Body Weight Exercises.... Useful?

knightmayorfw

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Just wanted to hear your views on the exercises that don't use weights, There are a few guys i work with that are pretty ripped that swear they have never lifted a weight in their lives, and swear by the results of body weight exercises. Any views?
 
Ripped has very little to do with the exercises that you do, and much more to do with how you manage your diet.
 
Sorry I should have worded that a bit better. They are also quite stocky/muscular. Can see the benifits of these exercises for muscle tone, but are they helpful at all for getting bigger?
 
Chins and dips are def. very usefull exercises, but im am sorry they cant replace squats, deads, etc. You could probably pack some muscle on them, tho.
 
Chins and dips are def. very usefull exercises, but im am sorry they cant replace squats, deads, etc. You could probably pack some muscle on them, tho.

Yea alot of ppl I know that train swear by chins and dips
 
Bodyweight stuff is great, but for a lot of bodyweight stuff you eventually need to add more resistance. One of my interests outside of powerlifting is different gymnastic skills. I suck at them, but it's cool when you finally get one down. Right now I am working on being able to do a flag.
 
Bodyweight stuff is great, but for a lot of bodyweight stuff you eventually need to add more resistance. One of my interests outside of powerlifting is different gymnastic skills. I suck at them, but it's cool when you finally get one down. Right now I am working on being able to do a flag.

I've recently changed my stance on bodyweight exercises as well. as long as I do ones that are increasingly difficult (such as some of the gymnastics drills) I believe they are very beneficial. Right now i've been working to do a full palanche and hold it for more than a second. When I reach that goal i would like to work to get a full handstand push up from the palanche position. Of course, I do this all outside of my regular weight training routine.
 
Chins and dips are def. very usefull exercises, but im am sorry they cant replace squats, deads, etc. You could probably pack some muscle on them, tho.

Chins and dips are great when used in progressive fashion. Of course this means you'll have to add weight, which makes it no longer a body weight exercise.
 
For some interesting ideas on body weight exercises have a look at the following.

Hannibal

Of course you could also have a look for some gymnastic training vids on you tube.
 
When I watch the Olypmics and see these gymnasic guys I know whats going on. For functional strenght better then powerlifting (yeah, yeah, kill me).
 
Bodyweight exercises can be very useful in conditioning or building muscular endurance. By gradually progressing to skills the are more muscularly challenging, or using added weight (ex. a weighted vest) progressive overload can be achieved and you can get stronger. Some examples and tutorials can be seen here: Tutorials

However there are a number of limitations. First, there is no bodyweight equivalent to exercises like deadlifts or squats...pistols just don't cut it when it comes to training the posterior chain...and eventually you'd have to add weight to pisols anyway. Second, barbells allow for a greater precision of loading...I can adjust how much I"m lifting to within 0.5kg (although usually percision to that degree isn't important), this makes it easy to train an exercise at varying intensities and rep ranges, and it also means I can always add more weight...you never get to strong to make strength gains with a barbell.

So you definitely can make use of bodyweight skills...if your progressing to being able to do an iron cross (or whatever) you are getting stronger. But don't limit yourself to soley bodyweight exercises. And definitely get your squats in.
 
For some interesting ideas on body weight exercises have a look at the following.

Hannibal

Of course you could also have a look for some gymnastic training vids on you tube.

hmm, I'm curious if one can actually get larger by doing bodyweight only exercises....in theory couldn't you continue to eat and increase your bodyweight and thus increasing the resistance therefore getting larger? I could be completely wrong on this, just asking.

Aside from that, I think that bodyweight exercises are very useful, to me I think that one should be able to have a certain control/mastery of your bodyweight. Plus if you can only do 5 pushups, my understanding is that that's a good way to build strength and once you can do more than 10-12 reps you can add more resistance and it's still a strength building exercise.
 
However there are a number of limitations. First, there is no bodyweight equivalent to exercises like deadlifts or squats...pistols just don't cut it when it comes to training the posterior chain.

Do pullups count as a bw equivalent to the squat, considering its a multi-joint movement that works a lot of muscles in the upper body region?
 
So you definitely can make use of bodyweight skills...if your progressing to being able to do an iron cross (or whatever) you are getting stronger. But don't limit yourself to soley bodyweight exercises. And definitely get your squats in.

I agree with this completely. Limiting yourself to ONLY bodyweight exercises is cheating yourself, I also feel that limiting yourself to ONLY weight training is cheating yourself aswell......Depending on your goals. I downloaded an E-book online a while ago called "Building the Gymnastic Body" interesting stuff in there. I wouldn't pay for it I downloaded it for free.
 
Do pullups count as a bw equivalent to the squat, considering its a multi-joint movement that works a lot of muscles in the upper body region?

I meant exercises with the equivalent ability to train the muscles of the legs, hips, and "core" in a single coordinated movement and with heavy loads. Besides which, unless someones particulalry heavy, pull-ups would have to be weighted to continue to promote strength gains...or I suppose someone could work progressions to a one arm pull-up.
 
I meant exercises with the equivalent ability to train the muscles of the legs, hips, and "core" in a single coordinated movement and with heavy loads. Besides which, unless someones particulalry heavy, pull-ups would have to be weighted to continue to promote strength gains...or I suppose someone could work progressions to a one arm pull-up.

Some of my eventual goals are a chin-up with whatever my bodyweight is currently added on and a one-armed chin-up. Both of those would be pretty bad ass.
 
Bodyweight exercises can be very useful in conditioning or building muscular endurance. By gradually progressing to skills the are more muscularly challenging, or using added weight (ex. a weighted vest) progressive overload can be achieved and you can get stronger. Some examples and tutorials can be seen here: Tutorials

However there are a number of limitations. First, there is no bodyweight equivalent to exercises like deadlifts or squats...pistols just don't cut it when it comes to training the posterior chain...and eventually you'd have to add weight to pisols anyway. Second, barbells allow for a greater precision of loading...I can adjust how much I"m lifting to within 0.5kg (although usually percision to that degree isn't important), this makes it easy to train an exercise at varying intensities and rep ranges, and it also means I can always add more weight...you never get to strong to make strength gains with a barbell.


So you definitely can make use of bodyweight skills...if your progressing to being able to do an iron cross (or whatever) you are getting stronger. But don't limit yourself to soley bodyweight exercises. And definitely get your squats in.

Thanks man, some interesting points.
 
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