During the Covid-19 crisis, we’ve all faced the situation of losing track to maintaining body strength. Gyms being closed made everyone gain weight. No matter how much you think about eating the right diet, you can’t keep up.
The reason is that you’re not training like you used to before. Staying at home takes its price. If you’re thinking that you should start working out again, you’re absolutely right. How to do it home is the question, though.
In this article, we’re talking more about the things you can do to continue maintaining your good shape. Aside from the pull-ups which are a great choice, there are other exercises. Sometimes we can’t have a pull-up bar in our homes, so we need to come up with something else. Here are a few ideas.
Table of Contents
Bodyweight Rows
It’s crucial to know that your body weight is enough for many exercises. During the day we lose so many calories by just maintaining our posture or walking from one place to another. See more about this on the link.
Using our bodyweight for exercise is the best thing we can do when we have no equipment around. For mimicking pull-ups we only need one item around the house that will be a support for us. For example, the kitchen table.
The kitchen table is heavy enough not to be knocked over while exercising. What you need to do here is to get under the table and put your hands on top of it. Grab it with your palms. Then, lift yourself up toward it until you touch your chest to the edge of it.
This is causing pressure on your arms and do the same job as the pull-up bar. Your body weight is completely enough to act as a weight that you’re lifting. You don’t need a machine to help you with this.
Standard Pushups
Standard pushups can be so beneficial for you. They have a similar influence on the body and train similar muscles as pull-ups. Although the main focus on the first ones in the chest and the second ones are the back, they will gain muscles in both positions.
If you’re aiming to keep your strength and muscles, doing a few sets of standard pushups can also add value to your overall training. If you do them right, of course. If you don’t, then the only thing you’ll get is wasting time. See the difference between the two here: https://www.quora.com/Which-is-better-push-ups-or-pull-ups.
Floor Pulls
This is an interesting exercise that is so simple to do, yet provides amazing muscle growth. What you need to do is lie down on the ground facing your face up. Then raise your arms for the starting position.
Put your elbows on the ground and next to your body. When you’re in that position continue the exercise without stopping with pushing with your elbows down. At the same time, your torso is going to go up. Do this until you can lift without moving your elbows.
When you’re in that position, place your arms on the ground start pushing with them until you have a sitting posture. Don’t help yourself with the other muscles, but only your hands.
Towel Rows
To do this you obviously need a towel. Wrap the towel around a firm object that isn’t going to move while performing the exercise. Then lean the body back while holding the towel. This is going to put pressure on your arms and shoulders.
Pull back and feel the pressure on the back muscles. This is perfect for beginners because you can easily control the pressure by leaning more or less with your body. Over time, you can increase the angle and let more weight on your arms.
Conclusion
This is just a small portion of the available exercises that act as pull ups. You can find more pull up bars and alternatives on the internet that you might see as even more interesting.
It’s up to you how you’re going to maintain that lost gym time. Some bought a ton of equipment making their home gyms, and others went to train with these alternatives. The choice is yours.