Are you looking to get fit and wish to improve your endurance and muscle strength? You are trying to include exercise in your routine but you don`t have access to free weights. You are continuously craving to have more energy and strength to do your daily tasks. If this is something continuously running in your mind, you should start doing bodyweight workout. A Bodyweight Workout can deliver everything you need to meet your fitness goal.

Considering you are going to start exercising, there can be some questions that can bother you before starting your beginner workout.

1. Is Bodyweight Workouts Better than Gym workouts?
2. Can Bodyweight Workouts Actually help in Fat loss?

Searching for answers on internet or talking to someone personally, you will find different opinions and a different perspective. Some people believe gym workouts are superior to bodyweight workouts for fat loss. Some believe that the bodyweight exercises are the most functional way of burning fat. Whatever the answer is, you will get informed on how to reach towards your goal of achieving a toned body.

Bodyweight Workout Vs Gym Workouts for Fat Loss

There is no denying on the fact that the gym workouts can help you build a lean and muscular physique. But, you can`t ignore the efficacy of Bodyweight Workouts in fat loss and improving overall body composition. Bodyweight workouts can help you in many ways than you might have thought.

Bodyweight workouts can help you improve your functional movements. You can aim to improve your mobility, endurance and flexibility by performing bodyweight workouts. The Gym workouts on the other hand can help you develop explosive strength and bigger muscles.

A lot of people also debate about more chances of injury during bodyweight workouts. It is true that bodyweight workout involves more muscles than what is involved in gym workouts in a particular exercise. But, if you have a wrong form or doing something out of your range, there are always chances of injury.

The only thing superior with gym workout is the way of progression. You need to make progression in your workout in order to improve your body composition. You can simply increase weight load, reps or both to make progression in the gym. However, progression is also possible during bodyweight training. But it is somewhat complex as you can`t simply go with add more weight perspective. So whether or not Bodyweight workouts are actually beneficial for you?

Are Bodyweight Workout helpful?

Bodyweight Exercises are the perfect way to aim for fitness. They can be your best companion if you wish to improve your body composition, increase muscle strength and don`t have access to free weights. Bodyweight workout can even be perfect choice for a beginner workout and it can be done even at home.

Bodyweight Workout needs minimum to no equipment and has zero time constraints. You can make a flexible schedule for you to train at any time you want. However, you don`t need to be a laid back person as this flexibility can cost you where you don’t even bother to workout. So, dedicate a special time and keep your fitness on priority. We would advise you to do your bodyweight workout the first thing in your day. So let us start your 7 day Bodyweight Workout Program.

The 7 Day Bodyweight Workout Program

The 7 Day Bodyweight Workout is designed by keeping in mind your desire of getting fit. This is a beginner workout program which will help you make progression at gradual pace. A person can only get fit by following a workout program and not just by doing any random exercises. So, we have prepared a daily bodyweight workout program for you to step into fitness. Let us first introduce you to all of the bodyweight exercises you are going to perform under this program.

Bodyweight Exercises

1. Push Ups:

Push up is one of the most performed and common exercise in any bodyweight workout. Almost everybody knows  how effective a push up is. If you perform a Push up, you can target your chest, arms, and shoulder muscles all at a time.  Furthermore, a push up also helps you to have a strong mid section by stabilizing your abdominal muscles. You can also make progression easily with a Push up exercise.  Let us first see how a beginner should first start with this bodyweight workout.

After you find the basic push up easy, you can try these different push ups in your bodyweight workout.

• Wide Push Up

The Wide Push up is a great way to target your chest and shoulder. It also engages your Triceps muscle giving a complete upper body workout. This form of push up is a great way to make progression from a normal push up. Start initially by keeping your grip a little outwards than your shoulders. And, once you can perform wide push up in a correct form, you can increase your grip by widening more.

• Hand Out Push Ups

The Hand out Push Ups is a great way to make progression. It workouts your complete pectoral muscles and help you build strength in arms. Besides building your chest and adding strength, it is more challenging than wide push ups. Thus, it makes a great choice for making progression in your bodyweight workout.

• Narrow Push Ups

Narrow Push ups are a great way to build strength in your arms. You place both your hands close while performing this push up. This enables your arms to get engaged and you can target your triceps and bicep muscles to grow.

• Clap Push Ups

Clap Push Ups is an advance form of Push ups. It helps you build explosive strength and power. This push up variation requires precision and correct form. You can include a lot of variations within clap push ups. Start with one clap push up and go your way up to three claps in one push up.

• Decline Push Ups

Decline Push ups are great to target your front shoulders and upper chest. During the Decline Push up, you place your feet higher than ground. This forces you to lift more weight than just your bodyweight. Hence, it works as great progression in your bodyweight workout.

2. Squats:

Squats are great to aim for lower body strength. It helps you to tone your leg muscles by working on your quadriceps, hamstrings and calves. This exercise also produces an anabolic response in the body, which is great to build muscles in the body. It is among the best bodyweight exercises which improve your mobility, balance and developing strength for your daily tasks.

Squat seems very effective and easy to perform. But, performing the below progressions can up your game to another level. Let us see how you can make progression in a squat?

• Squat Jumps

Squat Jump is great way to make progression from Bodyweight Squats. This way of Squat helps you build explosive strength along with lower body strength. Including explosive exercises also helps you elevate your heart rate and burn more calories. Also, you will increase flexibility of your hips and ankles.

• Pulse Squats

Pulse Squats can really make your legs feel that they are burning fat. This particular type of squat is great to engage speed and explosive strength in your workout. You can churn out maximum aerobic benefits with pulse squats along with toned legs.

• Plie Squats

Nothing works great than Plie Squats to build inner thighs, quadriceps and glute muscles. It is an effective bodyweight exercise to target your thighs and butt. You can also improve the mobility of your hips as this exercise increase the range of motion of your hips.

• Bulgarian Squats

Bulgarian Squat is a serious exercise to add in to your bodyweight workout program. It can help you pack serious muscle mass on your hamstrings and quads. Your glutes will also appreciate you for adding this effective lower body exercise. It is a great functional movement to improve flexibility and build stabilizer muscles.

• Pistol Squats

Pistol Squat is serious progression over a regular squat. You need serious leg strength to perform this exercise. Performing this one leg squat is similar to performing a barbell back squat with weight equivalent to your bodyweight. Perform this exercise only when you got very strong legs with good balance and flexibility.

3. Lunges:

The benefits of Lunges are huge and it can help you shape a great lower body. Performing a lunge involves your quadriceps muscles. It also targets your glutes, hamstrings and calves making a complete lower body workout. You should include this multi joint movement to build a strong foundation for your body.

• Reverse Lunges:

Reverse Lunges are little difficult from doing bodyweight lunges. Keeping your stability is a task with these types of lunges. It is great to achieve stability and mobility of your legs. Especially, if you are struggling with a knee problem, you can still achieve good legs with this exercise.

• Walking Lunges:

Walking Lunges is the next challenge to the normal lunges.  The Forward walking movement in lunges provides maximum contraction in your leg muscles. You can additionally progress with this bodyweight exercise by using additional weights if you have achieved a good form.

• Side Lunges:

Side Lunges are also referred as lateral lunges. You need to lunge towards your side. If you are looking to improve your flexibility and need progression from other types of lunges, it is a perfect pick for you.

4. Dips:

A Dip is a compound bodyweight push exercise which targets your chest, triceps and front shoulders. It needs a strong core to perform dips. You can acquire big Pecs and toned arms with lot of upper body strength. This compound exercise is performed in two ways, one targets chest and other is for targeting your chest.

• Triceps Dips

You can achieve toned arms by performing triceps dips. This exercise can also work great on building your deltoid muscles. Working on your triceps muscles will also help you avoid injuries which are a common sight when you start to age. You can perform the triceps dips by simply placing your hands on ground or by using a chair or a platform.

• Chest Dips

Chest Dips are very effective in making progression from triceps dips. Once you feel to have developed strength in your arms, you can perform these dips to work your chest muscles.  Chest dip do require the use of Dip Stand but you can`t just simply ignore the efficacy of this bodyweight exercise.

You can also buy this simple dip stand to perform dips more effectively.

5. Pull ups:

Pull Ups are a great to build a perfect back. You can target mostly all of your back muscles and biceps by including pull ups in your routine. You do need a Pull up Bar to perform this bodyweight exercise. A Pull Up bar can be easily found in your nearby parks or simply you can buy one.

Here are some common progressions you can make from doing regular Pull Ups.

• Underhand Pull Ups (Chin Ups)

The Underhand Pull Ups are a great beginner workout if you are just beginning with Pull Ups.  It engages more of your biceps and takes some strain out of your back muscles. This way you can slowly start to build strength in your back muscles before moving to next progression.

• Narrow Grip Pull Ups

Narrow Grip Pull ups are the second progression in your way to build a V tapper back. This type of pull ups help you build your lower lat muscles on your back.

• Wide Grip Pull Ups

Wide Grip Pull Ups is an advanced bodyweight exercise which needs serious strength in your back, shoulder and bicep muscles. Mostly all the resistance in this exercise will put only on your lat muscles and removing your biceps and shoulders from the picture. You can really focus on building a bigger and wider back if you can perform this exercise right.

A Pull up bar does not cost much but is sure to help you build a wide back.

6. Burpees:

Performing a Burpee can serve you with array of functions and is indeed a great bodyweight workout. One rep of burpee is so effective that it works mostly all the muscles of your body. It engages your arms, abs, chest, and legs, all in just one exercise.

Nothing can beat the level of conditioning this exercise provides you in every rep. It can pretty much up your heart rate even from the first rep. It is also the most performed boot camp exercises in many boot camps. Making progression with this one is easy. Let us see the common progressions.

• Lateral Jump Burpees

The Lateral Jump Burpees is a little more advanced from doing regular burpees. In this type of burpee, you have to jump sideways to complete your reps. These side jumps are great to keep your heart rate running and assist you in building endurance.

• 8 Count Burpees

The 8-Count Burpee has been devised by the U.S. Navy to train their soldiers.  It is an intense cardio and resistance multi movement exercise which promotes weight loss. It helps you build lean muscle mass and improve your overall conditioning.

• 12 Count Burpees

The 12 Count Burpee is great progression from 8 Count Burpee. This exercise can give you a fat torching and awesome strength building experience.

7. Abdominal Crunches:

Abdominal Crunches is a bodyweight exercise to target your core muscles. Having a strong core is ardently necessary if you to develop strength in your body. Also, having a set of chiselled and well defined abs is a must for a good body. So, how to build a rock solid core with abdominal crunches?

There are many variations you can try with Abdominal Crunches. These variations will also help you make a progression and slowly you will start building your core muscles.

• Reverse Crunches

Reverse Crunches is an exercise which majorly targets your lower abdominal. It is however not a progression to abdominal crunches. It is more of a type of bodyweight exercise to target your lower abdominal muscles.

• V ups

V ups can help you build some serious core strength. You can greatly isolate your core muscles to build your abdominal muscles. It also involves your oblique and some of your back muscles during the movement. Start by keeping your legs little above ground and once you have start to build strength with V ups. You can progress by using some additional weights which makes this movement more challenging.

• Bicycle Crunches

Bicycle Crunch works all the major abdominal muscles in your body. Your obliques are also activated when you perform the bicycle crunches. Also, if I missed telling you that the bicycle crunches also help you tone your thighs. This movement involves your hamstrings and quadriceps muscles as well.

• Jack Knife Crunch

If you are ready to challenge your abs and has engaged a lot of strength in your core. Then, these types of abdominal crunches are the progression your body needs. It is great bodyweight exercise to target your lower abs.

• Upside Down Hanging Crunches

Upside Down Hanging Crunches is another level bodyweight workout for your abs. But perform this exercise with caution as this is only recommended for advanced level. The people with issues of high blood pressure or any blood circulation disorder should stay away from doing this exercise.

8. Plank

Plank is an isometric bodyweight exercise which helps you builds core strength. It improves your stability by working on your back and glute muscles. This exercise is also good to strengthen your pelvic floor and diaphragm. It is a similar movement that of a push up. The only thing is you have to hold the position similar to push up.

There are many Plank variations you can try to engage your core.

• Single Arm Plank:

Doing a Single Arm Plank will help you build stability to your shoulders and intense core strength. It strengthens your shoulder and provides stability to your shoulder blades.

• Single Leg Plank:

Single Leg Plank is a level up challenge from a single arm plank. It is great for making progression to build core strength. The way it adds instability in the position makes it more challenging than doing a regular plank.

• Single Arm Single Leg Plank:

You can imagine yourself holding at a push up position with just one arm and one leg. Can you feel how challenging it is to maintain at this position. This type of plank is sure to increase your core strength to a next level.

9. Bodyweight Cardio Exercise

There is no use of a good chiseled physique when you don’t have endurance to sustain your strength. This makes it important for you to include bodyweight cardio exercises in your bodyweight workout. Including cardio will help you get your heart rate up which improves your blood circulation in the body. It is also good if you are looking to lose weight and want to burn extra calories. You should include these bodyweight cardio exercises in your workout.

• Inchworm

An Inchworm is a great bodyweight exercise which is great for warming up your body. Perform this exercise first thing in your bodyweight workout. Doing this exercise improves your stability and flexibility of your muscles.

• Jumping Jacks

Jumping Jack is an explosive bodyweight exercise that up your heart rate and fire the fat burning furnace of your body. Also, if you are working on your endurance, nothing beats the efficacy of jumping jacks.

• Mountain Climbers

Mountain Climber is a unique bodyweight exercise that works various muscles of your body. It fires up mostly all the muscles of your body which includes your abdominal, hips, deltoids, and arm muscles. Perform this exercise if you wish to improve your balance and coordination of your muscles.

• Lateral Jumps

Lateral Jumps are explosive bodyweight workout movements that can throw some serious balancing challenge. If you wish to improve your stability and explosive strength, this bodyweight exercise is your way to go with.

10. Bodyweight Exercise for improving Balance

Working on your balance is as important as building the body. If you wish to aim for overall fitness, you should work on your balance and stability too. When you perform an exercise, a good balance is very important to stay in the right form. Try these bodyweight exercises to improve your balance and stability. These exercises are also great to build core and overall strength in your body.

• Balance on Single Leg

The Balancing on a single leg is an effective exercise to work on your balance. You can also increase the challenge by standing on soft platform like a pillow and then standing on single leg. It can surely give you some serious balance challenge.

• Chest to Wall Handstand

A challenging mobility and balancing exercise that requires serious shoulder and back muscle strength. If you are into some kind of action sports, you know the importance of this exercise to work on your balance.

• Single Leg Romanian Dead Lift

The Single Leg RDL is an advance bodyweight exercise that works on your balancing and improves flexibility in your lower back, hips, and hamstrings.

These are pretty much all the effective bodyweight exercises that will help you build a great and conditioned physique. But, doing any random exercise will not land you at the right place. A good bodyweight workout program is something you need to follow to churn maximum benefits out of these bodyweight exercises.

Bodyweight Workout Program

A Bodyweight Workout program is important for you to progress and move in the forward direction. You can`t just randomly do any exercise and get the desired benefits. You need to follow a proper program for that. For a beginner workout, it even becomes more difficult to progress. As, he or she doesn`t know what to do because of lack of prior knowledge to do a workout. How can a beginner then make progress if he or she has no fixed routine to do things?

So, a proper Bodyweight Workout Program is needed to keep you committed and your workout sustainable. This workout program is then divided in weeks so you can gradually start making progress and move towards more advanced levels.

Bodyweight Workout Week 1-Week 4

The Week 1 to Week 4 is the initiation phase which is both important and is the foundation of your bodyweight workout. In these weeks, you will introduce to beginner bodyweight exercises. This will give you a chance to judge your body`s capability and test its strength.

1. Push Ups
2. Squats
3. Abdominal Crunches
4. Plank
5. Burpees

Do these exercises and record how many maximum reps of each you can do. Don`t forget to take rest for at least 30-60 second between different exercise to bring your heart and breathing rate to normal.

Day 1	Push Ups, Squats
Day 2	Abdominal Crunches, Plank
Day 3	Burpees
Day 4	Rest
Day 5	Push Ups , Squats
Day 6	Abdominal Crunches, Plank
Day 7	Rest

Bodyweight Workout Week 5-Week 8

You might have now developed some strength and got used to working out daily. The week 5 and Week 8 of your bodyweight workout are planned as some days with Upper Body, Lower Body, Abdominal and Cardio bodyweight exercises.

1. Upper Body Exercises: Push Ups, Dips, Pull Ups,
2. Lower Body Exercises: Squats, Lunges
3. Abdominal Exercises: Abdominal Crunches, Reverse Crunches, Plank
4. Cardio: Inch Worms, Jumping Jacks, Burpees

Do every exercise on its respective day and two reps less than failure in each exercise.

Day 1	Upper Body & Abs
Day 2	Lower Body
Day 3	Rest
Day 4	Cardio & Abs
Day 5	Upper Body
Day 6	Lower Body
Day 7	Rest

After the week 8, you have developed considerable amount of strength and conditioning in your body. You should now need to switch towards the progressive bodyweight exercises as we have discussed above.

Keep your workout plan same as above and move towards more progressive movements.  Start introducing a new progression in every exercise you do.  And, when you feel you are able to do it in right form and can go about 10-15 reps of that exercise. Then, you should switch to next progression of that exercise.  Also, now you should include bodyweight balancing exercises in you rest days to improve your conditioning and flexibility.

What about Nutrition?

A workout Program is always incomplete without a proper nutrition. The Bodyweight Workout is no different and is incomplete without the right nutrition. You should have right nutrition to aim for complete fitness and conditioning of your body. So how can you plan your nutrition and supplementation?

The general thumb of rule is to plan your macronutrient intake according to your daily intake calories. You need to plan the intake of carbohydrates, proteins and fats according to your body needs.

Read: How to plan your Calorie Intake according to Macronutrients?

What Supplements do you need?

Your body needs complete nutrition and some of that nutrition can only be completed by adding additional supplements. Taking these supplements can help you progress at a faster rate and you can reach your goal in less time.

However, supplements industry is hyped and there are lot of products available that claims to help you in your fitness journey. We are only mentioning those supplements which are essential and must be included in a beginner workout program. These supplements will help you with muscle growth and recovery.

• Creatine

Creatine helps in transporting nutrients into muscle which helps you improve your muscle strength and exercise performance. It is naturally found in your body and in some foods like red meats. Taking creatine in supplement form will help you replenish your creatine stores in your body.

• BCAA

BCAA is Branched Chain Amino Acids which you should take during your workout to reduce fatigue and accelerate recovery.  It also helps in decreasing muscle breakdown which is referred to as Catabolism.

• Whey Protein

Whey Protein is a quick digesting protein which contains essential amino acids your body needs to make recovery from your workout. Taking a whey protein just after your workout aids in recovery and help you put on lean muscle mass.

• Glutamine

Taking one serving of glutamine in your day can reduce the damage of a workout on your muscle. It helps in muscle protein synthesis which decreases the catabolism effect on your body.

• Vitamin C

Taking Vitamin C daily will protect you from cell damage in your body. It helps in repairing of your body tissues and maintenance of your bone and cartilage.