If you have a skinny figure, simply lifting weights or using whey protein in your diet is unlikely to deliver effective results.
While weight lifting is essential to work the muscles and bulk up, it is more time-consuming and increases the chances of injuries. Instead, a safer and more practical alternative is using muscle-gaining exercises with calisthenics routines to burn fat.
Calisthenics is unlike regular workout routines and involves various exercises to strengthen and tone the muscles. The best part is that you don’t just gain weight; this routine works on all the important muscles to ensure you achieve the right physique.
In this guide, we have explained the benefits of calisthenics and some exercises ideal for skinny people.
Table of Contents
Is Calisthenics Good For Skinny Guys?
The simple answer is yes! Calisthenics is great for skinny guys since it increases resistance and improves muscle mass to lift heavy weights. It further betters cardiovascular health, reduces the impact on the joints, helps burn body fat and shed calories, enhances flexibility, and helps in toning the body.
Moreover, calisthenics comprises bodyweight exercises that are fun and suitable for people of all ages. You can develop a calisthenics workout routine at home or outdoors since it requires no special equipment.
Benefits Of Calisthenics For Skinny Guys
1. Improves Cardiovascular Health
While traditional bodyweight training helps build muscle mass, with calisthenics, you will notice improved cardiovascular health. In fact, this is one of the first things a skinny guy will notice, along with higher body weight and muscle growth.
This is because the heart rate goes up during calisthenics, and the body becomes more tuned to use oxygen effectively. Hence, regular callisthenic workouts allow you to exercise longer without feeling tired.
2. Lean Muscle Mass
Using calisthenics with weight training helps you gain muscles while toning and strengthening them as well. As a result, you can develop lean muscles quicker and increase upper body strength. You will also look more muscular and have an attractive physique.
3. Burning Calories And Fat
The best thing about calisthenics exercises compared to regular bodyweight workouts is that you can burn calories and fat faster. This is because it increases resistance while gaining weight, once again helping with strength-building and toning.
We have seen that the fat-burning continues even after the workout is over.
4. Flexibility
One of the aspects skinny people struggle with if they want to gain or lose weight is the range of motion. Calisthenics is better than compound exercises focusing on just your body weight, as it can target multiple muscle groups to increase flexibility.
This proves beneficial for skinny people since they are likely to be stiffer than individuals with a greater muscular physique.
5. Low-Impact
Calisthenics is ideal for avoiding high-impact exercises, as most routines are low-impact and reduce joint or muscle stress.
6. Fun
Callisthenic workouts are fun as you can do handstand push-ups, leg raises, Bulgarian split squats, etc., while gaining muscle mass. This isn’t possible with a normal gym membership because all the exercises in calisthenics training are versatile and can be adapted to your requirements.
In other words, you won’t wear out and can stick with the routine to get better results in the long term.
Exercises To Start Your Calisthenics Journey
Whether you want to gain weight or reduce your overall body fat percentage, here are some basic calisthenics exercises for skinny people.
1. Support Holds
One of the best exercises to gain muscle is support holds, like push-ups, dips, knee raises, etc. It involves keeping the arms straight and managing your body weight in different positions for muscle building.
You can try out front, back, side, vertical overhead, and vertical positions for shoulder, scapular, and core strength. Beginners should work out on a solid surface and shift to rings for an intermediate training session.
2. Bent Arm Push Exercises
These are similar to normal push-ups, and you can tweak the exercises based on your skill level. For intermediate workouts, try pike push-ups, dips, and find more calisthenics tricep exercises.
3. Hanging Exercises
There are 2 types of hanging exercises – active and passive. In the passive method, you must hand from the bar without an active shoulder plate work, which will improve grip strength but can also be beneficial for decompressing the spine and core stability.
Active hanging further activates the shoulder and back muscles by retracting the shoulder without bending the arms. One effective exercise in this regard is pull-ups.
4. Knee Dominant Exercises
Some of the popular knee-dominant exercises are squats and lunges. The difference between the two is that squats work both legs simultaneously, while lunges work both legs in different positions.
Lunges help correct strength imbalances since most people have one dominant leg, which is more developed than the other. After you have mastered basic exercises, try out advanced techniques like Bulgarian split squats, pistol squats, etc., for building muscle.
5. Bent Arm Pull Exercises
Like push-ups, you can try bent-arm pull-ups. Here the goal is to focus on progressive overload, so you can start with body rows to improve your overall technique. These exercises focus on the back muscles, such as middle traps, rhomboids, and rear delts.
6. Hip Dominant Exercises
Hip-dominant exercises mostly comprise glute bridges or hip thrusts. They result in higher tension. So, in the extended position, they are more focused on helping you gain muscle mass.
Calisthenics Workout – Will It Help A Skinny Guy?
Just working out won’t deliver the desired results, and you must pair the calisthenics routine with a healthy diet. Because you are skinny, if you eat more food daily, you will gain more mass, while regularly working out will tone the muscles to give you an eye-catching physique.
Moreover, try to use additional resistance to progressively overload and get a muscular body, for which free weights or resistance bands come in handy.
This will help in losing fat and target each muscle group.
You should also use a weight vest, workout gloves, or wooden gymnastic rings to add more diversity to the routines. It’s important to remember that external resistance won’t always result in more muscle gain, so consult a professional to chart out an effective routine and stay safe!
Founder of www.calisthenics-101.co.uk. Training calisthenics since 2012.
Currently working on: 30 second one-arm handstand, muscle-up 360, straddle planche.