Gym Flooring Explained

Flooring protects three things: your floor, your equipment and your ears. Rubber tiles between fifteen and twenty millimetres suit most home gyms with dumbbells and moderate barbell work.

If you deadlift heavy or drop bumper plates, build a platform. Two layers of eighteen millimetre plywood with rubber on top under the plates and a hard surface under the rack gives you stability where you stand and protection where the plates land.

On a suspended timber floor, spread the load. Position the rack over joists where possible and add a wider platform footprint to distribute weight.

Interlocking tiles are easier to fit in an awkward room; rolled rubber gives fewer seams in a large one. Both need a clean, dry, level subfloor.