Woodway USA, Inc. v. Lifecore Fitness, LLC, Dba Assault Fitness

N OTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.
United States Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit
______________________
WOODWAY USA, INC.,
Appellant
v.
LIFECORE FITNESS, LLC, DBA ASSAULT
FITNESS,
Appellee
______________________
2025-1323
______________________
Appeal from the United States Patent and Trademark
Office, Patent Trial and Appeal Board in No. IPR2023-
00843.
______________________
Decided: July 17, 2026
______________________
SARAH E. RIEGER, Foley & Lardner LLP, Milwaukee,
WI, argued for appellant. Also represented by K ADIE M.
J ELENCHICK; J ACK T HOMAS CARROLL , Madison, WI.
ANDREW B. T URNER, Brooks Kushman PC, Royal Oak,
MI, argued for appellee. Also represented by J OHN M.
HALAN, K YLE G. K ONZ , J OHN S. L EROY .
______________________
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WOODWAY USA, INC. v. LIFECORE FITNESS, LLC 2
Before L OURIE, H UGHES , and STOLL , Circuit Judges.
L OURIE, Circuit Judge.
Woodway USA, Inc. (“Woodway”) appeals from a final
inter partes review decision of the United States Patent
Trial and Appeal Board (“the Board”), which held
claims 30–34, 37–39, 41, 45–49, 57, and 59 of U.S. Patent
10,561,884 (“the ’884 patent”) unpatentable as obvious.
Woodway USA, Inc. v. LifeCore Fitness, LLC, IPR2023-
00843 (P.T.A.B. Oct. 22, 2024), J.A. 1–59 (“Decision”). For
the following reasons, we affirm.
BACKGROUND
Woodway’s ’884 patent is generally directed to manu-
ally operated treadmills and mechanisms for controlling
the motion of the treadmill’s running belt. See ’884 patent,
Abstract. The ’884 patent depicts manual treadmill 10 in
Figure 1, which is reproduced below:
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WOODWAY USA, INC. v. LIFECORE FITNESS, LLC 3
Figure 1 shows that manual treadmill 10 comprises
running belt 16, which further comprises a non-planar,
curved running surface 70. ’884 patent, col. 6 ll. 58–66. As
the user runs, running belt 16 generally moves rearward
or clockwise. Id. at col. 6 l. 66–col. 7 l. 1; col 29 ll. 5–6.
Forward rotation of running belt 16 is undesirable because
it could cause users to lose their footing, resulting in injury.
Id. at col. 27 ll. 4–10. Manual treadmill 10, thus, may in-
clude safety devices to prevent forward rotation. Id. at col.
27 ll. 11–13.
Representative, independent claim 30 recites in part
“[a] manually powered treadmill, comprising . . . a running
belt . . . wherein the running belt comprises a curved run-
ning surface.” Id. at col. 35 ll. 51–59. We refer to this as
the “curved running surface” limitation. The claimed
“manually powered treadmill” further comprises “a safety
device coupled to the frame and the running belt.” Id. at
col. 35 l. 60. We refer to this as the “safety device” limita-
tion.
LifeCore Fitness, LLC (“LifeCore”) filed a petition for
inter partes review of claims 30–34, 37–54, 57, and 59 of
the ’884 patent. See Decision, J.A. 1. Relevant on appeal,
LifeCore argued that the claims containing the curved run-
ning surface limitation (i.e., all claims on appeal) would
have been obvious over U.S. Patent 3,637,206 (“Chicker-
ing”) in combination with U.S. Patent 5,538,489 (“Magid”)
and certain disclosures from the reference book Mecha-
nisms & Mechanical Devices Sourcebook (“Sclater”) at the
time of filing the ’884 patent application. Id. at 29. Specif-
ically, LifeCore argued that Chickering’s single-belt em-
bodiment, depicted in Figure 3, satisfied the “curved
running surface” limitation because the disclosed belt of
that embodiment follows the contour of rollers arranged in
upward- and downward-sloping planes, producing a curved
central portion where the planes meet. See id. at 33–34
(citing Chickering, col. 2 l. 73–col. 3 l. 10). Woodway re-
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WOODWAY USA, INC. v. LIFECORE FITNESS, LLC 4
sponded that the claimed curved running surface is a sur-
face with which a runner’s feet are intended to make con-
tact when using a treadmill and, in Chickering, a runner’s
feet are not intended to contact the belt at the area where
the forward rollers meet the rearward rollers. See id. at
36.
The Board agreed with LifeCore, finding that Chicker-
ing’s single-belt embodiment disclosed a curved running
surface, as recited by claim 30, while rejecting Woodway’s
expert testimony that limited the claimed “curved running
surface” to be a surface that a runner’s feet would make
contact with during normal use. See id. at 36–38. The
Board also rejected Woodway’s motivation to combine and
secondary consideration arguments. See id. at 41–56. The
Board ultimately found claims 30–34, 37–39, 41, 45–49, 57,
and 59 unpatentable as obvious over Chickering in combi-
nation with Magid and Sclater. See id. at 46–47, 61–62.
Woodway timely appealed. We have jurisdiction under
28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(4)(A).
D ISCUSSION
Woodway argues that the Board erred in its obvious-
ness determination because it applied an incorrect claim
construction, and that under its view of the proper con-
struction the Board’s findings are not supported by sub-
stantial evidence. See Woodway Op. Br. 25–35. We
disagree.
“We review the Board’s claim construction de novo and
any underlying factual findings for substantial evidence.”
Restem, LLC v. Jadi Cell, LLC, 130 F.4th 941, 944 (Fed.
Cir. 2025) (citation omitted). “We review the Board’s obvi-
ousness determinations de novo and its factual findings un-
derlying those determinations for substantial evidence.”
Int’l Bus. Machs. Corp. v. Zillow Grp., Inc., 160 F.4th 1360,
1366 (Fed. Cir. 2025) (citation omitted). “What a prior art
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WOODWAY USA, INC. v. LIFECORE FITNESS, LLC 5
reference discloses is a question of fact.” Id. (citation omit-
ted).
Woodway contends that the Board implicitly construed
the term “running surface” incorrectly to include portions
of the running belt on which users would not be expected
to place their feet. See Woodway Op. Br. at 25–28. In
Woodway’s view, the claimed “curved running surface” is
limited to a surface that a “runner’s feet would typically
make contact [with] when the user is running on the tread-
mill during normal use.” Id. at 26 (quoting Dr. Kim Blair’s
declaration (J.A. 4898 ¶ 90)). Under that construction, it
contends Chickering cannot disclose a “curved running sur-
face” because the only portion of Chickering’s running belt
that is “arguably curved is not a portion with which a user’s
feet are expected or intended to make contact.” Id. at 30.
We disagree. Woodway mischaracterizes the Board’s
obviousness analysis and fails to show how the Board’s ob-
viousness determination was not supported by substantial
evidence.
We first address Woodway’s claim construction argu-
ment. Neither party requested that the Board expressly
construe the term “running surface,” and the Board did not
expressly construe this term. See J.A. 4760–4762; 6894–
6897. Nor did the Board implicitly construe that term. It
merely rejected Woodway’s expert testimony regarding the
plain and ordinary meaning of “running surface,” while
making a fact finding regarding the differences between
Chickering’s endless belt 28 in Figure 3 and the ’884 pa-
tent’s “curved running surface” limitation. Compare Deci-
sion, J.A. 36 (determining the scope of Chickering’s
disclosures), with id. at 36–37 (concluding that Chickering
“discloses a curved running surface, as recited by claim 30”
and rejecting Woodway’s arguments); see also Graham v.
John Deere Co. of Kansas City, 383 U.S. 1, 17 (1966) (hold-
ing that determining the “differences between the prior art
and the claims at issue” is a fact question under 35 U.S.C. §
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WOODWAY USA, INC. v. LIFECORE FITNESS, LLC 6
103). We therefore reject Woodway’s attempt to recast a
factual dispute as a claim construction issue to obtain de
novo review. See, e.g., Restem, 130 F.4th at 945 (“We do not
agree with Restem that the Board’s analysis constituted an
implicit construction of the ‘placing’ step beyond its stated
construction. Instead, the Board made factual findings
that supported its anticipation analysis.”).
But even so, to the extent the Board’s analysis could be
taken as an implicit claim construction, we conclude that
the Board did not err in rejecting Woodway’s narrow con-
struction of the term “running surface” because that con-
struction conflicts with the language in the specification.
See Baxalta Inc. v. Genentech, Inc., 972 F.3d 1341, 1346 n.4
(Fed. Cir. 2020) (“We note that when a construction such
as this is inconsistent with the plain language of the claims
and the written description, it is incorrect.”).
Here, nothing in claim 30 limits the claimed “running
surface” to surfaces on which users would be expected to
place their feet. And the specification is consistent with
that plain reading of the claim. As the Board correctly
pointed out, the ’884 patent consistently describes the
claimed “running surface” as a continuous surface that
may comprise multiple regions (e.g., front, central, and rear
regions) with varying geometric configurations (e.g., curved
and linear portions). See Decision, J.A. 37–38 (citing ’884
patent col. 3 ll. 16–22, col. 6 ll. 34–40, col. 9 ll. 4–6, col. 10
ll. 11–16, col. 10 ll. 39–62, Figs. 7a–7j). Given the breadth
of the plain claim language and the disclosures in the spec-
ification, the claimed “running surface” plainly encom-
passes the running belt’s continuous surface, whether or
not it includes portions typically contacted by a runner’s
feet. See Verizon Servs. Corp. v. Vonage Holdings Corp.,
503 F.3d 1295, 1305 (Fed. Cir. 2007) (“We normally do not
interpret claim terms in a way that excludes disclosed ex-
amples in the specification.”); see, e.g., Wasica Fin. GmbH
v. Cont’l Auto. Sys., Inc., 853 F.3d 1272, 1280–81
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WOODWAY USA, INC. v. LIFECORE FITNESS, LLC 7
(Fed. Cir. 2017) (affirming the Board’s finding of unpatent-
ability because nothing in the claims or specification lim-
ited the claims as purported and relied on by the patentee).
Because Woodway makes no challenge to the Board’s
findings under the proper construction of the “curved run-
ning surface” limitation, we do not disturb the Board’s ob-
viousness determination regarding this limitation, which
is contained in all of the challenged claims.
Woodway does, however, challenge the Board’s obvi-
ousness determination on two other grounds. It argues
first that the Board applied the incorrect standard regard-
ing teaching away and, regardless, that there was no moti-
vation to combine the prior art with respect to the safety
device limitation. See Woodway Op. Br. 35–53. It also ar-
gues that secondary considerations, namely, evidence of
commercial success, outweigh the Board’s obviousness de-
termination. See id. at 53–62. Neither of those arguments
is persuasive, and they fail to show that the Board’s obvi-
ousness determination was not supported by substantial
evidence.
Regarding the motivation to combine argument, Wood-
way does not dispute that the combination of Chickering,
Magid, and Sclater teaches the “safety device” limitations.
It contends that a person of skill would have had no reason
to combine those references because Magid teaches away.
See id. at 35–45. But the Board’s determination is sup-
ported by substantial evidence. It explained that a “person
of skill] would have modified Chickering to include a safety
device as taught by Magid [i.e., Magid’s unidirectional con-
trol means 6,6’ – ratchet and pawl mechanism] in order to
reduce the risk of a user falling” based on the express
teachings of those references and LifeCore’s expert’s, Dr.
Giachetti, testimony. Decision, J.A. 40. It further ex-
plained, relying on other expert testimony, that the evi-
dence supported an obvious substitution of “Sclater’s one-
way sprag-type bearing for Magid’s ratchet and pawl one-
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WOODWAY USA, INC. v. LIFECORE FITNESS, LLC 8
way mechanism to obtain predictable results, e.g., reduced
noise and improved durability.” Id. It then rejected Wood-
way’s teaching away arguments because those arguments
did not concern the modification proposed in the petition.
Id. at 41–42. We therefore conclude that the evidence, in-
cluding the prior art disclosures and accompanying expert
testimony, provide substantial evidence for the Board’s mo-
tivation to combine finding.
As for Woodway’s secondary considerations argument,
the Board weighed Woodway’s evidence of secondary con-
siderations and found that Woodway did “not sufficiently
establish a nexus between the unique features of the
claimed invention and the evidence of secondary consider-
ations.” See id. at 47–56. “A showing of nexus can be made
in two ways: (1) via a presumption of nexus, or (2) via a
showing that the evidence is a direct result of the unique
characteristics of the claimed invention.” Volvo Penta of
the Ams., LLC v. Brunswick Corp., 81 F.4th 1202, 1210
(Fed. Cir. 2023). Here, the Board relied on Woodway’s fail-
ure to establish coextensiveness for purposes of a presump-
tion of nexus and its failure to show that the alleged
secondary considerations were attributable to the claimed
safety features rather than unclaimed features of its rele-
vant commercial treadmills. See Decision, J.A. 49–55. The
Board specifically found Woodway’s witness testimony pur-
porting that “safety is a critical factor for commercial suc-
cess” not credible because that same witness testified that
Woodway’s alleged commercial success could be due to
other factors, such as Woodway’s reputation. See id. at 53.
Thus, the Board’s lack of nexus finding was supported by
substantial evidence.
We therefore affirm the Board’s determination that
claims 30–34, 37–39, 41, 45–49, 57, and 59 of the ’884 pa-
tent are unpatentable as obvious.
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WOODWAY USA, INC. v. LIFECORE FITNESS, LLC 9
CONCLUSION
We have considered Woodway’s remaining arguments
and find them unpersuasive. For the foregoing reasons, we
affirm.
AFFIRMED
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