The Official Save The Bodybuilding.com Forums

[Deep-Voiced-One]

With all the madness of social media and discord taking over in an unfortunate and unfavorable way, the Bodybuilding forums have predated all the likes of these other so called "sources" with its wealth of information, knowledge, experience and detailed reviews from the community over its many years running.

You know this forum is a superior source when a quick search will pull up an archived thread likely to help you with something, or another...all the above mentioned, I'd hate to see it go and I'm getting repulsed by all the spam crap compiling I'm seeing here.

All this said, lets band together save the bodybuilding.com forums, or at least fight trying. Reply with a post of support. Thanks.

[RGrizzzz]

Keep it alive++

[urbanlifter]

Long live the Equipment Forum! I've tried ******** and Instagram, it's near impossible to have a meaningful conversation and people are just there to pat themselves on the back. Then if they don't like your opinion all your comments are deleted, no matter how valid and/or polite you were while sharing ideas. Forums are WAAAY better IMO, I've deleted my ******** account and I'll likely do the same with my Instagram. Total waste of time and energy.

[dragon360]

Long live the Equipment Forum!

Much agreed.

[Synthetickiller]

Even though I haven't been active in a while, I 100% agree with this.
It's just impossible to use social media for any type of discussion and searching out topics would be even more useless. This applies really to all topics. I still only find myself on real forums looking for information.
Plan A is to keep the forum going, but in case Plan A fails, what's Plan B?

[irongrandpa]

The equipment forum has been a great resource for me as well as a bond with fellow lifters/equipment enthusiasts. Definitely I’m in favor of it staying around.

[grumpytude]

Agree- now how to get rid of all the spam infecting the equipment forum lately.

[radrd]

I'm still all in on forums, especially for equipment. I hate social media. Tried discord and that was an impossible-to-follow mess.

[gym62richard]

I totally agree with everyone, I rarely post these days as I now have just about my perfect gym set up.

Over the years I've gleaned so much information from this exceptional forum and I'd really hate to see this wonderful resource disappear.

[ncsuLuke]

This forum has had the best information to noise ratio of anything else as far as equipment information goes. I'd hate to see it slowly die out but it seems like most forums are dying these days. Unfortunate because I still think this is the best way to have discourse online. Reddit is okay but ********, IG, discord are all trash and only useful for those with no attention span when it comes to stuff like this.

[weisgarb]

You should give the famous Indian astrologer a call to find out if your efforts will be successful.

You can do it while simultaneously holding a plank, smoking meth, and chewing CBD gummies.

[thedickus]

I'm shocked that the Equipment forum didn't just explode during the pandemic's shutdown of gyms. Either everyone already knew everything or Coop's FB page became the go to. I guess at the point that used equipment became the same price or higher than new no one cared what equipment was worth or what was more useful. No one cared if Bowflex dumbbells were any good or better than PowerBlocks, they just bought whatever they got their hands on. Redit has a decent home gym sub, but you can't really get questions answered here in a timely manner.
The knowledge of people on here is second to none. In my early years researching and asking questions on here saved me lots of money.

[AttyGuy]

Post #13 in this thread. Lifetime post 13,000.

[murphyreedus]

I say we start our own equipment forum, with blackjack and hookers

[urbanlifter]

Coop's FB page became the go to.

Think that sums it up, everyone wants to be a 'social media influencer' and its all in the name of making money. Garage Gym Reviews was just one of the first to monetize this little niche. But there are at least 2-3 others who started out here and seem to be doing well with their own PL competitions and review sites. More power to them, hopefully they can keep it up long enough to make it a worthwhile venture.

[401Delta]

I'm shocked that the Equipment forum didn't just explode during the pandemic's shutdown of gyms. Either everyone already knew everything or Coop's FB page became the go to. I guess at the point that used equipment became the same price or higher than new no one cared what equipment was worth or what was more useful. No one cared if Bowflex dumbbells were any good or better than PowerBlocks, they just bought whatever they got their hands on. Redit has a decent home gym sub, but you can't really get questions answered here in a timely manner.
The knowledge of people on here is second to none. In my early years researching and asking questions on here saved me lots of money.

Why would anyone want to come here, though, outside of the people that already are here?

The type of user in this particular forum fits into a very small part of the market.

If you come here talking about anything other than commercial equipment, you'll likely just be told to buy plates, a rack and a barbell...

...it's the right answer if someone wanted to achieve fitness in the most efficient way, but only a small % of the public would ever find that workout appealing.

Even when you walk into a commercial gym, often the least amount of activity is over in the free weight section.

The site has been far too rigid to expand the types of user here, imo.

Got something to sell? Can't do it here!

LOL

I personally like the equipment forum here, but it is stale as fukk.

[bisonp]

I agree with everybody here. Social media sucks for constructive long term discussion. There's no structure to it.

I think the biggest problem is that the forum platform hasn't been kept up to date and because of that it just plain sucks. I can't post pictures, search is nearly useless, and the rules are archaic and unfriendly to new posters. The most successful forums are run by people who are passionate about the topic because there's little to no profit to be had in it. This one attempted to be a business and it's clear there has been nearly no investment into it for a long, long time. A lot of people probably just got tired of dealing with it.

It's too bad because this place set the standard for well over a decade and the people who are left are still some of the most knowledgeable and helpful around. But it seems Bodybuilding.com is content to let it wither and die.

[urbanlifter]

I personally like the equipment forum here, but it is stale as fukk.

The entire site is stale, every forum category has been a sad state of affairs for years. Wouldn't surprise me if BB.Com went out of business because even the marketing looks sad these days. Pretty much everything is sold on Amazon cheaper, and I'm sure they lost their fitness influencers to other platforms. The equipment forum used to be busier but it was always a slower section. Little easier to post tons of reviews about cheap supplements compared to expensive fitness equipment.

Dat dere Celltech though, GOAT! (haha)

[1651Naismith]

Keep it alive!! I’m not actively posting as much as I used to (out of space, lol) but still reading multiple days per week.

Totally agree the alternatives are a hot mess. BB Equipment Forum is a great resource that needs to be supported.

[Dont Want None]

Think that sums it up, everyone wants to be a 'social media influencer' and its all in the name of making money. Garage Gym Reviews was just one of the first to monetize this little niche. But there are at least 2-3 others who started out here and seem to be doing well with their own PL competitions and review sites. More power to them, hopefully they can keep it up long enough to make it a worthwhile venture.

I'm assuming the PL competitions is me lol

I'm still here. Just not much to be here for. I try to be wherever the home gym discussions are because I love this ****. If you've heard me in interviews or podcasts I regularly mention this place.

I agree with what others have said... Discord was a nightmare for me. I tried on multiple occasions and couldn't for the life of me keep up. Felt like a 150 person wide group text.

I'm actually a mod on a large ******** Group, and it more or less sucks. You either have to lock the entire thing down which means pretty difficult to get newer members and have any on going regular discussions, or you deal with the **** we see here... spam like crazy. I block no less than 50 steroid sales posts a week, lots of porn, and a ton of other garbage. And the posts that DO get through are almost all rinse and repeat the same ****. "looking for a power rack that is really cheap but doesn't suck". The groups are pretty garbage. Dan O'brien has a decent ******** Group, Hardcore Home Gyms I think? It isn't super busy, but ok.

Haven't been a fan of Coop for a long time. You'll notice he doesn't get any play with most of the other home gymers... just the people who don't know any better. Hes a snake.

Best place I've found has been Reddit. Obviously I'm biased as a mod. It isn't perfect, and it doesn't have the history this group/forum has. But the members are active, we bring in a lot of companies for discussion, there's plenty of opportunities to share new equipment, discuss, whatever... the spam is controlled well... and the mods are active, so new things happen regularly.

[Mech6]

...Coop's FB page became the go to....

Never went, never will. I can't even stomach the youtube channel anymore, it's beyond cringe.

[murphyreedus]

Best place I've found has been Reddit. Obviously I'm biased as a mod. It isn't perfect, and it doesn't have the history this group/forum has. But the members are active, we bring in a lot of companies for discussion, there's plenty of opportunities to share new equipment, discuss, whatever... the spam is controlled well... and the mods are active, so new things happen regularly.

While I scroll r/homegym somewhat regularly, it's also not a place I think of often for in-depth information or meaningful discussion. 90% of the threads can be summed up as either "look at my super cool Swole Den cookie cutter gym - I have flags!" or "I just got these Weider kilo plates for $2/pound, miracles can happen!" The traditional forum format makes it easier to cram those into a couple of stickied posts so the rest of the main page is the 10% of more interesting stuff, but reddit makes that difficult to do. At the same time, I have never seen a thread about Indian Astrology on r/homegym...


Is Coop not an r/homegym hero anymore? I swear for a while his word was Gospel over there.

[Dont Want None]

While I scroll r/homegym somewhat regularly, it's also not a place I think of often for in-depth information or meaningful discussion. 90% of the threads can be summed up as either "look at my super cool Swole Den cookie cutter gym - I have flags!" or "I just got these Weider kilo plates for $2/pound, miracles can happen!" The traditional forum format makes it easier to cram those into a couple of stickied posts so the rest of the main page is the 10% of more interesting stuff, but reddit makes that difficult to do. At the same time, I have never seen a thread about Indian Astrology on r/homegym...


Is Coop not an r/homegym hero anymore? I swear for a while his word was Gospel over there.

I 100% agree. Great for pics and the off-handed chat... not a robust back and forth discussion platform. We've tried to modify several things over the years, but it is a hard game to play to balance free conversations and blocking every damn question on what flooring to buy.

Coop WAS a mod years ago, he got the boot for never doing anything. I can't exactly control what the hive mind thinks... so there are still hundreds of thousands of people who hang on his every word. There tends to be a lifespan to his following though. Spend more than a year or so in the home gym game, like actually dig into it, and you start to see through his shiny presentation and 8k videos and realize that hes a marketing wizard who owns a home gym so he can sell you ****.

[radrd]

I 100% agree. Great for pics and the off-handed chat... not a robust back and forth discussion platform. We've tried to modify several things over the years, but it is a hard game to play to balance free conversations and blocking every damn question on what flooring to buy.

Coop WAS a mod years ago, he got the boot for never doing anything. I can't exactly control what the hive mind thinks... so there are still hundreds of thousands of people who hang on his every word. There tends to be a lifespan to his following though. Spend more than a year or so in the home gym game, like actually dig into it, and you start to see through his shiny presentation and 8k videos and realize that hes a marketing wizard who owns a home gym so he can sell you ****.

I watch Coop"s chit pretty much just to see what gear looks like and to make sure I don't miss something new that might be worth trying our or doing some additional research on. The shilling is really fukking transparent. Just today, he's picking Nuobellls over PowerBlocks as the "best for most people" and in the same video announcing that he had an exclusive offer for them. Plus he's doing a giveaway. Jesus.

[murphyreedus]

Coop WAS a mod years ago, he got the boot for never doing anything.

I didn't realize he was booted; shows how much I pay attention.

[urbanlifter]

I'm assuming the PL competitions is me lol

I'm still here. Just not much to be here for. I try to be wherever the home gym discussions are because I love this ****. If you've heard me in interviews or podcasts I regularly mention this place.

Haha, yep! Seems like it's doing pretty well, think I saw it pop up on my feed a while back and you had some decent sponsors. Then Garage Gym Labs seems to be doing good, hopefully generating enough to make all the effort worthwhile. Haven't watched any equipment related interviews or podcasts though, I'm usually looking for comedy in my leisure time (like Joe Rogan). I'm not on as much either though, equipment flipping has pretty much dried up since I deleted ********.

[Dont Want None]

I watch Coop"s chit pretty much just to see what gear looks like and to make sure I don't miss something new that might be worth trying our or doing some additional research on. The shilling is really fukking transparent. Just today, he's picking Nuobellls over PowerBlocks as the "best for most people" and in the same video announcing that he had an exclusive offer for them. Plus he's doing a giveaway. Jesus.

Yeah, theres a decent chunk of us that attempt to be very transparent. And then there is Coop. You'll notice he never even mentions that he got anything for free, got paid for promotions, nothing.
I've heard to even do a giveaway with him, is several thousand dollars.

[Dont Want None]

I didn't realize he was booted; shows how much I pay attention.

It wasn't exactly a public hanging. He was asked to step down, he did. So not like you'd notice.

[Dont Want None]

Haha, yep! Seems like it's doing pretty well, think I saw it pop up on my feed a while back and you had some decent sponsors. Then Garage Gym Labs seems to be doing good, hopefully generating enough to make all the effort worthwhile. Haven't watched any equipment related interviews or podcasts though, I'm usually looking for comedy in my leisure time (like Joe Rogan). I'm not on as much either though, equipment flipping has pretty much dried up since I deleted ********.

Managed 40 sponsors this year, a little over $30k in prizes for two events (so about $70k in total), donations to non profits, etc. No complaints on my end... except that Social Media is a requirement and I hate it. Constantly changing algorithm is a pain in my ass.

Yeah Adam is doing well. We talk regularly. No idea from a financial perspective, but hes a smart dude and seems to be locking down connections no one else can. PLAE, American Barbell, etc.

Yeah, Marketplace is weird anyway right now. Good stuff sitting for days at reasonable prices. Makes the concept of flipping a little difficult.

[Camarija]

I spent years just reading the equipment forum before actually posting and logging workouts, lots of great knowledge here.

Thanks for building this place!

Cheers Brothers