5 Best Bodyweight Exercises For Men

There are tons of bodyweight exercises you can use to build a strong, fit body. All of them have their specific advantages. So there comes a time when you ask yourself - if one could choose the top exercises for a certain goal, what would they be?

Here's a list of top 5 bodyweight exercises for men who want to get a more muscular looking physique.

If you're one of those guys who want:

• bigger chest and arms
  
• wide back
  
• six-pack abs
  
• legs that don't look like you never use them...

...then this is for you. Read on to find out what makes these exercises best for you.

Hand Release Push Up

Target: Bigger chest

Advantage: No "stretch reflex" + More range of motion

Regular Push Ups are great, but you'll need more than that if you really want to focus on your chest. The Hand Release Push Up has two great benefits for building a bigger chest:

1. The movement gets stopped at the point when you lower your body yourself to the floor. This way you can't use the "stretch reflex" of your chest for pushing back up, as you would if you just kept pumping those regular Push Ups in a row.
2. There is a bigger range of motion because the chest is allowed to touch the floor. This works almost as if you were doing deficit Push Ups, when you place your hands on a higher surface and let your body go lower than the level of your hands for extra muscle activation.

Need instructions or workouts with the Hand Release Push Up? Get it for free in the Madbarz App for iOS and Android.

Chin Up

Target: Wide back, bigger lats

Advantage: Get a bigger Biceps without even trying

Pulling exercises with various grips are the best way to build a strong, big upper body with minimal equipment. There's more info on why Pull Ups are so awesome, as well as a detailed explanation of the difference between Pull Ups and Chin Ups. For this list, however, Chin Ups are the better choice simply because they activate your biceps more, helping you to get bigger looking, more muscular arms. Want to break your pulling limits? Check out this article with tips that can help you do more Pull Ups or Chin Ups.

Bulgarian Split Squat

Target: No more chicken legs

Advantage: More burn in the quads, less mobility required

A well built male physique requires muscular legs, not just the upper body. Many seem to forget that, but you won't. The split squat is an efficient leg blasting exercise you can do at home.

Why is it better suited than the regular Squat?

The male body is generally speaking less flexible, which is very often visible in the hips. Many women can easily squat deep without any kind of warm-up. Guys, on the other hand, need a lot of mobility work to reach the "ass to grass" squat. But men as they are, will usually still do all they can to perform deep squats and most likely, perform them as fast as they can. This can put an excessive load on the spine if too. Using the split squats helps you overcome some of the mobility issues and also hit your quads harder. Did we mention single leg work is great for balance? Note that, too.

Does that mean you shouldn't do squats? Of course not, but you need to focus on your form, just as in other exercises ;)

Burpee

Target: Burn fat to reveal your muscles

Advantage: There's no faster way to completely use all of your energy in a couple of minutes

While doing Burpees your heart rate increases instantly from moving up and down. Such high-intensity exercise can burn up to 50% more calories than moderate exercising. The research compares the effect of 30 seconds of fast Burpees to a 30-second all-out sprint! Here are other reasons why you should love Burpees.

L-Sit

Target: Abs of steel

Advantage: Builds stronger arms, too

No, you don't need parallel bars. You can do the L-Sit on the floor, too. It's a powerful exercise and it will be a real challenge to master it. The effort is definitely worth it. Even as you practice to achieve this position, your arms, abs, and legs will be burning, so no time is wasted! The best way is to start practicing with your knees flexed and then slowly progressing towards a straight leg L-Sit.

What are your favorite bodyweight exercises? Write in the comments below - let's see what will be no. 1!