This is an item I didn't know I needed until I saw it reviewed on Gym Radar! I replaced the carabiner in my cable set up with it and it feels so much better. No twisting of the cables and less pressure on the wrists and elbows during tricep pushdowns. I'll be ordering more. Highly recommend.

I bought this for $20 from an old lifter who was selling off his home gym. It is a custom fabricated A-frame weight tree that has a good deal of heft. I'm not sure about its origin or who made it. If it had an insignia, it probably would read: "made in the USA when it was a proper country."

I've had this jack in my gym for over 10 years now and I've never regretted purchasing it. Although mini jacks are nice, there is a special aura surrounding a full deadlift jack. I never used it to load above 500 lbs, because my deadlift never went above that range, so I can't speak personally about its performance at higher weights. But for my purposes, it gets the job done with no issues. About the biggest complaint I have about it is cosmetic and trivial: the UHMW inside the bar catch tends to move around and get off center.

Back when I first started to build a home gym (circa 2012), DIY items were common. The home gym market was pretty limited, and DIY-ing your equipment was also a way to gain some street cred among fellow home gym aficionados, of which there were few. And one of the easiest, and most cost effective, DIY fitness projects was a tire sled. It seemed like every big fitness channel either had one, or had instructions on how to make one. Zach Even-Esh had one, and so did Elliot Hulse. I wanted to be like them; I wanted to be a Pepper, too. So I made one. A used tire can be had for free (I found mine off the side of the road along a local highway), and all you need is a drill, an eyebolt, washer, and a hex nut. You can attach a chain or strap to the eyebolt and off you go. I also added a way to secure plates on top of the tire. The somewhat faddish nature of making tire sleds for home workouts have passed, but the product remains just as effective as ever. I put miles upon miles on mine and it is still going strong. If the tire eventually wears out, I can either flip it and drag it on the new side, or I can simply find another free tire and make another sled. One additional benefit of the tire sled vs. the metal sleds is that your neighbors won't hate you - at least not as much. It is pretty quiet when compared to the metal sleds. Having said all this, I'm giving it four stars rather than five with regard to performance because, due to the nature of its design, it can only pull or drag rather than push.

This airdyne bike is the definition of old school. It can be bought for cheap on Facebook marketplace (I got mine for $50) and thus ranks high in terms of value. Performance-wise, it will kick your butt as much as the newer air bikes from Rogue and others. I use it for HIIT ("high-intensity interval training") Tabata sessions couple of times a week to improve my VO2 max. They say chain-driven bikes like this require more in terms of upkeep than belt-driven ones (e.g. Rogue's Echo Bike), but I haven't found that to be true. I apply 3-in-1 oil to the chains about every couple of months, and that seems to be enough to keep it in good working order. While it is not "overbuilt" like the newer air bikes, it is built to last and has proven itself to those who care more about performance than pizzaz in their cardio machines.

Like the chrome hex-bolted ez curl bar, I don't remember ever buying this, yet it ended up in my gym somehow. (The gym fairy works in mysterious ways.) When my daughter was younger, she used to play with it alongside me while I worked out. Maybe that's why I never sold it. In any case, it functions as well as a two pound dumbbell could, and I put it to use during Wenning warmups for shoulders.

This back extension is not quite commercial grade, but it is adequate for home use. The padding is thick and comfortable, but for the feet, I'd rather have a pad rather than a metal lip holding me down. I got a great deal on Facebook marketplace and only got rid of it to upgrade to a Body Masters commercial back extension.

This 141 lb sandbag represents a unique piece of strength history in my neck of the woods. The abbreviation "FSH" inscribed on it stands for "Fisher Strength and Health," which was the premier powerlifting gym in Santa Barbara. Its owner, Kevin Fisher, was a notable powerlifter and a dedicated gym owner. The gym thrived during the resurgence of raw powerlifting during the early 2000s. That was the time when Pete Rubish was going berserk in front of his parents' washer and dryer, when George Leeman was deadlifting 800+ lbs in his living room cheered on by his friend, when the Lilliebridges (Eric, Ernie, Ernie Jr.) were like the Gracie clan of raw powerlifting, and when Mark Bell assembled all those and other freaks (e.g. Stan Efferding, Dan Green, Brandon Lilly) together in an Avengers-like fashion in his "Backyard Meet of the Century" - you just had to be there! But that era passed and Kevin Fisher eventually retired, entrusting his beloved gym to a new owner. Perhaps through avarice or stupidity or both, the new owner ran the business into the ground by raising the price of membership (from $60 to $100 per month), but not upgrading the equipment. Members were understandably angry and they eventually left, and the gym closed permanently in 2024. Some of the memories and the good times had in the gym live on in pictures available online - and this yellow sandbag can be seen featured in one of them, peeking out near the dumbbell rack. I acquired the bag from a former trainer of FSH, who was moving out east in search of greener pastures. Although I'm primarily a barbell guy, I do train with it occasionally, when I want a new stimulus. At 141 lbs, it offers quite a challenge to my 180 lb self. But its true value to me, perhaps, lies in being a reminder that all good things eventually come to an end, and that we should enjoy the journey while it lasts.