THE IMPORTANCE OF PLYOMETRIC TRAINING
If you’re a serious lifter, you’ve already figured out that bodyweight training deserves to play a role in your overall training program.
However, serious lifters and even performance athletes often don’t appreciate the importance of explosive, plyometric training to their workout routines.
We typically train at a slow, controlled pace. That’s good for certain applications, but we also need power training to be explosive so that we’re not just strong, but also functional and athletic.
Here are seven of the best explosive bodyweight exercises you can do anywhere (using just your bodyweight and a pullup bar) that you should start incorporating into your workout routine now.
I’ve included less-challenging “step-down” variations you can use to work up to the more difficult version. There’s no use hurting yourself or only squeezing out one or two reps, because you need more reps to get the benefit.
Choose the exercise variation that works best for you and your current fitness level.
BEST PLYOMETRIC EXERCISES
Let’s take a look at these seven explosive exercises one by one and their beginner variations.
We’ll start with a bodyweight powerhouse that hits your entire upper body including your core.
1) POWER PLANK UP
This bodyweight exercise is the perfect way to hit your triceps, chest, shoulders, and core at once. It’s great for training at home since it requires very little space and can be done either on your toes or from your knees.
Get in a plank position on your toes and elbows then explode up in one motion, driving up hard with your elbows, landing on your hands. You need stability in the shoulders, triceps, and chest, and adequate core strength to perform the move.
POWER PLANK UP STEP-DOWN VERSION
If you can’t do this as-described right now, use the elbow-knee starting position and build up from there. As you get stronger you’ll be able to get up on your toes to keep the progression going.
2) PLYO CHIN UP
All you need is a bar and an underhand grip to build “pull-through strength” with this awesome bodyweight exercise.
To do the Plyo Chin Up, you grip underhanded and release the bar at the top. You have to pull high enough to allow you to let go for a second. That develops “pull-through” strength.
This exercise could easily be confused with a Clapping Pull-Up. The big difference is the underhand grip of the Plyo Chin Up.
The underhand position for this chin up recruits your biceps and gives you that extra eccentric contraction when you re-grip the bar and slow down your descent before the next explosive concentric contraction.
PLYO CHINUP STEP DOWN VERSION
If you can’t do this extreme version with the full release, you can try the step-down version where one arm stays on the bar.
Use one hand to continuously grip the bar, maintaining control so you can let go with the other arm. Release one hand’s grip when you reach the top.
Work each side individually until you build up the strength to be able to release the bar entirely with both hands. You could do several reps in a row with the same side, or alternate hands.
3) GLUTE/HAM SINGLE LEG PLYO BRIDGE
Explosively train your glutes and hamstrings with this single leg plyometric exercise for the lower body and reduce the risk of hamstring pulls in the process.
This exercise is a plyometric variation of the bridge we often do. A traditional bridge would take you to a line parallel to the rest of your torso but would not add the explosive component.
For the plyometric variation, thrust through your hips enough to get ground clearance, and eccentrically control your glutes and hamstrings when you hit the ground, which activates those Type II fast-twitch muscle fibers.
GLUTE/HAM SINGLE LEG PLYO BRIDGE STEP DOWN VARIATION
Straighten your lower leg out a bit and just go for a little bit of clearance, even if it’s just 1″ off the ground.
This version is going to target a little more of your hamstring and a little less glute.
Work to get the glutes to take over to avoid hamstring injuries. If you allow the glutes to be dominant, it will work those glute/hamstring tie-ins.
4) PENDULUM PLANK
Build a solid, explosive core with this incredible bodyweight exercise.
From a plank position on your elbows, swing both your legs in a wide pendulum motion, side to side. Swing both feet far out to the left, push off with your toes and swing back to the right side. Swing back and forth, left-right-left.
Try to get as much clearance as you can without piking at the hips. Make sure you’re keeping your torso as steady as you can for core stability.
PENDULUM PLANK STEP DOWN VARIATION (SWIPERS)
The step-down version is called the “Swiper”. From that elbow plank position, use one leg at a time, returning to the midline on each rep instead of swinging all the way to the other side. Sweep left landing on the left foot, come back to the midline, then sweep right.
The Swiper creates a three-point plank position, so your forearms get the support of one leg. It alleviates a little bit of the stress on the core, but still makes a great exercise for explosive core strength.
5) THE HANNIBAL PUSH UP
Get back on your feet like a pro athlete with this next exercise that builds upper body explosiveness.
I train a lot of performance athletes: major league baseball players and MMA fighters who have to get off the ground fast. They can’t make a living laying on the ground.
The Hannibal Push Up is a little like the Superman push up but a little less showy and more functional. To do the Hannibal, press up hard so that your hands leave the ground, then try to touch your toes.
This upper body builder is one of the best ways to build bigger, explosive chest and triceps muscles at home.
Even the average guy needs to maintain that ability to get off the ground as fast as possible for the rest of their life or they’re going to be using a Life Alert.
HANNIBAL PUSHUP STEP DOWN VARIATION
If you’re unable to do the full Hannibal right now, leave your hands on the ground and swing your feet forward keeping your legs straight, similar to a pike. Touch the ground with your toes and then drop down for another.
You’re still going to get a lot of upper body work. Just the act of pulling your feet off the ground builds explosiveness.
6) ROLLING SQUAT BURPEE
This two-part exercise is a great way to train how to explosively get off the ground while building upper and lower body strength.
Get on your back with legs curled, knees to chest, then thrust your legs forward so that you roll up on your feet and then straight down into a burpee, then roll back down.
This is a progression from your back to your stomach to back to stomach using your bodyweight explosively.
ROLLING SQUAT BURPEE STEP DOWN VARIATION
If you can’t do the entire squat-burpee combo, just break it in half and do just the squat burpee part without the roll-up on your back.
Get down on the ground in a push up position, push off explosively like a burpee, and jump up to the squat. Alternate the burpee and squat position as quickly and explosively as you can.
Learn to get quick with your feet to get them back underneath you for the next rep.
7) 180° DEPTH TUCK JUMPS
Let’s hit our lower body one more time with our depth tuck jumps with a 180° twist.
The 180° Depth Tuck Jump demands that you have a little more control of your body in space, which is called proprioception. It also requires you to have enough explosiveness to execute the squat jump.
You can use a bench or a plyo box for this. Any sturdy elevated surface will work. You just need something that provides the right amount of height. Nothing crazy.
To do the move, step off the box so that you hit the ground naturally and cause an equally natural recoil. This stretches the quads and generates elastic energy. Then you do the 180° turn, change directions, and jump back up as fast as possible.
The space of time between the end of the lowering phase and the beginning of explosive ascent is called the Amortization Phase.
The amortization phase is the transition between centric lowering and explosive ascent. It’s not limited to jumping. Competition lifters train for rapid amortization phases in the chest and shoulder movements as well. We try to shorten the amortization phase in athletes to improve overall quickness.
DEPTH JUMP STEP DOWN VARIATION
If you can’t quite do the 180 turns you can work on depth tuck jump only. Step off with one foot, land, and quickly descend into that Amortization Phase and pop up.
Start with one leg for five to ten repetitions, and then switch to the other leg. You might notice a difference in the explosiveness of one leg over the other. It’s not uncommon to have a dominant side. Put in the work to equalize explosive strength between right and left sides.
Don’t think bodyweight means just doing as many push-ups or sit ups as you can. Use your own bodyweight in a challenging way and you can start building muscle without any equipment, in any environment.
These exercises aren’t easy to perform, but nobody ever got anything worthwhile by making it easy. Use the step-down versions as needed, master them, then move up to the more difficult versions.
If you’re looking to build a stronger more athletic and functional physique, we’ve got you covered. Check out our ATHLEAN-X programs to see which one is the best fit for your goals.
- The need to train with bodyweight is widely accepted and practiced, but not everyone appreciates the importance of power training with explosive, plyometric exercises in their workout routines.
- Plyometric training, like other bodyweight training, can be done from home, or pretty much anywhere.
- Professional athletes train explosively for performance, but plyometric exercises are useful to anyone for general health, physical fitness, and activities of daily life.
- These exercises are challenging. Step-down versions are provided as a way to work into the difficult versions while getting the benefits in the process.
- Rapid eccentric and concentric contraction of the muscle builds quickness and fast-twitch muscle fibers. The interval between eccentric and concentric contraction is called the Amortization Phase.
- These seven exercises work the upper body, lower body, and core. Some are more specific than others. For example, the Hannibal Push Up focuses on chest and triceps primarily, while the Rolling Squat Burpee hits upper and lower body.
BODYWEIGHT EXERCISES THAT BUILD MUSCLE
With these 8 bodyweight moves we’re going to cover your entire body, including your lungs!
Yes, this full body workout will take your breath away…. literally!
It is also a workout that will build muscle mass and strength, and you’ll see what I mean when you try the exercises!
The only piece of equipment you’re going to need for just a few of these body weight exercises is a $15 pullup bar. If you don’t have one yet, I highly recommend you get one.
I promise it will have a great return on investment in terms of your ability to effectively train at home.
1.) PULLUP OR COMMANDO PULLUP
Whether you have access to a gym or not, the Classic Pullup is one of the best back exercises you can do for your upper body.
Start position is with arms straight overhead grabbing the bar with hands wider than shoulderwidth apart, palms facing away from you.
With core engaged begin to hang from the bar with knees bent and feet a couple inches off the floor. Pull yourself up until your chin clears the bar and then slowly lower your body back down to starting position.
If you feel you’re not getting enough out of the Classic Pullup, or you’re looking for a more advanced option, we can involve more muscles in the exercise by simply switching our grip.
The Commando Pullup is a great pullup progression for an even more intense back exercise with the added benefit of working your forearms and biceps as well.
You can see that the over under grip also forces you to involve your core to help you stay stable as you pull up toward each side of the bar.
This grip also gives us a bit of extra forearm and biceps involvement, which adds intensity and challenge to the exercise.
2.) CHINUP KNEE UP
This exercise hits the biceps and abs equally as hard, as it breaks down the chinup into two parts.
You’ll start standing below the bar and take an underhand grip with palms facing you, hands shoulder width apart. Begin to bend your arms to pull yourself into a chinup while you bring your legs forward and up into a knees up position, as you engage your core.
The first part of this exercise is a normal chinup in which the underhand grip will give you an arm workout because of the biceps curls that are incorporated into the chinup movement.
We incorporate one of the best ab exercises by finishing it out with the knee up portion in the second part.
This is a great example to show that when we’re trying to get more out of a bodyweight exercise, we have to put more in to allow us to hit multiple muscles in one move.
3.) SLICK FLOOR BRIDGE CURL
This posterior chain exercise hammers your glutes and hamstrings, and is one of the most intense bodyweight leg exercises you can do for this area.
In fact, the Slick Floor Bridge Curl is as challenging as most weighted glute/ham exercises you’d have at your disposal if you were training in a gym!
No equipment at all with this one except a pair of socks!
You can do this on any slick surface such as a tile floor or a wood floor.
Start position is lying face up on the floor, feet hipwidth apart, thighs are parallel in a straight line extending in front of you, with shoulder blades and hands on the floor and feet flat on the floor.
With core tight, begin by bending your knees and sliding your feet toward your body into the press up position of glute bridges. Slide your feet back out to return to the start with legs straight.
The great thing about the Slick Floor Bridge Curl is that you’re training your muscles to work the way they’re supposed to work.
The hamstrings SHOULD work with the help of the glutes, not in isolation. And your glutes will definitely be working hard as you try to hold the bridge up while you initiate the hamstring curl portion of this movement.
4.) LEVITATION SQUAT
We’ll be hitting the quads with this next bodyweight exercise.
The Levitation Squat is a great regression from the Pistol Squat, because it’s easier to perform this single leg movement with your leg behind your body, similar to a Bulgarian split squat, instead of in front where balance may be a limiting factor.
It’s not necessarily that you don’t have the single leg strength to execute the Pistol Squat, but you might not have the single leg strength combined with enough balance to be able to execute it. In this case the split squats stance with leg behind the body will be a bit easier.
Begin standing with your feet shoulderwidth apart, and raise the left foot off the ground behind you with left knee bent and perform a bodyweight squat on the right leg. Be sure to take a deep squat to bring your knee to touch the ground. Perform all the reps on this side before you switch legs and repeat the same on the left leg.
Now, can you progress yourself from the Levitation Squat to a Pistol Squat?
By all means, yes!
And you can actually self-spot in the Pistol Squat by hanging on to a bar while you perform it, until you build the adequate strength and balance to do it without support.
However, I still love the Levitation Squat because it’s a bit more gentle on my knees which allows me to push a little bit more out of every single rep.
5.) DIVEBOMBER PUSHUP
You knew that no list of best bodyweight exercises could ever be complete without some variation of a pushup!
This Divebomber Pushup hits your chest, shoulders and triceps equally hard at different points in the range of motion.
You can add the one and a half rep style for an even more advanced challenge for either the triceps or the shoulders.
Start out in a pushup or low plank position with feet shoulderwidth apart on the floor and chest parallel to the floor. Push the chest forward into cobra position not allowing your body to touch the floor, and bend your elbows to return to pushup position and repeat.
When you first start your descent, you’re working your shoulders more. At the bottom of the rep, you’re maximizing your chest, and as you come back up and out, you’re contracting the triceps the most as you get a little bit of extension back behind your body.
You can get more out of this exercise for triceps or shoulders by performing it in a one and a half rep style.
If you want to work your triceps more, you can perform an extra half rep at the bottom.
If you want to work your shoulders a bit more, perform an extra half rep at the top of the range of motion.
6.) MULE KICK
This is an awesome bodyweight conditioning exercise to get your heart pumping and also overload your shoulders.
The Mule Kick is incredibly demanding, because your shoulders have to support your entire bodyweight while you push your legs up toward the ceiling.
Start on all four with hands and feet shoulder width apart. Next, raise your hips and jump your feet upwards by pushing through the glutes and thighs.
Every rep is basically a version of an explosive shoulder press with your shoulders still in contact with the ground. Instead of trying to push the dumbbells up and away from you, you’re trying to push your body up and away from the ground.
Do this for a minute straight and I’ll tell you, your heart will be pumping and you’ll likely be breaking a serious sweat!
7.) KICKTHROUGH BURPEE
There may be no more athletic version of the burpee than this one, and that is why I love it!
The Kickthrough Burpee will challenge your upper body, lower body and core while pelting away at your ability to breathe.
Start with arms and legs in high plank position, then kick the left leg toward the right side of your body as you lift your right arm, leg extending as far out to the side as possible.
Repeat on the other side, kicking the right leg toward the left side of the body as you lift your left arm. Perform a pushup, then stand up and jump before returning to plank position. This is one rep.
In this exercise we’re challenging ourselves not just in the sagittal plane but we are also involving some rotation. This move requires some coordination, but once you practice it a few times you’ll get the hang of it.
This exercise is a bitch, but I love it because it will get your lungs burning in no time!
8.) FRONT LEVER
For my final bodyweight exercise choice, I’m including a challenging but rewarding move for the upper body, the Front Lever.
This exercise demands that two muscle groups work together that aren’t accustomed to doing so, the upper back and the core.
The core will have to provide the stability to fight the force of gravity that’s trying to bend you in half every single time you lift yourself up.
And the only way you’re going to be able to lift yourself up is by having adequate strength in your upper back to perform what is basically a straight arm pushdown without weights to get your body up against that force of gravity.
This exercise is very difficult to do, and if you’re not ready for it you can modify by using a band to anchor your feet until you’ve built up the strength to be able to do the exercise without the band.
These 8 exercises prove that bodyweight training does not have to be inferior training. As you can see, with bodyweight workouts you often have the ability to change or modify the exercises to elicit all new responses from the movements. Looking for a complete bodyweight program that helps you build muscle from head to toe? Check out our ATHLEAN-X Programs to see which is the best fit for your goals.
- The typical beginner bodyweight workout is only conditioning-based and do little to build muscle. But this doesn’t have to be the case.
- If you choose the right exercises and ensure they’re working multiple muscles in one move, the benefits of bodyweight exercises include building strength and muscle.
- I’ve shown you what in my opinion are the 8 best bodyweight exercises to help you build muscle and provide a conditioning challenge.
- Many of these exercises contain progressions or regressions to allow you to perform them regardless of your fitness level.
- Some of the exercises like the Divebomber Pushup also provide us with opportunities to adapt them to preferentially hit specific muscle groups.
Ok guys!
Today we’ve got a workout for you that’s great for beginners…
Or a day when you need to take things a little slower regardless of fitness level!
No equipment needed!
Just grab a piece of floor and go!
18 MINUTE BEGINNER HIIT!!
Hey Ladies!
We all know that gymnasts have strong lean bodies!
How can we emulate that?
By doing simple bodyweight moves that they would do to build up strength!
TRY A FEW HERE!!
You never really see a weak looking gymnast now do you?
So… What is it about their training that causes this?
I’ll show you right here How Gymnasts Build Huge Muscles! Is it…
A) Time Under Tension
B) Eccentric Loading
C) Bodyweight Training
D) Lack of Energy Leaks
E) All of the Above
F) None of the Above
Find out in this new Bodyweight “Thursday” video!
Build Muscle Like a Gymnast – Here’s How