Hack Your Body With These Bodyweight Workouts

Getting really strong at the big three -the bench, squat, and deadlift is awesome and necessary for long term strength and ability. Too often though, people prioritize these moves over the ability to move their body through space.

During a fat loss phase or when trying to get lean, leaving out bodyweight movements is a huge mistake. Ability to execute difficult calisthenics exercises is a great predictor of body fat percentage.

This is because advanced variations of bodyweight moves rely on a high strength to weight ratio. This means that the more weight around your midsection, the less likely it is you’ll be able to do a muscle-up or a one arm pushup.

By focusing less on the scale and more on bodyweight abilities you’ll get the body you want faster by harnessing the power of your body’s adaptive tendencies.

In this article you’ll see:

* Why bodyweight movements signal to your body to drop the fat.

* Where a lot of people go wrong adding in bodyweight movements.

* The “Secret Weapon” of bio-hacking your way to a lean body.

* How you stack up against the best with five bodyweight challenges.(NEXT WEEK!!)

Want To Get Stronger? Lift Heavy & Lose Some Fat… Simultaneously

The body is an amazingly adaptive machine. However, if you want to go from chubby to ripped, you can’t just ask nicely. It takes hard work in the kitchen and in the gym to force your frame to make the change you want.

For proof of this look no further than Olympic lifters. By continually lifting heavier weights, their bodies get stronger, more muscular, and their bones become thicker and denser as a result.

So if our goal is to get leaner, we have to present our body with the correct stimulus that nudges our evolutionary mechanisms and says “in order to survive, we need to drop non-essential weight”.

The best way of doing this is not by adding plates on our bench press or deadlift. Instead we need to add in exercises where being lean is not only an advantage, it’s a necessity.

This is a simple concept, but one that a lot of people get wrong because these moves often have a steep learning curve or are extremely intense.

Where People Go Wrong

Most lifters screw up this concept by simply picking boring exercise. If your idea of a bodyweight workout is pushups and lunges, you’re simply not challenging yourself enough to make meaningful changes.

If your idea of a bodyweight workout is push ups and lunges, you’re simply not challenging yourself.

There are literally unlimited variations of bodyweight exercises that you can do to make them harder or easier depending on your level, so being resigned to the four basic moves that you see in every gym is doing a disservice to your physique.

We know that the general rep range for the following are pretty set in stone:

* Strength 1-5 reps

* Hypertrophy 6-15 reps

* Muscular Endurance 15+ reps

So doing sets of 40 pushups is not going to send the right signal to your body.

So we need to pick the exercises that challenge you in those rep ranges in order to get the results we want.

Make the Switch

Pushups can graduate to 1-Hand Elevated Pushups, Archer Pushups, and finally 1-Arm Pushups.

Bodyweight Squats progress to Bulgarian Split Squats, Skater Squats, and finally Pistol Squats.

Pull ups can be advanced to Archer Pull ups, Clapping Pull ups, and finally Muscle Ups.

The Secret Weapon

You’ll start to see physical changes just by changing out some of your regular exercises for advanced bodyweight variations. However, if you want to take this body signaling to the next level, use the secret weapon of developing a lean muscular physique… Hill Sprints.

Just like you would expect from a routine that promises above-average results, it takes above-average effort.

“Above average results takes above average effort.”

Since most of us haven’t hit our top speed in a while, we do these sprints on a hill in order to slow us down and avoid any potential injuries. After a good warmup, the goal of these is to work at close to our all-out maximum effort.

Hill sprints are much more like a 3 rep max squat than they are like traditional cardio, and should be respected as such.

Once you’ve completed a thorough warmup, which should include at least 3 hill sprints of 40-50 yards at increasing intensities, set a timer for 20-30 minutes.

Sprint the 50-yard hill focusing on consistent breathing. Walk to the bottom and take your time to recover almost completely. If you go again while you’re still gassed, you’ll lose out on some of the intensity. This is the key element.

Repeat as many times as you can in the time you set. Next time you do your hill sprints, shoot to improve by getting at least one more ‘rep’.

Start off with this workout just once per week, but you can do them anywhere between 1-3 times after acclimating.

Adding Bodyweight Training to Your Strength Program

If you’re already doing a heavy strength based program like Dr. Rusin’s Functional Hypertrophy Training program you can still add these moves in effectively just as JR did with that nasty high rep bodyweight squat heart rate ramp in Phase 1!

By using them as finishers, you can still get the benefits, while building fluency in difficult bodyweight exercises.

Use the lower body moves as finishers on the upper body days, and vice versa.

To make these an effective finisher, pair one of the bodyweight moves with a more cardiovascular component like Airdyne bike sprints, rowing intervals, or even a farmers walk.

Shoot for between 4 and 8 rounds.

WE’VE INCLUDED A THREE LEVEL BODYWEIGHT WORKOUT FOR YOU BELOW!!

Beginner - “I’ve never work out or rarely workout” Follow the workout below:

Ø PUSH UPS ON KNEES: 10 REPS

Ø PLANK HOLD :15 SEC

Ø CHAIR SQUAT (Sit on a chair and stand up) 10 REPS

Ø BICYCLE CRUNCHES 10 REPS TOTAL

Ø CHAIR DIPS WITH KNEES BENT 10 REPS

Ø HIGH KNEE, BUTT KICKS OR JUMPING JACKS FOR 1 MINUTE

Ø REST 90 SECONDS

Ø CRUNCHES 10 REPS

Ø REVERSE LUNGES 10 REPS TOTAL

Ø BRIDGE HOLDS :15 SEC

Ø INCH WORM 5 REPS

Ø LEG RAISES 10 REPS

Ø CHOOSE 1: HIGH KNEES, BUTT KICKS OR JUMPING JACKS FOR 1 MINUTE

Ø REST 90 SECONDS THEN REPEAT ONE MORE ROUND

· Intermediate - “I’ workout 2-3 times a week”: Follow the workout below:

Ø HAND RELEASE PUSHUPS: 10 REPS

Ø PLANK HOLD :30 SEC

Ø AIR SQUAT 10 REPS

Ø BICYCLE CRUNCHES 20 REPS TOTAL

Ø BENCH DIPS WITH LEGS STRAIGHT 10 REPS

Ø CHOOSE 2: HIGH KNEE, BUTT KICKS OR JUMPING JACKS FOR 1 MINUTE EACH

Ø REST 60 SECONDS

Ø STRAIGHT LEG SIT UP 10 REPS

Ø REVERSE LUNGES 10 REPS EACH SIDE

Ø BRIDGE HOLDS :30 SEC

Ø INCH WORMS WITH PUSHUP 5 REPS

Ø DOUBLE CRUNCH: 10 REPS

Ø CHOOSE 2: HIGH KNEES, BUTT KICKS OR JUMPING JACKS FOR 1 MINUTE

Ø REST 60 SECONDS THEN REPEAT TWO MORE ROUNDS

Advanced - “I’ workout at least 5 times per week consistently" Follow the workout below:

Ø REGULAR STRICT PUSHUPS 10 REPS

Ø PLANK HOLD :45 SEC

Ø SQUAT JUMPS 10 REPS

Ø BICYCLE CRUNCHES 20 REPS TOTAL

Ø BENCH DIPS WITH LEGS ELEVATED 10 REPS

Ø COMPLETE ALL THREE: HIGH KNEE, BUTT KICKS & JUMPING JACKS FOR 1 MINUTE EACH

Ø REST 30 SECONDS

Ø V-UP CRUNCH 10 REPS

Ø LUNGES JUMPS 10 REPS EACH SIDE

Ø BRIDGE HOLDS :45 SEC

Ø INCH WORMS WITH PUSHUP 10 REPS

Ø HOLLOW ROCK CRUNCH: 10 REPS

Ø COMPLETE ALL THREE: HIGH KNEES, BUTT KICKS & JUMPING JACKS FOR 1 MINUTE

Ø REST 30 SECONDS THEN REPEAT THREE MORE ROUNDS

** Always consult with your primary physician or doctor before participating in any new exercise programs **

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