If I had an opportunity to build a garage gym at home with all the equipment I need I would never step into a gym again. However, the two main issues with building a home gym are: you need to have sufficient dedicated space and you must be ready to invest a good bit of money. This can be challenging for a lot of people. The good news is, there are tools out there that can help you make your home workout more challenging, won’t take up too much space and won’t empty your bank account.
Gym mat
Obviously, you don’t necessarily need a gym mat to exercise. But depending on the floor you have it can come in very handy. You can choose from mats of varying thickness. The thicker ones will feel much nicer on your elbows and knees when you perform planks and half-kneeling exercises. You also want to choose a non-slip mat to avoid sliding all over the place during your home workout.
Resistance bands
Resistance bands are an excellent tool that you can use for warm-up, stretching, full-body, mobility training, and rehab exercises. There are a variety of resistance bands available, which all have slightly different functions. They will certainly make any home workout more challenging and can help build muscle.
Therapy resistance bands
These bands are very light and don’t loop. Apart from being useful for people recovering from injuries they have a number of other benefits. Therapy bands are great to include in your dynamic warm-up and even into the main workout if you are looking to add a bit of low impact resistance to your session. You can also use these bands in your static stretching and mobility work.
Loop bands or pull-up bands
These long flat loops are not just good for assisting pull-ups – you can use this versatile tool for full-body training at home. These loops come in different levels of toughness with the thicker ones being perfect to help master your first pull-up. The light and medium loops would be suitable for a great variety of total body exercises including compound movements (squats, thrusters, shoulder press), isolation movements (tricep extension, lateral raises) and core work (pallof press).
Mini bands (hip circle bands)
While the shape of these bands suggests they are best used for lower body exercises, you can also add them to upper body exercises and shoulder stability work. Mini bands are an excellent tool to add to your warmup for glute activation. Simply place the band over your ankles or above your knees and perform a lateral squat walks. You can also use these bands in your main workout to ensure your glutes work even harder during your squats, glute bridges, clamshells, and kickbacks.
Fabric hip loops
The fabric hip loops are specifically designed to increase your glutes’ engagement when performing various lower body exercises (e.g. squats) and glute specific exercises (e.g side leg raises). Depending on the resistance level these bands can be brutal but incredibly effective. Another great feature is that these bands stay put on your hips during an exercise, unlike mini bands.
They might be slightly more expensive than mini bands but they are an investment you won’t regret. A word of warning – the resistance on some of those bands can be quite high. If you are new to using these bands make sure to check specifications and reviews to find the best fit. You can always start with mini bands and build up towards these tougher fabric hip loops.
Tube resistance bands with handles
The best part about these bands is soft handles which make them more convenient compared to pull-up bands. What’s even better – you can use those handles with other types of bands! Tube bands also come with an anchor that allows you to secure a band at different heights. This creates a great choice of exercises for any body part. These bands are great for performing different types of rows, chest press, shoulder press, etc. You can also use them for support during squats and lunges. They come in different resistance levels and also contain an ankle attachment for exercises like kickbacks or lateral leg lifts.
Stability ball
Stability or swiss ball can bring more variety to your home workout. You can use it as a tool on its own or in conjunction with other pieces of equipment. For instance, you can perform lat pulldown by using tube or pullups bands and stability ball instead of a bench. This will allow you to work your back and challenge your core at the same time.
Alternatively, you can use a stability ball to increase the difficulty of your planks, push-ups, and mountain climbers; challenge your lower body in a wall squat, hamstring curls or hip extension; and take your core training to the next level with “stir the pot” and roll-outs.
Whatever exercise you choose to do with a stability ball, it will certainly make your deep core muscles work harder. Stability balls are easily inflated and come in a variety of sizes. The taller you are the larger the ball you’ll need and vice versa.
Adjustable dumbbells
As far as free weight equipment goes an adjustable dumbbell is probably the best value for money. Essentially you get a small bar and several plates which all together add up to 10kg, 15kg or more depending on the product. The best part about this type of dumbbell is you don’t need to buy several sets of dumbbells. You can simply adjust the weight by removing or adding the plates.
Furthermore, you can use the plates (usually 1-2kg) on their own for the exercises where you’d use a lighter weight. A lot of adjustable dumbbells are metal, but you can choose more floor-friendly vinyl or rubber-coated ones.
While it might not look like a lot of equipment it is a good place to start. Surprisingly, with just a few additional pieces of fitness equipment, your home workout will instantly become harder!