http://www.LeeHayward.com

In this video Im going to go over a total body workout routine that you can do using just bodyweight exercises.

The first exercise is the basic push up.
Push ups are great for building up the chest, shoulders, and triceps. They also bring the muscles throughout the mid-section and core into play as stabilizers to keep your body straight.

Here in the video both my self and my better half Patricia are doing the workout set for set.

Youll notice that here on the video we are doing the push ups with our hands placed on an exercise matt. This tends to make the exercise more comfortable then if you did them with your hands placed on the hard floor.

You can vary your hand spacing and positions with each set to work the muscles from different angles. Wider hand spacing tends to place more stress on the chest. And a closer hand spacing tends to focus more on working the triceps.

Were doing our bodyweight workout in a circuit routine fashion. Moving quickly from one exercise to the next. Only resting long enough for the other person to complete their set.

Here Im doing bodyweight squats. This is a great exercise that works the entire lower body from the quadriceps, hamstrings, hips, and glutes. When doing squats youll make the exercise a lot harder and get more benefit if you use a full range of motion and squat all the way down.

Here you can see Patricia doing bodyweight squats from a side angle. Youll notice that her upper thighs go down part parallel with the floor. This is what is referred to as a full squat.

When doing bodyweight squats you can hold your arms in whatever way feels best to you. You can hold them to the front as shown here, or you can keep them down by your sides.

Next we are moving on to bodyweight rows. I normally like to do this exercise in the smith machine as it keeps the bar more solid, but here on the video were doing them in the squat rack and holding the bar in place for each other so it doesnt slide or rotate.

Place your feet up on a flat exercise bench as shown in the video and then row yourself up until your torso touches the bar. This can be a tough exercise for beginners and will most likely take some getting used to.

Really focus on keeping your body straight throughout the exercise, dont let your hips sag down. It will help if you arch your back and expand your chest, almost as if you were trying to bring your chest up to meet the bar.

You can target different areas of the back depending on where you row. Pulling your stomach to the bar will work the lower lats more. And pulling your chest towards the bar will work more of the upper back and rear delts.

Now were moving on to one of my favorite abdominal exercises. Decline bench sit ups. This exercise is one of the best ab exercises because it works all areas of the mid-section, from the upper abs, lower abs, and obliques.

The steeper the decline on the bench, the hard the exercise will be.

Well, there you have it a complete total body workout using just your bodyweight. Like I mentioned before, go through each of the exercises in a circuit fashion, and then repeat the entire circuit again. A good goal to work up to is to perform 100 total reps of each exercise.

Bodyweight exercises are a quick and very effective way to stimulate some new muscle growth. Give this bodyweight circuit routine a try in your own workouts.

For more workout routines and exercise tips, check out my website at:
www.LeeHayward.com

Duration : 0:4:23

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