If you desire a exercise that’s low-cost, moveable, versatile, and efficient, learn the way to use resistance bands.
When you know the way to use them, you possibly can simply simulate your favourite barbell lifts and dumbbell workouts anyplace, anytime.
You may also use resistance bands to make body weight actions extra advanced and difficult.
But earlier than mastering how to use resistance bands, it’s necessary to perceive how they work.
Bands are available varied styles and sizes: small loops (a.okay.a., “booty bands”), giant loops, tube-shaped bands with handles, and flat bands, that are sometimes utilized in a bodily remedy setting.
Generally talking, the thicker the band, the “heavier” it’s.
Choosing the suitable resistance band will depend on your required degree of problem and the required vary of movement for every motion.
Pro tip: Get much more out of your resistance bands with a Control Track. Learn extra about this distinctive piece of kit and the way to use it with 9 Week Control Freak with Autumn Calabrese.
How to Use Resistance Bands for Legs
One of the only methods to use resistance bands for leg workouts is to loop a small band round each legs, says Gabrielle Bolin, licensed private coach.
“For example, loop a band around the legs right above the knees and do lateral shuffles,” she says.
Using a resistance band to create pressure between the legs additional engages the hips, glutes, and thighs.
The identical approach may be utilized to lower-body actions like squats, knee raises, and glute bridges.
You may also use bigger resistance bands — with or with out handles — to carry out lower-body actions sometimes executed with dumbbells and barbells.
To add resistance to a squat, for instance, use each toes to step on one finish of the band whereas looping the opposite finish over your head and throughout your shoulders.
If your resistance band has handles, step onto the center of the band and maintain the handles in entrance of your shoulders.
How to Use Resistance Bands for Arms
Wondering how to use resistance bands for arm exercises? Try anchoring your bands, suggests Saara Haapanen, M.S., an authorized private coach and sports activities psychology Ph.D. candidate based mostly in Denver.
“If you have bands with handles, you can anchor the handle in a door,” she says. (*9*)
With a high anchor (e.g., the highest of a door body), you possibly can add resistance to strikes like triceps pull-downs.
With a low anchor (e.g., the bottom of a park bench), you possibly can simulate biceps curls.
Alternatively, you should utilize resistance bands for arms exercises by anchoring the band along with your toes or gripping both finish of a small loop.
(Think pull-aparts, triceps kick-backs, and overhead presses.)
How to Use Resistance Bands for Abs
If you know the way to use these for the legs and arms, you know the way to use resistance bands for abs exercises; the essential strategies — anchoring and creating pressure between body components — are the identical.
You can enhance the issue of a traditional ab exercise like bicycle crunches by looping a small band throughout the laces of your footwear.
“It takes strength and control to push and pull the band in both directions without letting it pull the feet back together, creating massive time under tension and great added resistance to an already effective move,” says Bolin.
You may also use resistance bands for abs exercises by anchoring one finish of a giant band along with your toes or an immovable construction, explains licensed private coach Michael Julom.
“Perform your Russian twists with a looped band anchored to your feet and held in both hands,” he suggests. “Or perform leg raises with a band anchored to the floor and looped around your ankles.”
How to Use Resistance Bands Safely
When utilizing resistance bands, security is paramount. Before every exercise, examine your resistance bands for rips, holes, and weak spots, as they might snap once you subsequent use them.
Proper storage is essential to sustaining the structural integrity of resistance bands, says Haapanen.
“Don’t keep your bands in the sun or in a hot vehicle for an extended period of time,” she advises.
Heat, in addition to some chemical compounds in cleansing brokers, can break down the fabric of resistance bands. So, when it comes to cleansing, choose for a humid material as an alternative of soaps and sprays.
Additionally, the identical guidelines relating to correct type and development that you’d use in any conventional weight room apply to resistance bands workouts, says Bolin.
“It’s important to remember that, while resistance bands look benign compared to things like heavy dumbbells or kettlebells, they can cause injuries, muscle tears, or strains when overused or used incorrectly,” she says.
