Tired of making those long trips to the gym just to have your machines hogged by the sweaty guy in the headband and wife beater? Most people who love weight lifting dream of having their very own home gym but when you factor in the cost of the free weights, permanent pull-up bars, treadmills, ellipticals... Well, let's say by the time you purchase all of that equipment, you won't have time to work out because you'll be paying off Visa and MasterCard and the shape of your body will be in worse shape than your credit...
So let's scale this Home Gym vision back a little bit and focus on what we can do at home to still be able to do our workout and weight training, but on a little more reasonable budget. Here's the top five things I recommend for your very own At-Home Gym:
1: A set of Bands or some adjustable Free Weights---I've heard people argue about which are better---bands or weights. I personally use both in my workouts based on how much weight or resistance I need. There are benefits and drawbacks to both but for the sake of argument I'm going to pick a side and recommend the bands over the weights for a few reasons: 1) They are easier to story (just hang them up on a door rack) and 2) They are far more inexpensive (you can pick up a few bands for compared to a set of dumbbells can cost about per pound). Either way you choose, you need one or the other for doing some basic weight training moves.
2: Stability Ball---These large stability balls provide a number of ways to be able to include some key core exercises in with your other weight training moves. For example, rather than doing just a regular push up you can do a Balance Push-up with your feet on the floor and hands stabilizing your upper body on the ball throughout the push-up. For some other ideas, keep an eye on my Blog where I'll be posting some videos that will demonstrate some of these moves.
3: Medicine Ball---These little 8 to 12 lbs. bundles of fun are a great way to mix up your weight training with some weighted cardio! You can do some great moves such as the Mary Catherine Lunges while holding a medicine ball overhead or some different squat variations with the medicine ball. Medicine balls are also a great way to get in some core/ab work into your weight training routines.
4: Pull-up Bar---When you don't have a Lat Machine, the next best thing is a pull up. Some of the best pull-up bars have some varied grips that you can use to do overhand/underhand pull-ups or chin-ups and also close vs. wide grips. You can usually find these either online or at Walmart for under that fit right into your door frame. Another great idea is if you want to go really cheap, you can pick up some C Clamps from the local hardware store and attach them to either your door frame or rafters in your garage (you may have to use some wood to cushion the clamps). Pull-ups are a great part of any upper body weight training routine and where there's a will, there's a way (and I've just given you two ways!)
5: A Chair---This is probably already at your house (unless you're a college student living on lawn furniture) and is great for doing dips, increasing your range on your push-ups, and doing decline push-ups. I use chairs all the time in my at-home weight training routines.
Hopefully these five ways will make your at-home weight training routines easier and more realistic.
