Beginner bodyweight workout

Starting to work out can both be expensive and time consuming. A gym membership at a good quality place can easily cost you around 100 dollars a month. Then there is the time it takes to go there and not to talk of the waiting time when somebody is using the machines you need.

No wonder more than 50% of people with a gym membership never uses it.

An alternative to all this is bodyweight workouts. The beauty with this way of working out is that it doesn’t require any equipment and therefore can be done anywhere and anytime. The expensive gym membership you never use can be skipped and suddenly you can work out right away when you feel the need – no need to travel to a specific place. It’s just you and your body.

Especially for the beginner, a bodyweight workout has many benefits. Let’s look at some of them.

Good bodyweight workouts mostly consist of functional movements. These will not only give you a great workout but will also strengthen your body in a way that helps prevent injuries. Machines often focus on a few muscles and doesn’t strengthen the important muscles that support them.
Bodyweight workouts can easily be combined so they both work your strength, cardio & flexibility.
Most bodyweight exercises will involve the core. Core strength is one of the most important things to maintain a healthy body.
Many combinations. Have you ever seen a standard gym program with machines? You repeat around 10 exercises week after week. Bodyweight workouts can be done in endless combinations.

Ok, I think we got enough reasons to start with bodyweight workouts, but the question is then how do you actually start?

There are plenty of bodyweight workouts if you search Google or YouTube, but the issue with most of them is that they are too general and have no progression plan.

The key to start working out is to start at the right level. Otherwise you will either be fatigued quickly and risk injuries or simply not see any progress. The conclusion is that you will give up.

In this article, we will look at 3 beginner bodyweight workouts. One workout focuses on strength, one focuses on stamina/aerobic, and the last one focuses on cardio/High intensity.

All workouts will be full-body workouts.

The criteria for the exercises I have chosen are:

They are functional movements that will work the most possible muscles.
They can be done by a beginner without big risk of injuries.
They can be done without equipment.

If these workouts are too easy for you, please look at my other programs here.

Make sure to warm up prior to the workouts. If you don’t know how to do that, look at these examples.

Now let’s have a look at the first beginner bodyweight workout.

Beginner bodyweight workout with focus on strength:

Strength workouts need to be done with a controlled pulse and pauses in between the exercises.

We want to put our muscles under tension as long as possible, and with as big force as possible. But never compromise on the form. Strong muscles help us with a good posture, make us look lean and help to boost our metabolism.

5 Rounds of:

5 Push-ups – doing them on knees is perfectly fine.
10 Air squat – Squat down as deep as possible with good form.
Plank hold – Do it as long as possible with good form. If it’s less than 15sec, do the plank on knees.

Rest 1min between exercises and 1:30min between rounds.

Beginner bodyweight workout with focus on stamina/aerobic:

For this kind of workout, we need to get the pulse up. We need to be around 70% of our max effort. This is when we can only talk in short sentences.

These kind of workouts will improve our cardiovascular fitness and raise our metabolism.

For 14 mins without break:

Do as many repetitions and rounds as possible during the 14 mins of:

10 Lunges, alternating.
5 Burpees – select a version you can do for all 14 mins
30 feet/10m Bear Crawl
10 Flutter Kicks

Beginner bodyweight workout with focus on cardio/high intensity

In this workout we will work for a short period but the intensity will be really really high.

These kind of workouts can be very demanding. Therefore, only do them if you are sure that you can handle them.

Beginner bodyweight workout

Starting to work out can both be expensive and time consuming. A gym membership at a good quality place can easily cost you around 100 dollars a month. Then there is the time it takes to go there and not to talk of the waiting time when somebody is using the machines you need.

No wonder more than 50% of people with a gym membership never uses it.

Especially for the beginner, a bodyweight workout has many benefits. Let’s look at some of them.

Good bodyweight workouts mostly consist of functional movements. These will not only give you a great workout but will also strengthen your body in a way that helps prevent injuries. Machines often focus on a few muscles and doesn’t strengthen the important muscles that support them.

Bodyweight workouts can easily be combined so they both work your strength, cardio & flexibility.

Most bodyweight exercises will involve the core. Core strength is one of the most important things to maintain a healthy body.

Many combinations. Have you ever seen a standard gym program with machines? You repeat around 10 exercises week after week. Bodyweight workouts can be done in endless combinations.

Ok, I think we got enough reasons to start with bodyweight workouts, but the question is then how do you actually start?

There are plenty of bodyweight workouts if you search Google or YouTube, but the issue with most of them is that they are too general and have no progression plan.

The key to start working out is to start at the right level. Otherwise you will either be fatigued quickly and risk injuries or simply not see any progress. The conclusion is that you will give up.

In this article, we will look at 3 beginner bodyweight workouts. One workout focuses on strength, one focuses on stamina/aerobic, and the last one focuses on cardio/High intensity.

All workouts will be full-body workouts.

The criteria for the exercises I have chosen are:

They are functional movements that will work the most possible muscles.

They can be done by a beginner without big risk of injuries.

They can be done without equipment.

If these workouts are too easy for you, please look at my other programs here.

Make sure to warm up prior to the workouts. If you don’t know how to do that, look at these examples.

Now let’s have a look at the first beginner bodyweight workout.

Beginner bodyweight workout with focus on strength:

Strength workouts need to be done with a controlled pulse and pauses in between the exercises.

We want to put our muscles under tension as long as possible, and with as big force as possible. But never compromise on the form. Strong muscles help us with a good posture, make us look lean and help to boost our metabolism.

5 Rounds of:

5 Push-ups – doing them on knees is perfectly fine.

10 Air squat – Squat down as deep as possible with good form.

Plank hold – Do it as long as possible with good form. If it’s less than 15sec, do the plank on knees.

Rest 1min between exercises and 1:30min between rounds.

Beginner bodyweight workout with focus on stamina/aerobic:

For this kind of workout, we need to get the pulse up. We need to be around 70% of our max effort. This is when we can only talk in short sentences.

These kind of workouts will improve our cardiovascular fitness and raise our metabolism.

For 14 mins without break:

Do as many repetitions and rounds as possible during the 14 mins of:

10 Lunges, alternating.

5 Burpees – select a version you can do for all 14 mins

30 feet/10m Bear Crawl

10 Flutter Kicks

Beginner bodyweight workout with focus on cardio/high intensity

In this workout we will work for a short period but the intensity will be really really high.

These kind of workouts can be very demanding. Therefore, only do them if you are sure that you can handle them.

Pulse have to around 95% of max. This is when you only can speak single words.

Make sure to really warm up and then go full speed ahead.

8 sets of: Work 20sec, then rest 20sec

Set 1,3,5,7 As many repetitions as possible(AMRAP) of Jumping Squats

Set 2,4,6,8 AMRAP Mountain Climbers

Now it’s your turn. Give it a try and let me know what you think.

I have many more articles and workouts here if interested.

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