Bodyweight Workout for Weight Loss - Gym Free Workouts

Can a bodyweight workout help with your weight loss? Undoubtedly yes.

Many people do not like going to gyms, they may not have the time, do not want to pay for a gym membership or perhaps are intimidated by the gym environment.

For many people in search of a greater quality of life, be it weight loss, muscle gain, improved fitness or all of the above, the gym can be an uncomfortable place to go to work out.

If you're looking to lose weight, you may see your bodyweight as a hindrance but your bodyweight is a great tool you have at your disposal to give you an effective machine free workout.

Many (to use a broad term) exercise machines isolate specific muscle groups; biceps, triceps, quads etc, and achieving a full body workout using these machines can be very time intensive and can be difficult to maintain the motivation to continue.

These machines do not effectively mimic how your body would act in a real situation. You wouldn't life a weight with just your biceps.

Bodyweight exercises replicate the pushing and pulling that your body will utilise in real life to do your daily tasks, and when performing these exercise you are using many different muscle groups together to do the required pushing or pulling action.

By performing a workout utilising a few bodyweight exercises you can build strength and gain muscle, which will promote fat loss when applied with a healthy diet and cardio workouts.

Squats are a brilliant exercise for building up strength in the lower body and recruits the most of the muscles in the lower body; primarily hips, thighs and buttocks.

There variations on the squat that can put a greater emphasis on certain muscles by shifting the body weight more forward, to use calves and quads more for instance.

If you were lifting something from the ground, you would bend at your knees pushing your hips back while maintaining a straight back. When executing the lift you will squeeze the buttocks, push the hips up and straighten the legs to push your body upwards.

This natural movement is replicated by the squat to build lower body strength. Squats are one of the most effective exercises for the legs and buttocks as it recruits many of the muscle instead of isolating a particular muscle, like the leg press does to the quads.

When maintaining the form correctly you'll notice your abs are braced also, so your core is also given a workout at the same time.

Abdominal exercise should be one of the final exercise you perform, they abs are braced in most of the bodyweight exercises to maintain the form and if you tire the abdominals your performance in the other exercises would suffer.

Push ups (or press ups in the UK) work the chest and arms through a raising and lowering of the body while in the prone position.

The Standard push up is performed with the hands on the floor, shoulder width apart with the legs together and lowering the body till the chest is an inch or two from the ground and then pushing back up till the arms are almost straight.

It is important to keep the body in a straight line when performing the push up; many people have a tendency to push the hips up or down, reducing the work done by the arms and chest. The core muscles will be engaged when maintaining the correct form.

There are many variations to the standard press up to target specific muscles in more detail and to increase intensity.

The body's weight is distributed between the lower and upper body when in the prone position.

Shifting more of the bodyweight to the upper body than the lower body, e.g. by raising the legs, more pressure can be placed on the chest and arms. Alternatively to reduce the intensity, push up can be performed with the knees on the floor.

The plank is a great exercise for building up abdominal and lower back strength and endurance.

Many people will spend hours in the gym working on specific abdominal exercises like crunches or purchase some miracle machines that will give you perfect abs.

Having a relatively overdeveloped abdominal area had been shown to lead to lower back problems, the abdominals are too strong and pull the body forward, creating a hunch which can lead to lower back pain. You do not want to cause injuries to one area of your body while strengthening other areas. This is why the plank is such a great exercise.

With both your feet on the floor, laying on you forearms with a straight back, brace your abs and hold the position (or attempt to) for 60 seconds, maintaining a straight body throughout.

This may not feel as intensive on your abdominals as crunches but will yield great results, not only will you build stronger abdominals, you lower back will become stronger, giving you a stronger core and more effectively linking the strength of you upper and lower body together.

I've highlighted a few bodyweight exercises which can effectively implemented to build muscle and increase strength while at the same time developing your body's functional strength and endurance.

These exercises are by no means the complete solution to achieving weight loss but makeup one of the 3 main factors in effective weight loss.

A healthy Diet, weight training to build more muscle and exercise to burn calories, when combined together will make your body a much better functioning machine and will stimulate weight loss.