Building muscle at home can be a good place to start. It also can be where you spend all of your time lifting weights and bulking up. You certainly do not have to go to a gym to build muscle. No matter the size of muscle that you are looking forward to building.
At the very beginning of working out to get more muscle, you really do not need any weights. You can get really good workouts with just your own body weight. This may even be a good option to see if you would even like to get into the sport. Alternatively, you can use this method just to build up a little.
Just by doing pushups and pull-up you are engaging all of your upper body muscles. Pushups will work your Chest, shoulders and triceps. If you want to mix it up after you build some strength. Try elevating your feet in the pushup position. This will not only work the chest muscles differently, but it will increase the amount of weight to lift that you are working out with.
Pull-ups on the other hand, work your back muscles, biceps and forearms. You can do several variations of pull-ups or chin-ups. You can use narrow grip where the hands are close together and wide grip. You can also put your palms facing you or facing away from you. This will work different muscles for you also.
The pull-ups will require you to have some kind of bar to pull your self up on. You can find these every cheap on the Internet that will go in a doorway. You may even make something in your basement to use.
For the lower part of your body you can do squats without any weights. Once you build up and can do one-legged squats to increase the leg load. You can even do these on a step so you can really work out your legs. Do lunges also for a good over all leg workouts, and they help with your balance as well.
When it comes time to add some weights, I suggest you look around and find used ones. You generally will get them for half price or better than that. That also goes for any other workout equipment that you might want to add on later. When this stuff is bought new, you pay the top dollar for it. There is a lot of used weight equipment for sale, at very good prices. Just search Craig’s list for your city, you should be able to find anything that you want.
Home workout machines that use cables are the next best thing to free weights. Free weights will give you be best workouts. Free weights require that you use more muscles. Just to not only lift the weight, but also you have to keep it stable and balanced. Brings more of your muscles into the lift.
For working out alone, I like to use dumbbells for heavy weight loads wherever possible. This way you will not get trapped under a heavy weight load. You can use dumbbells and build very large muscles with them just like using barbells.
I like to use a home type gym that uses cables like a Bowflex for chest workouts. This way if I do run out of gas on the up stroke, I do not have to worry about dumping the bar. Try doing bench presses with a barbell and run out of steam halfway up. I have had myself roll a bar with weights off of my chest. This is not fun and a good way to get hurt.
Just remember when starting out with any exercise program, always get your doctors ok. Always use the proper form when lifting weights. It is much better to lift 70 pounds right, than lift 100 pounds wrong and injure yourself.
The above book by Bill Pear is one of the best how-to for weight training ever written.
