Bodyweight Exercises are set to become very popular this year. With the uncertainty about personal finances everyone is facing, looking for ways to save a few bucks is a big deal these days. If you’re the type of person who likes to stay in shape, but you’re not sure you want to shell out hundreds of dollars for a gym membership again this year, any alternatives may be welcome.
If you are fortunate enough to have home gyms or to live in buildings with workout rooms. That’s a great alternative to the paying for a gym membership and you can easily build yourself a program to stay healthy. But what if you have a small appartment or just don't want to bother with the clutter of exercise equipment? That's not a problem. The only thing you need to get in exactly the shape you want is your own body weight.
Exercise using only body weight {has been around for centuries} in organized systems of physical culture. From the Pahlavani tradition of wrestlers in Iran, to the strong old Yogis of the Indian peninsula to even today's break dancers, there is a lengthy track record of building great health with only the weight of the human body and a few pieces of simple equipment.
But these impressive bodies were not fasioned with countless repetitions of the same two dimensional and boring exercises. The exercises used in many of these physical cultures are ,of their own accord, impressive physical feats. The limitations to the variety of body weight training choices are virtually without end, and your imagination is the only thing holding you back.
So if the idea of countless repetitions of push ups and sit ups turns you off, don't worry. There are so many options of exercises using only body weight that you can incorporate into workout plans for any goal. Whatever your goal, the only thing you need is the weight of your own body, some reliable resources for bodyweight exercises, some imagination and some good old fasioned hard work.
A great place to look for ideas is YouTube. Search for for bodyweight exercise and dig in. Pay particular attention to anything from Scott Sonnon, founder of the Circular Strength Training system (CST), and Adam Steer, CST Head Coach. Both have some great tutorials of innovative exercises that require only your own body weight. If you want to skip the YouTube search you can head over to the Squidoo Lens dedicated to body weight exercises for the road warrior. There you'll find a selection of different videos. Follow those to their YouTube source and you’ll find countless bodyweight-only exercise treasures.
You're also able to treat yourself to a free tutorial of what I consider the best bodyweight exercise around, the Quad Squat, by signing up for the free gift package from the Better Is Better blog. The Quad Squat is a perfect entry point and will give you many ideas so you’ll be coming up with your own exercise twists in no time.
Lastly, you can turn to models of impressive movement for ideas. One thing I like to do is watch gymnasts, tumblers and dancers to get inspiration for bodyweight routines. Usually, what they are doing is way beyond what we mere mortals can expect to accomplish, but by analyzing the movements into bite sized pieces we can invent some pretty interesting and efficient variations to plug into our training.
There are no longer any excuses. I predict this cheap and effective means of training will turn out to be the trendy exercise option this year. Give bodyweight excercises a try. Not only could you make significant savings on your gym membership, but you may even find that you wind up with the best physique of your life when 2010 rolls around.