beginning bodyweight training.PLEASE HELP!

[GreenRage]

Hey all, I'm new to the boards and was wondering if I could get some help and direction with my workout. I've seen all of the great advice offered on other topics pertaining to weight lifting but I'm looking for help with bodyweight training, mainly for free running and an overall healthy feel. I'm 20 years old and I just started working out about two months ago, mostly chin-ups, pull-ups, pushups, and some free weight curls. For the first month I felt a huge difference in my body shape and overall strength but now I’m feeling like what I’m doing is all wrong and I can’t find a tutorial on how to properly set up a workout plan that will actually get results and won't require as much weight lifting. (Mainly because I don’t have a lot of weights, or time.)

I guess what I really want to know is if it’s even possible to gain upper body strength by just doing chins, and pull-ups. And if so, how to properly go about doing so. When I started exercising two months ago I could only do two chin-ups and two pull-ups so I was pretty damn weak. Anyway, since then I've been gradually raising the number of reps per set and also the number of sets for chin-ups to where I can do 10 sets of 9 reps each. The problem is that I don’t know what the hell I’m doing and I know something’s wrong cuz in order to do that many I have to wait 5-10 minutes in between, which doesn’t sound right. I've decided to totally revamp my workout and try for fewer sets with the max reps which right now are about 10 (which are fully extended and slow.) I guess what i want to know is if this is right or should I just keep on doing the 10 sets but with less rest time between sets? Also I've thrown bench pressing into my workout and curls of 4 sets of 4-6 reps with 30lbs hand weights. Again, I really don’t have a clue what I’m doing and would love to join a gym but with school and work, there’s just no time. I really want to make this a big part of my life routine, physical self-improvement is awesome but hard when you don’t know what your doing. So, if anybody can help in any way I would really appreciate any comments of pointers. Thanks and sorry about the rant.

 

[Starcraftmazter]

In regards to chinups and pullups, try doing sets of 12 reps (8-12 reps = max results), with a minute in between.

Chinups, pullups, pushups and dips are four excellent exercises for upper body, and will gain good results, yes. After all, that's what the 300 did 8)

From what I've learned here, all-body compound exercises are best. If you have a routine, which exercises the same muscle groups over and over - but in different ways, it will really give you great results.


Also, I do some parkour training (very similar to free running I'm sure you know)...when I have the time, and it's totally awesome
Hi 5.

 

[GreenRage]

Thanks a lot for the advice, I'll go for the 8-12 max reps but how many sets of that should I make as my goal for the workout? If you don’t mind me asking, what type of chin-up, pull-up, and dip routine do you regularly do? I mean how many reps and sets in a given workout. Just for comparison, I’d like to know what to work for.

Yes, I love Parkour, I'm only beginning but it's the main reason I’m exercising now. Good stuff.

 

[Starcraftmazter]

Yes, I think parkour is an essential skill to have

Parkour uses pretty much all muscles, currently I'm on a routine given to me by Shaft, and it goes like this:

*Squats
*Deadlifts
*Push Exercise (Variations of bench press, military press, etc)
*Pull Exercise (Pull-Ups, variations of rows, etc)
*Lunges
*Core Work

And I'm pretty satisfied with it so far. I belieeeve in the power of all-body compound exercise workouts now

I always try new things, but right now for my pushing and pulling exercise, which I see as the core of my workout, I have:
Pushups / Chinups
Bench Presses / Pullups
And switch them between workout days.

For both my chinups and pullups, I do 3 sets of 8.
While I can do the first two sets in both exercises, on the last set, with pullups, I can't do the last half or so reps (so 4) all the way up, and generally feel totally de-strengthened towards the end.
I'm finding that the pushing exercises tend to take their toll on me (3 sets of 12), so I'm going to try something new on monday, and do the pulling exercise first, and maybe switch the order every 2 workouts. But that's just me, see what works for you.

Me personally, I hate pullups so much, I just hate them ><
But it's an undeniable fact, that in parkour, you need to pull yourself up on obstacles all the time, and that's exactly like a pullup. Pullups also work the back very well, which is important for rolls, since your back is your padding when you land.