For many, maintaining a fit and well-groomed physique is a top priority, but the demands of personal and professional life often leave little time for gym visits. Enter the home gym – a convenient solution that allows for anytime workouts without leaving the comfort of home. However, the allure of a home gym comes with its own set of pitfalls. When exercising solo, without the guidance of a trainer or the camaraderie of fellow gym-goers, it’s easy to fall prey to common mistakes home gym users make. Additionally, the absence of gym amenities can lead to overlooked aspects of a well-rounded fitness routine.
Lifting your weights in a wrong way or focusing too much on any particular routine are simple well-known mistakes. Everyone will tell you about them. Some lesser known mistakes are the ones that can actually lead up to some of the worst results.
Here are some of them:
1. Home Gym Area Is Too Tight and Closed Off
Houses are getting smaller. Price of land is on its record high today and is expected to rise even further. Naturally, lot of gym rooms and areas will also suffer from this problem. Yet, you can do so much with your cramped gym spaces as well.
One of the worse and somehow not so much talked about mistakes in home gyms that are cramped for space is no real air flow. Windows in full large sizes that let in much fresh air are must haves in home gym spaces.
This air flow is required in all gyms in fact whether home based or commercial. Even if you have air conditioning, you will fare much better with natural fresh air. Your workout stamina and direct routines with be affected if you make the mistake of closed off gyms at home.
2. Proper Gym Mirrors Are Missing
Often, home gyms miss out on full large sized Gym Mirrors. Although people do have mirrors of some kind in their home gyms, but you need full sized wall length mirrors that show you all of yourself. These large mirrors work as your best available motivation and also workout mistake corrector.
You will be able to see yourself doing all the routines in a gym style Full Length Mirror. Also, this kind of mirror helps out best in expanding your field of view in a conjected cramped out home gym as well. You should definitely look into large full wall sizes mirrors for that home gym.
Also, mirror placement is very important. If you are working on a couple of machines or weight settings, one large wall mirror can serve the purpose well. For home gyms that have a lot of workout equipment, having mirrors placed nicely on wall spaces is very important as well.
3. No One to Correct Basic Workout Mistakes
Naturally, you will usually not get the amount of attention in a home gym as you would in a commercial one. Training helpers and experts with some of your workout colleagues are always there in commercial gyms correcting all your workout mistakes.
You simply don’t get that in a home gym. It is best to hire a home gym instructor at least for your starting days when you are not that much of a workout pro. This way, you will have the chance to correct most major workout mistakes that you may be making.
New starters can easily think their workout to be perfect even when it is not. Even the slightest mistakes in body movements can lead to injuries and also badly developed body shapes and muscles.
4. Over-Exertion Is Never a Good Strategy
Another common and somehow still lesser know mistake many home gym doers make is over-exertion. Since you are not limited by time often when working out at home, you can naturally exert yourself for extended periods of time.
Muscle tears, random injuries and not well-developing muscles are all results of over-exertion in a home gym. Basically, you want to start out slow and work yourself up the routines. Even then, staying within your limits while stilling pushing yourself wisely is the way to go.
For this, you should follow online tutorials or get advice from someone that you know of. Any time you feel like at the edge of exhaustion, pausing or even calling it a day should be the way to go. It is a game of patience and not sweat all the time after all.
5. What You Wear in the Gym Effects Your Workout
Usually, most of us wear proper gym clothes when going to a commercial one. Stretchy and comfy gym pants are coupled with suitable sweat shirts or their equivalents. Working out from home gym, you can make the mistake of working out in any casual clothing that you are wearing.
As supportive as your clothing in the gym is, more benefits you will be getting from it. Workout special clothing is made through years of research and supports your body in all movements and more. Also, you will be able to feel free in clothing like that and not in any other casual ones.
Simplest way of correcting this mistake is to always wear gym workout specialized clothing even when working out in the home. Your body needs to breathe and feel fresh while you do all your routines.
6. Lack of Motivation Becomes a Big Mistake
Gym motivation is essentially the biggest driving factor for all the gym goers. Looking at others perfecting their routines and also their improvements over time can drive you to do well. However, when working out in your home gym, that can surely lack.
It becomes one of the biggest mistakes in your routines leading to boring workouts and a lot of skip days as a result. There are ways to overcome this such as having a large screen installed with videos of people working out on them.
This way, you will be able to see the best exercise for yourself as well and also take motivation from people in those videos. Having a couple of mates is the ultimate goal even in a home gym though.
7. No Friends, No Helpers, No Fun
Working out is a fun activity. Most of us go to gyms just because all the fun they can bring in our daily lives. Socializing with your mates and gym partners can be the best time of most people’s day. When you do it alone in a home gym, you almost fully eliminate the fun part out of it.
It becomes a major mistake almost destroying the whole purpose of it in the long run. However, you can correct this by having some of your mates around or even siblings’ workout with you if you can.
All you are trying to achieve in a home gym is presence of other people you can talk to. Spending quality time with them can be the ultimate goal bringing fun back into your home gym time. Your Home Gym Mirror with yourself in it should not be the only person you should be looking at.
8. Too Easy to Miss on Workout Form
Home gyms have always been criticized by experts to lead to loss of workout form. This is true for many professionals and even home gym doers as well. What happens is that you simply don’t warm up well enough and them warm down properly when in home.
People start straight on their exercise and weight lifting habits without getting in the touch of things. This ends up making your form go away in that particular workout session. This is also attributed to the lack of support and attention you get in a commercial workout space.
Easy way to correct this is to always follow your pro tips. Go for a proper warm up first and then start on any weights or exercise. Do proper warm down sessions before you head out into the open or any other rooms of the house.
