Barbell Exercises for Legs

Back squat

Stand with your feet shoulder with apart and place the barbell on your shoulders (behind the neck). Squat down until your thighs are parallel to the ground or a bit lower, pause and stand back up.

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Medicine ball is often an overlooked exercising tool that can add a great variety of challenging exercise to your workouts. In this post we will go over the most well-known medicine ball exercise variations as well as describe a few "less mainstream" variations. If you are interesting in discovering a bit more about other exercising tools like kettlebells and dumbbells, have a look at our previous blog posts here and here.

Superman Extensions

Lie down on the floor with your hand extended in front of you. Raise your upper body and legs at the same time while holding a light medicine ball in your hand. Pause and slowly return back to the starting position. This is an excellent exercise for building lower back strength and stability.

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Following the success of or Kettlebell Exercise List blog post we decided to create one for dumbbells. Since dumbbells are a more common and accessible fitness training tool, we hope that this article will benefit many users of our gym as well as others.

Push-ups using dumbbells

Hold two dumbbells in your hands and place them shoulder with apart on the ground. Keep your core muscles engaged and your whole body as straight as possible. Perform a regular military push-up. Dumbbells will allow you to go a bit deeper than usually.

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Here have just created a well-rounded 3 day full-body conditioning routine. The main focus is on simplicity and use of highly effective movements. While the concept stays the same, there are some major differences between the three days. In day one we will be using an olympic barbell and the focus will be on the development of raw strength. In day two we are going to use kettlebells in order to develop that explosive strength and improve core and posterior chain muscle endurance. Day three will be all about bodyweight training and learning how to properly and efficiently use your body to execute demanding movement patterns.

Day 1 - Olympic barbell:

Perform 10 reps for each exercise without taking breaks between the exercises (or putting down your barbell). When you have done 10 reps of all exercise take a 1 minute break and repeat the whole process for five times in total. Shoulder press – grab the bar a bit wider than shoulder with apart. Lift it up and slowly lower it back down. Rest it on your chest or on your shoulders (behind your head) before pressing up again. You can alternate the sides or pick the one that feels most comfortable for you.

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In this post we have provided you with a large variety of kettlebell exercises. We believe that kettlebell is a great tool for developing mobility, explosive strength and upper body endurance. You will see that we have divided the exercises in small groups depending on the main muscle group each of them is targeting. You can pick and choose the exercises to fit your needs and develop a great full-body workout routine. Just remember, even though an exercise might be "posterior chain dominant", most of the exercises listed here are full-body exercises. Be prepared… this post is a long one!

Posterior chain

Kettlebell swing: Feet should be shoulder with apart and lower back completely straight. Use your legs and hips to generate movement in order to swing the kettlebell up. Stop the movement when your arm is parallel to the ground. All the “work” is done by your legs, hips and core muscles, not your arm or shoulder.

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Good joint ability is a very important aspect of improving individual’s athletic performance. Quite often people experience inability to perform a specific movement not because of lack of strength, but because of lack of sufficient range of motion in the major joints. Use of joint mobility exercise will not only help to improve athletic performance, but it is also a great prehab tool for avoiding injuries and degenerative joint illnesses when you are older.

In this blog post we will show you a very basic, easy to follow joint mobility routine which you can (and should) use as a part of your warm-up routine before boxing or fitness training. A lot of emphasis will be put on shoulder mobility since it is a common problem area for many athletes, but especially boxers.

Shoulder mobility A: Relax your arms and let them hang at your sides. Start to slowly move your shoulder joint in a circular motion. Try to use a full range of motion, but don’t put too much pressure or additional force. Perform 10 circles forward followed by 10 circles backwards.

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Core muscles consist of the oblique, abdominal muscles, lower back, and the gluteal muscles. These four areas of the body are the ones that frame the posture of a person. Having strong core muscles will make you physically more powerful, it will help you to maintain balance in physical activities. All explosive body movements are generated in the core region. It doesn’t matter how strong your arms, legs or shoulders are individually if the centre of your body isn’t able to produce the same or higher power output.

If someone has a ripped six pack it doesn’t certainly mean that he/she has strong core muscles. Most of the time it only shows that this person has a low level of body fat. People often underestimate the importance of strong core musculature, especially abdominal muscles. It’s important to remember that core muscles have three main tasks: generation of movement, protection if spine and protection of internal organs.

Below you can find a basic core muscle training routine which focuses on both static and flexing type core training exercises.

Regular plank: place your elbows shoulder-with apart on the ground and extend your legs. Keep your abdominal muscles strained and buttocks slightly raised so that your belly doesn’t sink in. Maintain this position for as long as you can (at least 15 seconds and no longer than 3 minutes).

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In a recent blog post we tried to cover the very basics of nutrition and dietary planning. In this article we will focus more on the major food groups and try to provide a bit more specific guidance on the creation of your individual diet/nutrition plan.

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I think we all would agree that proper nutrition is a vital part of a healthy and active lifestyle. Unfortunately not many people fully understand at what scale nutrition can actually affect ones physical performance and visual appearance. As Mark Sisson, the author of one of the most popular fitness & nutrition blogs has said: “80% of your fitness related gains (including visual appearance) will come from your nutrition and just 20% from the way you train”. Probably many have heard the saying “ABS are made in the kitchen, not in the gym” and honestly I couldn’t agree more.

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If your objectives is to improved general fitness, endurance and lose weight one of your best options is high intensity interval training. Due to the variable intensity and training patterns this approach allows you to reach your goals in a faster and more efficient way.

Quite often interval training routines are performed using treadmills, elliptical trainers or other forms of traditional cardio equipment. While you are still able to gain the cardiovascular benefits, it’s not the best approach to obtain general fitness. The main issue is that majority of active people have got a good level of lower body muscle endurance, but unfortunately their upper body muscle endurance is usually quite weak. By placing more emphasis on exercises that develop upper body it’s possible to fix this disbalance. The following routine is designed with exactly this objective in mind.

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