Explanation of All the Bars in the Gym
The first step in lifting the barbell is loading the dumbbells onto the barbell. Some gyms only have one type of barbell and it weighs 45 pounds and that’s all you need to know. But this is not the only type, and if you have bars of different shapes and weights in your gym, you can get confused.
Check out the simple answer first
If you are interested in a strip, always check the end of it. Sometimes you will find a label with a brand name, a description of what the bar is, and its weight. For example, this one has a small lid that says “The Rogue Ohio Deadlift Bar”. 27mm. 20 kg “. You now know that it weighs 44 lbs (20 kg) and has a 27 mm wide handle, which is slightly thinner than a typical power bar. Great! The problem has been resolved.
But on many slats, all you see at the end is a rusty bolt. If the bar is seven feet long, it probably weighs 44-45 pounds. However, if you are suspicious, don’t trust anyone. I heard passers-by say, “Oh yeah, that’s 55 pounds” for both the standard 45-pound barbell and the monstrous 69-pound trap.
There is an easy way to find out how much any rod weighs: weigh it. Almost every gym has a bathroom scale somewhere, so you can weigh yourself holding a barbell and then weigh yourself without it and subtract your own weight.
However, these are the most common stripes you are likely to come across:
Standard 44 and 45 pound bars
This family is a bit different, but I am bringing them together because they are about the same size and weight and can be used interchangeably for many elevators. Some are 44 pounds and some are 45 pounds. Don’t worry about the difference.
If you see a barbell that is seven feet long in the gym, with the part that you hold about an inch in diameter, and the parts that hold the weight plates about two inches in diameter, you are almost certainly looking at one of them. This is the most common type of barbell you’ll see in most gyms.
- Men’s olympic bars are 20kg (about 44lbs) for men’s bars and are 7.2 feet long. The collars (wider parts at the ends) twist easily. If you load them with a lot of weight, you will see that they are “flexible,” meaning the bar has a tendency to bend or bounce easily. They are designed with two Olympic lifts in mind: the snatch and the clean and jerk. But you can use them for any exercise you like, so you will find them in gyms where no one does Olympic exercise.
- Vultures for strength exercises used for squats, bench press, deadlift, and so on. D., of the same size and shape as the Olympic men’s necks. They tend to be stiffer (less flexible) and the collars probably won’t rotate as easily. If they are not 44 pounds, they will be 45.
- Deadlift bars can be slightly longer than regular strength bars, or they can be thinner and more flexible. They are usually still 45 pounds.
- The squat bar is the wild card here. Typically, the squat bar is a regular strength bar. But sometimes it will be a specialized squat bar that is thicker and stiffer and can weigh 50 pounds and sometimes 55 or more.
Women’s Olympic Bars
Women’s bars are lighter and slightly thinner than men’s Olympic bars, but they are also noticeably shorter – about eight inches shorter. They weigh 15 kg or 33 lbs.
Women’s olympic bars exist for women who can use them in snatch, clean and jerk competition. They have two main advantages over the men’s bar (if you are a medium-sized woman):
- They are thinner for easier grip, especially with the hook that Oly lifters typically use.
- They are more flexible, so the bar does not need so much weight to bounce. This makes a difference in Olympic weightlifting (for example, when you let the bar swing when you get up from an instep) and means little to nothing for other exercises.
Since they specialize in Olympic exercise, you are unlikely to see these barbells in most gyms. But they are and can be a good replacement for the deadlift if you want something very thin and flexible. Just be aware of the weight difference.
Exercise and curling bars
These strips are smaller and lighter than those discussed above. The idea behind training bars (often 5kg or 10kg, i.e. 11 or 22lbs) is to give you something easier to work with if you’re not ready for a full-length bar.
Curl bars are what they look like: smaller, short bars designed to perform bicep curls and other movements that don’t require a full-length bar. In my gym, they are not stored with barbells, but under dumbbell racks.
Curlers are often, but not always, 25 pounds. Check or weigh to be sure.
EZ-curl bars
It’s wriggling. They are used as curling bars for low-weight exercises. Their handles are designed so that you can choose the position that is most comfortable for your wrists.
Trap grates and other unusual shapes
There are many other rods with unusual shapes and weights. One is a trap or hexagon, a hexagon big enough for you to stand inside it. (It is primarily used for trap deadlifts where your arms are at your sides and you don’t have to worry if you’re going to hit the bar in your shin.) Some traps weigh 45 pounds, but some are more and some are less. …
There are also football bars , also called Swiss bars or multi-handle bars, that allow you to use a neutral grip for your bench press or other pressing motion. Sometimes they are 45 pounds, but then again, sometimes they are not.
Fancy rods are not standardized, so the weight is as it was when the rod manufacturer welded all the pieces together. If in doubt, weigh yourself.