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I'm just curious about how big some one can get doing body weight excercises. And what type of traning do people in the military do to get as freaksihly large as they do?

You can't really get big doing that. Unless maybe you do them weighted, but then it isn't really body weight. In my experience army guys are not very large at all. I was a brat, so I lived among them. I am sure there were some ironheads around, but I bet all that running they did was kind of catabolic. Maybe you are thinking of action movies. Soldiers are lean and cut. Maybe that is what you are thinking. You can get lean and cut doing body weight. The army has rules about weight too. You're not allowed to be over a certain weight regardless of what the composition is. Or at least that is the way it was when my father was in.

Bodyweight exercises can be awesome. I hate to define how "big" you can get. Look at gymnasts, they thrive on bodyweight stuff. As a kid, and on into high school, we did a lot of handstand pushups, squats with our buddies on our backs, and they worked out very well. Most of us were pretty well developed before we ever got into weights, and most of us did by the time we were 14. That being said, they are a good lead in for anyone looking to get into the weights.
Tim

Herschel Walker, prior to becoming a pro football player, supposedly shunned weight training in favor of bodyweight exercises.

Hi Stephen. Hershel was featured in one of Terry Todd's books on weight training way back when when Hershel was still competing. And yes, he was doing all types of bodyweight stuff, and I doubt seriously if it was all straight pushups. According to Todd's accouts,the first time he even BP'd, it was close to 315 for reps.
Says alot for BW (and maybe their variations, and genetics)
Tim

That is EXACTLY who I was thinking of. But I also heard other people saying he was a genetic freak and that's how he was able to get as strong as he did on bodywieght excercises.

I've heard alot of people talk about him, but never seen anything concrete or factual that I can quote about him. He DID do a workout book, but I havent read it.

Does anyone even know (and is able to prove) exactly what his routine was?

That's still true. Also, there are physical tests that army personnel have to pass, including the two mile run. How many oversized bodybuilders could pass that one? ;-)

TimD-

Walker claimed that playing basketball every day was good for his abs! Never heard that one before

If you can pass all your phisical tests it shouldn't matter how much you actually weigh. Unfortunately that's not how the military works.

Aren't the push-ups and sit-ups timed too, (and done in a single session, but that does go without saying)?

Oh, and I have heard that clinching/flexing your abs while running can be a good workout for them, perhaps that applies to just going up and down the court.

go to bronzebowpublishing.com and see john peterson. Hes bin doing bw exercises his whole life and hes big.

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Muhammad

Age: 15 Height: 5'9'' Weight: 153 lbs

I have a feeling that Peterson and Walker would be built no matter what exercise program they follow. When it comes to building muscle, some people are more equal than others.

But bodyweight exercises are resurfacing. In my gym, most of the personal trainers are training their clients on stability balls, balance platforms and "free style" machines where bodyweight provides some or all of the resistance. Whether there's something to it or whether it's the latest wrinkle to motivate jaded clients, only time will tell.

H. Walker didn't just do BW workouts either. His program included carrying cut-down tree's through various paths in the woods as well as exercises such as chopping wood and hitting a sledge-hammer against a tire.

Perhaps a better question would be why restrict your training to only bodyweight exercises? Why not use every tool available to you? Unless you're looking for a bare bones general fitness program, I say do a little of everything ..... barbells, dumbbells, bodyweight, weighted, even some cables and machines. Some might even throw in kettlebell stuff, or exercises where a training partner provides the resistence. My point is you have a lot of good options, so why limit youself?

I'm just trying to learn what I can, and find a balance. I've had people beating me over the head about how horrible weight training is and how weight trainers have no strength and how wonderful bodyweight excercises are. By learning what I can about them now, the next time I hear a tirade I can just refrence the stuff I learn here and tell them otherwise. (To be honest, I've done it several times already. They never really listen.)

I do know that I need to drastically simplify my routine. I was doing way to many excercises trying to target as many muscle groups as I could.

I can think of TWO advantages to bodyweight excercises.

1. I don't need anyone to spot me.
2. I don't need anyone to spot me.

But that's it.

Do calisthenic excercises (overall) target more muscle groups than free weight excercises?

I'm looking at the chin up page right now and it's got 12 synergists.

And exactly what would I do if I wanted to intigrate some bodyweight excercises into my routine?

Sure, but if you look at the puilldown it has the same muscles.

If you look at the squat (which you could do bodyweight squats), it has the same muscles.

Basically you should do bodyweight exercises until they are too easy, then you use weights to make it harder. If you arent strong enough to do bodyweight exercises then you should try to do them, and do weighted ones with lower weight until you can.

Just read an article talking about this with regard to bench press. It said if you cant drop and do 20 pushups easily for many sets, you really have no business touching a barbell and I definately think this is true.

Most of the compound exercises many people recommend on the board are simply the weighted versions of things you could do as bodyweight exercises. There is no inherent magic to it being bodyweight, the magic is in the multi muscle work the exercises provides. These are the exercises you should always include in your routine.