My two most used pieces of equipment

I thought this was an interesting idea for a post, and then tried to add up in my head which piece of equipment I used the most (at first I was thinking about just one piece of equipment). I considered number of times per week, and per workout to try and get to the equipment I used the most, as opposed to posting about which I enjoyed the most. So it’s not the barbell, or power rack or even pull up bar.

Once I narrowed down the list I thought I would post two things, one cheap and one a little more expensive. It also worked out well that they aren’t things that often get mentioned but I find super useful. So without further ado:

Foam Mats

I bought two sets of these from Mitre 10 (a big hardware store) for $20 per set of four and it was money very well spent. I have (hard) vinyl floors inside and a concrete floor in my garage/gym so these mats are super versatile for all sorts of movements you don’t really want to do on hard ground.

I use them for all kinds of work, abs and body line drills, knee prep, some wrist prep, stretching etc. I could use a cheap yoga mat but I find these to be quite handy and comfortable. Now before someone goes off about being soft; most of your workout should be about building the body, so there is a time and place for building some tolerance to hard ground when that is the focus. The rest of the time when the focus is elsewhere you should set up your environment to best target that aspect (when you’re working on abs, just work on that, not some mental toughness linked to your lower back skin).

I strongly recommend getting a set, its $20 well spent.

Also as a side note I use these mats a lot when working in my garage on various projects, either to protect them or me from the concrete floor.

I didn't have any photos of my ab work or body line drills, but you can see the mats under the rings as a (thin) safety mat.

Gym boss timer

I bought this long before I had a smart phone, but I still use it now. I paid $80-$90 for it and I consider that a lot of money but I think it was totally worth it. I use it for timing both work sets and rest intervals and find it far better than using a regular stop watch or even my phone.

I’m not trying to sell these so I won’t write an ad for it here, I will say that its small size and being able to clip it to my shirt or shorts is really handy for when I’m moving between equipment, especially when I’m doing handing grip work.

For these I would clip the timer to my shirt

So while there are free alternative available I consider this to be an excellent luxury item for my training.