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For the longest of times, I always heard the classical debate of which is better for you: Weight lifting or calisthenics/bodyweight exercise. I always did and enjoyed doing both immensely. As a kid, I was skinny, puny but very athletic and had that "skinny boy" wirey strength. I was able to do all sorts of types of gymnastic and always did well in various sports and martial arts. However, I was still always undersized and pushed around by the bigger, stronger kids in my age group. I was never big and I had a HUGE appetite despite someone of my frame. Even as a kid, I noticed I can manuever and control my bodyweight better than kids who were bigger and stronger than me and I usually lasted longer.
I hated being so skinny though so at the age of 13 I got into lifting weights in high school and did some wrestling and football where weight lifting was pretty much mandated and to make matters better for me, I had a weight lifting gym class, so I needless to say, I became obsessed with weights and started to see gains. At the time, I just wanted to be big and not picked on anymore. I had a huge growth spurt from 13-15 (maybe till 16) and put on a lot of solid weight and grew a few inches. I was mainly a heavy lifter and bulked up a ton.
Even after high school and even now, I lift heavy. During my high school years though, I kind of started to ignore calisthenics since I seen how much bigger I got from lifting weights and that was all that mattered to me. Luckily, I was always able to fall back on my bodyweights and still did plenty of push ups, pull ups and chin ups more effieciently than some of my other colleagues when I needed to. There was a period where I almost didn't do any bodyweight exercises at all and I was kind of in a "meat head" mode for a while.
At one point though, I was really busy with life and my expenses or time wouldn't allow me to make it to the gym to lift weights. So I brought some free weights but it wasn't enough for me and I needed to exercise. So I went down to this park of mine one night randomly with a friend of mine who swore 90% of the time he didn't lift weights. He is much older than me and has always been a BIG and really ripped guy and I thought he was bsing me when he said he hardly touched weights. Everyone who knew him said they always saw him do basic bodyweight exercises.
So I took him up on the offer and did some bodyweight exercises. And after about a month I started to notice that I definitely became more ripped, my muscles more stabilized and noticed more endurance in my muscles. I also got equally as big using my own bodyweight.
So for about a 6 months I did almost nothing but bodyweights until I went back to the gym and started lifting heavy again but still ALWAYS incorporated my bodyweight exercises.
So last year, I decided to see what I truly think is a better or more beneficial form of exercise. So from January till June of last year, I did heavy weight lifting and less bodyweight. I did bodyweights mostly for warm ups and of course, I loved the gains I was making but I definitely looked more bulky lifting heavy. I also incorporated lifting light to get more tone.
Then from June of last year till January of this year, I started doing 90% bodyweight and just doing free weights for certain exercises I like to do. When I started doing bodyweight, I noticed that I lost some mass like in the first month or two and people noticed but what they also noticed was that I looked more "lean and ripped". Afterwards, I started doing more advanced bodyweight weight exercises (like isometrics, plyometrics, weight vest) and definitely felt like I was developing as much strength, endurance and explosiveness as if I did with weight lifting or lifting heavy.
As of now, I've been doing almost only bodyweight exercises including other bodyweight exercises like yoga and gymnastis and I feel better than I ever have. I feel stronger and I last longer when I do my grappling, I feel more flexible. And even without doing weighted squats, my legs are still big (though I have to do hundreds and close to a thousand squats a week!). I put myself in the mind set of "How about if I am far away from a gym, how can I still maintain my physical fitness without lifting weights?" and I figured it out. Every single part of my bodyweight I felt I couldn't do without weights, I found a way to do it and even better.
I can do push up planks (I'm still working on those!), planks on my finger tips, a lot more pistol squats, one handed pull ups and more. I'm stronger and I can perform some cool feats of strength .
Besides feeling better, I usually get compliments about looking better. I don't look like a "beef stick" but instead look more like an athelete to most people. And it helps that women tend to love my physique more as well .
So in conclusion, I wouldn't say abandoned the weights, just don't simply cater only to weights. I still definitely can't help but see and feel how much I can curl with one arm, how much I can squat or of course BENCH PRESS but I think its absolutely important to master your bodyweight and do your calisthenics. To get the "real" and "inner" strength. I think both are very great and beneficial but I feel calisthenics certainly is the best thing for you and is something you can do ANYWHERE and is something you can always have as primary or back up exercise. You simply CANNOT go wrong with it. Plus, it saves you a lot less risk of injury.
I wish I would have taken some before and after pictures or videos but I don't. This is only my personal experience and you can take it for what it is, or see for yourself!
Any other questions, comments, ideas, etc. Lets hear them!
Depends on the person and goals… Me personally, I don’t do any bodyweight exercises. When I am required to do them (running PT or a PT TEST), I destroy calethenics exercises.. but that’s me. I can do pushups forever, situps, jumping jacks… etc. At 139 pounds, I can bench press (Competition bench, not ass off the seat struggling) 270 pounds, powerlift squat (parallel) 375 and ass to calf squat 315 +/-… I can also do 94 pushups in one minute and 75 situps (PT test). I can do ‘bodyweight squats’ ‘pistol squats’ and run half-marathons. I can box jump 58” at 65”. When I “Maintain” (See food diet), it’s 11-13% bodyfat. I say depends on the person because, in my opinion..
I am obviously an outlier from everyone else.
My body responds well to lifting weights (levers, muscle fiber composition, etc). I can still maintain muscle endurance and even running endurance. Due to genetics and Olympic Weightlifting, I am more flexible than 99% of the people I know.
My goals are much different than most people. Most people also train wrong. It takes years for some people to start training right, and others won’t ever train.
If your goal is to blow away an FBI SA pt test - then body weight training is a great way.
If your goal is to bench 315lbs - probably will need to hit the weights.
If your goal is to maintain a good level of fitness - body weight training will be satisfactory.
If your goal is to be as strong as you possibly can - you have to hit the weights.
Again, there is no one fit all exercise program as everyone has different goals. I do not advise my wife to do the same routine as I do as she is not into power lifting. When my friend was training for BUDS, we did not do the same routine except for the run as his goals were different than mine. I do body weight training, I put it at the end of my routine, plyometrics mostly.
I understand that, but let's take FBI, Marines, etc out of the discussion for a minute and talk about the general civilian population, essentially the average Joe & Jane out there in society who simply want to be more fit and (as one poster put it in another thread) look great naked. This is what nearly everyone wants, more muscle & less fat. I mean very very few can actually say to themselves "Nah, I've got too much muscle" or "Nah, I'd rather not lose any fat". Bodyweight exercises are the key building block to this.
Weight training is great, but for a person to go straight into weight training without mastering basic bodyweight exercises, they are essentially skipping a step in the journey that is fitness. Weight training is actually the easy way out for a lot of people. That's why you see tons of strong guys who can't do 1 pull-up or 1 correct dip (rarely see guys go to 90 degrees).
This may sound radical, but if it was up to me and my goal was a more fit America, I wouldn't let anyone be allowed to use weights until they can prove basic proficiency in bodyweight exercises. For example, you shouldn't even be allowed to start bench pressing anything until you do at least 10 correct push-ups & at least 5 correct dips. No leg press machine until you can squat below parallel or something like that. No lat pull-down or rowing machine til you can do a few pullups....you get what I'm saying.
There is a place for both and I believe in mixing it up over the course of the year. One of my favorite quotes from Dan John is "Everything works.... for about 6 weeks". In addition to doing weight lifting & bodyweight exercises I do kettlebells as well. For me they seem to be the perfect exercise that bridges the gap between lifting and bodyweight routines.
I think especially for guys once they hit 40 they should spend at least 6-8 weeks a year concentrating on hypertrophy. Then just mix it up for the remainder of the year.
Weight training is great, but for a person to go straight into weight training without mastering basic bodyweight exercises, they are essentially skipping a step in the journey that is fitness. Weight training is actually the easy way out for a lot of people. That's why you see tons of strong guys who can't do 1 pull-up or 1 correct dip (rarely see guys go to 90 degrees).
This may sound radical, but if it was up to me and my goal was a more fit America, I wouldn't let anyone be allowed to use weights until they can prove basic proficiency in bodyweight exercises. For example, you shouldn't even be allowed to start bench pressing anything until you do at least 10 correct push-ups & at least 5 correct dips. No leg press machine until you can squat below parallel or something like that. No lat pull-down or rowing machine til you can do a few pullups....you get what I'm saying.
There is a place for both and I believe in mixing it up over the course of the year. One of my favorite quotes from Dan John is "Everything works.... for about 6 weeks". In addition to doing weight lifting & bodyweight exercises I do kettlebells as well. For me they seem to be the perfect exercise that bridges the gap between lifting and bodyweight routines.
I think especially for guys once they hit 40 they should spend at least 6-8 weeks a year concentrating on hypertrophy. Then just mix it up for the remainder of the year.
That's something similar to the 'conjugate' wave method of periodization. I do the same exercises, but wave percentages of a 1rm every 3 weeks.
My workouts include both types of exercise. I find it to be a good mix, although, the bodyweight exercises are much more difficult for me.
Quote:
Originally Posted by subPrimeTime
This may sound radical, but if it was up to me and my goal was a more fit America, I wouldn't let anyone be allowed to use weights until they can prove basic proficiency in bodyweight exercises. For example, you shouldn't even be allowed to start bench pressing anything until you do at least 10 correct push-ups & at least 5 correct dips. No leg press machine until you can squat below parallel or something like that. No lat pull-down or rowing machine til you can do a few pullups....you get what I'm saying.
No bench pressing until you can do a few "correct" dips! You got to be kidding! Thank god my trainers do not have these same views. And since there are so many different variations of push-ups, who would determine which variation is the correct one? Also, people with injuries or post-surgery, like me, are going to have a greater difficulty doing bodyweight exercises. There are far more modifications with weight training than bodyweight training, and I'd personally rather be training, then struggling with perfecting a dip before I could move on to the bench press. I started with my current gym/training program 5 months ago, and I still struggle with a "proper" dip...I'm probably not even doing a "proper" dip, but I'm making progress, and I'm making fantastic gains in my weight lifting, and even using proper form.
The more I read on these forums & elsewhere, the more I appreciate my gym/trainers.
I'll have to clarify with my previous post; I agree with what he said, but not 100%.
Body weight exercises are a good starting point for a lot of people, not all. It's possible that certain people will understand movement of their own body much quicker and better using body weight exercises. Afterwards, once they learn the bench press/squat etc, they will progress quicker than if they started out doing just those exercises. Holds especially true for bodyweight squats. If someone cannot do a bodyweight squat properly, there is no way I'm letting them get under the bar. That should be fact, everything else is opinion.
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