Air-powered or fan-resistance mechanisms are inexpensive. This makes them a likely choice for low-end exercise bikes, which in turn creates the skewed perception that all fan exercise bikes are rickety, poorly built machines. That's not necessarily true; a well-built fan bike makes an excellent weight-loss tool. After all, your body doesn't care what sort of resistance system you're using; all that matters is burning more calories than you take in so that you can burn stored body fat as fuel.
Calorie Burning
Stationary cycles -- no matter what sort of resistance mechanism they use -- are one of the best calorie-burning exercise machines. According to Harvard Health Publications, an 185-pound person can burn 311 calories in half an hour of moderate pedaling. How many calories you burn with your fan bike -- and thus how fast you lose weight -- depends on how hard you pedal. So, half an hour of vigorous pedaling would net the same person a 466-calorie burn.
Advantages
Fan bikes offer a specific set of advantages over other types of exercise bikes. They usually have relatively simple construction, and on a well-built machine, simpler mechanisms mean simpler fixes if something goes wrong. A fan bike also automatically adjusts resistance according to how hard and fast you pedal. This means the resistance range is effectively infinite, as opposed to inexpensive magnetic-resistance bikes, which might have too limited a range to sufficiently challenge you. Finally, fan bikes tend to be smaller and lighter than other exercise bikes, which means they won't take up much space in front of the television. You can work on your weight loss while you watch your favorite programs.
Disadvantages
One of the most important aspects of a successful weight-loss plan is finding a type of exercise you enjoy so much, you look forward to doing it in its own right instead of doing it as a necessary chore. Fan bikes have a few quirks that might -- or might not -- rule them out as your feel-good choice of exercise. The sound of the fan blades cutting through the air starts as a low hum but can build to a distracting roar if you pedal fast and hard. Some manufacturers also use fan resistance as a way of cutting corners on inexpensive equipment. If the same manufacturer skimped on the frame, you might find pedaling on a rickety machine so uncomfortable that you'll avoid doing the workout on the bike.
The Bottom Line
Although fan exercise bikes are an effective calorie burner, whether or not your efforts on the bike lead to actual weight loss depends on your dietary habits, too. You should eat enough to meet your body's basic metabolic need, which is about 10 calories/pound of body weight for women and 11 calories/pound for men, and fuel your body for increased physical activity. But in order to lose weight, your basal metabolic rate, plus the number of calories you burn on your fan bike and with any other type of exercise, should be greater than the number of calories you take in. This difference is known as a caloric deficit. For every 3,500 calories of caloric deficit, you lose about a pound of body fat.
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