Bodyweight exercise

No gym? No equipment? No problem! It’s false to believe that we need gyms and expensive equipment to get a good workout in. A simple and effective approach to exercise is to use your own bodyweight. Simply put, it’s an exercise that uses the body as a form of resistance to work against gravity. It’s completely free, accessible and highly effective.

There’s nothing new or fad-like about Bodyweight Training. There are records of ancient Greeks, Romans and Egyptians using this method and it’s still used in military training for the same reasons. What Bodyweight Training does, in particular, is it incorporates core stability and stabilisation of the joints relative to the person’s body weight. Compared with traditional weight training, you won’t build muscle mass, but you can gain strength relative to your bodyweight.

Today, some common approaches to bodyweight training are the traditional squats, push-ups and lunges. Yoga is also a form of bodyweight training, but there are also hundreds of others that work the whole body in a functional, 3-dimensional way, not just isolating one or two muscle groups. At Ritualize, we use bodyweight workouts which can be done anywhere, anytime. After just 4 minutes your heart-rate will increase and you’ll feel like you’ve done an hour at the gym! Here’s an example of what you can do at home.

Take 4 – 8 minutes to try our Body Weight and ZUU workouts

To try our Bodyweight Workouts from Level 1 (beginner) to Level 5 (advanced) log-in and go to https://au.ritualize.com/workouts on your desktop or go to the Learn-Workouts section of your app. Or check out our 4-minute Bodyweight exercise video or our 8-minute Bodyweight exercise video! 

Our Movement Snacks are a form of bodyweight exercises. These are short bursts of exercise you can do at work or home to break up a long stretch of sitting.

While there is no ‘best’ way to exercise for everyone, bodyweight exercise offers so many benefits. The top benefits being it can be done anywhere and it’s free. Given recent research is associating exercise and physical activity with better quality of life and health outcomes, it’s a great way to gain these benefits even if you are time poor.