Calisthenics Way

Wait so, can I get stronger with zero weights? Simply put, Calisthenics is the only answer to this relatively simple question. Before we get into the exercises needed, let’s quickly go over what Calisthenics is in the first place.

What’s Calisthenics?

Simply put Calisthenics is when you use your own body weight as a form of resistance/strength training. We are letting go of the traditional way of building strength, aka weight lifting. And instead, we are lifting ourselves! With Calisthenics, we master our anatomy and begin to be one with our movements.

If that sounds enticing to you, then take a look at some Calisthenic exercises you can do to get STRONGER WITHOUT LIFTING WEIGHTS! You can also get a free workout plan emailed to you! JUST CLICK HERE!

Body-Weight Exercises Needed For Max Strength

• Push-Ups

The perfect compound movement that works your triceps, chest, shoulders, and core. This exercise also creates fantastic stabilization strength as you work your scapula to maintain that plank position as you burn through those reps! If you do this movement correctly, you also work your legs and glutes to stabilize and straighten out your whole body. Avoid that bend at ALL COSTS! To see how to get the most out of your pushups, take a look at this page.

• Chin-Ups

The ultimate bicep builder that simultaneously works the forearms. You can never go wrong with the chin-up as it targets similar muscles to the pull-up with an extra emphasis on the biceps. If you want to maximize your strength in the biceps, this is an exercise you do not want to miss out on. Get those reps in!

• Pull-Ups

The good old pull-up. Everybody talks about it and is widely known as the ultimate back builder. This exercise creates great strength and is a definite and essential workout to add to your routine. If you want to avoid all those isolation exercises and simplify your workouts, this is an absolute must-have. Haven’t gotten your first pull-up, that’s alright we’ve all been there.

• Calf-Raises

This is one of the most underrated bodyweight exercises of all time and it hurts to see this be overlooked. People may think “oh but it’s just your body weight, that can’t possibly do anything?” To be fair they are partially right. Your legs adapt to body weight exercises fairly quickly, which is why one must be strategic. This is where high rep counts and holding that raise (isometrics) comes in with a cape to save the day.

• Deep Squats

This is straight up a double whammy when it comes to your health. Not only does it exceed the normal range of motion in a regular squat, but it also is the perfect mobility exercise. Holding this position, as seen in the photo below, loosens up those hip flexors which is always a good thing as we all know the struggle of having poor mobility.

Quality Over Quantity For Strength

Now that we know the exercises needed to build that strong frame, what’s next?

Our main focus is always the quality of our reps. There are a ton of benefits of doing exercises fast and explosive or slow and controlled. But to get the best of both worlds is to have a slow negative (eccentric) and an explosive concentric motion(going up). One more point to add …

Since we can’t add any weight to ourselves, yet, we must think outside the box and be creative with our workouts. We have to also focus on isometrics. We discussed this topic briefly in the calf-raises section but now let’s dig deep!

What Are Isometrics?

Good old isometrics to save the day. Well simply put, isometrics exercises are when you hold a movement whether that be holding a plank position or wall sits.

Even though the exercises above are not technically isometric exercises, we can still incorporate the same principle into each and every workout. Now let’s get into the ways we can use this in our workouts.

Using Isometrics To Build Strength

This is where the fun and challenge begin. Every simple and “easy” movement all of a sudden gets way harder than before. You no longer use your momentum to bring yourself back up, only your pure strength!

This may bring your ego down as you will definitely not be able to do as many reps as before, but that is a good thing.

Remember, QUALITY OVER QUANTITY, ALWAYS! Alright got that out of my system, now let’s bring back each exercise and have a short video example of me incorporating the pause(isometric) & slow negatives(eccentrics) into each workout. Enjoy!

• Push-Ups:

• Chin-Ups:

• Pull-Ups:

• Calf-Raises:

• Deep Squats:

Try Harder Variations

The day will come when these exercises get too easy and you can do 30 pushups easily. Once that happens try a harder variation to ensure progressive overload is taking place. Don’t stay stagnant!

Below I will be going over different variations for each compound movement and a rep requirement for each. This means that once you hit the rep count with ease and high quality, as I mentioned above, you can progress to the more challenging variations.

Push-Up Parallettes:

This is a fantastic way to increase the range of motion. When doing push-ups on the parallettes, you get that extra stretch on the chest that you wouldn’t get from the floor.

As we all know, the more range of motion the better. Getting that deep stretch will strengthen our pushing power to the max!

And if parallettes aren’t in your budget, you can just stack books evenly to increase the height of your hands. But books can cause too much pressure on your wrists which can be bad. If you are really dedicated, then you could just make a DUI parallette.

Assisted One Arm Chin-Up

Sadly there aren’t many different chin-up variations on the straight bar. So if you want to make your chin up strength, it’s best to try to only use one arm

Use a resistance band to help assist your journey to the one-arm chin-up. As it gets easier and easier, use less and less of your assistance hand up until you achieved the ONE-ARM CHIN-UP!

Arched Body Pull-Ups

I was tempted to put on the one-arm pull-up, but it is way harder than the one-arm chin-up. With this variation, it makes it much harder as you are not just going chin over the bar, but rather your sternum to the bar.

This makes it harder since you are doing more of a range of motion. This form of pull-up can also help with your front lever since you will be doing a similar retraction of the shoulder blades.

One Leg Calf Raise

This is perfect to add more load onto your calves. Since you will be doing it with one leg, it will require much more force than doing it with two legs.

It can also improve your balance if you choose to do it without a wall!

Pistol Squats

Similar to the calf raises above, using one leg is an excellent way to create a progressive overload. Doing a proper pistol squat requires the right mobility and strength to reach.

That is why I chose the deep squat since it will better your mobility and strength to reach the pistil squat.

Final Statement:

There you have it, a simple guide to getting stronger with only your body weight. If you add this to your routine with a healthy whole-food diet, then you are set to gain that strength! Remember guys, your body is your gym. Stay safe and stay moving! Now that you have gotten stronger, click here to maintain that strength!