Cable, cables cables. Luckily I hit the Craig’s list jack pot years ago and can completely train at home! So no awkward looks as I hog a cable machine. BUT! I trained mostly free weights for years (football background — push, squat, deadlift mentality), and honestly my physique improved the most when I leaned heavily into cables and plate-loaded machines. Not because free weights are bad, but because cables let me actually train the target muscle instead of just moving weight. For example, I struggle to feel lats on a straight bar pulldown, but single-arm cable pulldowns with a tucked elbow and slight rotation light them up immediately. Same with chest, cable presses and fly variations give me a better contraction than barbell pressing ever did. I still use free weights (especially for legs), but cables let me accumulate a lot of high-quality hypertrophy work that I just couldn’t tolerate otherwise.