5 Reasons to Use Bumper Plates in Your Home Gym
If you’re setting up a home gym, you may be considering which types of weight plates to use. Bumper plates could be the ideal choice, so here’s a guide to bumper plates and five reasons why they are a great addition to any home gym.
What Are Bumper Plates?
Bumper plates, sometimes just called bumpers, are weight plates with a durable rubber cover to increase shock absorption. They are usually colour-coded, allowing you to identify the weight quickly.
Bumper plates are usually made from steel or iron, and they were originally made for Olympic lifters who drop their weights after finishing the move.
Olympic bumper plates are the same high-precision Olympic plates with a rubber coating, but with a smaller circumference and upturned edges that make them easier to stack.
So, why would you want to use bumper plates? Here are five reasons.
1. Protect Your Floors
Dropping weights is something you will probably do a lot in your home gym, and the solid rubber layer that surrounds bumper plates provides a good amount of protection for your floor. This is important at home because you don’t want to damage your floor, which can be costly. Rubber bumper weights provide an extra layer of protection.
2. Protect Your Equipment
Just as bumper plates can help to protect your floors from damage, they can also protect your other gym equipment.
You may have invested a lot of money in your home gym, especially if you are buying large items like cross trainers and treadmills. It’s natural that you want to protect your equipment, but dropped weights can cause a lot of damage to equipment just like they can to the floor.
So protect your equipment by using bumpers. The thick rubber will help to reduce damage should one of the weights come into contact with your other equipment.
3. Ideal for Certain Exercises
Some types of exercises involve making quick movements, like lifting the weights quickly and then dropping them, as with competition lifting. If you want to do CrossFit, you will also carry out exercises like presses, snatches and squats, all of which involve dropping the weights.
Bumpers are ideal for these types of exercises because they provide protection even when the weights are dropped repeatedly.
4. Reduce Bouncing
The rubber coating on bumper plates is dense, which helps to prevent bouncing unpredictably when you drop the weights. Weights bouncing around can cause injuries to you and other people.
They also come in the same diameter but with varying thicknesses depending on the weight. This means that when you drop the bar, the weights will make contact with the ground together, reducing the chance of bouncing and causing damage.
5. Reduce Noise
Try dropping a bumper plate and then try dropping a standard plate – the sound is much louder with a standard plate.
Bumpers are ideal if you want to reduce noise levels in your home gym. You may have a partner, family members or neighbours who you don’t want to disturb, and bumpers are ideal.
Choose High-Quality Bumper Plates
If you have decided to choose bumper plates for your home gym, you will want to choose how heavy your weights are as well as the colours.
But you should always make sure you choose bumpers from a top brand. They will be higher quality and last longer, and there’s a good chance they will smell less. Bumpers can sometimes smell quite strong, so try to find some that don’t have an overpowering smell because you will enjoy using them more.
Conclusion
Bumper plates are a great choice in your home gym for all the above reasons, and they are ideal if you plan to do competitive lifting or CrossFit. They are also durable and designed to last a lifetime, making them a great investment. Search around to find your bumper plates and enjoy all the benefits they provide.