[Thermodynamics]

Very nice setup there, thanks for sharing.

I don’t have privilege of space. All I got are a pair of dumbbells, resistive bands and a curl with adjustable weights.

Originally Posted by Ag6502

[h3]Do check with local gyms in your area that might need a little cash to stay afloat!

Very true. Gyms are among the most severely affected businesses in this pandemic. One of my relative started a Gym two years back. 6 months of zero income, heavy loan burden, fixed costs (rent) and families (trainers) to support, these businesses are under existential threat.

[Ag6502]

Originally Posted by GTO

Thanks for sharing, Ag6502! Moving your post to a new thread, and it will also go to our homepage .

I also have a home gym setup with a treadmill, exercise bike, single stack gym and dumbbells etc. Primary reason for home gym = convenience & consistency. It helps me to workout almost everyday (except for the mandatory rest days between exercising).

Will strongly recommend to anyone who has the space.

Thank you for the thread GTO, I am honoured. As I said in my post, single stack gyms are appealing for someone wanting to start but once you experience a power rack and free weights you just cannot go back! The scope for progress and the wide range of exercises available to you just cannot be compared to a single stack gym. Space-wise, a power rack setup can be contained within the rack so you are looking at a space of about 7ft x 7ft.

Originally Posted by lordtottuu

Having a home setup has been a godsend during the lockdowns. Plus, when you've been working remote for well over a decade, learning to work between workout sets is the first thing you do.

My main problem is that I don't have safe enough flooring for dead lifts (and the subsequent drops). I'm super concerned that I'm going to end up wrecking the floor that I've given up on dead lifts, which is a pity.

How're you home gym-mers doing dead lifts?

For deadlifts at home, I suggest a combination approach. First, try to use rubber bumper plates when deadlifting as they are less damaging to the flooring. Secondly, do try to purchase some cow/horse stall mats. These mats are made of heavy-duty rubber and are used to line the areas where the animals sit/stand. As such they are easily washable and very dense. This ensures that they don't compress under your feet when you perform heavy exercises like squats and deadlifts while also protecting your flooring by dispersing the impacts over a wide surface area. If you are still concerned about your flooring or if you have delicate tiles then you can use a piece of plywood as the base and screw the horse mats on top of the plywood to create a "jugaad" deadlift platform!

Originally Posted by iamitp

The only other piece of equipment I'd love to have are adjustable dumbells. However, Bowflex's easily run upto 50K.

Bowflex certainly offers convenience, but if you are willing to spend a little more time changing weights then there a lot cheaper options available. For starters, adjustable plate loaded dumbells like the ones I have are relatively cheap (I bought mine for 2400 from amazon) and feel much closer to real dumbells than the Bowflex ones. You can also slowly buy more weight as you get stronger thus reducing the one time investment. Alternately you can pickup adjustable dumbbell sets like this which are equally as good as the bowflex.

Originally Posted by PrasannaDhana

Being a person who tried working out in my home in my early twenties, I must also admit that there is no contest between a proper commercial gym and a home gym when it comes to pushing your limits.

The sheer variety of stations, almost unlimited weight plates (try doing 200 kg deadlifts at home), a lot of isolation exercises to choose from, keeps you away from boredom. I love those full size mirrors too, which somehow is very hard to set up at home, specially in multiple directions.

Add sauna/nutritionist's availability and so on.

An average gym fee is 1k per month in tier II cities, and average cost for one to put up a home gym is 50-100k. Even financially, commercial gyms make more sense.

To set up a home gym and consistently work out there takes quite some discipline!

I see where you are coming from Prasanna but I would have to disagree! In my opinion as someone who is interested in weight training and disinterested in all the fancy machines in most commercial gyms flaunt, a home gym makes perfect sense. Most commercial gyms do not care much for serious lifters and keep pestering you. Add to that the fact that often there is only one bench or only one squat rack and it really starts to become tedious. At home, I am free from these distractions and can focus on my workout (which can also include 200kg deadlifts). Coming to the financial aspect of it, in my city, a good gym with a squat rack and barbells runs about 20k a year. Given that my home gym is used by about 4 people in some shape, it will pay for itself and be a good investment really soon! However, not many people can do this and so yes fitness does need to be an important priority for someone looking to set up a home gym.

Originally Posted by carthick1000

Having your own gym has some major advantages:
1. Being there for you 24 X 7. This helps in being consistent and disciplined.
2. Works out much cheaper than going to a gym. Saves time (to travel), money and not have to wait for equipment.

From an overweight obese teenager (~118kgs and 185cm tall) in 2005, to a disciplined lifting and running 34year old now (90~100kgs and 193cm tall). I prefer to combine both cardio and resistance training whenever possible. If it is spring and fall, I combine running and lifting. If it is winter or summer, I will only be lifting. When I travel for work, will be using the gym facilities at the hotels and will bring my running shoes just in case, if the gym is not adequately equipped. The 3 important things that keep me healthy :

1. Discipline to workout, eat right and rest well

2. Good quality running shoes

3. Power rack with safety catch and weights upto 150kg

In 2016, when when we moved to a house with an extra room/attic/loft with permanent stairs on the top floor (In Dutch it is called Zolder), me and my wife decided to let go of our gym memberships (€30/month per person which adds up to €720 for both of us per year) in exchange of a home power rack setup. Surprisingly, it costed even less than our yearly gym subscription. We bought the power rack and Olympic barbell, used. And simply bought some new cast iron weight plates with heavy-duty rubber floor pads for deadlifting. For the past 5 years, this has been our go-to gym rain or shine, snow or wind:

Attachment 2140168

What a lovely set up. I truly get jealous when I see the quality of products available easily outside India. Here we do have high-quality products but they are often prohibitively expensive. The power rack and bench are lovely but do you not feel the lack of a pulley system? Tricep pushdowns and cable rows are a staple for me

[armaan_singh]

Great thread buddy,

I've contemplated this idea in my head several times, and like a lot of people I had bought a treadmill only to end up going to the gym anyway, and having it rust away from one room to another due to a lack of use, and eventually sold it at a quarter of the price.

If working out at home works well for you, then this is an excellent investment, but from my personal experience working out at the gym is like therapy for me, seeing the same faces everyday motivating me to go the extra mile and take things up a notch. Somehow I've never been able to get the same result in isolation.

But again love your setup man.

[carthick1000]

Originally Posted by Ag6502

Here we do have high-quality products but they are often prohibitively expensive. The power rack and bench are lovely but do you not feel the lack of a pulley system?

Well, here too it is expensive, but the quality is certainly far better than what we get back home. Since I bought the power rack and barbell used from a person together, I managed to get a good price. Rest of the things, I bought new. Here is an overview of costs just to give an idea for you and others. You will see, getting a used power rack and olympic barbell saved me almost half the price, if I would have bought new.



I wanted to keep my setup minimalist and I dont like the noise and having an extra attachment of a pulley system. It looks a bit ugly. For me the same functions are done by the dip bar and the pull up bar, which is part of the power rack. I like complex movements than isolated ones. That is why skipped pulley system.

[Axe77]

Kinda timely thread for us folks in mumbai / Maharashtra. 😜

Mission Patience Again commenced tomorrow.

[am1m]

For folks who are super-disciplined (and of course have the space), this is a great way to go. But if you aren't very disciplined about working out, would suggest not going in straight for a full-fledged setup. I've seen that in several cases, what keeps one motivated and coming back to any form of exercise is the community one forms while indulging in the activity. Whether it's running, exercising with weights, swimming, football, or whatever. We tend to motivate each other and often that is the difference between sticking to a sport and slowly losing steam. That aspect will be absent when working out at home and one needs to be a self-motivated individual. So if I was simply not sure, I'd wait and invest in equipment in stages rather than going all in for a full setup.

[theexperthand]

Good thread, and thank you for sharing the information.

I was on the lookout for a couple of dumbbells for our apartment gym and after going through many options (decathlon - too costly, Amazon - looks shabby and costly), zeroed in on OLX and found a good contact from Bangalore, who can supply any kind of weights, barbells etc.

I finally got a pair of dumbbells (140 per KG, rubber-coated dumbbells, Bouncer brand), a barbell, and a couple of stoppers from him, and the quality was excellent.

The guy's name is Sunil, and his contact number is 8951638082.

His OLX profile is www.olx.in/profile/263368201

I am in no way affiliated with him, giving out his contacts only since I am a very satisfied customer.

--Anoop

[Jattitude]

Originally Posted by am1m

one needs to be a self-motivated individual. So if I was simply not sure, I'd wait and invest in equipment in stages rather than going all in for a full setup.

Bullseye! I second this. Only self-motivation will get one to use a home gym setup. If not, then community set-ups are the way to go.

[Mortis]

Some good advice and tips here that can also be used to set up a small gym in an older society that doesn't have one and with limited space.

[motorpsycho]

I also have a home gym, with a few dumbbells and an expensive treadmill, which we now use to dry clothes on during rainy season!

[any23]

Congrats on setting up your home gym. I can understand the itch we regular gym goers feel for hitting the weights every day.
Ever since Covid-19 hit the world i was in dilemma to have my own little personal gym. But to be true personally i like hitting a good spacious commercial gym for the obvious reason of change in mood/place(breaking the monotonous home-work routine), meeting friends and making new friends. There is no denying having a home gym is best to optimize time, I do have strong feeling to set up a home gym as it will be more value for money and peace of mind during such pandemic times.

Some of my options would be to setting up a home gym -

1) Power rack - https://www.decathlon.in/p/8491828/g...ress-back-pull

2) Adjustable bench - https://www.decathlon.in/p/8491829/g...-weights-bench

3) Olympic rods

4) Dumbbell blox - https://athleanx.com/athleanx-blox -to save space/ but normal dumbbell setup can be done to save money.

5) Cross Training Bands -https://www.decathlon.in/p/8484823/resistance-bands/cross-training-elastic-training-band-60-kg

6) Olympic Weight Plates

7) Dip Station/Bar - https://www.decathlon.in/p/8503464/g...ps-station-900

8) Plyo Box - https://www.decathlon.in/p/8484144/g...lyometrics-box

9) Yoga Mats

I have done my research but considering weather to go or not for such a investment at present, & YOUR POST MIGHT MAKE ME TO TAKE THE BIT AND SETUP MY HOME GYM.

The above setup will cost (approx.) INR 1.5lakhs - 2lakhs.

[AZT]

I've don't have room for a separate gym so making do with Dumbbells. I miss deadlifts and pull ups but for the rest I'm liking this new routine. Need more weights but just going high reps where I've maxed out the weight.

Ideal case would be a bench and DB set at home for those days when you have less time and a proper gym membership where you can change variations and go full ham.

[Nitish.arnold]

Here's my rooftop gym,
It has everything you may think of....
This is the 3rd iteration, after building a basic one, and then a more advanced one..
Now it's all Olympic grade weights, barbells, stations, and more...
I have even added battleropes (not in the pic), and a spinning machine (cycle).
The more you workout, the more you identify the needs of each and every muscle group, and accordingly you add equipment/weights.

I have bought most of the stuff pre-owned, after much research and running to and fro to retailers, wholesalers, manufacturers and more...

You guys can pm in case you want to build your own rig, I may help in maximizing efficiency with minimising costs.

[Jattitude]

Originally Posted by any23

C

Some of my options would be to setting up a home gym -

1) Power rack - https://www.decathlon.in/p/8491828/g...ress-back-pull

I would recommend that you find local fabricators for the power rack. There will be several of them in Hyderabad. Ignore middlemen while doing this. The cost and quality of getting this don will beat whatever Decathlon may have to offer. Unless you're planning to compete in powerlifting competitions, you could steer clear of expensive rods and plates and buy them cheaply from usually these same fabricators. They will not be calibrated, but again if you will not be competing then they're mostly irrelevant, and the cheaper ones will serve your purpose at the fraction of the cost.

[motorpsycho]

Originally Posted by Jattitude

I would recommend that you find local fabricators for the power rack.

I agree with Jatin, you can get one fabricated for a lot less cost, below is the blue print for the Starting Strength rack by Mark Riptoe, you can see one fabricated by Alec Steele on Youtube.

https://startingstrength.com/files/starting_strength_rack.pdf