BL1 Body Weight Home Gym

I have done personal training since 1990, held both ACSM and ACE certifications, and have served as a design consultant for major fitness equipment companies...and let me tell you, the Inspire BL1 is not only the best home piece of equipment I've ever used, it is the best piece of equipment I've used, period. The BL1 is a pure marvel of mechanical engineering. It clearly was designed by a brilliant engineer who is also an expert in weightlifting. It is stunningly good. Typically home gyms are not the real deal and cannot be used for serious bodybuilding. They feel cheap and flimsy, have rough or sharp edges, are made out of cheap metal, their movement is not smooth and jerky, and their range of motion is limited where you top out at the top of the rep or bottom out when you lower the weight. The Inspire BL1 is NONE of that. It is made out of heavy, solid, highest quality ROUND steel, not square like almost other home gyms. The welds are very clean and strong. Mechanical angles are absolutely perfect. The range of motion? Incredibly full. You will not top or bottom out unless, maybe, you're seven feet tall. And the movement is smooth as glass. Absolutely smooth and silent. The best part? Using the lifter's bodyweight as the resistance. Absolutely brilliant engineering. By putting the lever at a mechanical advantage or disadvantage, the machine offers a resistance that ranges from 10% to 150% of the lifter's bodyweight. So I guy like me who weighs 185 can get up to 277 pounds in resistance, which is way plenty for me since I train in the higher rep range of 10-15. If ever do I need more weight, I can just clip a plate to the front of the leg extension attachment. So there are no plates to rack and unrack. No banging, clanging weight stack. But here's the most important part: Bodyweight is TRUE concentric/eccentric resistance! Other machines like the Bowflex and the Soloflex that use elastic bands are NOT true resistance and do not trigger maximum hypertrophy. Why? Because the resistance of those devices increases as the rubber band stretches and decreases as the rubber band is shortened, which means the resistance DECREASES ON THE NEGATIVE! For maximum hypertrophy, it needs to be constant. Same holds true for any machine that uses a piston for resistance. Those are even worse. Those typically are concentric-only resistance devices, which are pretty much useless for bodybuilding. The BL1 is REAL WEIGHT. Can a competitive natural bodybuilder train on the BL1 exclusively and place in contests? Absolutely. Can a female bodybuilder use it and place? Definitely. Can a steroid bodybuilder use it and place? Probably not, as it probably does not offer enough weight for a guy on drugs. Bottom line: If you body build naturally, this is the only machine you will ever need. Maybe throw in a set of adjustable dumbbells if you want to, but they're not necessary. SHIPPING: My BL1 was shipped to me directly from China. It was delivered in two big boxes on a pallet. The delivery guy dropped it in my driveway, then came to my door and asked, "You good?" and I asked, "You can't bring it in the house for me?" and he said "No." So I said, "Well I guess I have to be!" So my BL1 was laying in pieces in two huge boxes in my driveway, blocking my wife's SUV in. I sweated for a bit on how to get it inside until I finally decided to just open the boxes and take it in piece by piece, which actually worked out since I had to unbox it anyway. Might as well do it outside. ASSEMBLY: Assembly was not difficult but it took me about four hours. The instructions are extremely professional and accurate. Plus they group the hardware (bolts, nuts, and screws) by assembly step, so you always know exactly which bolt or screw a step is calling for. I loved that. If you've ever put together Ikea furniture and sat wondering which bolt you're supposed to use next -- the long one or the short one -- you know exactly what I'm talking about. The hardest part for me was lacing the steel cable through the pulley assembly. You have to loop the cable over and under several pulleys, and they're hard to get to. At one point I was standing on a step ladder with the flashlight in my mouth to see what I was doing. I was not happy with the folks at Inspire at that point. But that frustration vanished as soon as I finally got the cable through and took the machine for its first test drive. I was floored at how good the machine is. The BL1 comes with a gym-quality lat pulldown bar and a revolving straight bar attachment. The lat bar is, heavy, thick, and super solid...not those tin-feeling things you get with other home gyms. My only complaint is it seems Inspire shortened the straps on the handle attachments on the pressing arm. The pressing arm has hooks where you're supposed to be able to snap the handles of the strap attachments to the arm so they don't swing or clatter around. But my straps seem to be about an inch too short to reach? No biggie, though -- I can just loop the strap and let the handle hang. I'm surprised that a machine with this much attention to detail and plain quality assurance would let this slip through? BOTTOM LINE: I love, love, LOVE this machine. I have lifted weights for over 30 years and where has this thing been all my life??? No more annoying gym memberships for me. No more kids shooting TikTok videos all around me. No more dudes playing vulgar music out loud on their phones. No more dudes deadlifting 5,000 pounds for one concentric rep and then just letting it smash down to the floor and scaring the living h3ll out of me while I'm trying to concentrate on a set. Five stars. I'd give it 10 if I could. Highest recommendation. Trust me: Buy one.

I had been looking at the BL one home gym from inspire for at least the past few years. For me the factors were right to buy it now or when I did. My old gym was wearing out and there was a sale on the bl1 at the time I ordered so I took the plunge. I would say it's definitely worth the current price of 1399 because it is a very good quality smooth operating home gym. It two boxes that are quite heavy totaling about 300 lb. It's delivered by a freight company and they use a hydraulic jack to roll it wherever you want it but won't carry it into your house for you you'll have to arrange that on your own. My son helped me carry one of the boxes that was slightly lighter upstairs to where I built it. The other box we opened and we carried the parts individually upstairs. If you live in an apartment, and plan to move anytime soon, would not recommend getting this gym now. Once it is together it weighs the 300 lb and it's quite tall. The parts are expertly packed with a lot of protective foam and cardboard and strapping. Even though there were two minor holes in the boxes I received there was no damage to anything inside. The assembly instructions are quite detailed and fairly easy to follow. You just have to go step by step and understand what you're doing using the diagram and the written description. You will need a good metric socket set rubber mallet and so forth. It will also help to have a helper During certain parts of the assembly for instance the main arm that lets you do bench presses and so forth is quite heavy possibly weighing 80 lb or so. One of the final steps is to thread a very long cable through 11 pulleys and that was somewhat challenging in and of itself. The finish on this gym is baked on satin black and looks great and flawless. The upholstery is solid and the attachments are also good quality. Attachments include a lot bar and a curl bar looking at the photo of the gym, you would not think you would be able to do any sort of squat movement with it however if you remove the seat which comes out easily you can do a front squat using the lat bar and a strap or chain down to the leg power pulley. There is a detailed workout poster that comes with it that gives you a nice set of exercises for each body group, arm shoulders legs etc. Because I had a Bowflex type machine previously, I have embellished their basic workout to fit my needs. Everything is quite adjustable including the back seat the main bar and so forth. As has been said previously, the action is very smooth and quiet with this gym. It can easily be used on a second floor and a house or an apartment. I will update this review down the road when I've had longer to use the gym but I expect good results with it.

Awesome machine, easy to use