Having decent home gym equipment is essential right now, as I’m writing this, Ireland just entered its second lockdown. No more gyms around here.
But even without it, it’s nice to have a home gym available whenever you feel like it.
You can’t always hit the gym or you might not want to. It’s a completely different vibe to workout at home and you can customise it however you wish.
Here are a few things you’ll need to get started with your home gym.
1. A yoga mat
It might sound boring or obvious but a yoga mat is the one thing you can’t do without.
And you shouldn’t jump on the first one you see. During the first lockdown, my friend bought the cheapest one there was, after 2 months the thing was falling apart. Plus, from the get-go, it wasn’t padded properly and felt like a hard floor.
Choose a yoga mat that is smooth and has some grip. It needs to be comfy. Working out at home involves a lot of bodyweight exercises on the mat, which means you’re gonna be kneeling on it so it needs to take it.
It doesn’t need to be crazy expensive, $20 to $30 usually does the job. Which is better than spending $10 on one bad quality mat to quickly purchase a better one afterwards.
To recognise a good mat, it should roll easily, not like the bulky camping mats that are 2 centimetres thick and take up the whole trunk.
A good mat doesn’t move around when you’re exercising on it and it’s comfortable. When I say comfortable, I don’t mean like a mattress, but more in the way that you can kneel on it and not feel your bones hating life.
To be honest, everything else is a bonus to diversify your workouts and mix things up. Whereas a proper yoga mat is key to working out from home.
2. Weights
For this second lockdown, I treated myself to a set of adjustable dumbbells and a barbell.
I don’t think it’s a must but it’s certainly nice to have on hand for a new challenge.
If you had to start somewhere, I’d say a set of dumbbells. But I wouldn’t necessarily go for the super lightweight ones.
A home gym is about getting the most out of a few things. I don’t know about you but I don’t have an entire room dedicated to it, so it shouldn’t take up the whole space.
You should try to aim for a pair of dumbbells that seem slightly too heavy, but nothing major. If they’re on the heavier side, you can start exercising with one and use it like a kettlebell, grabbing it with both hands.
You can then progress to using both dumbbells simultaneously.
Also, legs and arms exercises do not match each other weight wise. You might want to keep it light for your upper body in the beginning but can go a bit heavier on the legs.
So I feel like you’d get more out of a pair of dumbbells with which you can easily mix up the challenge.
3. Resistance bands
I’m not the biggest fan of resistance bands but they are a cheap alternative to weights and they help to increase the challenge.
I prefer the small loop ones to put around my legs as that’s where I like a tougher challenge.
However, I’d say the bands are more versatile and are great to use for the upper body (arms, chest, and back).
You can do lots of exercises with them, get creative. At this point, there are tons of examples of how to use them on the internet.
4. Pull up bar
A home gym is about maximising space and finding a variety of workouts and a pull-up bar is a perfect example of it.
It takes no space at all and can be uses in several ways especially when you pair it with resistance bands.
Functional workouts are my favourite, at the end of the day, I want to be able to move my body in the best way I can. And I feel like pull-ups are a fun challenge. It’s like learning a new skill and the results are very rewarding.
Who doesn’t want to show off their pull-up skills?
Those are a few pieces of equipment to start your home gym. But remember, you don’t need them to get started. It’s important to get creative and move your body however you can, check out my post about loving your workout routine.
