How To Build Your Own OCR Gym

One thing that 2020 has made more popular, is building your very own home workout center. You may have had a few things in your garage to get a quick workout in, but this year has forced most of us to rely on home equipment. We quickly found shortages of common workout equipment like dumbbells and kettlebells.

With no clear end in sight, many will be turning to their garages and backyards to continue their training. While I think most enjoy the feel and energy from getting to the gym, it just may not be available right now.

Luckily there are many affordable options to build everything you need in your own home. To help you out, this post will list and explain some of the benefits of each piece of equipment. The order they are listed are from what I feel would be the most important to the least important. The first few can be argued which would be the most beneficial, but this is a good starting point.

In order to build your gym, you should consider two main questions to ask. What skills/strengths are needed for the sport? How versatile is the equipment?

For the sport of obstacle course racing (OCR), you will need to build functional total body strength, grip and carrying strength/endurance, and running capacity. Sure there are more we can get into, but if you are good at all of these, you will probably be pretty successful. You can purchase a treadmill, but since you can run anywhere, we will focus the first two components.

Building functional strength is a broad term, but it boils down to being able to have the capacity, strength, and endurance to complete basic movement patterns underload. These include things like squatting, lunging, lifting, pushing, and pulling. Now you find equipment that you can do these movements with. And even better is having equipment that you can do multiple exercises with.

While I understand it would be awesome to build rigs and other cool obstacles in your garage or backyard, I am assuming that most will not have the ability to do so. For this article we will focus on equipment that most will be able to purchase and use in their home setting.

Here are some of the best ones that I feel fit these criteria.

1. Sandbags

I have to put Sandbags at the top of the list because they are just so versatile in all they can do. Plus with the unstable loading of the sand they add an extra component that will better prepare you for the unknowns of racing. From standard strengthening exercises, to power training, core training, and carries, the sandbag can do it all.

Because of the variety in exercises you can do it is recommended to get a few weights to choose from. At a minimum you will want a lighter bag for more core exercises (15lb for women/25lb for men) and a heavier back for strength or power work (40lb for women/60lb for men). These weights are general recommendations.

There are many choices out there but I highly recommend checking out the Ultimate Sandbag. Josh Henkins and Jessica Bento do just an amazing job of not just showing you how to use a sandbag but more importantly why it can help you better train your body. They have a ton of resources out there to help you figure out the best way to use this incredible tool.

Ultimate Sandbag

2. Suspension Trainer

There are a few different suspension trainers out there and all of them will work well. This exercise equipment will take body weight training to a whole new level. It is easy to get a total body workout with one tool, which is exactly what we are looking for.

While you can get all the major movement patterns trained here, it really provides great variety in your pulling work. Especially if you have not mastered pull ups yet, this is a great place to start. I think what I love most about suspension trainers is the fact that you can use it if you are a total beginner to help learn the movements easier or as a more advanced lifter to further challenge you.

Check out the suspension trainer by Fitbar. This will be the best option especially for the price.

3. Kettlebells

Yet another incredibly versatile tool that needs to be included in every gym. Similar to the sandbags you can get so much work done with this one tool. There are so many corrective exercises, strength drills, and power drills you can choose from here.

Staples in most of my programs include Turkish Get Ups, Goblet Squats, and KB Swings. Of course there are many more, but these are 3 drills that everyone should learn to master.

Just like the sandbag you probably need a couple different weights. At least a get up weight or pressing weight (18lb for women/26lb for men) and a Swing weight (35-44lb for women/53-62lb for men). Again just some general weight recommendations.

Perform Better Kettlebells

4. Pull Up Bar

Ok I am going to break one of my rules already. Well sort of. Pull ups is just one exercise you will need to master using the pull up bar. There are more drills we can use the bar for, but no where near as many as we will see with our previous equipment. But still pull ups, chin ups, flex/dead hangs, knee raises, and more can be accomplished using the pull up bar.

All of these exercises are so critical to your racing success so I had to put this pretty high on the list. Plus we will need something to hang our suspension trainer from if you don’t want to attach it to the ceiling.

You could get a squat rack that has a pull up bar attached. Then you would get more out of it. But I realize that may not be an option for everyone. Instead check out the doorway pull up bar from Fitbar. This is the best one I have seen on the market. Especially if you are tall. Most doorway pull up bars make it awkward with your legs needing to be tucked up. With this bar it attaches above the door allowing for more room to do your pull ups.

Fitbar Pull Up Bar

5. Medicine Balls

Med balls can be used a lot of different ways, but I feel the biggest impact these can have on your training are with MB throwing exercises. It is easy to get lower body power work in with a variety of different equipment. But upper body can be tricky.

MB’s are the easiest solution. With so many different throwing exercises, you will never get bored with these drills. When picking your weight you want a balance of heavy enough to challenge you, but light enough that you can throw it as fast as possible. Typically most can get this done with a 6-12lb weight for most exercises.

PB Elite MB’s

6. Strength Bands

I love bands for a variety of reasons, but for this article the main focus is the fact that bands can make exercises easier or harder depending on how you use them. You can add a band to your push ups or squats to increase the loading. But you can also use bands to help with exercises like pull ups.

Top that with the fact they are light weight, easy to store, great for power development, and allow training in different planes of motion that do not rely on gravity. Put that all together and you have a must have for your home gym.

Perform Better Bands

7. Dumbbells

I don’t think much needs to be said about DB’s. There is clearing a large number of possible exercises that you can choose from. The main downfall here, is it becomes expensive for a full DB rack. You can invest in adjustable ones to save on space, but the price will still be up there.

I admit I struggled where to put this on the list and I could have put barbells here as well. But I think for most people DB exercises are easier to implement than barbell and you don’t need an entire squat rack to hold everything.

Check out the adjustable ones here:

8. Various Grip Attachments

Given that you are reading this to build an OCR type home gym, we need to have some things that will specifically target your grip. Yes you can train grip using standard weights, but in a race you are probably going to see all sorts of grips you will have to deal with.

These implements are typically well affordable and can be used in a variety of ways so it is worth stocking up on a few options like nunchucks, grip balls, and fat gripz.

Plus you can even use these to build your own pull up bar if you don’t have one already. Check out this video here:

Fitbar Products

9. Battling Rope

As we get down on our list here I have a few that you can probably go without, but are definetly fun if you can fit them in. Battling ropes, similar to MB’s, are a great way to develop upper body power capacity. There are nurmous batling rope drills that make you feel like you are sprinting with your arms.

You can also use it for dragging or pulling objects and in some cases even use it to help train for rope climbing. Conditioning is a big part of your program and there is nothing quite like battling ropes.

Perform Better Battling Rope

10. Assault Bike

Again, this has a bit of a price tag on it, but well worth it. Running will be a huge part of your training, but cross training is vital for long term success in this sport. There are very few pieces of cardio equipment out there that are as effective as the assault bike.

This is great for conditioning with minimal impact on the joints. Whether you are doing shorter or longer intervals, the assault bike will be the piece of equipment you love to hate.

https://www.assaultfitness.com/collections/airbikes-1

Well, there you have it. You may have some things you felt should have been on the list. And maybe for you they should be on there. One important aspect I didn’t mention is the fact that you should be excited to workout. If there are things you can add to your gym to get you excited you need to have them too.

If nothing else I hope this list gives you a few helpful suggestions.

And now for the best part. Here is a workout you can do using all 10 pieces. If you don’t have one or more of them, just skip it or replace it with something you do have.

Enjoy!