ExRx.net

Well, I'm trying to build the commitment :) So far so good. I'm getting used to it. I've paired the exercises like this:
Chin ups and handstand
Deadlift and lunges
push ups and dumberl curl
Lying leg hip raise and calves.

Dunno how effective that is. So far the only muscle soreness I've had is in the triceps and the hamstrings and quadriceps. I didn't take any break, just the time that it took me to prepare from one exercise for the other.

Those combinations are fine.

Keep us informed how it's going. You will tell us how effective it is!

Good luck.

_________________
Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.--Francis Chan

Hi guys!

I didn't want to open new thread because I also want to do bodyweight exercises and I have some questions regarding that.

So far I made my practice schedule and it has many (really many) different exercises so that I could give my body everytime another set of exercises. (BarBrothers, moricestreet909...)
I plan on practicing 3-5 days on a week. I searched whole "nutrition" and "exercise science" sub forums so I kinda know what to do but I still have some questions to ask.
I'm 175cm/60kg so I want to gain some weight too.
Sorry for big intro but now let's get to my worries :)

1. Is it better to do whole body in one training or specific muscle areas? I know that when bodybuilding you should do specific muscle areas per training, but what's with bodyweight.

2. I know that pre and post workout snacks are very important, can someone give me few examples of good snack.

3. How important are stretches and warm up when bodyweighting?

I read many new information so there's a little mess in my head, but if something else comes on my mind i'll ask.

If possible, gaining muscle mass works best with resistance training. It's possible with bodyweight training as well, but it's more complicated and more precise. The most common problem is finding the difficulty level to suit your goals. When there is no possibility to add resistance, you have to increase the difficulty of the exercise. If you manage to do that properly(and eat right), you should get your goals.

What are the exercises? What is your current level or fitness background?

I'd suggest Full-body training. At your weight you most likely want to build muscle all around and also create a good foundation of strength. Bodyweight isolation is a silly context to me. Functional training using the most muscles will stimulate best growth and gains.


Something with protein and small amount of carbos ½h-2h before workout (the closer the workout, the smaller the meal) and something with lots of carbos and proteins in the window of 2-24h afterwards should do the trick. Could be a whole meal both pre and post, or some shakes. But I'd still recommend to eat the biggest meal of the day 1-4 hours after the workout. There are no specific criteria, as many different methods work.


Warm-up is always useful, no matter what you do. If you don't need warming up before exercising, you aren't really exercising. All Depends on your own personal mobility and stability needs, but dynamic/active strecthes, mobility drills and a little nervous system wakers like squat jumps or other plyometrics should work well. Core stability and core reaction exercises wouldn't hurt either.

_________________
Prove the impossible!

I'm fit. I started working in march until summer holidays. At summer I used to swim, and practiced 3x week just to maintain my shape. Now I decided to go as far as I can so I started to research about nutrition, timings and other stuff which will give me best results. Forum doesn't allow me to put links, but you should find them if you type: "bar brothers killer routine" and "peter carvell" and in his playlist are many exercises. I have some dumbells and hamstring at home too and I'm going to use that aswell.

Body weight exercises should be weighted as needed. Dip/chin belts, squat belts, vests, etc are all very useful.

Ok, thanks guys very much.

Eating properly is a bit of an obstacle for me but I'm trying to fix it. Can't say my diet is protein rich, with three meals a day, but I'm working on it. :b The thing is I'm training at 7-8 pm.

I fear my workout is not that effective. Don't feel tired after it, don't have muscle soreness, I'm not even close to failing at leg exercises. I'm doing 8 reps legs and abdominals. Is that ok? Should I increase the reps? The push ups are not really challenging even though I'm doing them extra wide. Gonna increase the reps and if still not good enough I'll elevate my feet to add some resistance. Handstand and pull ups are doing fine, doing 3 reps per set now! ^_^ With some air kicks.

I was thinking of adding plank before the abdominal exercises. One minute of plank and right after that doing some leg raises.
How to know if my muscles are really worked out?

Based on this information, your workout sucks. Atleast the legs and push-up department. 8 reps on basic squats? Hell, almost anyone with alright mobility can do that, that's not even warming up.

The main question is, is it challenging? Even remotely? If not, there's your problem. Imagine a spinter training for the 100m dash by a brisk walk in the morning. Or a light 5 minute jog on the field. Is that sufficient? I doubt not.

You got three options.
1) Increase reps and sets
2) Increase exercise amount
3) Increase difficulty

I'd recommend doing 1 first, then when you get to a big amount of reps, 3. Then start over again. 2 if you have something left in the tank.
Gray Cook has a good definition for the third option. There are three ways the exercise feels. First, it's easy. You can do it for several tens of reps without stress or excess straining. Then there is challenging. That's where the reps and exercise starts to get on you after a certain amount of reps. You have to focus and stress the body to maintain quality when gaining quantity. Then there's difficult. That's too hard. Something you struggle to do for only a couple of reps and is not really smart to waste time on yet.

You have to perform on the edge of your ability, but in the range of possibility.

Same for push-ups. Unless you are a superman, you should find a way making push-ups harder. Have you tried different variations? Check this article by Nick Tumminello. It has something for every performance level:
http://nicktumminello.com/2012/06/top-2 ... ariations/

Sure. Planks are an awesome exercises. Remember that there are several great tricks to make it more challenging after things get easy.



How do you measure your progression towards your goals? Do you make progress toward the thing you want? If not, change something. There is no one workout certain answer that's quaranteed only when you have a good workout. If there would be such a thing, things would be easy. But no, it takes weeks and hell of a lot of working out.

_________________
Prove the impossible!

That happened to me too, so I shortened rest time between sets and I started to do exercises much slower. It really paid off, everything seemed much harder and I could feel every muscle of my body :)

EDIT: How long should last my training session? I read that it's best when it's done in 60-80mins.

That's a good ballpark. Hormone balances changes during strenuous activity so, depending on the intensity of the workout, the optimal duration is somewhere close to an hour. Workouts can be effective anywhere from 10 minutes to 3 hours in duration, but 60-80 min is a good target for most workouts.

_________________
Let thy food be thy medicine, and thy medicine be thy food.~Hippocrates
Strength is the adaptation that leads to all other adaptations that you really care about - Charles Staley
_________________
Thanks TimD

Nice to hear that I was doing something good, thanks.

What do you guys think if I add weight training 1-2 days a week (2-3 days of bodyweight)? I thought on doing deadlifts, bicep and bench press. Is it better to stick with only one or I could do both?

Weight training and bodyweight training can complement each other. It's not an either/or thing.

_________________
Let thy food be thy medicine, and thy medicine be thy food.~Hippocrates
Strength is the adaptation that leads to all other adaptations that you really care about - Charles Staley
_________________
Thanks TimD

But is it possible if I start doing weight training that my bodyweight (pushups,pullups...) become too easy?