By now you all know who Craig Ballanytne is. He’s the creator of the original high intensity home program – Turbulence Training.

Over the years, he’s come out with some great workouts. The most famous of which is his 6-month bodyweight training manual.

Using this program, he’s put together an incredible deluxe package using only his bodyweight workouts to help you get the most out of your bodyweight training.

I had a little chat with Craig about his bodyweight workouts:

Parth: Craig, thank you so much for taking the time out of your busy schedule to talk to me. Lets get right into this. Tell me, what exactly is the Turbulence Training Bodyweight Deluxe package?

Craig: The Bodyweight Deluxe program is my famous 6-Month Bodyweight Training manual showing you how to lose fat and gain muscle with only bodyweight exercises. It includes some of the most challenging workouts I’ve ever created. You’ll love it, it’s a lot of fun.

Parth: I’ve tried some of those workouts, and I must say they are tough. But with a new fitness product coming out everyday, people get confused on where to start. What is one tip you would give to people starting out?

Craig: If you are completely beginner with no current workout history – or interest in working out – then simply find something you like to do, and do that activity. Combined with eating less, you’ll lose fat.

But if you want a structured workout for maximum bodysculpting, then you need to get a professional program. If you want to workout for 6 days per week, I don’t recommend that and you won’t like my program.

But if you want to get results in just 3 short workouts per week, with exercises you can even do at home if you want, then Turbulence Training will work perfect. We have a beginners program for people who aren’t working out, and an intermediate program for people who are experienced – but I make even my advanced clients start here.

Parth: Nice. Love the variety. Like I said, there are lots of fitness products coming out every single day. But people still prefer Turbulence Training over all the others. What makes Turbulence Training so special?

Craig: It’s proven. A lot of new programs are copycats but don’t have all of the magical ingredients that Turbulence Training does…and the biggest thing all these copycats don’t have is massive, massive, massive proof like Turbulence Training.

There are very few programs that can say they’ve been used by millions of Men’s Health, Women’s Health, and Shape magazine readers, plus all of the folks online and the good people in the TT Transformation Contests.

It’s really just Body for Life or Turbulence Training, and Turbulence Training is based on the most recent science and gets updated all the time.

Parth: Well, I like Turbulence Training because I can do it at home without any equipment. Speaking of which, lets talk about bodyweight training. What are the benefits of bodyweight exercise?

Craig: Most bodyweight exercises are a combination of resistance training and interval training, so they work to burn calories and sculpt muscles. You won’t become a massive bodybuilder with bodyweight exercises, although if you’re a gymnast and you train hours per day, it’s obvious that you can gain a lot of muscle mass.

But most people are going to get lean, athletic, fit bodies with bodyweight exercises, and as much as I love weight training, I have to admit that bodyweight exercises are easier on the joints.

Parth: True. You have a lot of different bodyweight programs out there. Just curious to know. What’s the main difference between training a man and training a woman?

Craig: Most women can and will work as hard as a guy, but they are fearful of getting bigger.

This won’t happen unless they eat too many calories, but I make two small changes…

First, I have women use more bodyweight exercises. Whenever possible, we’ll choose an equally difficult bodyweight exercise rather than using the dumbbell or barbell version. Women prefer this, and it might be slightly better for bodysculpting.

Second, we could also use fewer sets. Remember, getting big is all about volume – eating more and doing more repetitons. So we’ll only do 1 set per exercise with some women rather than 3 sets. That cuts back volume, and eliminates any fear of getting bigger.

Parth: Ok. This actually leads to my next question – why is muscle building so important in your quest to drop fat?

Craig: It’s not mandatory. You can lose fat without gaining muscle, and most women just want the fat loss.

But most guys need to gain some muscle if they want to look amazing, so that’s why I use muscle-building programs so much.

Plus, it’s important for everyone’s health to be as strong as possible in their old age.

Parth: Ok, so what’s the difference between Turbulence Training for Fat Loss, and Turbulence Training for Mass Gain?

Craig: The fat loss program is more of a home workout program focused on metabolic resistance training to sculpt the muscles and burn calories, along with interval training to burn more fat.

The mass program is supersets of heavy lifting focused on building strength and mass.

Parth: Makes sense. Alright, so what’s your background Craig? What motivated you to create the Turbulence Training bodyweight workouts?

Craig: Like most folks in the fitness industry, I played a lot of sports when I was younger. That led to weight training. From there, I realized I wanted to be a strength coach in professional sports.

I went to school for Kinesiology, which then led to a Master’s Degree in Exercise Physiology. Along the way I studied what made a good NHL Strength Coach (they had Master’s Degrees and were Certified Strength And Conditioning Specialists – CSCS).

I also started training athletes, along with men and women for fat loss. Then I started working with Men’s Health in 2000. And I invented Turbulence Training in 1999, and finally put it online in 2001. The rest is history.

Parth: Yup, and it’s looks like it’s been a great run. Hopefully I’ll see some more great Turbulence Training workouts for many years to come.

So, as I stated in the interview, Craig has some great workouts. To learn more about each of his workouts, click on the links below to read their reviews:

• Turbulence Training Bodyweight Deluxe
• Turbulence Training for Abs
• Turbulence Training Bodyweight Workouts
• Original Turbulence Training Workouts
• Turbulence Training for Abs DVD
• Turbulence Training for Women
• Turbulence Training Bootcamp
• Turbulence Training for Muscle

The Bodyweight 500 Challenge is a training routine developed by Trainer Craig Ballantyne. The challenge involves performing a series of bodyweight exercises where the repetitions all add up to 500.

The challenge actually is not a stand-alone workout. The challenge is what you would do after your regular weight routine. Hence, this is not a bodyweight-only program.

However, the challenge has been used by many individuals as a way to replace their boring cardio workouts, or even as a stand along program. I personally use the program sporadically to supplement my regular training.

Bodyweight 500 Challenge – The Breakdown

The challenge is actually broken down into 4 parts – bodyweight 100, bodyweight 200, bodyweight 350, and bodyweight 500:

Bodyweight 100 Workout (Time Limit: 9 minutes)

• 20 Prisoner Squats
• 20 Pushups
• 10 Jumps
• 10 Inverted Rows
• 20 Forward Lunges (10 reps per side)
• 15 Close Grip Pushups
• 5 Chin-ups or Inverted Rows

Bodyweight 200 Workout (Time Limit: 15 minutes)

• 30 Prisoner Squats
• 30 Pushups
• 10 Jumps
• 10 Stability Ball Leg Curls
• 10 Stability Ball Jackknifes
• 20 Step-ups
• 5 Pull-ups or Inverted Rows
• 30 Forward Lunges (15 reps per side)
• 20 Close-Grip Pushups
• 15 Inverted Rows
• 15 Squats
• 5 Chin-ups or Inverted Rows

Bodyweight 350 Workout (Time Limit: 30 minutes)

• 45 Prisoner Squats
• 40 Pushups
• 20 Jumps
• 20 Stability Ball Leg Curls
• 20 Stability Ball Jackknifes
• 40 Step-ups (20 reps per side)
• 10 Pullups (No Substitutions)
• 40 Forward Lunges (20 Reps per side)
• 40 Close Grip Pushups
• 20 Inverted Rows
• 40 Squats
• 15 Chinups (No Substitutions)

Bodyweight 500 Workout

• 50 Prisoner Squats
• 50 Pushups
• 25 Jumps
• 25 Stability Ball Leg Curls
• 25 Stability Ball Jackknifes
• 50 Step-ups (25 reps per side)
• 25 Pull-ups (NO Substitutions)
• 50 Forward Lunges (25 reps per side)
• 50 Close-Grip Pushups
• 50 Inverted Rows
• 50 Squats
• 25 Chin-ups (NO Substitutions)

Make sure to time each workout, and do not move to the next challenge until you’ve completed the workout in the recommended time frame. However, if you surpass the time limit, keep going.

The key is to get a good workout and build yourself up. If the Bodyweight 100 took you 12 minutes, instead of 9 minutes. Don’t worry. Your body will get stronger, and you’ll be able to do the workout in under 9 minutes soon.

For the Bodyweight 500 Workout, the idea is to do the best that you can. Once you get up to this level of fitness, strive to consistently beat your own PR.

Craig’s best time is 27 minutes.

Bodyweight 500 Technicalities

Technically, you’re only supposed to do the bodyweight challenge once per week after you regular dumbbell workouts. However, you can turn this into a 3-day per week routine.

Or, you can just add this challenge to any Turbulence Training program you may be currently doing. Here is what a sample schedule would look like:

• Monday – Dumbbell Workout A
• Tuesday – Interval Training
• Wednesday – Dumbbell Workout B
• Thursday – Interval Training
• Friday – Dumbbell Workout C
• Saturday – Bodyweight Challenge
• Sunday – Rest

Here are some modified versions of the schedule based on how many days you wish to train:

• Day 1 – Dumbbell Workout A
• Day 2 – Bodyweight Challenge, Interval Training
• Day 3 – Dumbbell Workout B
• Day 4 – Interval Training
• Day 5 – Dumbbell Workout C

• Day 1 – Dumbbell Workout A
• Day 2 – Bodyweight Challenge, Interval Training
• Day 3 – Dumbbell Workout B
• Day 4 – Dumbbell Workout C, Interval Training

Week 1

• Day 1 – Dumbbell Workout A, Interval Training
• Day 2 – Bodyweight Challenge
• Day 3 – Dumbbell Workout B, Interval Training

• Day 1 – Dumbbell Workout C, Interval Training
• Day 2 – Bodyweight Challenge
• Day 3 – Dumbbell Workout A, Interval Training

* Follow this pattern

Craig Ballantyne’s Recommended Bodyweight 500 Strength Routine

Lets go over one of Craig Ballantyne’s sample Dumbbell routines he recommends in the Bodyweight 500 program:

Superset #1

• DB Push Press – 6 reps
• Front Loaded Forward Lunge – 8 reps per Leg
• Rest 1 minute and repeat superset 2 more times

Superset #2

• DB RDL – 8 reps
• Stability Ball Mountain Climber 10 reps per side
• Rest 30 seconds and repeat superset 2 more times

Superset #3

• DB Row with Elbow Out – 12 reps
• DB Chest Press – 12 reps
• Rest 1 minute and repeat superset 2 more times

Craig Ballantyne has developed hundreds of fitness programs that revolve around the basic concepts of Turbulence Training.

To get an overall introduction to Turbulence Training, you should grab the original Turbulence Training manual. The manual includes everything you need to get started on your fat loss journey. There are workouts for beginners, intermediate, and advanced trainees. If you go through each program separately, in a few months you’d have literally transformed your health and physique. Click here for more information.

For individuals who have had some experience with exercise or even Turbulence Training, then Craig has numerous other workouts specifically designed for women, muscle mass, bodyweight only, abs training, and more.

You need to make the decision today: Are you going to continue to follow pointless, boring workouts and never get any impressive results, or you going to take a chance and try some trully unique ideas using Craig Ballantyne’s workouts? Start today with either one of the Turbulence Training workouts:

• Click here for Turbulence Training Original workout Review
• Click here for Turbulence Training ab Workouts
• Click here for Turbulence Training for Muscle Mass
• Click here for Turbulence Training Bodyweight Only Workouts
• Click here for Turbulence Training for Women

The best for busy moms to stay in shape is to use Bodyweight workouts. This makes sense because busy moms are always on the go, and bodyweight training can be performed anywhere.

For the following workout, perform each exercise for the recommended repetitions as a circuit. A circuit is where perform 2 or more exercises back to back with little to no rest in between each set.

Try to complete as many rounds as possible within a 15 minute time frame. Now, if you have more time, you can do a longer workout. Vice versa if you have less time, then keep the workout shorter.

Exercise #1: Inch Worm 25 Feet

Get down into squat position and place your hands on the ground. Walk your hands forward until your in a push up position. Snap your legs back up so that you are back into squatting position with your hands on the floor.

Exercise #2: Quad Squat, 10 repetitions

This is a pretty difficult movement to explain. The main idea is to perform a pushup and squat at the same time. Get into squat position and place your hands on the floor. Straighten your back so that it’s parallel to the floor.

Now bend your elbows and knees at the same time, bring your body towards the ground. Bring it as low as possible, then press back up to starting position.

Exercise #3: Jump Squat, 10 repetitions

From the squat position, simply jump up and catch air.

As you can see, each movement easily leads into the next movement. For the inch worm, you do not need to measure a distance of 25 feet. You can easily use your own height as a distance.

For example, I’m 5′5″, so around 4-5 repetitions would cover a distance of 25 feet.

For more unique bodyweight exercises and workouts, check out Bodyweight Blueprint for Fat Loss. Click here for more information.

Everyone talks about doing 100 pushups or a 100 pullups. Even though these feats of strength are impressive, they are simply that – feats of strength and endurance. The bodyweight squat is actually a much more important movement then thepullup or pushup.

I truly believe that everyone should be able to do 100 bodyweight squats. This is because it is the most important movement in our daily life. Each day we stand up, sit down, walk up stairs, jump into the air, sprint after things, etc.

Millions of movements throughout our lifetime all point back to the same range of movement as trained by the bodyweight squats. And when people get older, it is the hips and lower back muscles where they have problems.

Well, that’s all going to change now. Because I’m about to issue a challenge. If you are unable to do at least 100 bodyweight squats, then you need to take on this challenge. I’ll even give you a blueprint, a set of steps to achieve this goal.

Perform each level, once a week:

• 20 sets of 5 squats, 30 seconds break
• 17 sets of 6 squats, 30 seconds break
• 15 sets of 7 squats, 30 seconds break
• 13 sets of 8 squats, 30 seconds break
• 12 sets of 9 squats, 30 seconds break
• 10 sets of 10 squats, 30 seconds break
• 10 sets of 11 squats, 30 seconds break
• 9 sets of 12 squats, 30 seconds break
• 8 sets of 13 squats, 30 seconds break
• 7 sets of 15 squats, 45 seconds break
• 6 sets of 17 squats, 45 seconds break
• 5 sets of 20 squats, 45 seconds break
• 4 sets of 25 squats, 60 seconds break
• 3 sets of 34 squats, 60 seconds break
• 2 sets of 50 squats, 120 seconds break
• 1 set of 100 squats, as fast as possible

If at any level, you are not able to maintain the recommended rest break, then repeat the workout again the following week. Keeping the rest periods short is extremely important.

For more bodyweight workouts, exercises, and training ideas, check out Workout Without Weights. Click here for more information.

Here are some great body weight workouts for middle age men:

Workout #1: Hotel Room Workout

This is a great workout for busy people who are always on the go. Even if you rarely ever find yourself in a hotel room, you can perform this workout almost anywhere, even in your own bedroom:

Workout #2: Intense Bodyweight Workout

Here’s a more difficult workout for stronger individuals. You can still perform this workout almost anywhere, however you will need a pullup bar. If you do not have a pullup bar, you perform back exercises with a resistance band:

Workout #3: Mini Bodyweight Circuit

The mini bodyweight circuit is exactly what it sounds like: a super fast bodyweight workout you can perform in the shortest time possible. The idea is to do 4 basic movements for 2-4 circuits for very little rest in between:

Turbulence Training is an effective home fitness system which incorporates a variety of cheap, in home fitness equipment to design high intensity workouts to help you burn fat and build lean muscle mass.

Author Craig Ballantyne has helped hundreds of thousands of individuals all over the world to reduce stubborn body fat and literally change their lives. He has done this solely through his main Turbulence TrainingeBook.

Well, in addition to his main fat loss manual, he also has hundreds of other workouts which he sells separately. Most cost as low as $10. So, if you do not wish to spend $40 on a full program, you may interested in an individual workout that gives you even more results but costs much less.

Turbulence Training Bodyweight Workout

Craig has developed a lot of bodyweight-only workouts. This is because he realizes that one of the main excuses people use to not working out is the fact that they are unable to afford a gym.

An average gym may cost up to $400 per year. Most people would rather spend that $400 paying the bills, or investing in education for their children. Well, Craig says, save your $400 and just train with your bodyweight in the comfort of your own home.

Before Turbulence Training, bodyweight exercises ere only used properly with a few, handful of people. These individuals were usually athletes who had been training with their bodyweight for many years.

Well, Craig has taken what he knows about bodyweight training, developed a program, and has helped made bodyweight workouts available to the general public. So lets take a look at three of his best bodyweight workouts:

Workout #1: Bodyweight Cardio 2.0

Bodyweight cardio is recent “buzz word” that basically means that you’re replacing your regular cardio exercises with bodyweight exercises. So instead of spending 30 minutes on a treadmill, you’ll spend 15 minutes doing a bodyweight circuit designed to get your heart rate up.

You’ll need to spend less time performing bodyweight cardio then regular cardio since the workouts will be done at a higher intensity level. The question here isn’t whatseparates Bodyweight Cardio from regular Cardio, but instead what separates Bodyweight Cardio from regular Bodyweight Training.

The answer to this question is….I don’t know. In terms of Turbulence Training, Craig tends to refer to Bodyweight Circuits as Bodyweight Cardio. And his regular bodyweight workouts are usually in the format of supersets.

Here’s a sample bodyweight cardio workout:

Click here to learn more about Bodyweight Cardio 2.0

Workout #2: 30 Minute Bodyweight Circuit Training

As you can see, I love bodyweight circuits. This particular workout is formatted a bit differently. Craig gives you a set of exercises to perform in a circuit. You set a timer for 30 minutes, then do as many circuits as you can, nonstop within a time frame of 30 minutes.

This sort of training is extremely beneficial, since it pushes you to try to complete more rounds within the 30 minutes. What I like to do is record how many rounds and total repetitions I completed within the workout, then try to beat my performance the following week.

Here’s a sample bodyweight circuit using this method:

Workout #3: Advanced Bodyweight Training

Bodyweight Cardio is a great program for beginners. 30 minute Bodyweight Circuit is more of an intermediate workout. The following workout is an advanced routine. It’s known as the Bodyweight 1000, and it’s hard core:

Click here to Learn more about the Bodyweight 1000

Ultimate Bodyweight Package

There are two ways you can approach purchasing all these workouts. You can buy each workout one by one (which I prefer), or you can buy all the workouts at once. The benefits of buying a workout one by one is lack of confusion.

In other words, when you have access to hundreds of workouts all at once, you just don’t know where to start. Instead, it would be better for you to buy a workout, go through the full 4-week program, then move onto the next routine.

However, in the long run this strategy would cost you a lot of money. $10 each month is $120. Instead, you can grab all the turbulence training workouts for less than $60.

It’s known as the Turbulence Training Bodyweight Deluxe Package, and it’s basically a package of a whole bunch of bodyweight workouts. Click here to learn more.

At this stage in your life, you probably have a lot going on: full time career and a family to look after. You’re probably extremely stressed out by the lack of time you have on your hands to enjoy life with your friends and family.

Click here to Learn over 100 Bodyweight Exercises

When it comes to fitness, you can follow some very basic principles to help you get into better shape with less time commitment. First of all, the core of your fitness plan should revolve around bodyweight training.

Lets go over some of the key advantages to making bodyweight training a corner stone of your fitness plan:

Advantage #1: Prevent Bone and Muscle Loss

Two of the biggest issues facing middle aged men is the loss of muscle mass and the weakening of bones. You start losing muscle mass as soon as you hit the age of 25.

And so, an untrained male will be the most muscular at age 25. For most individuals, this doesn’t mean much. If you only weighed around 135 lbs when you were 25 years old, then I can only imagine how thin and frail you’ll be when you hit the age of 50.

In addition, bone loss begins at age 30. As you get older, the breakdown of bones will be greater than the formation of new bone tissue. Your only hope is to maintain the strength and density of the bones that you already have.

If the body is unable to maintain the proper amount of bone density and strength, bones may become fragile and this may lead to osteoporosis.

Click here to Learn over 100 Bodyweight Exercises

Men are not as much in risk of osteoporosis as women, but this does not mean that you’re safe. Over 2 million men in the U.S. have this condition.

Increasing lean muscle mass and strengthening your bones will make you a better man in your daily life. You’ll have more energy to perform your daily tasks.

Bodyweight training will help you gain lean muscle mass and strengthen your bones by stressing your body with a variety of difficult exercises.

In case You Need to Lift Someone on your Back

Click here to Learn over 100 Bodyweight Exercises

Advantage #2: Boost your Metabolism and Get Lean

On the flip side, even if you weigh 200 lbs or so, how much of that is lean muscle mass? If you have a gut sticking out, then I bet you need to lose fat.

But most individuals just do some cardio and try to burn some fat. What they don’t realize is that they’re not burning fat. They’re losing weight in the form of both muscle and fat.

Remember, we want to maintain our muscle, but want to lose fat as well. The best way to do this is to speed up your metabolic rate. Your metabolic rate is the rate at which your body burns calories through out the day.

The higher your metabolic rate, the more calories you will burn. But unfortunately, your metabolism slows down as you age. Don’t worry, you can still enjoy a fast metabolic rate as you age.

The key is to engage in high intensity exercise. Basically, perform bodyweight workouts using high intensity techniques such as supersets, circuit training, and interval training.

Click here to Learn over 100 Bodyweight Exercises

Intensity techniques like the ones I just mentioned force you to work harder. When you’re working harder, you’re placing more stress on your body, causing your body to perform a variety of metabolic processes such as the rebuilding of lean muscle mass.

Advantage #3: Look Younger, Feel Better

Studies show that even a moderate amount of exercise can reverse aging dramatically. A 30-year study shows that middle aged men starting a basic fitness plan can regain the same aerobic capacity they enjoyed when they were younger.

The study began in 1966 with five healthy college students. They were asked to remain completely inactive for 20 days, followed by a rigorous workout.

The results of those 20 days (one of the men could barely drive his car after wards), opened up new thought into the effects of inactivity on the human body.

30 Years later, all five men were called back for a follow up. They found that those 20 days of inactivity were more damaging than 30 years of aging.

Click here to Learn over 100 Bodyweight Exercises

And after a 6 Month, moderate intensity program, all five men were in similar shape as they were in their twenties. This shows that older men can regain their youth with just a little bit of exercise.

You’ll be stronger, fitter, leaner, and younger looking 6 months from now if you start a basic, moderate intensity bodyweight routine today.

If you’re ready to learn how to use bodyweight exercises to help improve your health and fitness, then I suggest you grab a copy of Workout Without Weights:

Workout Without Weights

Workout Without Weights is a complete bodyweight manual written by Coach Eddie Lomax which shows you over 150 bodyweight exercises you can perform in the comfort of your own home.

The manual also includes templates you can use to design your own bodyweight programs, plus over 60 sample workouts to keep you challenged.

Don’t forget to grab the Combo Package for even more high intensity bodyweight workouts.

Click here to Learn more about Workout Without Weights

This article links out to a product. If you purchase this product, I receive a percentage of the sale. Click here to read my disclaimer.

I’ve often preached the idea of training your entire body in one workout. In fact, the overwhelming majority of the workouts I publish on this site are whole body in nature. But, what exactly are the benefits of whole body bodyweight workouts? Well, here are three reasons why you should consider training your entire body in one workout:

1) Build More Functional Strength

Functional strength training has become a popular buzz word in the fitness industry. But, what does it exactly mean? Out of all the interpretations out there, I believe that functional training simply relates to how your body moves. A more functional body means that you are better at performing sport and daily activities.

Whole body bodyweight workouts generally involve compound movements, or movements that train more than one muscle group at a time. Most compound movements have a greater “transfer effect” when it comes to sport and daily life. For example, the motion of a bicep curl is rarely ever used in average daily life.

However, the squatting motion is one of the most commonly used movements in our daily lives. Another common movement is picking things up off the ground and placing them over head. This is why movements such as bodyweight squats are so important.

2) Build More Muscle and 3) Burn More Fat

Compound movements are not only functional in nature, but they also activate a lot of muscle mass. The more muscle you activate, the harder you work. The harder you work, the greater stress you place on the body. This stress causes the body to build up stronger and bigger.

There are numerous hormonal responses that occur when you activate and train a large amount of muscle mass at once. Two hormones that are released both during and after your resistance workouts are Testosterone and Growth Hormone.

Growth Hormone is important because it increases the utilization of fatty acids as well as the breakdown body fat. This means that your body will use fat stores for energy (as opposed to muscle mass) both during and after your workouts.

In other words, more muscle and less fat!

The Easiest Way to Organize your Whole Body Bodyweight Workouts

There are lots and lots of variations you can choose from when designing your own whole body bodyweight workout. But one of the easiest ways to design a whole body workout is Circuit Training. The purpose of circuit training is to keep your body moving and working at all times.

Circuit Training is one of the most efficient ways of training your whole body within a very short period of time. Think about it, if you were to rest 30-60 seconds after each set you performed, you’d be spending more time resting than actually working out.

The biggest misconception surrounding circuit training is that it’s just a fat loss technique that you performing using easy exercises and high repetitions. The truth is that you there are many variations of circuit training and parameters which you can easily modify for strength, mass, and fat loss.

Top Three Reasons to Use Circuit Training

I’ve written about Circuit Training so many times that there is really no reason to keep repeating myself. However, here’s a quick review of why Circuit Training works so well for whole body bodyweight workouts:

1. Allows you to work your aerobic system while working your muscles. This translates to a fat burning and muscle building effect at the same time. If you’re burning more fat with your circuit workouts, that means you’ll have to spend less time on the treadmill.
2. Remember how compound movements release lots of Testosterone? Well, short rest periods also aid in releasing more testosterone. We already know why Testosterone is so important for overall fitness. Also, long boring cardio sessions lower testosterone levels, so you’ll be boosting Testosterone your levels even more by staying away from the Treadmill.
3. The final reason why I love circuit training so much is that it allows my workouts to remain short and sweet. Sometimes I have workouts that last a mere 10 minutes, but these workouts are usually the most intense because I’ve pushed myself to the maximum.

But if you’re really stuck on figuring out how to exactly organize your workouts, then here’s a simple template you can use:

• Step One: Choose a Push Up Variation (Pushups, Hindu Pushups, Feet Elevated Pushups, Dive Bombers, Elevated Pushups, T-Pushups, Spiderman Pushups, One Leg Pushups, One Arm Pushups, Uneven Pushups, Handstand Pushups).
• Step Two: Choose a Pull Up Variation (Pullups, Chinups, Mixed Grip Chinups, Side Side Pullups, Circular Pullups, Commando Pullups, Typewriters, L-Pullups, Gorilla Chins, One arm Chinups, One Arm Assisted Chinups, Assisted Chinups)
• Step Three: Choose a Lower Body Exercise (Squats, Lunges, Squat Jumps, Side Lunges, Boot Strappers, Ankle Grabbers, Hip Raise, One Leg Hip Raise, One Leg Boot Strappers, Tuck Jumps, Squat Tuck Jumps, Duck Walks, Bear Crawls)
• Step Four: Choose number of circuits to perform (usually 2-20)
• Step Five: (Choose rest interval (0 to 120 seconds)
• Step Six: Choose repetitions for each exercise (1-100)

The following is a sample workout showing how all the steps fit together:

Perform 3 rounds of (Step Four):

• Hindu Pushups, 10 reps (Steps Two and Six)
• Gorilla Chins, 5 reps (Steps Three and Six)
• One Leg Boot Strappers, 20 Reps (Steps Four and Six)
• 30 Seconds Rest (Step Five)

If you’re ready to incorporate bodyweight training as part of your fitness plan, then you should check out Bodyweight Exercise Revolution. Coach’s Adam Steer and Ryan Murdock show you how to use unique bodyweight movements to lose fat, build muscle, increase strength, improve athletic fitness, and enhance longevity.

Click here for more information.

Bodyweight training is the perfect choice for athletes. Most sports require you to be fast, strong, and powerful. Heavy weight lifting makes an athlete slow and bulky. However, bodyweight training teaches an athlete to better control his or her own bodyweight for better performance.

When I was lifting heavy using bodybuilder workouts the biggest problem was that I would gas out quickly. My sport is Karate. So during sparring (practice fighting) sessions, I may have been bigger and stronger than my opponents, but I would get tired really quickly.

Hence, my opponents would just dodge my slow punches until I was tired, then hit me with everything they got. That’s how I lost a lot of sparring fights. The day I gave up on bodybuilder workouts, I started reading into the way Indian Wrestlers used to train.

Hindu Squats and Pushups

The two common exercises used by these magnificent ancient wrestlers are the Hindu Pushup and Hindu Squat, made popular by Matt Furey. Honestly, I don’t think these exercises are the BEST bodyweight exercises out there. They are simply two variations out of hundreds of different bodyweight movements.

However, just by replacing these two movements with all my heavy weight training gave me some great results. I already had the bulk, now it was time to teach myself how to move the bulk (my own body). The workouts I used were very basic.

It’s time to peer into my old training diaries and show you a sample of the primitive, but powerful stuff I used to do.

(Before I continue, let me just state that I have shared my old workouts in the past. I used to do a lot of stuff, but this particular post revolves around Hindu Squats and HinduPushups and their relationship to improving my Karate training.)

Back to what I was saying before: I stuck to mostly density training, which is something I shared with you a few days a go. However, my density workouts were much shorter, since my conditioning was very poor.

The Poorly Designed but Powerful Workout

So, instead of using 15-20 minute time intervals, I was using 5 minutes intervals, with around 1-2 minute breaks. So here is what a sample workout would look like:

5 minutes of:

• 5 Hindu Pushups
• 10 Hindu Squats

I would alternate between these exercises for 5 minutes straight through, and decided if I could do anymore. A lot of what I was doing before was extremely random. I didn’t even know about the terminology “density” training. It was just training to me.

But…it worked! I was moving faster and lasting longer on the mat. I even started winning some fights. Some of the kids started getting scare of fighting me since now I was not just a bulky guy, but a bulky guy who could move!

Take Home Point

Now, how can you take what I used to do to your own sport? Well, the simple answer is take a look at how you move in your sport. Karate involves a lot of high intensity techniques for a short period of time (such as a barrage of punches) followed by a short rest period (where you’re just bouncing on the mat and blocking your opponents attacks).

Hence, interval and density workouts were perfect for Karate training. But, you may need a different method of training for your particular sport.

If you’re ready to incorporate bodyweight training as part of your fitness plan, then you should check out Bodyweight Exercise Revolution. Coach’s Adam Steer and Ryan Murdock show you how to use unique bodyweight movements to lose fat, build muscle, increase strength, improve athletic fitness, and enhance longevity.

Click here for more information.

According to some people, you can’t build muscle with bodyweight exercises. Well, you can, but it’s completely “inefficient.” Why? Well, they that you can not achieve progressive overload with bodyweight exercises. I completely disagree.

Progressive Overload means that you steadily add more and more stress upon a muscle to cause it adapt to increasing demands. These so called “experts” claim that progressive overload is not possible with bodyweight exercise since the only way you can increase overload is through adding endless sets and reps. Continue reading