What is a home gym? Do you have have a home gym? Do you want a home gym?
My definition of a home gym is “any dedicated space in your home dedicated to working out.” That said, generally, there are 4 types of home gyms you can have. They are as follows:
1. Bare Gym Studio
This is as basic as it gets for a home gym. A home studio gym is bare studio space where you do floor-based workouts. Basically you don’t have any significant workout gear or machines. An example is a home yoga studio or a space where you do workouts that don’t use weights or fitness machines.
2. Exercise Cardio Equipment Home Gym
A fitness machine home gym is a space dedicated to your treadmill, elliptical, stationary bike, or similar type of cardio equipment. You don’t need multiple machines to qualify as a home gym … in my view.
3. Resistance Training Home Gym
When you visit fitness equipment retailers the “home gym” section is filled with resistance training gym equipment. These types of gyms are the contained resistance training systems or free weight equipment you can buy. I classify weight resistance training home gyms as three types:
(a) Lever style weight training home gyms. Lever style weight training equipment use swivelling arms which you push, pull, lift, and squat as your workout movements. There aren’t pulleys or cables - just swivelling arms on which weight plates are placed.
(b) Pulley and Cable Home Gyms. Pulley and cable home gyms are generally called weight lifting machines. A lat pulldown is an example of a pulley and cable weight training item. Any type of apparatus that uses cables and/or pulleys that are attached to weights for resistance are pulley and cable home gyms.
(c) The tried and true weight lifting equipment is free weights. Many people create home gyms with free weights. It’s pretty cheap if you stick to the basics - a bench, a dumbbell set, and a barbell set. This was my first home gym. In fact, my first home gym was a dumbbell set where I could add and remove weight plates.
At the end of the day, many people build a combination of the above in their home.
The great thing about home gyms is you can always make them better.
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Tags: muscle mass, weight training program, muscle building program, hardgainer