Turn Your Man Cave Into a Home Gym

How to Turn your Man Cave into a Home Gym With a Pull Up Bar

If fitness is a big part of your life, you may have thought about turning your man cave into a home gym, complete with pull up bars and kettlebells. Every guy craves to have a man cave, a space of their own to reflect and do the hobbies they love. A basement or a garage is the normal “guy” space, but it can be difficult to use these spaces for a home gym.  Let’s take a closer look at some of the qualities of a home gym.

Size and structure

We’ll assume that you’ll be using your home gym for strength training. You can run around your neighborhood for cardio. A good size for a minimalist gym is a 10’ x 10’ space. That is enough for you to lie down fully and still have room for all of the equipment. It will also need to be tall enough that you can install a pull up bar. At least a 7’ ceiling will be needed, unless you enjoy doing pull ups through floor joists. The space should also be well-lit and free of everything that isn’t for your training. Don’t put your TV in your training space.

A concrete floor sounds manly, but it can also get slippery over time and it’s hard to keep clean. It’s much safer to put down a non-slip surface. You can lay down some old carpet or go to the fitness store and buy non-slip mats. These surfaces are also much more comfortable than concrete.

It’s also good if you can make the room temperature controlled in some way. That will keep you from putting off exercise because it’s too hot or too cold. No excuses!

Equipment

The most minimalist type of exercise is bodyweight exercises. There’s countless ways to vary them to make their execution easy or difficult. However, there is one piece of equipment that is vital to complete a body weight workout and that is something to do pull ups on. Most people don’t have convenient tree branches growing through their walls, so we recommend getting one of our pull up bars and installing it into your wall or ceiling.

Here are some other pieces of gear that we also recommend:

• A chair or a wooden box (Incline pushups, box jumps, etc.)
• Resistance bands (Assisted pull ups and other exercises)
• A yoga mat (If your floor surface is too slick for stretching)
• A jump rope (Cardio)
• A kettlebell (Get training first though! Consider this optional)

If you need a primer on bodyweight exercises, the forums at BodyWeightCulture.com will give you reams of information on how to properly perform them. Kettlebell instruction can be gotten for cheap at any CrossFit box.

That’s all you really need! You could easily build this simple home gym for under $500, or even less if you already have some of the equipment or a good space. Forget paying gym fees. Make your own home gym and get fit!