Ahh, home workouts.

Love ’em or hate ’em they’re very much part of life now. Especially since the coronavirus pandemic hit and gyms were forced to close.

And although I do prefer the gym for exercising, I actually don’t mind working out at home…

I’m fortunate to have both the space (my garage) and equipment to get some decent workouts in until gyms can open again.

But while we definitely don’t need a gym for an effective workout, there are certain exercises that are difficult to do at home.

One such exercise is the pull-up. For me, those flimsy door-mounted chin-up bars just don’t cut it – I’m more worried about falling flat on my backside than performing the next rep!

So I was delighted when I discovered the Pull Up Mate – a portable pull-up bar and dip station – to add to my home gym and overcome that problem.

I always get excited to add something shiny and new to my home gym, so I thought I’d share my experiences of the Pull Up Mate so far…

What Is The Pull Up Mate?

As mentioned above, the Pull Up Mate is a portable free standing pull up bar and dip station which can be used both indoors and outdoors.

Here’s how it looks fully assembled in my garage. Pride of place in the middle of the ‘gym’:

Despite being referred to as a portable pull-up and dip station thought, turns out you can do a heck of a lot more with this equipment than just pull ups and dips (which I’ll tell you more about in a sec).

All-in it took me about 5 minutes to put together (literally) and was surprisingly straight-forward.

The designers have clearly given a lot of time and effort in designing this to be assembled as quickly as possible for effective exercise on the go. Impressive.

Given the way the Pull Up Mate is assembled, there is some movement in the joining sections, but overall it feels very sturdy.

At 84kg it took my full body weight no problem and I felt very safe completing a range of exercises.

And although it may look quite large in the photo, it actually didn’t use up that much space. Here’s the product dimensions and info from the official website:

And even if you didn’t have a huge amount of space in your home workout area?

I was able to disassemble the Pull Up Mate in just a few minutes and store it away neatly in the storage bag it came with:

The Exercise Selection

At first, I used my Pull Up Mate only for conventional pull-ups. But as I began to think outside the box I realised there’s a whole host of exercises I could try using this portable pull-up bar:

• Leg Raises
• Knee Raises
• Modified Push-Ups
• Dips
• Supine Row
• Chin-Ups and Pull-Ups
• Wide Grip Push-Ups
• Wide Grip Inverted Row

Turns out this is far from an exhaustive list though.

Here’s a short YouTube video I found overviewing these exercises, as well as many others, that are possible using the Pull Up Mate:

…more than enough to have varied and effective home workouts at home.

I can’t wait to give some of these a go in my next home workout.

As you can probably tell, I’m rather pleased with my Pull Up Mate and I think it’d make an excellent addition to any home or outdoor workout space.

And who knows, discovering how many exercises are possible with the Pull Up Mate, I may spend more time working out at home even when the gyms are open again!

If you’re interested to find out more about the Pull Up Mate you can find out everything you need to know over on their website here.

And if you are considering purchasing one I’m happy to answer any questions about my experience using it so far. Feel free to contact me here.

In the meantime, regardless of the equipment you have, let’s stay active and keep fit, strong and healthy (both mentally and physically) for as long as this pandemic continues!