IME and in talking to others, there is Woodway, then there is everything else way, way, way down the list. Go into any high performance facility. The treadmills are Woodways. I'd never heard of them, but then after Simon W. got one in preparation for Beijing, I started seeing them all over the place, usually in places that you could tell put a lot of thought into their equipment, such as the Athlete's Performance facility in Tempe.

How can we encourage our local gyms to stock them?

Quality of materials. I can get in the same workout on a sole or a Landice. But the Landice feels way more solid during the experience. A mazda and a BMW will both get me from point a to b. but I'll take the latter every time and pay the premium because for me it's about the result and the experience.

True, but a BMW only costs about 2-3x more than a Mazda, if even that.

A Woodway, however, costs 8x more than a $1500 Sole F80, and over double a Landice premium TM.

For commercial users, and possibly pros who really use the heck out of it, I could understand, but for a single amateur AGer? That's big wallet stuff right there, even for someone earning 6-figs.

You missed my main point about the experience. It's not about arithmetic. It's about owning something that I'd want to use.

Ummm, when did I ever say I needed a Woodway?

And the boring and mundane nature of treadmill running is not automatically separate from the quality of the product. Treadmill running sucks to begin with. Anything that further detracts from the experience isn't going to help.

Some of you guys must be running slow as hell on these treadmills. A $1500 machine ain't particularly stable or fun at 12 mph.

As to whether or not I should own a treadmill, it's to accommodate my running when the weather or time of night makes it impractical. Investing in a decent machine is just to help moderate the hell of running on one of those satanic devices. For the record, I have a Landice L8, not a Woodway. Its built like a brick house.

I don't know why everyone raves about the 'shock dampening' as a sales point. It just trains the body to not to worry about doing the shock absorbing for itself which will increase the chance of injury and decrease performance when running on the road, which is where the running that counts occurs.

I'm interested in a treadmill that is as close as possible to running on cement.

Anyone know which one that is?

I own a Sole F80 ($1400 when I bought it), and it's rock solid. It weighs friggin' 300 pounds, so it's not going anywhere.

And FYI - I do intervals on it at 5:30/mi pace on a weekly basis (it goes down to 5min/mile) no problem. No weird shaking or extra sounds, although I'll admit that the footsteps get pretty loud when I'm running that hard on it, but that occurs on pretty much every TM.

I don't think its accurate at all to claim that you can't run fast on $1500 TMs - you can run no problemo at 5-6 min/mile on these things. In fact, my SoleF80 is better to do fast work for me than the pricey Landice(older models, probably) TMs at the local gym, as there's less weirdo noises from loose bolts and parts that probably got slightly overlooked with the constant use, despite the fact that the Landice is a bigger TM than the Sole.

I've got zero complaints with my Sole. (I've owned two other TMs in the past which I sold due to big moves x-country, Vision Fitness, and a Pacemaster, between $2000 and $1500, and honestly, there's like no difference for me between them all.)

It just trains the body to not to worry about doing the shock absorbing for itself which will increase the chance of injury and decrease performance when running on the road, which is where the running that counts occurs.

I'm interested in a treadmill that is as close as possible to running on cement.