More and more people are starting to incorporate some form of body weight exercises into their program. New gyms are popping up all over the place that are stressing ‘functional’ training and utilize medicine balls, exercise balls, tubing, balance beams, and so on as a means to train rather than the classic standby’s of benches, squat wracks, dumbbells, barbells, and so on.
But, what can you really accomplish using body weight exercises? Can you really build muscle effectively?
That’s something you must assess before making the decision to switch your program over.
Your Muscle Building Goals
First, consider what type of muscle building goals you have. Are you simply looking to add some definition and maybe put on a pound or two of additional muscle mass?
Or, are you looking to really pack on the pounds and completely transform your body?
This will make a huge difference in whether bodyweight exercises are effective.
Body weight exercises can be effective for generating greater strength, core stability, and balance ability, but as far as helping you gain 20 pounds of pure muscle, that aren’t going to do the job.
To build that much muscle, you really must have a greater overloading stimulus – one that bodyweight exercises just cannot provide (assuming no additional weights are added to the movement).
Your Training Status
Next, you also should factor in your current training status. How long have you been working out?
If you’ve been lifting regularly in the gym for six months or more, you’ve earned yourself the ‘trained’ status, and may want to think twice before switching completely over to a body weight routine.
You likely have a decent amount of strength behind you and unless you’ve got body fat percentages that are very high so tha additional weight will provide resistance, you need to keep up with your weight training.
That’s not to say you can throw in the odd body weight exercise here and there to help give your workout a change and stimulate the muscles from a different angle, just that I wouldn’t rely on body weight exercises for months on end to try and help you accomplish large strength gains.
Getting The Best of Both Worlds
Potentially the best situation the is to incorporate some body weight movements right into your typical weight training program, allowing you to reap the benefits of both worlds.
Always perform your heavy weight lifting exercises first, however, as these will stimulate the CNS the most and require the greatest amount of sheer tension and force.
Body weight exercises are great to add at the end to fatigue and work the core muscles, as well as help increase balance as mentioned above.
So, you may want to think twice about trying to build muscle with body weight exercises.
Nothing can replace the classic ‘big 5′ gym standby’s of bench, squat, deadlift, row, and shoulder press, so if your goal is strength and muscle development, these need to be in place in one form of another.
Body weight exercises can work great when you’re away from the gym – they will certainly be better than skipping your workout altogether, but they need to be supplemented with weighted work over the long haul.
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