CanadianBiker32

As it does take some time to drive to the gym to get going. And our gyms our closed due to the "19" at the moment.
Is it possible to entirely just do body weight workout for strength training.

Such as push ups , sit ups, self lunges for quads etc? possible to do and get a almost decent strength all around just from body weight exercises? as in no dumbells at all either?

caloso

I think you'd get 90% of the benefit of the gym from 6-count burpees plus pullups.

alo

You could get a lot of the same benefits, but you would need to be creative with the exercises. Think of exercises for each of the muscle groups.

wolfchild

Yes bodyweight training is very effective for building and maintaining strength and fitness. You don't need gym membership to get fit or strong... I maintain my strength and fitness by training at home with kettlebells and bodyweight exercises. I never had gym membership.

Kat12

Yes, of course. Look up calisthenics, bodyweight exercises, etc. Google and Youtube are full of ideas. Especially now, because all of the fitness sites and channels have been putting out tons of "home" workouts for nearly a year now.

(Just evaluate carefully. There are plenty out there that say "no equipment needed" and then it's "so you'll need a pullup bar, and a box, and a couple kettlebells...")

mrv 

Grant Peterson has a nice list of easy to do exercises at home in his Eat Bacon, Don't Jog book.
You should be able to scroll through the table of contents here: https://www.google.com/books/edition...sec=frontcover

I also like to do a short ride to secluded parks and do calisthenics, or the local high school track, which has a about 41 steps up the bleachers.
Already mentioned: push ups; burpees; mountain climbers; crawl like a bug for 50 yards, that's always tough.....

SapInMyBlood

Muscle ups
Planche
Front and back levers
Pistol squats
Handstands (Handstand Pushups..)

If you can achieve these movements, you don't need to worry about going to any gym
​

The Clumsy Oaf

There is a bodyweight exercise book called Convict Conditioning.
It's pretty effective.

burnthesheep

Even VO2 has conversion of type iib to type iia fibers. And is mostly type iia. Which is best bet for what you describe.

So, what you describe is not strength training. Especially since it's going to be longer than 15 seconds. Here's a handy chart.

sloppy12

kettle bells and "thera" bands can be had at walmart. you can do allot with just those. and its cheaper than one month of gym.

push ups, burpees, pull ups.

cheesesandwich

I use balance board to do some squads, also double up as push up tool. The effort to do push up while balancing can be a bit challenging at first. And pull up bar, That's about it for me.

ARider2

Yes, exercises that use only body weight can certainly be used to build and maintain strength. However, you should also consider other benefits of increasing and maintaining flexibility and balance just using your body weight for stretching and calisthenics. I have been using a home-based approach like this for the last 5 years and I am very pleased with the results. Not only am I stronger but I can see the difference. I like not having to go to the gym as it saves time and money. I do this for about 20 minutes each day and two days a week I supplement my program with another 15 minutes using 10, 15 and 25 pound dumbells. I find the dumbells help me especially with upper body strength in my arms, shoulders and chest.

xroadcharlie

I'm sure if you google the subject you will find all you need to maintain a reasonable level of fitness. Might I suggest if you have the room look for used exercise equipment. I like free weights best, Dumbbells specifically, But Ive seen machines somebody paid $1,000's of dollars for go for almost nothing. Some just want to get rid of that monstrosity.

The benefit of dumbbells is you can find a weight that is best suited to your condition. Whether you start curling 20 lbs, or want to be a competitive lifter using 50+ lbs. Same idea with the other 10 exercises I do. When I'm done, a rack of 12 pair of dumbbells and a folding bench take up about 8 sq. ft. of floor space.

wolfchild

Pushing big gears uphill while seated is a sure way to kill your knees...You should be standing up when pushing big gears uphill or just sit down and spin....Also what you describing here isn't bodyweight strength training, what you talking about here is riding a bike. Bodyweight strength training is done off the bike and not on the bike.

Carbonfiberboy 

Thanks for bringing this chart to our attention again. I have a question: I also do low cadence high effort training, though seated on my resistance rollers. I do intervals at from 90%-100% FTP, 2 intervals of 15'-25', rest between 1/2 interval length. My HR and breathing are below AeT at that effort. What zone am I in? BTW, it works for me. Does not increase my 1RM with weights, but does steadily increase how long I can do them, and my muscular endurance on long climbs. So it does change something. I could also do them at 120% FTP though for a shorter duration and with a higher metabolic cost, i.e. training load? I'm pretty sure that the TSS I get from these is not a good measure of training stress. I don't need to rest the day before or after at my current effort. I've done them once a week for 2 months in the early spring, and only then, for many years.

Oh and for post 16. Never had a knee problem, even on long backpacking descents in the mountains. Maybe because I do them? Doubt that though. Old bubbe-meise.

wolfchild

Being able to do these is impressive but it doesn't mean that it will make you good at other things.The amount of time and dedication that it takes to master these movements is way too much for 99% of the people. It's not worth it for what you will get out of it.....It's a lot better to choose few simple and basic exercises which are sustainable long term and which don't require a lifetime of dedication to master.

Carbonfiberboy 

If someone can find a study that showed bodyweight strength work increased the cycling performance of well-trained cyclists, we'd all love to see it. I don't think it exists. There are studies which show that moderate weight lifting does nothing for cycling performance, however.

If all one wants to do is to improve performance using weight training at home, with little equipment, see my posts 22 and 27 in https://www.bikeforums.net/training-...-training.html
Not bodyweight, but just dumbbells. I bought 2 sets of Amazon cheapo dumbbells for ~$120. Getting good ROI.

C_Heath

yes

Octavianandrei

Hello everybody!

Very good post.

2 times a week, I do legs, knee bends and, climb the ladder. Another 2 times a week, push-ups, abs and plank.

Ride safe!

ZHVelo

You can't do a proper deadlift without weight. And I think that is the single most useful strength exercise out there. Most amount of weight, works whole body, thus your whole CNS and your mind.

But google calisthenics, they do strength training with bodyweight. E.g. pistol squat is insanely hard and useful for Cycling I guess. Calve workouts can be done with bodyweight, too, core of course, all useful for cycling.

bulevardi

There's a LOT of material online, on youtube.
Coaches and trainers showing tons of excercises for "home workout".

You could try the handstand challenge (without a wall or kicking off), to push yourself up slowly. You need to strengthen your core muscles and other stuff.
I'm trying this for myself currently. Nice way to get my body in shape without a gym.

You could aswel invest in dip bars or parallettes. Or a pull-up bar, which I installed at home.
You train with your own weight, you don't need extra weights.

PeteHski

I think what low cadence, high torque training does is improve your muscle coordination in that specific application. It's not really strength training as I believe the muscle loads are still far too low for outright strength adaptation. But the better coordination of the various muscle groups involved may improve your endurance on long grinding climbs.

rwmct

Its better to have some weights, such as dumbells. But there are a lot of good body weight exercises. You can do push ups with you feet up on a chair or a stability ball. Split squats and lunges. If you do bulgarian split squats (rest the back leg on a bench or chair so more weight is on the front) you can hit the legs pretty hard.) A gallon water jug in each hand, or a brick or smaller paving stone will add some weight.

There are ways to improvise. If you have a pick up truck, you can do "step ups" right on the tires, swinging your self up and into the truck. Or grab the water jugs and go up a stadium stair, or other stairway.

The toughest things are you really can't do rows very easy without a bar. If you can find a bar low enough with room under it --maybe at a play ground--you can do bodweight rows by hanging underneat the bar and rowing your self up to it. The more level your feet and hand the harder it is to pull yourself up.

Carbonfiberboy 

I'm sure that neuromuscular coordination has a lot to do with it, but it also increases my reps at say 70%+ in the squat rack. Dunno. Endurance.

terrymorse 

I don't know for sure if it makes me stronger, but when I intentionally push a big gear up hills, my muscles are sore the next day.