Adam Steer Teaches Scott Sonnon's Leg Swoop Exercise

Bodyweight Exercises could be the next big thing.  With the uncertainty about personal finances everyone is facing, looking for ways to save a few bucks is a universal theme these days.  If you like to stay in shape, but you’re not sure you want to pay for a gym membership again this year, you may be looking for options.

Some of you are blessed enough to have home gyms or to live in places with gyms.  That’s a great alternative to the commercial gym environment and you can easily build yourself a program to get the same results as you would at a commercial facility.  But what if you live in a small space or just are not interested in the clutter of a home gym?  Not a problem.  All you need to get in exactly the shape you want is your own body weight.

Body weight exercise {has been around for centuries} in various physical cultures.  From the Iranian Pahlavani wrestlers, to the incredibly strong practitioners of traditional Indian yoga to today’s modern gymnasts, there is a lengthy track record of building great health with nothing but bodyweight training and a few simple training tools.

But these amazing bodies were not built with boring repetition of mind-numbing conventional bodyweight exercises.  The exercises used in many of these physical cultures are themselves impressive physical feats.  The boundaries to the variety of body weight exercise options are pretty much endless, and your imagination is the only thing holding you back.

So if the image of countless repetitions of push ups and sit ups leads you to despair, have no fear.  There are countless options of equipment free exercises that you can work into workout regimens for any goal.  Whatever your goal, the only thing you need is your own body weight, a few good body weight exercise resources, some inventiveness and some sweat equity.

One great source for bodyweight exercise ideas is YouTube.  Do a search for bodyweight exercise and start sifting through all the great clips.  Pay particular attention to anything from Scott Sonnon, founder of the Circular Strength Training system (CST), and Adam Steer, CST Head Coach.  Both have some great tutorials of imaginative exercises that are equipment free.  If you want to skip the YouTube search you can head over to the Squidoo Lens devoted to body weight exercises for the road warrior.  It has a few different videos.  Click through to the original YouTube source and you’ll find countless bodyweight-only exercise treasures.

You can also grab a free tutorial of the number one best bodyweigh exercise around, the Quad Squat, by grabbing yourself the free wellness package over at the Better Is Better blog.  The Quad Squat is a great place to start and will spur your imagination into action so you’ll be inventing your own training twists before you know it.

Lastly, you can consider examples of great movement for help.  You can watch gymnasts, tumblers and dancers to get ideas for bodyweight exercise.  Usually, what they are doing is light years beyond what we mere mortals can expect to accomplish, but by breaking down the movements into bite sized pieces we can create some pretty exciting and efficient variations to include in our fitness plan.

There are no longer any excuses.  I predict this cheap and effective means of training may just turn out to be the trendy exercise option this year.  Give bodyweight excercises a try.  Not only could you save on your gym membership, but you may even find that you end up achieving your dream body when 2010 rolls around.