Build Muscle And Reduce Fat Doing Bodyweight Exercises
Bodyweight Exercises
Bodyweight exercises are a good way to get in shape. Push-ups are one of the most popular bodyweight exercises. They are easy to learn and very effective. If you add some other bodyweight exercises you can do a full body workout routine without any equipment. The main problem with bodyweight exercises is that you are not lifting your full bodyweight and when your strength improves it means more repetitions. So if I increase my strength the exercise routine lasts longer or I need to try some different exercises.
The strength section and the yoga section on the Wii Fit exercise game are full of bodyweight exercises that are good for strengthening your muscle. It can teach you how to do the exercises and keeps track of the repetitions. The strength section focuses on the number of repetitions and the yoga section focuses on balance.
Routine
I started using the Wii Fit strength section on a daily basis. The exercises were fairly simple so I could have probably learned them and done them on my own. However the routine was also very difficult because of the number of repetitions I was doing. I could barely finish each exercise. The game made it easier to dig deep and continue.
When I tried doing the routine without the game it was harder for me to finish the repetitions. My routine consisted of the single-leg extension, push-up and side plank, torso twist, lunge, rowing squats, plank, arm and leg lift, and push-up exercises. The exercises lasted around 18 minutes at first but after I increased the repetitions for some of the exercises it took closer to 25 minutes. At least I worked out for 25 minutes. Since the exercises were tiring I could not finish the routine without taking a break or two.
I could tell that my muscles were getting a really good workout but it was boring and required a lot of will power. It is not a routine I would want to continue doing every day for months. However there are lots of other bodyweight exercises. If I was doing it for more than a week I would change the exercise routine once in a while to make it more interesting. When using Wii Fit there are some good yoga strength exercises and there are some other exercises in the strength section. There are also other Wii games like Wii Fit Plus.
If I was going to use the Wii Fit for an extended period of time I would want to use all the activities not just a few strength training ones.
Results
After doing the Wii Fit bodyweight exercises for 7 days I lost over 1/2 a pound and based on the circumference of my gut I lost nearly an inch of fat. My muscles became slightly bigger so my muscle weight must have increased a little. Measuring the circumference of my arms they were about 1/16 of an inch bigger but my exercises involved my whole body. I spent as much time on my legs and abs as I did on my arms.
Another reason there was not a lot of increase in size was that I was not doing the best exercises for increasing the size of my muscles. It is a good routine but not if you are trying to quickly increase your muscle size. Previously I did a workout routine that allowed allowed me to increase the size of my muscles fairly quickly. If you are interested check out My Muscle Growth Experiment: Build Bigger Arm Muscles Fast.
It was not a very efficient way to lose weight and it did not increase the size of my muscles very much. However it was only a week and I lost weight while becoming stronger throughout my body. The best part was that it made me feel stronger.
The main problem with the routine was that is was boring and a lot of people would lose interest. However it gets results that you can see and feel if you stick with it.