As more and more apple devices are sold, so will the development of Malware aimed at Mac users; Users will understand very soon that they have the same problems Microsoft had ten or 12 years ago
Welcome to Microsoft’s world, Eugene Kaspersky tells Apple
The recent Flashback/Flashfake malware outbreak targeting Apple’s Mac computers is likely to be just the start of a new wave of attacks aimed at the system, according to Kaspersky founder and CEO Eugene Kaspersky.
Speaking to CBR at Info Security 2012, Kaspersky told us that Apple is a long way behind Microsoft when it comes to security and will have to change the ways it approaches updates following the recent malware attacks.
"I think they are ten years behind Microsoft in terms of security," Kaspersky told us. "For many years I’ve been saying that from a security point of view there is no big difference between Mac and Windows. It’s always been possible to develop Mac malware, but this one was a bit different. For example it was asking questions about being installed on the system and, using vulnerabilities, it was able to get to the user mode without any alarms."
Kaspersky added that his company is seeing more and more malware aimed at Macs, which is unsurprising given the huge number of devices being sold. Its most recent quarter revealed Mac sales of 4 million, a 7% rise on the year ago quarter. These figures are still dwarfed by PC sales of course, and Kaspersky said Windows will remain the primary target for cyber criminals.
However he added an increase in Mac malware was, "just a question of time and market share. Cyber criminals have now recognised that Mac is an interesting area. Now we have more, it’s not just Flashback or Flashfake. Welcome to Microsoft’s world, Mac. It’s full of malware."
"Apple is now entering the same world as Microsoft has been in for more than 10 years: updates, security patches and so on," he added. "We now expect to see more and more because cyber criminals learn from success and this was the first successful one."
This will mean that Apple will have to change the way it approaches its update cycle for patches, Kaspersky added. The company had previously criticised the speed of Apple’s response to the outbreak and accused it of leaving its users vulnerable for three months.
That approach will have to change if Apple wants to keep its users protected.
"They will understand very soon that they have the same problems Microsoft had ten or 12 years ago. They will have to make changes in terms of the cycle of updates and so on and will be forced to invest more into their security audits for the software," Kaspersky told CBR.
"That’s what Microsoft did in the past after so many incidents like Blaster and the more complicated worms that infected millions of computers in a short time. They had to do a lot of work to check the code to find mistakes and vulnerabilities. Now it’s time for Apple [to do that]," he added.
Remember when you were little, and your parents would try to get you to eat a certain food you didn’t want to eat? The conversation, in some form or another, would go like this:
Parent: Eat your [insert yucky food here].
You: I don’t want to.
Parent: Why not?
You: Because I don’t like it.
Parent: But you haven’t even tried it. How can you know you don’t like it if you haven’t even tried it?
Whoa. That’s some pretty hardcore psychology our parents dropped on us. But still, we remained strong in our convictions. How do we know? We just do!
The point is, it can be tough to change people’s minds about certain things, and it doesn’t get any easier as we grow up. If you weren’t a picky eater and that last example was lost on you, just ask any sports fan how they feel about Tom Brady’s suspension being upheld on Tuesday, and you’ll see what we mean about unflinching opinions.
People take very hard stances about certain things, whether they be about movies, sports, politics, and all sorts of other subjects we won’t be touching with a ten-foot pole.
But one area we’d like to delve into would be calisthenics — specifically, the idea that there are only a handful of exercises in the field of bodyweight training. We run into this argument almost every day:
“I don’t want to do calisthenics because I’d get bored only doing pull-ups, crunches and push-ups all day.”
Now, if you’re at all familiar with A Shot of Adrenaline (or calisthenics as a whole), you know there are a lot of things wrong with that. For one, there are a whole lot of exercises in the world of calisthenics that have nothing to do with pull-ups, crunches or pull-ups. If you don’t believe us, you should take a look at this gigantic list of bodyweight exercises we’ve compiled.
So we are constantly trying to change people’s perception on bodyweight training. But OK, let’s play devil’s advocate here and say that all calisthenics has to offer are those three exercises. Well, that doesn’t mean there aren’t a whole lot of variations on each of them. And today, we’re going to focus on different push-ups you can do — specifically, plyometric push-ups.
Plyometrics, also known as “jump training” or “plyos”, are exercises in which muscles exert maximum force in short intervals of time, with the goal of increasing power.
So what kind of push-ups exist within the plyometric world? Well that’s what we’re going to show you here!
These exercises are sure to break up the monotony of standard push-ups, and do a whole lot for building strength and muscle. That’s right, bodybuilders — you can get a toned, cut chest without subjecting yourself to the hazards of the bench press.
Just keep in mind, these exercises range in varying degrees of difficulty, so exercise caution as always.
So without further ado, here are our favorite plyometric push-ups. Give them a try and see if they don’t change your mind about how awesomely diverse a calisthenics exercise can be.
Former Patriots quarterback and team Hall Of Famer Drew Bledsoe made a name for himself in New England for his play on the field. After his retirement from the N.F.L., he is now known for his Doubleback Winery. In this informative video, Drew talks about his transition after football and how Patriots owner Robert Kraft [...]
Traditional Architecture, Contemporary Interiors
From the developer of Osler Residences and Oak + Park, these 15 Marpole townhouses offer an attractive opportunity to enjoy the perks of living in a quiet residential South Vancouver neighbourhood. Near David Lloyd George Elementary and Sir Winston Churchill Secondary, an International Baccalaureate School, Shaughnessy Residences is an ideal location to raise a family.
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Shopping and leisure opportunities are close at hand. For groceries, choose from the new Safeway at Granville and 70th Avenue or the brand new T&T supermarket at Marine Gateway, where a new Cineplex has also opened. Oakridge Centre Mall and the McArthurGlen Designer Outlet are less than a 10-minute drive by car. Just five minutes away, the Marine Drive Canada Line station offers easy rapid transit access to YVR Airport and Downtown Vancouver. And to keep fit, enjoy Oak Park’s grass playing fields, tennis courts, baseball diamond, and walking trails.
Pricing for Shaughnessy Residences
Sales start May 2016. Sign up to our VIP list above to ensure you’re immediately informed of Shaughnessy Residences pricing as soon as they’re released. Alabaster’s recent project, Osler Residences, sold out quickly, so we expect the same level of interest for these spacious homes.
Floor Plans for Shaughnessy Residences
Alabaster has yet to release floor plan details for Shaughnessy Residences’ 3- and 4-bedroom townhomes.
Amenities at Shaughnessy Residences
Details have yet to be determined.
Parking and Storage
Alabaster has not released details, but we expect at least one underground parking stall per residence.
Maintenance Fees at Shaughnessy Residences
As this development is in pre-construction, maintenance fees have not yet been finalized.
Developer Team for Shaughnessy Residences
Alabaster Homes is a boutique Vancouver developer inspired by the city’s neighbourhoods. From the classic beauty of Shaughnessy to the urban energy of Oakridge, their vision is to enhance communities and create new legacies.
Alabaster has teamed up with Formwerks Architectural and Occupy Design to create Shaughnessy Residences. Formwerks has a reputation for sensitive, user-friendly architecture that embodies clients’ functional requirements within an artistic building form. Their experience ranges from single-family homes to multi-family projects and commercial buildings. Similarly, Occupy Design seeks to achieve the best experience for those using the spaces.
Expected Completion for Shaughnessy Residences
To be announced.
Are you interested in learning more about other homes in Marpole, South Vancouver, or near the Cambie Corridor?
Danish-Inspired Modernity
Arne by MONDEVO is a boutique collection of twenty Mount Pleasant townhomes with a clean, warm expression that balances architectural modernity with flexible layouts. Its floor space ratio, open courtyard layout, outdoor stroller lockers, and proximity to a park with a playground make this development ideal for young families. Arne’s first two storeys are a very crisp cube in white brick veneer, with form and material emphasizing the individuality of each dwelling. The upper storey is a more subtle, contrasting expression of metal faux wood siding that recedes from view, giving the impression of a smaller external facing.
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Situated in eclectic Mount Pleasant, vibrant Main Street, with its wide assortment of independent businesses, is just outside your doorstep. From bakeries, cafes, and eateries, to boutiques, shops, and professional services, here is where you’ll find your everyday needs. Nearby parks, schools, Mount Pleasant Community Centre, Science World, and False Creek ensure families need not travel far for their educational and recreation needs. To venture further afield, frequent trolley bus service on Main Street is a popular way for neighbourhood residents to conveniently access other parts of the city.
Pricing for Arne
As this development is in pre-construction, details are still forthcoming. Don’t miss out on an opportunity to buy into Arne. Subscribe to our VIP list above for priority announcements.
Floor Plans for Arne
Although MONDEVO has not published any plans for Arne, there will be a mix of flexible layouts for nine 1-bedroom units with private patios on the ground floor, two 2-bedroom homes, and nine 3-bedroom townhomes with rooftop patios.
Amenities at Arne
A central courtyard with a hopscotch design will act as a community social space where children can be easily supervised while playing outside in a secure environment. Each ground level home will have private outdoor patios that are planted and screened to accommodate barbecues. Townhomes will offer relaxing rooftop patios. For more open spaces, Tea Swamp Park is on the next block and Robson Park is three blocks northeast.
Parking and Storage
Resident parking will be available in one level of underground. Six Class B bike stalls are slated for the front, east-side yard, and there will be outdoor stroller lockers.
Maintenance Fees at Arne
As with pricing, these are to be determined.
Developer Team for Arne
MONDEVO and b Squared Architecture, who brought us the successful Skala development just one block away, have partnered to demonstrate, yet again, artful homebuilding.
Vancouver-based MONDEVO combines cutting-edge design and smart floor-planning to create highly functional, stunning homes that exude urban sophistication. b Squared Architecture is a young Vancouver design firm that was founded in 2005. Their penchant for crisp, modern design has attracted the accolades of a young and optimistic client base. In 2008, b Squared was awarded the BC Wood Works Award for the Multi-Family Division.
Expected Completion for Arne
Date pending.
Are you interested in learning more about other homes in Mount Pleasant, East False Creek, or the Cambie Corridor?
Have programs that need to run automatically on your machine and need to autologin and lock your server or computer at startup? Here’s a simple way with the use of a couple free programs.
Autologin
Install Autologin by Sysinternals.
Autologon enables you to easily configure Windows’ built-in autologon mechanism. Instead of waiting for a user to enter their name and password, Windows uses the credentials you enter with Autologon, which are encrypted in the Registry, to log on the specified user automatically.
Autologon is easy enough to use. Just run autologon.exe, fill in the dialog, and hit Enable. To turn off auto-logon, hit Disable. Also, if the shift key is held down before the system performs an autologon, the autologon will be disabled for that logon. You can also pass the username, domain and password as command-line arguments:
While Autologin by Sysinternals provides an encrypted way to autologin with your credentials, you may still want to autolock your server or computer after bootup. Auto Logon & Lock provides a way to both autologin (PCs) and autolock (PCs and servers) your system after bootup and autologin.
1) Run “Lock.exe” from the archive to test if the application runs without errors. If all is well your desktop should lock. Logon again and Windows Explorer should be open. You might want to create a System Restore Point before proceeding just to be safe.
2) Copy the files “Lock.exe” and “LockCMD.exe” to your Windows directory. (Ex: C:\Windows)
3) Run “lockcmd.reg” from the archive and click Yes in the dialog box. You must run this while logged on to the account which you want to enable auto logon for.
lockcmd.reg contains the following script which runs the .exe to autolock your computer at startup.
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System] “Shell”=”%windir%\\lock.exe”[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\SafeBoot] “AlternateShell”=”lockcmd.exe”Download Auto Logon & Lock
Legacy Instructions:
Need your pc/server to autolock after rebooting? Here’s another way:
Create vbs script; this script will auto lock your computer after 30 seconds. Save as lock.vbs <code>
Wscript.Sleep 30000
Set WshShell = WScript.CreateObject(“WScript.Shell”)
WshShell.Run “rundll32.exe user32.dll,LockWorkStation”,1,false</code>
Next, create a string in your registry for lock.vbs to autorun during startup.
Go to: HKEY_USERSS-1-5-21-1123561945-1060284298-839522115-500SoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionRun
or if unavailable:
Navigate to any of the following path according to your requirement and then add a new “String key” and store path of the Program to be run in this key’s value.For Local Machine- HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindows
CurrentVersionRun
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindows
CurrentVersionRunOnceFor Current User- HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindows
CurrentVersionRun
HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindows
CurrentVersionRunOnce
Create a new string value called lock.vbs. Set the value data to C:pathlock.vbs (assuming path is where you saved lock.vbs
Your computer/server most likely requires a login. So that services automatically startup, you probably want it to automatically login. Download and install Tweakui from http://ift.tt/147VDrE
Once installed, run the Tweakui from START > Programs, expand Logon in the left window pane, select Autologon and enter your system credentials in the right pane.For Windows 7, to autologin
Click on Start and then enter the following command in the search box: netplwiz
Press the ENTER key.This command will load the Advanced User Accounts Control Panel applet.
In the Users tab, uncheck the box next to Users must enter a user name and password to use this computer.
Click on the Apply button at the bottom of the User Accounts window.
Your system should now be able to boot up automatically and lock itself!
Referrals are the bread and butter of the mortgage industry—and for good reason. When the product you’re selling is a 100k-plus lifetime commitment, it helps to start establishing trust before even the first phone call. That’s where your referral partners come in.
“Referral partner” is marketing code for “non-competing professional who passes on prospective leads.” You’ll also see referral source used interchangeably. When you get right down to it, though, this is just a professional relationship like many you probably already have.
If you’re looking to move away from paid leads and create a self-sustaining system of business, you’re in the right place. This guide will help you win, keep, and make the most out of your referral relationships.
Customers aren’t referral partners
Many sources of advice harp on the benefits of pumping your customers for referrals or doing such a good job that leads come to you through “word of mouth.” Plenty of sales professionals follow this advice and end up doing pretty okay.
But for the best sales professionals, “pretty okay” doesn’t cut it for very long.
That’s because depending on happy customers to pass your name on is a very passive approach to sales. You may need to do some work to convince a customer to stick around, but for the most part, they’re coming to you.
There are two main reasons that this isn’t the best strategy:
It’s not your clients’ business to know people who need mortgages. Sure, they may have a friend buying a house, or a cousin a few years down the line, but they’re probably not coming into contact with a steady stream of potential homebuyers day after day. That means they’re not nearly as valuable as a realtor who is—and who can recommend those people to you.
Handling your clients’ mortgages well is your job, not a favor. Building a referral relationship is all about finding ways to help each other succeed. But you’re not really helping a client out—you’re providing a service and getting paid for your time. A client never owes you anything but money. After a certain point, effort put into the customer also has diminishing returns. That is, you can take them out to lunch to celebrate their closing, but don’t expect it to win you leads that doing your job well hasn’t already.
This isn’t to say that you shouldn’t ask for referrals at the end of a successful transaction—you should, every time. A lead is a lead. But be aware that your best wooing efforts will be better spent on other professionals in adjacent industries. The one exception? If you’re still following up with your customers years after closing. But we’ll cover that in a later article.
Finding referral partners
All our highest-producing loan officers have one thing in common: they have an extensive network of referral partners. Finding the right people, however, is half the battle. There are a few requirements you want to keep in mind while you’re searching:
You share the same or a similar target market
You are not in direct competition
You will be willing to vouch for each other’s skills to customers
Your potential partner has influence within your market
You have the ability to refer them business as well—no great relationship is one-sided
In the mortgage industry, all this tends to point to real estate agents, title companies, contractors, attorneys, accountants and CPAs, financial planners, and investment bankers.
Of course, pretty much anyone can drive leads to you—one of our top loan officers has a barber as a referral partner. The real key is to do your research.
How to build relationships
No matter where you are in your career, you’re going to be starting at square one with a new referral partner. After you’ve singled out the people you’d like to connect with, making initial contact—at an event, through a customer, or even with an email out of the blue—is still just the first step.
There are a few things you should keep in mind.
Start slow
Some sales people make the mistake of jumping from person to person or networking group to networking group when they first start their search for referral patterns. Their reasoning? If I don’t see an immediate benefit, I need to cut my loses early and move on.
But this is exactly the opposite of what you should be thinking.
You don’t want to start the relationship off by immediately asking for referrals—it’s probably the least likely way to get them. That’s because “relationship” is the operative word here, and relationships generally start off slowly. Any worthwhile referral partner will want to get a feel for who you are and how you operate before throwing their reputation in with yours. And you should feel the same way.
Prove your value
For a relationship to work, it can’t be one-sided. Another common networking mistake is thinking that providing great service to a partner’s clients is enough to really seal the deal, but it isn’t, at least not at the beginning.
Refer potential clients their way.
Send them insider information on what’s going on in the mortgage industry
Work with them on a joint marketing initiative
Offer yourself as an educational resource
Really go above and beyond. Still want to take clients out to lunch to celebrate their closing? This is the time to do it
Maintaining your referral partners
Like any established relationship, it’s easy to drift apart if you’re not proactive in staying involved. There’s some maintenance involved in keeping the lines of communication open.
Staying top of mind
The key to really staying at the forefront of your referral partner’s mind isn’t just to nudge with a phone call or an email. It’s to remind them that they want you on their side.
That being said, you don’t have to bring out the big guns each time—that is, sending them a lead. Next time you reach out, consider trying one of these:
Share an interesting link
Offer a new deal or incentive for their clients
Propose a content swap—they write for your blog, you write for theirs
Invite them to a networking event
Propose co-branded flyers or postcards
Targeted marketing
Just because you already have a history with a referral partner doesn’t mean you have to (or should) stop marketing to them.
For instance, in 2015 the Total Mortgage marketing team and I constructed a short email campaign for our loan officers that we tailored specifically to realtor referral partners. In it, we repurposed existing blog content into a series of emails that real estate agents want to share with their borrowers.
These were longer, information-heavy emails, and if you read our previous article on email marketing, you’d know that long emails are difficult to pull off—you have to have the perfect situation for them to work.
A referral partner is that situation. They generally have a more technical knowledge of the industry and are already somewhat invested in you personally. Campaigns tailored to their needs are much more likely to hit home (and strengthen your relationship).
How to manage the transaction
Regardless of how well you woo a referral partner, the real test is how you treat their clients. If you mess up, you can bet it’s going to get back to your partner and potentially damage the relationship. Here are two common sense things that we’ve notice trip up loan officers again and again.
Be available
As a loan officer, a certain amount of inherent flexibility comes with the job. But while it’s easy to say that you’re always available, it’s harder to follow through on that promise.
Whatever your schedule actually is, make sure that you let borrowers know in advance what your response times are like, so they don’t have difficulty getting a hold of your later down the line.
Set expectations upfront
With turn-times varying so widely depending on program and underwriters turning up errors every so often, it’s incredibly easy to over-promise in the mortgage industry. While you may have an idea of how long a borrower’s mortgage will take, it’s never good to promise something you can’t guarantee.
Instead, set expectations upfront and use worst-case estimates. That way, when things go as planned, borrowers are pleasantly surprised. Remember, it’s better to under-promise and over-deliver than the reverse.
Next steps: tracking your referral partners with a CRM
A CRM (or Customer Relationship Management) system is a great tool if you have a difficult time managing all your contacts and keeping track of your customer interactions, something that tends to happen when you set up a referral network. Basically, CRMs keep everything you need in one place, so you don’t have to skip all over the internet for the materials you need.
Depending on the system you choose (and there are a lot of them), you can expect to have features that:
Store customer and contact information
Automate parts of your process
Help you visualize your pipeline
Integrate with social media accounts
Track support calls
With these kinds of things accounted for, it becomes much easier to scale your business up and accommodate the new leads that a great referral strategy will nab you.
If a CRM is something you’re interested in, make sure you do your research on all the options available. At Total Mortgage, we actually use several, depending on a loan officer’s needs.
Want more?
You can learn more about what the Total Mortgage marketing team does for our loan officers by checking out other articles in this series, or by visiting our career portal.
from Total Mortgage Underwritings Blog http://ift.tt/1O18b5T
This guest post was written by Tyler Bramlett, AKA The Garage Warrior, creator of 0-6 Pack Abs.
Everyone and their mom has heard of the plank, right? Heck, you even see people in the gym trying to hold a conventional plank for 5+ minutes, right? But my question to you is: Do you really want to be in a plank position for five minutes?
Now, don’t get me wrong. The plank is a great exercise for stabilizing your spine, and creating better posture and core strength… IF it’s done correctly.
The problem is, most people simply don’t perform the plank correctly. Even worse, if for some lucky reason they find a coach who can teach a real plank (where your whole core is activated), they don’t teach a progression that will take them from basic planks to complex ones, reshaping their abs in the process.
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Luckily for you, this article will teach you three plank tricks to ensure you’re doing them with perfect form, and give you a specific 9-step plank progression that you can use to build abs of steel!
First up, let’s talk about the four muscle groups you need to fire in order to make the plank more effective. In order for you to develop massive strength that can apply to other activities, test yourself by doing a plank right now and make sure you are squeezing these four muscles.
1. YOUR QUADS – Your quads must be active in order to prevent your hip flexors from taking over. Practice holding a plank while squeezing your quads and, if need be, have a person test you by gently tapping or kicking your thighs.
2. YOUR GLUTES – Your glutes help set your pelvis, and prevent both spinal damage and pain while performing the plank. Unfortunately, nine out of ten plankers are NOT tightening their glutes. Practice holding a plank while squeezing your quads first, then your glutes, and, if need be, have a person test you by gently tapping or kicking your glutes and thighs.
If you are unable to fire your glutes, practice in a standing position and revisit the plank once you’ve mastered firing your glutes while standing.
3. YOUR LATS – This is where people go wrong big time with the plank. 99 out of 100 plankers neglect to fire their lats because it makes the exercise WAY harder. The great news about this, though, is that you get better results in much less time.
To fire your lats in the plank, imagine you are trying to drag your elbows towards your feet. Don’t actually move them, but apply just enough pressure that you feel tension building in your armpit muscles. Practice holding a plank while squeezing your quads, then glutes, and then lats and, if need be, have a person test you by gently tapping or kicking your lats, glutes and thighs.
4. YOUR PECS – Finally, to prevent you from over-activating your shoulders (which is what 99.9% of people do when performing a plank) you should instead activate your pecs. Yes, those handsome chest muscles are good for more then just push-ups and looking good at the beach!
To fire your pecs during the plank, imagine that you are trying to squeeze your elbows towards each other. Don’t actually move them, but apply just enough pressure that you feel tension building in your chest muscles. Practice holding a plank while squeezing your quads, then glutes, then lats and pecs and, if need be, have a person test you by gently tapping or kicking your lats, glutes, thighs and pecs.
Ok, so now that you know the critical four muscles you should be squeezing in the plank, here’s a series of nine plank variations you can use to transform a flabby gut into six-pack abs!
Just start at exercise #1, and if you can hold it for one set for a total of 60 seconds while squeezing all four muscle groups that are outlined above, then move on to the next exercise.
Heck, we can just call this… one minute abs! Let’s dig in…
#1 – Wall Plank
Place your elbows on a wall about shoulder-width apart. Press your elbows and palms firmly against the wall. Drive your elbows into your sides, and squeeze your lats and glutes. Feel your abs fire when you drive your elbows down and towards to yours sides.
Hold this position for one set at the end of your workout (while making sure to fire all four muscles outlined above), and once you can hold it perfectly for a whole minute, move on to the next exercise.
#2 – Kneeling Plank
Place your elbows on the ground about shoulder-width apart. Press your elbows and palms firmly into the ground. Your shoulders should be positioned directly above your elbows. Place your knees on the ground to keep your body off the ground. Keep your core tight, squeeze your glutes and pull your elbows towards your sides.
Hold this position for one set at the end of your workout (while making sure to fire all four muscles outlined above) and once you can hold it perfectly for a whole minute, move on to the next exercise.
#3 – Half Kneeling Plank
Start in the kneeling plank position. Place your elbows on the ground about shoulder-width apart. Press your elbows and palms firmly into the ground. Extend one leg straight out behind you and drive that leg into the ground. Keep your core tight, squeeze your glutes and drive your elbows down and back.
Hold this position for one set at the end of your workout (while making sure to fire all four muscles outlined above) and once you can hold it perfectly for a whole minute (30 seconds each side with no rest in between), move onto the next exercise.
#4 – Plank
As in the kneeling plank, place your elbows on the ground about shoulder-width apart. Instead of using your knees for support, however, raise your knees off the ground. Squeeze your glutes, press those straight legs into the ground, and drive the elbows down and back. Keep tight and hold for as long as possible.
Hold this position for one set at the end of your workout (while making sure to fire all four muscles outlined above), and once you can hold it perfectly for a whole minute, move on to the next exercise.
#5 – One-Leg Plank
As in the plank, place your elbows on the ground about shoulder-width apart. Press your elbows and palms firmly into the ground. Keeping tight, lift one leg off the ground. Make sure not to rotate your hips when lifting the leg. Repeat with the opposite leg.
Hold this position for one set at the end of your workout (while making sure to fire all four muscles outlined above), and once you can hold it perfectly for a whole minute (30 seconds each side with no rest in between), move on to the next exercise.
#6 – One-Arm One-Leg Plank
As in the One-Leg Plank, place elbows on the ground about shoulder-width apart. Press elbows and palms firmly into the ground. Find your balance, squeeze your glutes and lats, and lift one leg and the opposite arm off the ground. Repeat with the other leg and arm.
Hold this position for one set at the end of your workout (while making sure to fire all four muscles outlined above), and once you can hold it perfectly for a whole minute (30 seconds each side with no rest in between), move on to the next exercise.
#7 – Superman Plank
Place your hands in a push-up position and walk them out to the front as far as you can. Press your palms and fingers firmly into the ground. Imagine pulling down on the ground in order to activate your lats. Squeeze your glutes. Keeping tight, hold your body off the ground and try to maintain this position for as long as possible.
Hold this position for one set at the end of your workout (while making sure to fire all four muscles outlined above), and once you can hold it perfectly for a whole minute, move on to the next exercise.
#8 – One-Leg Super Man Plank
As in the Superman Plank, place your hands in a push-up position and walk them out to the front as far as you can. Press your palms and fingers firmly into the ground. Keeping tight, lift one leg off the ground. Repeat with the opposite leg.
Hold this position for one set at the end of your workout (while making sure to fire all four muscles outlined above), and once you can hold it perfectly for a whole minute (30 seconds each side with no rest in between), move on to the next exercise.
#9 – One Arm One Leg Superman Plank
As in the Superman Plank, place your hands in a push-up position and walk them out to the front as far as you can. Press your palms and fingers firmly into the ground. Keeping tight, lift one leg off the ground. Repeat with the opposite leg.
Hold this position for one set at the end of your workout (while making sure to fire all four muscles outlined above), and once you can hold it perfectly for a whole minute (30 seconds each side with no rest in between), move on to the next exercise.
All you have to do is follow this EXACT plank progression, while making sure to fire those four muscles, and you’ll be well on your way to six-pack abs!
I hope you enjoyed this article, and if you found it useful please share it with your family or friends who need to snap out of traditional ab training, and start getting real results with only one minute of work!
Tyler Bramlett is the creator of 0-6 Pack Abs. After suffering a severe knee injury in a road accident, Tyler discovered the benefits of bodyweight exercises. Tyler has learned from the best in the world in variety of training techniques, and now shares that information with the Garage Warrior community.
Happy Friday everyone and welcome to the TMS current mortgage rates blog. There’s a decent bit of economic data out today, but first, your mortgage rate forecast/advice.
The Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey (PMMS) came out yesterday, and it showed that mortgage rates rose this week. The average rate on a 30-year fixed is now 3.66% (0.6 points), the average rate on a 15-year fixed is 2.89% (0.6 points), and the average rate on a 5-year ARM is 2.86% (0.5 points).
The 10-year Treasury yield dropped after the Fed’s statement was released on Wednesday. Since then, it’s had some ups and downs but has basically stayed around the same spot. Unless it spikes up over the next few days, we should be seeing lower mortgage rates next week.
Looking forward, the April jobs report will come out next Friday. It’s always a big market mover and this time will be no different. The Fed will be hoping for a strong showing, and it’s possible they’ll get it. Of course, what’s often portrayed in the headlines doesn’t exactly portray the reality of the situation. The jobs report isn’t just about the number of jobs created–despite what you might hear–the real issue are the types of jobs. Anyway, we’ll dig deeper into it as the report approaches.
Income outperformed spending in March, according to data out this morning. Month over month, personal income rose 0.4%. That’s above the consensus for 0.3%. Consumer spending went up 0.1%, month over month, which is below the consensus of 0.2%. The core PCE–the Fed’s favorite inflation measure–only rose by 0.1% in March. Year-over-year, the core PCE is at 1.6%. That’s one-tenth lower than the prior reading and four-tenths lower than the Fed’s target of 2%. With inflation continuing to drag, hopes of even one more rate hike in 2016 hang in the balance.
Employment Cost Index shows wage strength
The ECI came in right in line with expectations with a 0.6% rise, quarter to quarter. The index takes into account all employee compensation costs, such as wages, salaries, and benefits. Wages drove the growth this go around, which is sure to sit well with Fed policymakers.
Chicago PMI moves lower
The Chicago PMI fell from 53.6 to 50.4 this month. There’s little reason to think that the Chicago economy will get out of its flat-to-soft trend anytime soon.
Consumer Sentiment drops
The consumer sentiment index has fallen to 89.0 from 89.7, reflecting consumer’s decreasing optimism about the future of the U.S. economy.
Holidays are time when people go out of town to spend time with their families. Whether you leave your home for a few hours or a few days, make sure you avoid these common home security mistakes during holiday season, such as: post-pile up, bushy landscape and social media.
Below are 3 common home security mistakes during holidays:
Post Pile Up Nothing alerts a burglar like mail overflowing from the mailbox, or newspapers piled up in your driveway. Stop mail and newspaper delivery while you’re out of town, and enlist a neighbor to pick up any packages or other deliveries that may arrive while you’re gone. Source:AlarmRelay
Bushy Landscape Having leafy trees and untrimmed shrubs adds a wild side to your landscape, but you need to know that you are giving the burglar lots of rooms to maneuver and move around undetected. The thief won’t move only under the cover of darkness, but also during broad daylight since they have the advantage of shadows. Source:Ericabuteau
Social Media The lights are off, the cars are gone, and mail, newspapers and packages have accumulated. This paints the perfect picture for an easy burglary target. When leaving for a vacation or business trip, consider what your vacant home will look like, and seek ways to maintain the appearance of an active home.
Ask neighbors or relatives to pick up the mail in your absence.
Invest in an energy management solution that allows you to schedule and remotely control lights within your home. Source:VectorSecurity
Securing your home means more than just locking the doors when you leave. If you want to know more about home security services, please give us a call or contact us here.
Bathroom vanities are extremely useful and are the best addition to bathroom decor. If you’re planning to have one of these, then here are a few ideas for you.
Glass Bathroom Vanity At any clear finish or frosted tempered glass provides a single, sleek and modern, as well as the set of bathroom vanities. This is one of the easiest surfaces to clean and has very good tolerance of heat does not dissolve or burn, if you forget the curling iron out! Tempered glass isalso a non-porous surface, bacteria and germs have no place to grow, which is hygienic and resistant to stains. Another advantage of glass is that you will not need to worry about communication with your bath or color, because it is a different material, each device color (white or bone) game. Finally, the most dramatic for the bathroom remodeling project to install lights beneath the surface of tempered glass to add. Source:ModernBathroom
Double Bathroom Vanity Double sink vanities are often seen in home design magazines. They are extremely stylish and provide a fantastic combination of form and function. Double sinks look great when they fit the dimensions of the room nicely; they also provide personal space in the bathroom for individuals living together in the same house. A bathroom vanity with two sinks is very practical. Two people can save a considerable amount of time just by having two sinks in one bathroom. The basic components of a double sink vanity include the countertop, cabinet, basins, fixtures, and hardware such as knobs and drawer pulls. You have two options, you can look for each item individually or you can look at furniture style complete vanities. Source:Ezine
Floating Bathroom Vanity The main advantage of a floating vanity is the illusion of space it creates in the room; the room seems bigger because of the light that passes beneath it. In a small bathroom where space is already a premium, adding strip or spot lighting beneath the floating vanity helps to enhance the illusion of additional space. It also makes the bathroom less cluttered and simpler, rendering it easier to keep clean, a plus in any home. Source:Home
While selecting vanities for your home, you need to consider several things such as the size of the bathroom, as well as your budget along with the rest of decor. If you want more suggestions, please contact us here.
It’s no secret that search engine optimization plays a crucial role in the success of any website on the world wide web today. Having a solid understanding of SEO is very important if you want to see your website ranking on the first page of search engines for your desired keywords. In this article we will give you a complete breakdown of what you need to do in order to make sure that your website is not only optimized for search, but that it also gets indexed well in popular search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing. Let us first understand the 2 different aspects of SEO which are made up of on page seo and off page seo.
On Page SEO
Content
This deals with the meta tags, content, style, navigation and structure of your blog. This is very important and the reality is that if you do not get your on page seo correct, you will have trouble ranking your website for your desired keywords regardless of how much you spend on link building. To start with, you need to make sure that every bit of content you add to your website is 100 percent unique and appealing to your readers. There are tools online such as copyscape that can help you check to see if your content is unique. Having unique content is very important as search engines are known to punish websites that use scraped or copied content on their websites. So always keep it unique, engaging and well optimized for your targeted keywords.
Keywords
The second factor to talk about is your use of meta tags. This is your title, description and keywords used for the front page and also the inner pages of your website. Always try to include the main phrase you want to rank for in the title and description of your meta tags as this will help not only to rank your site for these keywords, but it will also increase your CTR (click through rate). This should be applied to both homepage and inner pages. You can make use of online meta tag checker tools to make sure this has been done correctly.
Style
When choosing a website template you are engouraged to use one that has simple navigation and an attractive style. Remember, at the end of the day you want your visitors to move around your site easily and not have trouble finding pages. WordPress is a very popular CMS and offers a massive range of highly responsive themes for website today. You can visit www.wpthemeblog.com to learn more about the most popular wordpress templates on offer today.
Off page SEO
Link Building
This is your link building. There are many ways that an individual or business can build backlinks to their websites including web 2.0 properties, guest posts, blog posts, blogroll links, homepage links, social bookmarks, press releases etc. One has to be very careful when doing link building as purchasing link packages or building links too fast can trigger penalties and negatively affect your rankings. Its important to build links slowly and to use different variations of your keywords and raw URL when building links. A combination of DOFOLLOW and NOFOLLOW is recommended with the majority being DOFOLLOW which passes link juice. Guest posts still remain the most powerful and effective method of link building to date.
Getting Your Site Indexed
Here are some tips to get your website indexed in search engines quickly. Once your website is completed, submit your website to Google & Bing webmaster tools. After this is done you will need to verify your site and also submit a sitemap file so that Google, Bing and Yahoo can crawl all the pages on your site. Once this is completed, you can do a few social bookmarks to your site to help get it indexed quicker.
Are you a startup and looking to minimize cost? Don’t want to spend tons of money before making money? Looking for an inexpensive, almost free CRM and accounting solution? These two software as a service platforms provide everything you need from managing your contacts, to invoicing them and bookkeeping.
CRM and accounting solutions on the market are quite costly. There are open source solutions, but require development or charge an arm and a leg for accounting integration plugins. The solution below is ideal for the starting business and offers feature rich functionality at an affordable price.
Agile CRM
Agile CRM provides a FREE CRM version for up to 1000 contacts, with extras like appointment scheduling, marketing and sales tools, and seamless easy integration into Quickbooks. 1000 contacts should get any business making some money, and the next package up after that allows for 10k contacts at still an affordable cost.
Agile has everything you need to grow your business – contact management, sales enablement, marketing automation, web analytics, gamification, telephony, 2 way emails, real-time activity alerts, form builders, mobile marketing, drip marketing, email newsletters, social media, extensive plugins and integrations, and so much more!
Paid versions include 10k contacts and up, email integration, telephony, automation tools, advanced marketing tools, advanced support, additional plugins and more.
Quickbooks w Agile CRM Integration
With Quickbooks integration into Agile CRM, you can manage payments and invoices from contact pages within Agile. Prices start at $11. Create invoices, track and receive payments, and see invoice history from one place. Low cost, easy integration, organized and convenient access, makes this solution appealing for startup businesses.
Beach season is kind of like tax season: everyone knows when it’s coming, and for months leading up to it, people promise themselves they’re going to be ready for it. But then when the season arrives, they find themselves completely unprepared and end up trying to cram months of work into a few weeks.
With tax season, we’re talking about W2s, 1040 EZs and all the other lovely forms the government requires us to fill out by April 15. But in regards to beach season, we’re talking about getting fit.
You hear it all the time. When summer is just around the corner, it seems like everyone wants to get “beach body ready”. But the truth is, fitness isn’t just a seasonal thing. If you’ve neglected your health since autumn, it’s going to be a mighty tough challenge getting the body you’ve been hoping for.
Now, that being said, ANY time is a good time to start getting in shape. You don’t need to wait for beach season, the new year or any other special occasion. The best time to get in shape is now, now matter when now happens to be.
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But if you’re looking to get an awesome beach body, surely one area of focus is your stomach. After all, most people’s stomachs are rarely on display any other time than when in a bathing suit. It’s for this reason we get a lot of emails asking what the secret is to getting shredded abs.
First thing’s first — and we can’t emphasize this enough: You can’t have a poor diet and expect to get a chiseled core simply because you regularly work your abs during workouts. It doesn’t work like that. A balanced diet is literally just as important (if not more so) to a flat stomach as exercising your abdominals. Proper diet and exercise go hand-in-hand.
If this is an area in which you could use some help, we’ve got a great program that provides exercise plans, a nutritional guide and a lot more, which you can check out here.
But on the exercise side, there are a lot of different ways to activate your core and help build those abs that pop you’ve been trying to get. Some of them are very effective, some not so much. We’ve sifted through all the ab workouts in the fitness universe to bring you our absolute favorites. And per usual, there’s no need for a gym membership. All you need for these workouts is your body.
These are going to activate every part of your abdominals, which, if you’re unfamiliar, are all listed here. So give these a try and see if you can incorporate them into your workout program. They’re not going to be the only thing you need to do to get that beach body, but they definitely put you on the right track. And if you’ve got any other abdominal workouts that you think are especially killer, let us know if the comments!
The Federal Open Market Committee’s two-day meeting on monetary policy came to an end yesterday. Their written statement, which was the only form of communication this go around, had few changes from the March version. It was basically the usual talk about strength in the labor market, inflation still running below 2%, and being data dependent when considering future rate hikes. They nixed any talk of “global economic and financial developments” posing a risk, so it seems all eyes are on domestic issues at the moment.
The big question on everyone’s mind was if there would be any mention–even just the subtlest hint–about a June rate hike. Alas, there was not. Janet Yellen doesn’t seem to be in any hurry at all to raise rates. I think that surprised a lot of people who were expecting the Fed to signal to the markets that they should consider June a definite possibility.
Not that the markets would have totally bought that line but it still would have influenced the framing of future meetings such as September and December. With no mention of June, the probability of a rate hike at any of the remaining meetings has gone down, according to the Fed Fund futures. The chances are 15%, 33%, 49%, 53%, and 67% for the June, July, September, November, and December meetings, respectively. Of course, these numbers change all the time, and it’s certainly possible that we get some strong data and hawkish Fedspeak that puts June back on the table, but that’s not what’s happening right now.
Freddie Mac PMMS has rates up
The Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey (PMMS) came out today, and it’s showing mortgage rates moving higher this week. The average rate on a 30-year fixed is 3.66% (0.6 points), the average rate on a 15-year fixed is 2.89% (0.6 points), and the average rate on a 5-year ARM is 2.86% (0.5 points).
The yield on the U.S. 10-year Treasury note fell after the statement was released. It’s currently trading around 1.86%. Mortgage rates usually follow the lead of the 10-year yield so we could see rates move lower next week.
It means right now is still a great time for home buyers. If you’ve been thinking about purchasing a home or refinancing your current mortgage, I’d recommend acting sooner rather than later.
According to data from the Labor Department, U.S. gross domestic product has fallen to 0.5%. Expectations were for 0.7%. Cheap oil is one of the major culprits. Economists are hoping that the labor market will help the economy find its footing moving forward.
Weekly Jobless Claims are up
Applications for U.S. unemployment benefits went up this week to 257,000. That’s up 9,000 from last week’s revised reading. Overall, the report seems to point toward a strong labor market.
Credit makes life easier both on a day-to-day and long-term basis. For example, credit cards help pay for clothes and dinners out, while loans pave the way for large purchases like a car or house.
No matter your age or situation in life, it’s important to understand the reasons to monitor your credit (and how to go about doing it).
Why Do Credit Monitoring?
Credit matters in ways you’ve surely considered, as well as in ways you might not have. Most people know that unless you have a substantial chunk in savings, you need a loan to get a car, and your credit score affects the loan’s interest rate. But did you know that prospective employers often check your credit history to see how financially responsible you are? Or that utility companies examine your credit as well?
Couple that with the prevalence of credit card fraud and identity theft, and there are a lot of reasons to monitor your credit:
You’ll know what is going on and see much of what prospective employers and lenders are seeing (such as your payment history, how much you owe, recent credit and types of credit).
You’ll be able to identify errors and/or potential problem areas and move to fix them.
You’ll be alerted to possible credit card fraud or identity theft (new, unexplained accounts opened or balance surges, for instance)
You’ll be able to monitor credit fluctuations in advance of a large purchase.
You’ll have better preparation for housing, transportation and employment.
It’s important to get an idea of what to expect when you’re planning a purchase such as a house. Credit monitoring helps you stay on top of your finances as you prepare for new stages in your life. In general, you can do self-monitoring, pay a company to do it or some combination of both.
Credit Self-Monitoring
Credit self-monitoring often requires little upfront monetary investment and is a good starting point if you’re unsure about the need to monitor your credit. Here’s how to do it.
Look at your bank accounts, credit card accounts and other financial accounts on a weekly to monthly basis. When possible, set up alerts for online transactions or transactions that cost more than a specific amount. These alerts ensure you’re aware of any unauthorized purchases.
Get a free credit report every four months through annualcreditreport.com. Rotate the free reports among Experian, TransUnion and Equifax. Assess each report for unusual activities such as a credit card account you have no idea about, credit denials and unfamiliar credit card charges.
Take preventative measures such as shredding financial documents and conducting online financial business through secure channels.
Ask your prospective mortgage lender, landlord or credit card company for your credit score when one of them makes a credit inquiry. Your score will fall somewhere between 300 and 850, with 850 being the best. Experian, TransUnion and Equifax use slightly different metrics for your credit score, but your score normally should not vary dramatically. As you get and track your credit score, keep an eye out for huge increases or drops.
Take advantage of a one-stop service such as Mint that puts all of your transactions in one place for easier supervision.
Credit Monitoring Services
You may prefer a credit monitoring service instead of self-monitoring, especially if you want the absolute peace of mind that comes with complete monitoring and are okay paying for it. Experian, TransUnion and Equifax each offer credit monitoring services at varying package levels. So do banks and identity-theft services.
Here’s what you should factor in as you compare the various possibilities.
The cost: Some places ask you to pay a monthly fee that can really add up. If a credit score is all you really want, order it directly from Fair Isaac.
Extraneous scores: You only need the FICO (Fair Isaac) score. Forget about any other score.
Free monitoring: Approach free-monitoring offers with caution. Retailer offers tend to come with pretty significant drawbacks such as requiring that you waive the right to sue them. However, other free services might be okay—Lifehacker recommends Credit Sesame and Credit Karma. You’ll have to pay extra for optional features such as real-time notifications, though.
Free trials: Free trials are useful so you can get an idea of how user-friendly and vigilant a credit monitoring service is. They come in varying lengths such as 14 days or one month. Here is a handy chart comparing common credit monitoring services; you can see which ones offer free trials.
Which bureaus: Most, but not all, credit monitoring services keep an eye on the three bureaus.
Whether you self-monitor your credit or pay for it, it’s essential to correct any mistakes as soon as possible. You will need to contact the bureau that issued the erroneous report and follow its procedures.
Self-monitoring your credit has never been easier when you set up one-stop apps and alerts, but whatever form of monitoring you use, catching an error early could make a huge difference in your life and stress levels.
from Total Mortgage Underwritings Blog http://ift.tt/1VVMMCN
We all know that one of the greatest benefits of calisthenics is that you need little to no equipment to workout.
However, I can’t deny the benefits that come from having a homemade gym set up in your house completely dedicated to calisthenics training.
Wait Todd. What if I don’t want to buy anything new?
That’s totally ok.
This post is only for those who are interested in creating an awesome place to workout that inspires and motivates them big time.
In the beginning, I was a little hesitant about the idea of having a homemade gym.
Investing in equipment and tools wasn’t my thing. I always preferred to follow a minimalist approach to my training.
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As the time passed and I was getting more advanced, the need to invest in equipment became more apparent and I started to purchase basic calisthenics tools, like rings, parallel bars, etc.
My perception about homemade gyms slowly started to change. I gradually got convinced of the idea of creating my own home gym.
After creating my own pulling and dipping station a while ago (#9 in the list below), I can assure you that the benefits of having a home gym are phenomenal.
Later in this article I’m going to give you a list of my favorite calisthenics home gyms and offer you some basic guidelines to help you create your own DIY calisthenics park.
To start with the basics let’s define what is a home gym.
A home gym is a place dedicated to training in your house. This place has all the training equipment that are necessary for your training. The home gym can be inside your house, in the garage or in your backyard.
Based on the above definition a DIY home gym is a home gym where the majority of the equipment was created by you. Of course, not all of the tools have to be created personally by you, because sometimes buying a high-quality tool might be a better option.
Why Should You Consider Building A Home Gym?
Todd, I have been training for a couple of years while using only a pull up bar and I am pretty advanced in calisthenics. Why should I be considered about building a home gym?
That’s a great question that I used to have for many years as well.
If you are totally happy owning only a pull up bar and you are making the progress you want, there is no serious need to start investing in more equipment.
However, if you want to have more training options and the ability to challenge yourself in lots of different ways, creating a home gym is the way to go.
Here are some of the benefits that come with having a calisthenics home gym:
Nonetheless, constructing a homemade gym is a cheaper option than going to the gym or buying commercial equipment.
Benefit #2: More Training Options
Having only a pull up bar is enough most of the times for becoming strong and advanced with calisthenics.
However, having more training options is always a good thing.
When you create your own gym, you have the opportunity to develop tools to target all the different muscles you want and master new calisthenics moves.
For example, building a pull up station, like in home gym #8, will allow you to train with human flag variations, while having a simple door pull up bar won’t.
Benefit #3: Immediate Access
The biggest benefit of having your own gym at your house is that you can have easy and immediate access to it any time of the day you want to.
You can train at the morning, evening and night, something that is hard to do at a commercial gym.
Benefit #4: Become More Involved With Your Training
Creating something and buying something are two different things.
Based on my experience, when you create something by yourself you are more emotionally attached to the product, which makes it more likely that you are going to use it in the long run.
Also, if you manage to build training equipment that is of great quality and works well, you are going to feel very self-sufficient, probably more than ever before.
Benefit #5: It’s Fun
Even if it seems to involve a lot of hard work (and sometimes it does), creating your own gym is a very recreational process.
After building your first training tools, you might even become addicted to constructing equipment.
Benefit #6: A Training Environment That You Truly Enjoy
When you create your own gym you have the opportunity to design it the way you want.
You can put on the music you like to listen while you are training.
You can put on motivating posters on the wall.
You can train in whatever outfit you want to.
You don’t have to wait around to use the equipment.
You can move your tools around the way you want too.
Etc.
All of the above give you the opportunity to train in an environment that is motivating, inspiring and enjoyable.
The Top 10 DIY Calisthenics Home Gyms
In this section, you are going to find the top 10 homemade gyms dedicated to calisthenics training. These are the best gyms I have found that are available in a video format.
Of course, some other more awesome gyms might exist, so let me know if there’s a home gym out there you think should be on the list.
In addition, before moving on you should understand that some of the following gyms are very hard to construct and may require a serious investment of time, money and effort. The main reason I have included such examples is for inspirational purposes.
Calisthenics DIY Home Gym #10: DIY Calisthenics Gym
This is a very basic home gym that has everything that a calisthenics athlete would need.
What I like the most about this gym are the pull up bars that were created by unused equipment and the addition of some rope. This is resourcefulness at it’s finest!
A truly great homemade gym. This is a more complex construction than the one from the Kavadlo brothers, but offers more training options.
If you have enough space in your backyard and you can invest in the construction of this small calisthenics park, then this is one of the best options you have.
Calisthenics DIY Home Gym #5: Homemade Ninja Warrior Obstacle Course
This is a little more creative than the previous ones and gives some new exercise options.
What I enjoy the most about this setup is that it’s simple and no more difficult to construct than the previous ones. The only drawback that I see is that it’s not very stable.
Calisthenics DIY Home Gym #4: Ninja Warrior Course
This is a great all around training bootcamp in your backyard.
This is a very complex set up, but it offers a lot of different training variations most of which are based on the ninja warrior challenge.
Calisthenics DIY Home Gym #3: Backyard American Ninja Warrior Course
This is another ninja warrior inspired backyard gym. This is a very big construction and it will probably be hard to construct.
The greatest benefit of this setup is the it allows you to perform a lot of different pull up variations focusing on grip development and explosiveness.
Calisthenics DIY Home Gym#2: Homemade American Ninja Warrior Course
This homemade gym contains almost all of the challenges of the American ninja warrior.
While most calisthenics athletes aren’t going to need such a big construction, it’s always motivating to see what dedicated people can build to accomplish their goals.
Calisthenics DIY Home Gym #1: Ninja warrior training room
This is by far the best home gym that I have even seen.
Unlike most of the previous ones, this gym is built inside the house.
This home gym is actually built inside the bedroom! I have never seen a bedroom this awesome! If I was a kid this would be the bedroom of my dream!
Other than that, I really enjoy how the athlete started small and gradually created possibly the greatest home gym.
Bonus: The Ultimate Back Yard Gym
I decided to let this one outside the top 10 because it’s a very extreme example, yet I couldn’t let it go unmentioned.
This backyard course is HUGE and it’s not even completed yet…
I find this construction to be very inspiring and I am starting to thing of creating some new equipment for myself.
How To Build Your Own Home Gym – General Guidelines
Some of the above home gyms might seem that are beyond what you can currently do by yourself.
But don’t be discouraged.
You can create a gym like one of the above, or even better if you follow sound guidelines and be ready to put in the necessary time and effort.
In this section, I am going to offer you some basic guidelines that can help you get started.
Guideline #1: Start Small
The first time I saw a complete home gym, I was completely overwhelmed by the idea of creating such a thing by myself.
It looked like too much work, especially since I could workout with calisthenics without needing to put all this effort into creating equipment.
The key to getting over this feeling is to start small.
The way I got over it was by creating simple equipment that was needed for the accomplishment of my goals (such as parallel bars).
After, I created my first two or three tools, I was more confident in my abilities and I felt ready to create something bigger, like the PVC station.
Guideline #2: Know Your Priorities
A very important rule in building your own equipment is to build something that you are going to need in your training.
This might seem obvious, but most people seem to miss it.
You wouldn’t want to put time, money and effort into something that you aren’t going to be using for a long time.
The reason behind this is that if you build something that you never use, it’s very unlikely to build something new.
The only way to avoid this situation is to identify your priorities. Take a good look into your goals, and see what calisthenics tool could be of use for the achievement of your goals. Find a tool that contributes to the accomplishment of your most important goal. The more important the goal the more likely you are going to use the tool you created.
Guideline #3: Have A Plan
Before attempting to create something by yourself, it’s always a good idea to search for tutorials and see examples of what others have done before you.
Searching can help you get inspired and find new blueprints that you can combine when creating your own gym equipment.
If you don’t have experience in manually creating big structures, you can get the help of a professional. You want to build something that will be of high quality and that will last long, so having someone to help you isn’t a bad idea.
After you have figured the above stuff out, make a list of what you are going to need, how much it will cost, etc. Knowing what you need beforehand is going to help you avoid unnecessary delays during the construction process.
Guideline #4: Take Action
After you have figured everything out, it’s time to take action and start buying and building your own home gym step by step.
It’s important to take action, even if it is small. Otherwise, it’s going to be something that you are going to procrastinate about a lot.
To help you out, I have made a quick list of DIY tutorials of different tools and equipment that you can include at your own home gym:
For more DIY blueprints and tutorials, you can check this great list.
Conclusion
Building your own gym might seem a lot of work, but I can assure you that it can be a very enjoyable process. Especially, when you are going to train with a tool that you created yourself.
Furthermore, even if you are still a beginner with no immediate need for a home gym, I believe it’s a good idea to have a certain vision of how your ideal home gym would look like. This can help become more resourceful later on when you are creating your own calisthenics park.
Have you created any tool for your training so far? What tool would be more useful for your training goal?
I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments section below.
Let’s dig in…
