As you can see on all my uploaded pictures and videos, my workouts consist mainly on bodyweight exercises. I often get asked what kind of sport I practice. For some it might looks like gymnastics and for others like street workout. In this blog, I’d like to explain what “Calisthenics” is and give you a brief gimpse of my personal training style.
Even though I’m a member in a crossfit gym, I don’t practice crossfit to date. The reason why I chose to workout in Limitless Power in Kriens is the equipment. There aren’t 10 different machines to work on back from every possible angle, but there are rings, bars and free weights. This is basically all I need to have a good workout.
My workouts vary often. Some days I focus on pure strength training, on other days I train in hypertrophy or even in strength endurance range to feel the burn in the muscles. Also, there are days on which I just practice some skills like handstands (I do this when I’m really sored from the day before).
My main goal is to get stronger and master some advanced gymnastic skills. To clear things up, I don’t have a gymnastic background! I’ve learned my skills from my friends in the US and also with help of youtube. 🙂 Exercising with little equipment is pretty popular in California. You can find a workout area with pullup bars and pbars in almost every park and also at the beach. People in the States call this kind of working out calisthenics, which you probably know as street workout. An advantage of calisthenics is that you don’t need a gym membership, but still can build muscles. It’s being said that people who practice calisthenics often aren’t that muscular like the guys from the gym (I’m speaking about bodybuilder), but they’re strong and got pretty sick skills. Calisthenics can be done by everyone because the workouts can vary in difficulty. While a beginner workout includes basic exercises like pushups, pullups, dips, squats and situps, you can modify the basic skills to make them harder. More advanced exercises are muscleups, handstand pushups, planche pushups etc. which all require solid strength. Another advantage of calisthenics is that it will help you with any goal. Whether you want bigger muscles, gain strength or lose bodyfat, bodyweight training in combination with a proper diet will get you there. Last but not least, Calisthenics looks awesome. If you do the human flag in front of your friends or even some strangers, I swear you will have their attention (….yes, I miss the Muscle Beach!!).
Search for Calisthenics on YouTube and you will see what I’m talking about.
To summarize, I practice Calisthenics but I also include elements from gymnastics in my routine. My aim is to get stronger, to master more advanced skills and of course to stay in good physical shape.
Let me know if you want to start with Calisthenics or need more information about it. I’ll be glad to help you.
– Tinu
