 5”, giving you complete stability during even more intensive workouts.

The handles and seat are all fully adjustable across multiple positions so that you can get into the position you want. This is part of JTX Cyclo Studio’s Quadri-Set™ adjustment system, which takes everything vertically and horizontally using the quick release handles. You will be able to perfect your riding stance, remaining comfortable and bringing all the power you have to bear.

In addition, the handlebars have integrated hand pulse sensors and dual bottle holders for a combination of comfort and usability.

You can read your heartrate alongside the usual training data you might expect on the Cyclo Studio’s advanced training computer. This tracks cadence, speed, pulse, time spent training, and distance travelled, allowing you to track and analyse your training in real time.

The sensors are decent, but sensors like these are notoriously unreliable. You can buy a chest strap separately for a more accurate reading – this connects simply and wirelessly via a Polar receiver.

You can also bring your own media to your cycle. The Cyclo Studio features a solid tablet holder, perfectly positioned to help you avoid neck strain.

The Cyclo Studio comes with JTX SPD Clip-In Pedals, which normally go for around eighty quid just by themselves. They feature a good SPD clip in system on one side. Clipping in like this can give you a proper 360-degree pedal stroke so that the upward motion isn’t wasted.

The other is a flat pedal for those looking to train in more standard footwear (I used my usual gym trainers to great effect).

The frame itself is stainless steel for a longer lasting lifetime and stands at 132 (l) x 51 (w)cm. You get a year-long commercial warranty or a three-year home warranty with purchase.

Check Latest Price Of The JTX Cyclo Studio

Using The JTX Cyclo Studio

The JTX Cyclo Studio gives a very nice ride. For starters, it has a large, weighty flywheel. This gives a very smooth, balanced feel to everything. It is perimeter weighted, with JTX’s Max Traction™ technology, which emphasises this still further, especially for those using clips and making the most of a 360-degree pedal stroke.

Then there is the positioning in the frame itself, all focussed on the Quadri-Set™ adjustment system built into the handlebars and seat.

They each adjust vertically and horizontally using the quick release handles, which is both incredibly easy to use and gives for a perfect riding stance with just a little playing around. The multi-position handlebars further allow you to find a good position for both comfort and power – you’ll really be able to brace against them as you let the taps off.

The pulse sensors are also very well located, meaning that most people’s riding positions will naturally include them. However, they don’t seem to be too accurate – a frequent failing with this kind of tech, with which anyone who has spent any time on a cardio machine will be familiar.

However, if you invest in the chest strap monitor then you will be able to get accurate readings on demand – the connectivity allows for a smooth user experience.

I also liked the monitor itself. The computer gives you all you need to know, as above – data on cadence, speed, pulse, time, distance, calories burned and so forth – which is standard but always good to know.

The pedals are nice. I tend to shy away from clip ins, though I tried their SPD pedals out and found them to be decent. It’s straightforward and quick to clip in and out of them, and the extra power you can put through the upward portion of each pedal is noticeable.

However, I’m quad dominant and favour flat pedals. Here, too, everything was as it should be – comfortable, grippy, with a nice tread.

The resistance works well. The levels themselves are smooth and quite gradually scaled, meaning no sudden jumps if you don’t want them. It sets in slowly, evenly, with minimal, infinite increments. The resistance control is intuitive, with a simple emergency stop for when you need it.

I would suggest using a tablet in the 10” holder loaded with something like iFit or the Peloton app. This will give you a real road experience, plenty of on-demand instruction, variety like you’ve never seen before, and options for some of the loveliest vistas the world has to offer.

It’s generally nice to have these built into upright bikes, such as in many on offer in NordicTrack or ProForm’s ranges, but at less than a grand you really can’t argue with the JTX Cyclo Studio.

Check Latest Price Of The JTX Cyclo Studio

Alternative To The Cyclo Studio

If you want something a bit fancier, and have another few hundred quid to put towards it, ProForm’s Studio Bike Pro 22 is always a good alternative to the Cyclo Studio.

The Pro 22 features a large, fantastic HD touchscreen display. This allows you to view and use the best bit of a ProForm model of this calibre – you get a year’s free subscription to iFit, ProForm’s go-to training programme.

It is around thirty quid a month thereafter (I would suggest you pay this, as iFit is one of the best pieces of fitness tech out there, but you can still use the Pro 22 without it).

iFit is always a great addition to any exercise regime. It comes with over 16,000 live and on-demand classes across multiple disciplines, from cycling to strength, from yoga to HIIT. Professional trainers and fitness experts put together fantastic classes, both on-demand and in-person, so you needn’t ever get bored or run out of new ways to train and test yourself.

The 22” HD touchscreen display swivels 180 degrees, so you can take classes both on and off the bike. This means you can make the most of iFit’s aerobic and yoga classes, which I love. You can also invest in a cheap set of dumbbells and get some decent resistance work in, under their trainers’ expert instruction.

The saddle is comfortable, too, firm but with a decent bit of padding to it, and well-shaped along with it. You should be able to avoid the awful bum ache that lesser models can bring.

In fact, you can go for a couple of hours without it aching (you can probably go longer, I just didn’t have it in me to!). You can also install your own seat if you want, as it comes built with a universal stem.

Then there is the weightiness and support. I tried out a few HIIT and sprint classes. I’m lower body strong – though I can’t bench much, I can squat multiple times my bodyweight and a sprint session will generally see me tear a machine to pieces if I really go for it.

The Pro 22 felt like it could take me on for hours without flinching! It really is tough as old boots whilst being engineered to perfection.

Verdict

As I said above, the JTX Cyclo Studio is one of the best models on the market at its price point. For a little under eight hundred quid, you get a studio standard, professional calibre upright bike that does absolutely everything you need it to with superlative grace and support.

The only downside, if you can call it one, is that it doesn’t have much by way of media and training options. However, with good connectivity and a sturdy tablet holder, this is by no means an unassailable problem – you can get any number of training apps going, giving you more options than you’ll know what to do with.

Steady, well crafted, comfortable, and very high performance, the JTX Cyclo is worth every penny and more.

Check Latest Price Of The JTX Cyclo Studio