My boys suckered me into buying a power rack. I say suckered because the rack wasn’t too expensive, all the other stuff we “needed” to use the rack is another story. Anyhow, it’s 4’ wide by 3’6” deep. I got 6-3/4” 4x8 sheets of OSB and 4-3/4” 4’x6’ pieces of horse stall mat.

The boys want it to be 8’x12’, but I’m looking at it thinking 8’x8’ would be plenty. They want to use the weight bench outside the rack for dumbbells, but 4’x8’ in front of the rack seems like enough to me.

How big should this thing be?

Go big or go home... lol

4x8 outside the rack is probably plenty assuming only one person is working out there. Space gets pretty full pretty fast when doing burpees.

Tell the boys you will go the extra 4x8 if they simultaneously do 50 burpees a day for a month.

I keep saying body weight exercise is where it’s at.

I vote 4x8 outsde the rack is enough for deadlifts, too, though I don't think I'd have selected OSB. Depending on how heavy ya'll might go I'm not sure it'll hold up over time. I'd probably spring for a hardwood ply, at least.

I can see doing the 8x8 if you plan to have the rack itself on the platform.

The rack will be on the platform. The platform will be on the concrete floor in the basement.

I already bought the OSB. If we do 8’x8’, I can do three layers of the OSB plus the horse stall mats. If we do 8’x12’, then two layers of OSB plus the horse stall mat. It’s a bolt down rack, but we’re going to bolt it to the platform instead of the concrete floor.

8x8 was competition standard, as I recall.

I think my rack platform was 4x8, but all my work was inside the power rack….

We’re getting there:

I don’t know how heavy you’re going, but that seam seems like a bad idea.

In terms of the mats potentially moving? The seem will lay flat when we are done. The mat will be glued, screwed, and the seems taped.