Garage Gym of the Week: Evan Holdsworth

1. What’s your name? Evan Holdsworth

2. How old are you? 34

3. Do you have an IG handle or website? @badmetasin

4. Tell us a little bit about yourself: I am originally from California but currently live in Scottsdale, Arizona where I work as a hospitalist physician. I’m married with two kids, a 6 year old daughter and 1 year old son. I’ve always had an interest in health and fitness and also enjoy sports and music in my free time.

5. How would you describe your training style? Currently my training regimen is mostly CrossFit. I started lifting weights in high school as I was pretty scrawny and wanted to build a little muscle as I played soccer and baseball. I started off mostly doing magazine workouts from Men’s Health and Men’s Fitness. In medical school and residency I did a lot of “TV workouts” like P90X and Insanity before discovering CrossFit a few years ago. I like that it incorporates all aspects of fitness, and that it’s not repetitive as I tend to get bored fairly quickly doing the same workouts over and over.

6. How would you describe your fitness/strength level, currently? I’m definitely fitter than most people my age, but probably less fit compared to the average dedicated CrossFitter. I’m a pretty small guy (5’4”, 140lb) so pound for pound I'm pretty strong but I definitely scale the weight down on a lot of WODs. It’s a bit embarrassing but I will usually do the female Rx for most WODs. My endurance could use some work too, and I’m definitely better a shorter sprint type workouts compared to longer ones.

7. What are your fitness/strength goals? My main goal overall is to be healthy and maintain functionality as I age. As a physician, I see people all the time with chronic disease related to an inactive lifestyle and bad nutrition, and have made a commitment to not let that happen to me. In regards to specific fitness goals, I’d like to drop about 5-10 pounds, improve my overall cardiovascular endurance, become more comfortable with my olympic lifting technique, and increase my shoulder and hip flexibility.

8. Describe your garage gym. My current basement setup includes a variety of items including:

1. Rogue SML-2 90” Monster Lite Squat Stand with Matador Attachment
2. FringeSport Bomba Barbell
3. OneFitWonder Contrast Bumper Plate Set
4. FringeSport Flat Bench
5. Concept 2 Model D Rower
6. AgainFaster Plyo Box
7. 14lb and 20lb Medicine Balls
8. 26lb, 35lb and 53lb Kettlebells
9. 5-20lb Rubber Hex Dumbbells
10. PowerBlock 50lb Adjustable Dumbbell Set
11. Rx Smart Gear Jump Rope
12. USA Timer Garage Gym Edition
13. Generic Wooden Gymnastic Rings, Ab-Mat, Foam Roller
14. AgainFaster 3 Tier Storage Unit
15. I also have a few things in the garage including a generic squat rack and bumper plates I bought from Play It Again Sports with a FringSport Wonder Bar and a FringeSport Econ Push Sled.

9. Who works out in your garage gym? Just me at this point. I’ve been trying to get my wife to use it as well but she seems a bit intimidated by CrossFit and she doesn’t like working out with me telling her what to do :).

10. Why did you build a garage gym? I used to work out at a local box here in town, but with my work schedule and family situation it was difficult to go on a consistent basis and I felt I wasn’t really getting my money’s worth. Over the last year I decided it would make more sense to just invest in some quality equipment and build my own gym in my basement. I also have some basic equipment in my garage mostly for WODs incorporating running as it’s a pain to have to go back and forth up and down the stairs.

11. What’s your favorite piece of equipment in your garage? I would say the combination of the squat rack with barbell and bumper plates. I was using some pretty crappy equipment for quite a while before buying the quality stuff last Christmas. I wish I would have invested sooner!

12. What piece of equipment was a waste? I wouldn’t say anything I have is a waste, but I bought a pack of resistance bands that I don’t really ever use so they mostly just give the gym a little bit of color.

13. What’s the next piece of equipment you’re going to get? I would like to get a foldable treadmill so I could do running inside especially during the summer here in Arizona when it’s over 100 degrees for several months in a row. Unfortunately I don’t really have any more space in my gym so I’d have to convince my wife to let me put it in another room in the basement.

14. Any dream piece of equipment? An assault air bike and GHD would also be nice but again, I don’t really have space at the moment.

15. How did you build your garage gym? I started off with some basic equipment that I accumulated over the years like the generic squat rack, dumbbells and kettlebells, most of which I either bought on Craigslist or Play It Again Sports. Over the last year or so I have added various pieces of equipment when they went on sale, like the bumper plates, barbell, plyo box, and storage rack. Then last Christmas I bought some of the bigger ticket items like the squat rack and rower during Black Friday with free shipping deals.

16. Do you have any tips for anyone else looking to build a garage gym? I would recommend investing in quality equipment which, to be honest, isn’t that much more expensive than poorer quality stuff. I love FringeSport as the equipment is great and they have sales all the time. If you can, plan out what you want, save up, and then buy as much as you can during the Black Friday sales as it’s really never gonna get any cheaper than that! I also made spreadsheets comparing prices across different sites so I could make the best decisions on what to buy.