Think bodyweight training is too easy or too hard? Think again! Whether you're a newbie or a calisthenics pro, these 8 strategies will transform your workouts and unlock superhuman strength.
8 Ways to Scale Your Calisthenics (Up or Down)
1 | Elevation & Body Angles Elevate your hands or feet to shift your bodyweight and target different muscle groups. Progress gradually by reducing elevation over time. Want to really challenge yourself? Elevate the opposite side of your body for an even greater challenge!
Push Ups: Elevate your hands to make it easier on your upper body. Elevate your feet to make it harder
Bodyweight Rows: Increase your body angle relative to the floor to make it easier. Decrease it (closer to parallel with floor) to make it harder)
2 | Range of Motion Start with a shorter range of motion to build confidence and joint stability. Gradually increase the range over time to enhance strength and progress to more advanced skills.
Box Step Ups: Start with a small step/box for stability. Slowly progress to a taller box over time for strength and hypertrophy.
3 | Eccentrics Focus on the negative (eccentric) part of the movement, where you're naturally stronger. This will help you build the strength needed to eventually perform the full skill.
Chin Ups: Start with negatives to enhance your awareness of the movement path and strength needed. Eventually progressing to full reps.
4 | Leverage Extend your lever length to make exercises harder. Hollow body holds, dragon flags, and classics like Front & Back lever – these are just a few ways to turn up the heat on your bodyweight training.
Hollow Body Holds: Probably the easiest place to practice and get used to the various levers/shapes.
5 | Mechanical Advantage Reps Combine shorter levers on the way up (concentric) with longer levers on the way down (eccentric). This is a clever way to bridge the gap between different levels of difficulty.
Dragon Flags: Unlock longer levers and prepare for the classics with this Bruce Lee inspired core strengthener.
6 | Resistance Bands Bands are your calisthenics BFF! Use them for assistance, added resistance, and everything in between to unlock new skills and supercharge your strength.
(Power) Pull Ups: Use bands to get your first reps or increase your range and speed to eventually get over the bar!
7 | Weighted Calisthenics Feeling strong? Add weight to your exercises to make gravity feel like a thing of the past. Once you remove the added weight, you'll feel superhuman!
Pull Ups: Adding weight to pull ups is one of the best ways to develop the strength for tons of advanced skills like the muscle up and front lever.
8 | Plyometrics Explosiveness is key for both strength and athleticism. Incorporate plyometric movements to increase force production and unlock impressive skills.
Sprinter Lunges: A great place for beginners to start unlocking some lower body power and explosiveness.
Bodyweight Training: A Primal Approach
These strategies will help you:
Get insanely strong using only your bodyweight
Scale your training to any level
Train anytime, anywhere
We recently released COMPOUND, a three-phase program that teaches you how to apply all of these techniques. It's the perfect next step after our joint health program ISOLATE, and it sets you up for success in our mixed movement skills program, FLOW.
Our tribe takes a bodyweight-first approach to training, aligning with the movements our bodies evolved for. Let's master our bodyweight and evolve together!
Thanks for watching & reading! With gratitude,
Jared F.
Creator & Head Coach | EV/CO
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