Post: #76

Seen this guy?





Not an endorsement. My research is not complete on him.

Post: #77

Bar stars do pushups pullups and dips basically everyday. After they get their routine done (every day is different) they'll try out moves on the monkeybars, like clapping pullups or muscleups or flipping around the bar, really any sort of trick you could think of.

If they're not strong enough for a particular feat they'll keep hitting different variations of pushups pullups and dips until they are.

I don't much care for al kavadlo, bodyweight feats become easy if you weigh as much as a decent sized middle schooler. You can only write so many books on getting big with pullups before people ask "where is your mad gains?".

That said, his books are artfully done and they're a decent primer if you don't know where to start. Given the amount of "guest posts" on his blog by "coach" Paul Wade, I'm inclined to believe that the kavadlo brothers write convict conditioning.

If you're talking about something more structured than that go hit up the gymnastic bodies forum and get a copy of foundation 1. Convict conditioning isn't terrible either but foundation 1 is going to give you actual results by following the program to the letter.

Post: #78

This little kid has done amazing things, and has some great moves. That said, and it is by no means meant to disparage his achievement, he is helped significantly by being a small, skinny guy. A reasonably sized adult man is going to struggle a lot more to develop the same kind of proficiency within a reasonable time frame. I think calisthenics have a prominent place in any good training regime, but honestly if you're a decent size and coming to it as an adult, I think the time investment doesn't really work out over the long term. I spent a few months last year doing exclusively gymnastics stuff (look up the Foundation courses by coach Sommer for progressions), and it was very useful for teaching me about flexibility, mobility, and for building some static strength. But as a tall guy of a reasonable size in my mid twenties, I wasn't ever going to reach any meaningful proficiency, and weights ultimately offered a better means of measurable progression.

Post: #79

I think this is the reason why bigger guys go for weights, whereas smaller, shorter guys go for calisthenics. Bigger guys move more weight from the get go, which motivates them. Smaller guys starting out can do like 50 pushups in a row and that motivates them.

The amount of hate on weightlifting in the Convict Conditioning series is like reading a diary of a chubby girl's impotent rage on why she will never be pretty or get attention like her more popular friends (lol).

I agree wholeheartedly with H1N1 here, calisthenics definitely have their place in a training program. They encourage mobility and higher levels of relative strength, which also discourages high levels of bodyfat.

The way I looked at it, even though the shorter gymnasts were going to get full planches and maybe even feats like the manna or the maltese with enough time and dedication, I could get a lot of mileage out of simple stuff like pseudoplanche pushups and different variations of bodyweight rows.

Foundation 1 was great and I made some good gains with it, but one of the things I really didn't care for what the need for strange or improvised equipment for certain mobility exercises. It seemed to defeat the purpose of a program where the draw was that you didn't need a set of weights.

"Street workout" has gotten popular in certain places of the world because there are no gyms or the people doing them are too poor to afford a membership.

It's better than nothing and the results (with enough effort) speak for themselves. If you live by a playground and you don't think you'll get arrested, you can go there instead of the gym and just hammer on pullups, dips, and pushups for an hour a day.

Post: #80

This is a channel with excellent vids:

Post: #81

I am well aware that I may have contradicted myself compared to what I said in the past, but I can't stress enough that if you are into calisthenics training for the long term, get your body fat down to 6-12%. The specific number does not really matter. Once there, if you're fat and have always been fat, try to deprogram your brain from the compulsion to stuff your face at every meal. It is hard in the US since nearly everybody eats to failure at least one meal per day.

If you're fat and training pushups or dips it's just such a pain in the ass to make progress. When I was leaner (like 15%), doing hspu and chinups was great fun and the workouts were a breeze to be consistent with.

Ever since I got more sedentary and fatter, workouts have been irritating because I'm so used to push high numbers of reps. Now I gas out on the last set or two. Long breaks from training are easier to justify mentally.

Anybody calling bullshit can look at any of these youtube videos. These guys are all lean. The more jacked they are, invariably the leaner they are. Correlation may not be causation, but even assuming my reasoning above is faulty, why are these guys all lean? Does training make them lean, or does leanness make them want to keep training?

Barring that, why willingly make things harder on yourself? Over time you'll just be less likely to stick to something.

I'm in the process of getting leaner right now and genuinely excited to see where my numbers (chins/dips/hspu) will be once I lose the fucking weight. Then I plan on making the biggest cheap-broke ass gains in my life. In one year I hope to get to 15 handstand pushups in one set.

Once you get down there (most guys will be 135-180 pounds), according to everybody I know at that physique it should be no problem to stay lean by basically doing shitloads of reps of everything.

If anything it should be easy to stay lean simply because you'll want to exercise and be active. Skinny people have more energy.

Post: #82

Havind done an overall research and putting the bodyweight exercises and progressions into practice, I can conclude in my opinion that If you want to start training with calisthenics and mastering your own bodyweight, there are two guys that can teach you from zero.

There are two approaches.

The simplest one:

Kinobody

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVfpj4ejmBY

The complex one, LittleBeast , for those who like to do a more in deep research and learning the why of everything

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMlTt9xxaE0

Post: #83

(07-25-2013 10:17 PM)PoosyWrecker Wrote:  

(07-25-2013 02:22 AM)Eastbound Wrote:  Imo, Bruce Lee with a tad bit more muscle is an ideal male physique for most females.

It's been over 10 years since I read the Tao of Jeet Kune Do but I'm pretty sure Bruce Lee did barbell exercises and recommended lifting heavy weights for all martial artists.

"The Art of Expressing The Human Body" has a more detailed breakdown of his workouts and nutrition. I remember reading he favored compound moves with a barbell (clean and press, squats, etc.), 2 sets of 6-12 reps, three days a week.

I'd imagine combining that with a basic calisthenics/stretching routine would bring great results.

Post: #84

Convict conditioning is an excellent book for anyone getting into calisthenics. And anyone looking to advance too

Post: #85

Bumping this thread to see if there are any Calisthenics practitioners out there, either exclusive or mixing it with weights.

I've been doing it for the past couple of years. Have always been on the lighter side and I find this type of training fits me perfectly. Plus I love the minimalism of it. If there's interest I can start a new thread where we discuss progressions, resources, goals, progress, plateaus etc.

Post: #86

I'm a bodyweight / weights person right now my upper body work consists of

Gymnastic bodies fsp:
Dead hang
Pbar support hold
Reverse plank
Scapular protraction on all fours
Hollow hold
arch hold

Then I do my bent arm work which on day a it's ring rows superset psuedo planche pushups
B day is dips and face pulls

Then I do curls or tricep extensions to ward off tendonitis from my straight arm work. Seriously no one in the body weight world realizes how important these are. Mostly bicep curls in my case(I have a hyper extended elbow and small lengthy biceps...)

Groundbreaking fitness research.

Post: #87

Also forgot to mention after I finish psuedoplanche pushups i like to do a set of incline dumbell bench for atleast 6 reps.

Pretty much every set of my bent arm work is to failure because i never feel right unless i know i failed on the last rep. Maybe its not the most efficient way to train but in my opinion its better to work hard and know you stimulated hypertrophy instead of leaving things to chance.

Post: #88

I can do 6-7 muscle ups right now. Not super strict form as I use a bit of momentum sometimes, the very slow gravity-defeating ones from Youtube seems impossible to me.

I had this crazy idea of getting to 20. I will probably follow the 20 pull ups challenge and customise it a bit to see if I can get there. Probably not as muscle up take way more strength but who knows.

On another note I can not do a front lever for shit been training 5 months for it now but still far..

Post: #89

For front lever you need solid hollow hold and lsit work. I assume your core is weak if you aren't progressing after that long.

For muscle ups straight bar dips and transition work will help.

I've never been huge into muscle ups they're more like a trick than anything. For gymnasts they arent even counted as an excersize they're just how you get to the top of your rings.