GGC Closed and New Reviews

Gray Matter Lifting

FreeMax Weight Releasers Review

I worked on this review and actually had it mostly finished a few months ago, but wanted some additional feedback from my guy John Gaglione. He is a regular GGC Coach Contributor, Geared Powerlifter and Coach, so I wanted some ideas from a guy who might use weight releasers more often. Overall, John had similar feedback to me. They definitely tried to recreate the wheel for weight releasers, but I ultimately think they missed the target. And the price is an absolute non-starter for most people.

ANCORE Pro Review

Another one that we started back around HomeGymCon 2025, is the ANCORE Pro review… With how much work I was spending on the VOLTRAs, I needed some distance to be able to think about the ANCORE as not just a weaker VOLTRA option.

The video is in Dan’s hands right now for editing, but the written review is finished and ready.

Papa Bear Rogers Podcast

I got a chance to hop on Travis’s podcast last week and chat about all things home gyms, powerlifting, and the GGC. Travis has competed in the GGC a number of times, is a world renowned powerlifter, coach, and all around legit dude.

Speaking of podcasts, I’ve been asked to join one focused on online fitness business, should be recording in the beginning of June. And we are actively putting together research and a list of participants for the next episodes of the VOLTRA Expert Podcast, which I’ll be scheduling once the Spring GGC wraps up.

Behind The Scenes

I’ve had a number of conversations and commitments made by companies in the past couple of weeks. I’ve gone ahead and reordered my pipeline, which has me tentatively booked into February of 2026. Some of these commitments can change and move based on what follows up, but some recent notes.

• Wide Body Bench 2.0 - I have been told to expect mine in Q3

• FED Fitness SC2 Stair Climber Machine Ultra - A new compact Stair Climber offering, en route to our house as we speak

• MERACH R50 PRO Rower - An updated version of the rower we reviewed last year, with a focus on the monitor, also en route

• MX Select Dumbbells - Still finalizing details, but hoping to have these in hand shortly

• NÜOBELL-S Adjustable Dumbbell Review - They got stopped at the border, but are being sent back to me again. So, on the way, just not here yet.

• There are a few other pending ones including the APEX Bench, a new Nordic Bench offering, TWO updated bench ecosystems, another adjustable dumbbell set, a sled, and a few more items pending final release

As always, I’ll share info, pictures, and details when I can.

WAY Behind The Scenes

I am working on a couple of large projects that are WAYYY behind the scenes. Just a little peek into the world of a content creator.

My website hosting platform was awesome for years, but has quickly turned to crap in the last 12 months. Doing some research, apparently they got bought out. So, yeah, I know how that goes. So this summer I will be migrating my GML and GGC websites to a new host, several weeks before my current hosting plan expires. It shouldn’t be too miserable, and the hope is that downtime will be minimal, but we’ll see.

To improve that process, I’m tackling two additional projects. One is cleaning up a lot of the storage, media, and various pieces to the puzzle within the websites. The smaller the size of the sites, the quicker the process can be. There are other benefits to this as well, but this was the main push.

I also am going to actively work towards shutting down the [email protected] email address, and pushing everything to the [email protected] email address. Sounds like a small piece to the puzzle, but again, an effort to streamline processes, reduce duplicate effort, and minimize wasted storage space.

Sometimes it isn’t just fun and games reviewing gym equipment, its all this other stuff.

Whats New In The Community?

Sales & Price Drops

Porter PhysEd opened up a bunch of options for cable attachments recently. If you have been waiting, now is the time!

Powertec has a 20% off sale on everything right now. And Ironmaster just let me know that they just dropped their prices site-wide… not sales, but literally dropped, due to some improvements in their pipeline, looking at an average of 10% reduction in price.

RVL Wings

Saw this on IG, looks like a play on Jammer Arms. You can adjust the pivot point, which allows you to adjust the loading point as well. Interesting concept. Not sure how I feel about these out the gate, but I appreciate the creativity.

NoFate - Good and Bad

Been watching more of my buddy Johnathan’s stuff lately, and he managed to drop some good and bad videos this past week. So lets give him some love before we torch him. BTW, I let Jonathan know this was coming.

I like this video overall. His overall push-back on the flashy new toy of a home gym is a great piece. I have an article about the TONAL for the same reason. They are targeting people who have money, but won’t actually workout. Last time I looked they had one of the Williams sisters and Lebron James as sponsored athletes for their marketing materials. I guarantee they ain’t using a TONAL.

As home gym owners we are often searching for that next thing we NEED in our gym, when in reality, we probably already have something better collecting dust. I have a video planned around this discussion for early 2027, but this is a good gut check from NoFate.

This video, however, fell flat. The concept is based around lifters turning 40 and what exercises they should avoid. He uses a lot of buzz-words like EGO LIFT when describing the Deadlift, Bench Press, and more. Then goes on to recommend “safer alternatives”.

I have two fundamental issues with this video.

First, is that turning 40 doesn’t flip some switch that tells your body it can’t lift heavy anymore. In fact most of the information we have tells us that the peak for powerlifters is right around 40. Chris Duffin hit 1000×3 in the Deadlift and Squat at just over 40 years old. Your body needs time to build tendon strength, bone strength, and connective tissue as well as muscle and nervous system adaptations to be able to maximize your abilities.

Second, is that this is a VERY generic recommendation. And when we talk about ideal exercise selection for an individual, that is very rarely the case. I have a number of athletes at different ages, shapes, sizes, and experiences in my gym, and we all do different variations of lifts that are right for that particular person. And those exercises will adjust as their experience and abilities change with more time in the gym. One of my regular lifters just added in belt squat variations, but we did that after doing a lot of posterior chain work to address the back problems he was having consistently due to tight and weak hamstrings. My mom is 72, and her main exercise is the sled. At some point we’ll get her deadlifting, but it’ll probably be a single leg RDL or a very high and light trap bar deadlift to start.

Instead of leaning heavily into the fear mongering of exercises, I’d rather see a nuanced discussion about appropriate exercise selection based on the athlete, and discussion of proper programming and exercise execution.

I don’t think every person has to do the conventional deadlift or back squat or straight bar competition bench press. Hell, that is why the GGC is so loose on the rules. But if your back hurts from deadlifts, there is a VERY strong chance it is because you are doing them wrong for any number of reasons, not because deadlifts are bad based on your age.

Tl;Dr - Keep lifting!

Garage Gym Competition

The #26SpringGGC is closed for submissions. 

 —What Is Next—

Wednesday May 13th – Live Stream for Prettiest Powerlifter
Thursday May 14th – Live Stream for Most 10 RPE Lifter
Friday May 15th – Top Athletes Announced
Monday May 18th – Prize Week Opens
Friday May 22nd – Prize Week Closes
Monday May 25th – Data Week Begins
Friday May 29th – Full results available and competition DONE!

During this time I’ll be buried in Excel alongside our GGC Data Team. We’ll be prepping everything above, prepping stickers, 5 Year Club, 499 & 999lb Club Entries, and everything else behind the scenes.

So… Stay tuned, the lifting is done, but the fun has just begun!

r/HomeGym

Current Targeted Talk

We are talking about Storage right now on r/HomeGym. Big fan of this discussion, and happy to see that Wall Control is a huge mention in this one.

Upcoming AMA

We just had our next AMA cancel due to lack of availability. So we get a small break.

One Last Thing…

We are headed into the final week of Flag Football for my daughters team. As a parent helper, I’m in charge of the defense. We started off the first half of the season with a lot more of me coaching positions, chiming in on each play, moving kids forward or back or left or right, and choosing who was in and out for each rotation.

The last few games I decided to let them take over. I told them to start making the decisions. Told them to set strategy on the sidelines for defense, while our team has the ball on offense (and I’m not even in that huddle). Told them to talk on the field, let your teammates know what you are doing, what you are seeing, you name it.

In our last game on Mother’s Day, I only did 2 pieces of active coaching. I reminded them that on defense they needed to not just float, but pick up a person. And at halftime, I made one judgement call to not Blitz a certain QB on the other team (she would run on every blitz and get around us).

The only TDs the other team got, were from that one girl running on our blitz. We knocked down a ton of passes, we were patient and played fantastic TEAM defense, and the girls were talking the entire time. And our coach has been crushing the offensive play calling, so the score took care of itself.

If you are a coach, remember to get out of the way of your athletes development sometimes. Give them the ability to make mistakes, learn, and fix them. Give them the ownership, the decision making, the high level IQ that comes from reading plays, seeing movement, and making decisions, instead of reading from a script handed to them by a coach. I noticed that this started to jive around the 8 to 9 year age range, where they start to understand the WHY, more than just the WHAT. Give it a whirl, let me know if works.

• Joe