EwinRacing Champion Series Gaming Chair Review

If you have a desk job, you will spend over five years of your life sitting down at a desk. You can double that amount if you game or browse on a desktop at home for a few hours a night. It’s a daunting statistic when you think about it. We all spend over a third of our lives sleeping on mattresses, of which we spend a few hundred, if not thousands, on. So it begs the question: Should we take note of this and invest in a decent office chair too? It is crucial to sustaining a healthy posture and eliminating any bad back issues you may face in your later years.

There are many varieties of office/desk chair out there, and the cost of them can vary, greatly. The old saying “You get what you pay for” rains very true when it comes to purchasing a decent chair that can consistently service your back and posture for many years to come. We shouldn’t scrimp on cost when it comes to purchasing an office/desk chair, but most of us always do – myself included.

I usually turn my nose up at any chair costing more than £100. “A chair is a chair. It doesn’t need to be complicated. All you do is sit in it”, I would say, but as the years tick on by, I soon realise how many hours I spend at a desk. If I spend hundreds on a mattress, then sitting at a desk for over seven hours a day justifies the same kind of investment for the sake of avoiding a bad back in my later years.

The EwinRacing Champion Series gaming chair retails for €349 EU / £279 UK / $349 US and it is currently on sale for €223 EU / £190 UK / $237 US whilst also using our own 15% off voucher code ‘consolemonster’. You could say that this is probably the lower end of how much you should spend on a office/desk chair, but I’ve seen chairs costing much more than this and still have less features and quality – I’m looking at you IKEA! So on paper, the EwinRacing gaming chairs seems a bit of a bargain, but how are they in practice? Let’s find out…

Setting up the Champion Series chair was very simple, thanks to supplying all the tools and the helpful guide that lists all the necessary steps needed to assemble it. During the chair’s assembly I noticed how good the general quality of the parts are, with the only let down being the plastic arms, but with that said, even these arms carry particular features I’ve yet to experience on my past chairs. In less than 30 minutes I had the chair fully built and ready for its first test.

As features go, the Champion Series offers many buttons, leavers and switches to help achieve maximum sitting comfort. For me, the base of a seat is important. There is nothing worse then having a thinly padded seat that last barely a year before you begin to feel the framework inside. Thanks to its fairly thick padding of 10 cm, the Champion Series will be supporting your derrière for a long time.

The back support is just as important and the Champion Series caters well in this department too. The back rest dominates this chair’s form factor. Once assembled, it was the first thing to trouble me, because my current chair it replaces (a 5+ old chair from IKEA) is one of those short-backed chairs. I was never a fan of large executive chairs with high backs. This isn’t the companies biggest chair either, but should this trouble you as well, I would look at the Calling Series, which has a slightly smaller frame. But with all that said, I could slow get used to a high backed chair for many reasons.

Adjusting the back position is done by pushing down on the right side leaver, which is located where the back rest meets the seat. Powered by some fairly strong springs, the back can jump forward fairly rapid if you’re not leaning back on it, so it helps to apply some pressure to it. Adding a little more pressure whilst leaning back moves the back of the seat backwards very easy, and as you keep leaning back you soon start to notice one of this chairs key features – the ability to move the back almost fully horizontal!

Now I don’t know who would want to do this in any office environment, but at home I can see the appeal – if you wish to relax and pretend you’re in a dentist chair, this feature can seem pretty great. I don’t think I will be using this feature much, but to know the back can go backwards further than most chairs, to enjoy a relaxed posture, it’s welcoming. I must say though, I didn’t feel too comfortable setting the chair back to its maximum lean position, because my back is beyond the chair’s centre position, it felt that my weight would eventually tip me over if I wasn’t too careful.

Very popular with gaming chairs these days are the lumber and head cushions. These are held on by a pair of elasticated straps and plastic buckle clips. The straps come pre-fitted, wrapped around the bottom and two holes located in the neck area of the back seat. The lumber cushion alone makes a huge difference to my sitting experience; the neck cushion however, probably not so much. Whilst the chair is more reclined, I can see the neck cushion having more of a purpose. For me, the straps could be a little tighter, or at least hold the cushions in their adjusted position, because they always require constant adjustment every time you sit back into the chair.

On either side of the seat you’ll find the plastic arm rests. Just like most chairs, each arm rest can be raised and lowered to your own preference. For me I wish they could go a little more lower than these currently allow. Pressing a small button on the side of the rest allows you to slide the top part of the arm rest forward and backwards, which is a nice feature. Another button allows you to slide the top portion sideways towards and away from the seat. Finally, you can also apply a little force to the rotation of each arm rest to pivot them diagonally inwards and outwards. So all in all, with these four adjustments, you should find the perfect sweet spot for how your arms rest on them. These arms come pre-bolted to the seat, however if you prefer, these can be unscrewed and removed entirely.

After two weeks using the Champion Series I am slowly getting used to its dominant size. The general build quality has always felt very sturdy and solid, and I can imagine this chair would serve me well for many years. The pleather material used in the seating appears to be of a high quality, that doesn’ look like it will begin to flake off for some time. The cushions and seat padding feels like they contain a good quality and firm density of foam that should take the weight and reshape themselves after use for many sittings.

My only gripe is that I felt that the size of the seat could be slightly smaller for me. At 5’8” I found that my feet would leave the floor when I adjusted the seat to the correct height for my desk height (a standard 72 cm high). Usually, I rest my feet on the wheel frame underneath, but with the rather generous seat depth, my feet would miss the frame and dangle beyond its reach. With my feet not resting on the floor, this isn’t good for the blood circulation to my legs, so I had to seek an alternative solution by buying a cheap footrest from IKEA.

As you can see from the photo above, the overall size of the chair has troubled me from day one. I guess I prefer a smaller, more compact desk chair. For me, if the Champion Series could come in a slightly more compact form factor, I think EwinRacing could be on to a winner. The Calling Series could indeed tick that box, and I hope I can sample that chair also soon. But for someone taller and more leggy than me, the Champion Series might be a perfect chair for you because, as features to price goes, you really can’t do any better than investing in an EwinRacing Champion Series chair. Give your back the support and comfort it deserves and check them out.

Recommended!

Get 15% off EWinRacing Chairs with code 'consolemonster' at checkout
For an additional 15% discount off the final sale price of an EwinRacing gaming chair, please use our discount voucher code ‘consolemonster’ at check out.
Twitter
Facebook
Reddit
LinkedIn

Anthony Barker

Anthony is the designer, developer and owner of Console Monster. In his spare time, Anthony is a keen gamer who enjoys playing mostly First-Person Shooters and Racing games. When he is not developing games or tweaking this site, Anthony likes to be on the slopes snowboarding or hurtling down off-road tracks on his mountain bike.

By clicking on the buttons above and buying an item from Amazon, you will help support us by giving us affiliate commission. It will not cost you extra, but it will go a long way in allowing us doing what we do best here. Thank you!

Learn how to support us

Recent Posts

Game Reviews
Hardware Reviews
What's Trending