Calisthenics are exercises that use only the practitioners body weight and gravity in order to provide resistance. As such calisthenics exercise routines are commonly used in circuit training and for sports teams or military groups. They can used either as a warm up or as a full workout themselves and the fact that they require only body weight means that they can be performed anywhere at any time. It also means that as the practitioner gets stronger and so heavier, the exercise becomes more difficult. As you are working with your own body weight it also means you will train yourself to become more agile and gain better control over your own body.

Calisthenics are generally used as part of a full body routine, meaning that you train all the major muscle groups rather than focussing on just one. A calisthenics exercise routine will then probably involve one or all of the following exercises:

Jumping Jacks – Jumping Jacks involve squatting so that your fingers are touching the floor then jumping out and up and spreading all your limbs before returning to the curled-up squatting position. This is a powerful explosive (plyometric) movement that trains the muscles in the legs and particularly the fast twitch muscle fibres. Typically around twelve to twenty reps will leave you feeling exhausted, do for three sets.

Press Ups – Press ups (or push ups) are probably the single most common exercises in any calisthenics exercise routine. They involve lying on the floor with your hands palm down and shoulder’s width apart and your feet straight and together behind you. You then push yourself up and lower yourself down repeatedly in order to push your upper body away from the ground. This movement then trains your pecs, shoulders, triceps, lats, abs and legs making it a great compound movement that teaches you a useful transferable pushing power. Around thirty reps of press ups for three sets is a good starting point and from there the sky is the limit.

There are many variations of the press up, including the incline press up where you have your feet up on something high behind you, or clapping press ups which require you to launch yourself off the ground with your arms and clap before you land again. This latter movement is again more explosive and so recruits the fast twitch muscle fibres more. Alternatively you can do press ups really slowly which requires more muscle control.

Pull Ups – Pull ups require an overhead bar or ledge and involve holding this with your palms facing away from you then pulling yourself up until your shoulders nearly touch the bar. This trains both the lats and the shoulders as well as the biceps to a degree and is the calisthenics equivalent of the lat pull down. Again there are various alternatives to the regular pull up including the ‘supine pull up’ which looks like a reverse press up with the bar at a mid level and with your body diagonal and legs out stretched in front of you. Most people can only do five to ten pull ups per set to begin with but with time you might get this up to around twenty.

Chin Ups – Chin ups are the same as pull ups but use an underhand grip so that your palms are facing towards yourself. This change engages the biceps more in the exercise making them the only way to target the biceps in a calisthenics exercise routine. Again there are several variations you can use, such as using one arm or moving yourself in a circular motion rather than directly up and down. Again you will likely only be able to around eight to ten but with time you should be able to increase this number significantly. Both chin ups and pull ups are also great workouts for the abs and are again compound movements.

Leg Raises – Leg raises involve hanging from a bar in pull up position with your arms straight then raising your legs directly upwards pivoting at the tops of the legs. This trains the abs, in particular the top two segments of the abs. A variation to make it slightly easier involves bringing your knees up to your chest instead of bringing your feet up in front of you.

Sit Ups – Sit ups are one of the best known calisthenics exercises and target the abs specifically. Here you lie flat on the ground with your knees bent and feet flat on the floor in front of you then sit directly up using only your stomach. To isolate your stomach you need to take your arms out of the equation which you can do by either crossing them across your chest or touching your ears. Like the press ups, sit ups require a greater number of reps and you should probably look at three sets of fifty to start with. Again there is no end to the amount of variations you can do including holding a bar behind your head to further increase the isolation, or putting your legs up on something high. The biggest variation is the twisting sit up, which engages the obliques down the sides of the abs which are crucial for a good mid section and core stability.

Crunches – Crunches are sit ups where you only sit up halfway and squeeze your abs in as you do. Here instead of sitting up, you are ‘rolling’ your abs and bringing your head upwards and forwards. Again, sets of around fifty are a good starting point and all the same variations are available as the ones for sit ups.

Squats – Squats involve standing with your feet shoulder’s width apart and lowering your body so that your knees are at right angles. This works almost every muscle in the lower body, including the quads, hamstrings and glutes but doesn’t provide much resistance. A more difficult variation then is the one-legged squat, or the sissy squat, the latter of which involves leaning your knees forwards onto your toes and your upper body backwards. Both are far more difficult.

Calf Raises – Calf raises are the best way to train your calves and involve simple raising yourself up onto to tip toes. To make this more difficult you can cross one foot behind the other or stand with your toes on a step or raised ledge.

And there you have it, a complete calisthenics exercise routine!

Mack LeMouse

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