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Treadmill

Treadmill description/claims

1. Field of Invention

The present invention relates to a treadmill and, more particularly, to a treadmill for providing strides.

2. Related Prior Art

Referring to FIG. 1, a conventional treadmill includes a base 10, a post 11 disposed on a front portion of the base 10, a wheel 13 disposed on a rear portion of the base 10 and two exercise sets arranged on opposite sides of the wheel 13. Each exercise set includes a rocker 12 connected to the post I1, a crank 14 connected to the wheel 13, a keel 15 arranged between the rocker 12 and crank 14 and a tread 16 mounted on the keel 15. An upper portion of the rocker 12 is used as a handle. By treading the treads 16 alternately, an exerciser moves a tread 16 down and forward and the other tread 16 up and backward. This conventional treadmill however entails intensive stress in the exerciser as ankles since the tilting of the treads 16 is large. Moreover, it causes the exerciser troubles in balancing since the vertical movement of the treads 16 is large. The rockers 12 must be long so that the exerciser can hold them with his or her hands while treading the treads 16. This renders the treadmill bulky. To reduce the vertical movement of the treads 16, the keels 15 could be extended. However, this would render the treadmill bulky.

There are devised conventional treadmills wherein the wheel is disposed on the front portion of the base, and the front end of each keel is connected to the wheel while the rear end of each keel is movable on a track. Such conventional treadmills are found in Taiwanese Patent Publication No. 429791 and Taiwanese Patent M262216. However, they also suffer the foregoing drawbacks.

Referring to FIG. 2, there is shown another conventional treadmill including a short base 20, a post 21 disposed on a front portion of the base 20, a wheel 23 disposed on a rear portion of the base 20 and two exercise sets arranged on opposite sides of the wheel 23. Each exercise set includes a rocker 22, a track 24 and a tread 25. The rocker 22 is connected to the post 21. A front end of the track 24 is connected to the rocker 22 via a rod 26. The tread 25 is movable on the track 24. A front end of the tread 25 is connected to the rocker 22 via a rod 27. The length of this conventional treadmill is short. It however causes the exerciser troubles in balancing since the vertical movement of the treads 16 is large. Therefore, the rockers 12 must be long so that the exerciser can hold them with his or her hands while treading the treads 16. This renders the treadmill bulky.

Disclosed in Taiwanese Patent M271597 is a miniature treadmill including a base 10, a shaft 20 disposed on a front portion of the base 10, a wheel 16 disposed on a lower portion of the base 10 and two exercise sets. Each exercise set includes a rocker 23 connected to the shaft 20, a crank 161 connected to the wheel 16, a keel 25 arranged between the rocker 23 and the crank 161 and a tread 26 disposed on the keel 25. This conventional miniature treadmill however forces the exerciser to take small steps instead of strides for using a very small wheel.

The present invention is therefore intended to obviate or at least alleviate the problems encountered in prior art.

It is an objective of the present invention to provide a treadmill for allowing exercisers to take strides.

According to the present invention, a treadmill includes a frame, a wheel disposed on the frame and two exercise sets arranged on opposite sides of the wheel. Each of the exercise sets includes a track installed on the frame, a rocker disposed on the frame, a crank connected to the wheel, a rod arranged between the crank and the rocker and a tread connected to the rod and crank on one hand and movable on the track at the other hand.

Other objectives, advantages and features of the present invention will become apparent from the following description referring to the attached drawings.

The present invention will be described through detailed illustration of two embodiments in view of conventional treadmills referring to the drawings wherein:

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a conventional treadmill;

FIG. 2 is a perspective view of another conventional treadmill;

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of a treadmill according to the first embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 4 is a side view of the treadmill shown in FIG. 3;

FIG. 5 is a side view of a person exercising on the treadmill shown in FIG. 4; and

• Provisional Patent
• Utility Patent

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