Barring the obvious exceptions of sumo wrestlers and single heavyweight lifters, nearly all athletes could benefit from more relative strength. Virtually all sports require relative strength, and body weight drills form the foundation for developing this physical quality.
Mastering body weight across a range of movement patterns provides the novice trainee with a broad base of physical literacy upon which specific biomotor abilities can later be trained. By developing movement skills in calisthenics through a complete range of motion (ROM), you not only reduce the risk of injury but provide a strong foundation upon which an external load can be applied. So body weight training is the cats meow. But what if body weight is too heavy for an athlete? Obesity, diminished movement skills, and subpar mobility and stability are the usual culprits here. Though these trainees are the exception, they do exist and, as coaches, we have to circumvent these shortcomings.
A traditional solution to this problem is to work within a limited ROM and progress it as proficiency increases. However, I’m not a fan of this approach. An athlete is typically weakest at the extremes of the ROM. To avoid this is to negate the weakness that requires the most attention. Given that training adaptations are joint angle specific, an athlete will progress most quickly by training at these extremes of the ROM, not avoiding them entirely.
Another approach is to train only the eccentric or isometric phase of an exercise. The pull-up typically gets this treatment when trainees lack the concentric strength to complete a rep. Like joint angles, adaptation is specific to contraction type. Simple physiology tells us that the athlete will be weakest in the concentric phase, so why cut it out? Again, the quickest progression comes from tackling a weakness head on.
Lastly, a coach will sometimes bypass calisthenic drills altogether and switch straight to machine or free weight drills. For example, if an athlete can’t perform a decent push-up, the bench press may be substituted in its place. To me, this is like walking out of the house wearing only a tie. Yes, you’re wearing clothes, but you’re still essentially naked. To bypass callisthenic drills is to bypass all the benefits I listed.
You will doubtless be familiar with the band assisted pull-up where band tension deloads the body, reducing exercise intensity. This classic exercise got me thinking about how other traditional body weight drills could be deloaded with bands.
Below is a list of modified drills that I came up with and have had great success. They may not be groundbreaking, but they are certainly effective. I encourage you to try them with your more deconditioned clients.
Push-up
Place a bar in a power rack and then choke the band around it. Place the band around the torso under the armpits. Make sure there is still some tension in the band at the bottom position. If not, adjust the height of the bar in the rack accordingly.
Dip
Loop the band around the handles of your dip apparatus. You can put a twist in the band to increase the tension slightly and better secure it. Put your knees in the band and get dipping.
Chin-up
This classic needs little description. Choke a band around the bar, put your knees in the middle, and do a chin-up. Simple.
Squat
Join two bands together and then choke them around the top frame of a power rack. Place the bottom of the joined up band around your backside and put your arms through it like you’re putting on a jacket. Use your hands to secure the band at the level of your chest and you’re good to squat.
Lunge
Use a single band choked around the top of your rack. Place the arms through the band as with the squat.
Inverted row
At my current training location (interning with London Wasps rugby), the athletes perform inverted rows using blast straps attached to a chin-up bar. In this instance, I find that two bands linked together and choked around the bar works best. Place the bottom band around the torso under the armpits and then set up normally for the exercise. This has the added advantage of greater posterior chain recruitment than the bent leg inverted row that sometimes is used to progress to the straight legged version.
Note that if you perform barbell inverted rows, a single band choked around the bar will suffice.
These exercises allow the trainee to work through a complete ROM, which better engrains the motor pattern from the outset. They allow for all contraction types to be trained while still providing the benefits of calisthenics that I outlined earlier.
These lifts are simply progressed. Each time the trainee demonstrates satisfactory form in an exercise for the required sets/reps, reduce the band thickness/tension the next time around. Eventually, all assistance is removed and proficiency with body weight is achieved. Give these exercises a try today and get your trainees on the fast track to mastering their body weight.
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Keir Wenham-Flatt is a freelance personal trainer operating within the Northampton area of the United Kingdom. Keir is currently studying for a masters’ degree in strength and conditioning. He is also an amateur rugby league athlete with competitive powerlifting experience. He can be contacted at keirwf@gmail.com or for more information visit www.trainingbykeir.co.uk. 
Great! I use the chins (though I so weak I use an average band and loop it around my foot) still the numbers are going up (5×7 so far) I’ll reduce the band strength when I hit 5×10.
hey u say ur wer working with wasps is the use of bands to create extra tension used alot, wats ur view of the use of chains on exercises
Hey Eamonn,
The bands are used in conversion phases where power and power endurance are being trained however not looped around bars and DBs etc. They tend to be used by themselves (like JC Santana uses in his MMA stuff) and with thick ropes looped through them. I think these are a little bit more applicable to a rugby setting as they tax the grip a bit more and you can allow for the form to get a little looser (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing sometimes).
As far as the chains go, they are a bit of a pain in the arse with large numbers. They weigh a lot more than the bands and take up more space, plus the bar speed on the eccentric is slower so whilst they are just as good as bands for training acceleration, they are less useful for developing deceleration. With that said, they will occasionally be used with players where their primary skills don’t involve a big eccentric component e.g. props lifting in the lineout or engaging in the scrum.
oh cool sounds good ye cause im a loosehead prop and doin alot of strongman stuff at the mo but using alot of chains on bench and squat, i no its not really to do with the article. wats ur view on trap bar deadlifting rather than straight bar deadlifting?
Eamonn,
The trap bar deadlift is more quad dominant than the straight bar deadlift. It’s a fine substitution unless you are using the straight bar variation to address a muscle imbalance and specifically bring up the posterior chain (but you would probably use something else anyway).
One thing we tend to use it for is with guys who have lower back problems. Keeping the load closer to the centre of mass reduces the lever arm about the spine so they are still able to perform deadlifting variations with less aggravation to their backs.
oh cool thanks,last question what wud u say be the best 5 lifts for a prop to work on?
1. Front squat
2. Box jump
3. Push press
4. Bench press
5. Inverted row
A decent all round torso exercise like TGUs or suitcase deadlifts would come close too.
If you would like to discuss your training further feel free to contact me at keirwf@gmail.com. I have a bunch of former clients who currently play in the Championship and Superleague academies and I do a lot of online consultation putting together programs + diets for people.
Great post. Please write more. All be missing you and I will be read more your post.
will defenitelly try this. thank you!