EXERCISE BAND STRENGTH TRAINING. Start by doing 5-8 repetitions of each exercise, 2-3 times week on non-consecutive days. Gradually increase the. Thera-Band® resistance bands and tubing are low-cost, portable and versatile. Avoid exercises that involve stretching the Thera-Band resistance band. Resistance Mini Band Exercises +PDF download a printable PDF version of exercise guide Routine: 3-4 sets of 10-15 reps of each exerc. Resistance Mini Band Exercises Video If you need a printable PDF document with miniband exercises please visit this page. View, download and print Resistance Band Exercise Charts pdf template or form online. 4 Resistance Band Exercise Charts are collected for any of your needs. Education; Exercise Chart. Knee Pain Exercises Chart Medical. Food, Mood & Exercise Chart Miscellaneous.
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Resistance Band Exercises With Only 1 Band
Resistance Bands are a great tool to use with your clients. But one of the number one questions that I get is, “Which exercises can I do with bands with my clients?”
Well I’m glad that you asked!
The following 12 Band exercises should be the first exercises you master when initiating a Resistance Band Training program using Quantum Bands.
Why Master These 12 Band Exercises First?
- They come with an easy learning curve so success is guaranteed
- They require no additional equipment (other than bands and your body)
- They will increase strength to all body-weight only exercises
- They will provide you an instant total body workout you can do anywhere, at any intensity
- They will increase your dead weight strength by improving joint stabilization where you need it most
- They will teach your body how to quickly generate force which will transfer into greater power with daily activities and recreational sports
- They will allow your joints and muscles to recover faster when performing active recovery workouts with a lighter resistance band
- They will allow you to easily create high intensity fat blasting calorie burning strength circuit workouts that you can do 4 times per week at various resistance levels and work loads
- It sets you up to begin focusing on increased exercise volume to specific body regions to create more of a muscle sculpting effect without the concern for overuse injuries.
- Perfect strength exercises to conveniently combine up with any cardio based treadmill, stepper or stationary bike workout if you enjoy doing those
- They are the best 12 exercises coaches or trainers can use to initiate a large group band only workout
- It will provide you the core stabilization, mobility and strength to move into more advanced multi-plane, higher velocity power based band exercises
- Its a fun and convenient way to strength train
Now that you know the benefits of these 12 Band Exercises, its time to show you all 12 of these key band exercises and subtle progression tweaks you can make for your clients (or yourself) if needed.
The following 12 Band Exercises are performed in a sequence that allows you to easily flow through all 12 exercises, while hitting every body part with 2 or 3 different band exercises. Watch the Video below to see these band exercises in action.
12 Band Exercises
- Plank
- Mt Climber
- Seated Row
- Chest Press
- Incline Chest Press
- Pull A Part
- Shoulder Press
- High Pull
- Hammer Curl
- Triceps Press
- Front Squat
- Split Squat
Summary
A few years ago I showed you the 10 Best beginner band exercises. What’s interesting is 8 of those exercises have withstood the test of time. However, what I have realized over the years is that training with 1 single band using an attachment free setup is definitely the BEST place to start when introducing band training. As a result I am confident after completing 1000’s of workout with my adult fitness members that these 12 Band Exercises will create awesome training results and success 99% of the time.
Want more training on using bands?
You’re invited to join Dave Schmitz and other well-known fitness experts at our Elite Training Workshops throughout the US. You’ll get hands-on coaching on how to continue to deliver effective training programs to your clients.
Want to integrate more band training into your program design?
Learn more from fitness guru and band expert, Dave Schmitz, on the most effective band training for your clients. In his token product for trainers, RBT 360, Dave providers fitness professional everything they need to know about resistance band training to take their programs (and their clients) to the next level.
About the Author
Dave Schmitz, PT, CSCS, PES has been writing, teaching and training how to implement resistance band training for rehabilitation, general conditioning, and performance since 1996. He is the founder & co-owner of Resistance Band Training— the leading band provider worldwide.
Along with being a co-author of the Amazon best seller, Total Body Breakthroughs, Dave is also the author and producer of numerous fitness & nutrition articles, E-books, DVDs. His passion is focused on trainers, clients, and athletes improve their body’s ability to handle momentum, gravity and ground reaction forces using elastic resistance. Dave also consults online with several high schools, universities, private performance training business and is also on the board of experts for the International Youth and Conditioning Association (IYCA).
*This article was originally posted on Resistancebandtraining.com
This is a long article, and it’s one you’ll want to refer back to over and over again. I’ve made it available in PDF form for people who want to start incorporating resistance bands into their workouts.
You know why I love resistance bands?Because they’re convenient.
Simply put: Resistance bands let you get more exercise, build more muscle and lose more fat- all while spending less time in the gym.They can also be used to improve your bench press and squat, so you can overcome sticking points and make faster gainz.
For most of the past two years I was in the gym six days a week.But for the last two months, I’ve only been going four days a week, and I’ve also been keeping my workouts shorter.But what’s really cool is, I’ve still added three pounds of muscle in the last two months.Better yet, I’ve added half an inch to my normally growth-resistant arms.
The reason I’ve been able to gain muscle without going to the gym as much is because I’ve also been doing some resistance band exercises at home.I particularly give the bands credit for my arm growth, as they’ve made it easy for me to add in high-volume bicep and tricep work, 4-5 days a week.
In fact, resistance bands are an amazing tool for working out at home, at the office, in hotel rooms, or for doing high-frequency training anywhere you need to be.In this guide, I’ll teach you everything you need to know about resistance bands- what kinds to get, what to use them for, and how to use them.I’ll show you videos of all my favorite resistance band exercises, and in the end I’ll give you a few resistance band workouts that you can start doing at home.
The different types of resistance bands and how they’re used
Resistance bands are elastic bands that you use for strength training, in much the same way you would use weights.However, with resistance bands, the resistance comes from elasticity, rather than gravity.Because of that, the resistance- or “weight” as you’re probably used to thinking of it- isn’t constant.It increases over the course of any given exercise, as the band gets stretched out more.
That has to be taken into account when you decide when and how to use resistance bands.You often can’t just take a barbell or dumbbell exercise, replace the weight with a resistance band, and do the same thing.A resistance band bicep curl uses different form from a regular bicep curl, for instance.But more on that in a bit.
First, we need to clear something up: there are several different types of resistance bands, and they’re used for different purposes.
Therapy bands are used for injury rehabilitation, and often given to patients by their doctors.They’re a great rehab tool, but they’re beyond the scope of this article.
Figure Eight resistance bands consist of a single band in a figure eight, which you pull on to train your upper body.Ring resistance bands consist of a single ring with soft handles on either end, and are usually used for lower-body training.Lateral resistance bands, also known as velcro cuff resistance bands, have a pair of velcro cuffs that you attach to your ankles; you then use the bands by moving your legs apart against the resistance.
These three types of resistance bands are all very limited in their uses, so I won’t be overing them in this article.Instead, I’ll focus on the two types of resistance bands that are flexible enough to be used for a variety of exercises.
Compact resistance bands are used as a stand-alone piece of exercise equipment for both upper and lower-body training.They consist of a modular system with a pair of handles, and multiple cord-shaped resistance bands that can be attached to those handles.Here’s what they look like:
By attaching different combinations of bands, different levels of resistance can be created.For instance, combining the 3 pound band with the 5 pound band creates 8 pounds of resistance.
They usually come with a door anchor- a simple cloth loop with a bulky part at one end for attaching the bands to a door.Some exercises will have you standing on the bands to anchor them, while others will call for you to anchor the bands to either the top, bottom or middle of a door.Some sets also have an ankle strap for anchoring the bands to your ankle.
If you know what you’re doing, you can use these things in place of many barbell and dumbbell exercises.In fact, the right combination of resistance band and bodyweight exercises
My recommended compact resistance bands: Black Mountain resistance band set
Fit loop resistance bands consist of a single band in a loop shape.These bands don’t have handles, and are shaped like flat straps rather than circular cords.
There are two distinct ways in which fit loop bands are used.First, they can be used to assist bodyweight exercises.By hanging the bands from somewhere above you and then looping your arms and legs into them, you can effectively reduce your body weight for the purpose of that exercise.
Second, you can use them to add variable weight to barbell exercises.By anchoring the bands somewhere below the barbell, they’ll add resistance to the exercise.Unlike adding weight plates though, the resistance isn’t constant- it goes up as the barbell goes up.
In other words, the bands modify the resistance curve of the exercise (they do that for body weight exercises too).This makes them useful for movements like the bench press that have ascending strength curves- meaning your weakest at the bottom of the movement.
My recommended fit loop bands: Bestope latex bands
The pros and cons of resistance bands
Pro: They’re cheap
A full of of resistance bands can be had for around thirty dollars, and that thirty dollars buys you the ability to do a wide variety of exercises outside of a gym.If you’re using fit loop bands to modify a barbell exercises, you may need two sets- one for each end of the barbell- but it’s still not much.You need two bands for squats, but can usually use just one for the bench press.
For comparison, a pair of adjustable-weight dumbbells that go up to 50-100 pounds can cost anywhere from one to four hundred dollars.
Con: Some movements you just can’t do.
Don’t get me wrong, you can do a lot of things with resistance bands.But you can’t effectively front squat, or do preacher curls, or javelin presses.They’ll never be a full substitute for going to the gym.
Pro: They improve the resistance curve of some (usually pushing) exercises
Weights weigh the same amount no matter how high you lift them.However, resistance bands exert more resistance the further you stretch them- the “weight” increases from the start to the end of a movement.In exercise science parlance, this is known as an ascending resistance curve.All resistance band exercises where you move in a straight line have ascending resistance curves; for curved movements like bicep curls, it gets a bit more complicated.
Now, that’s not inherently good or bad. See, your strength also varies between different parts of an exercise-this is known as the strength curve.Some exercises have an ascending strength curve, meaning you’re weak at the beginning and strong at the end of the movement.
One of the principles of exercise selection is that you want to match the strength curve to the resistance curve- so an exercise with an ascending resistance curve should also have an ascending strength curve, for instance.If the strength and resistance curves are matched, the exercise will be equally difficult across all segments of the motion, have no particular sticking point, and will optimally work those muscles which are the prime movers for that exercise.
So which exercises have ascending resistance curves?In general, they tend to be ones where you’re pushing the weight away from your body, like the chest/bench press, overhead press, or squat.
Con: They mess up the resistance curve of other (usually pulling) exercises
So this shouldn’t be hard to figure out- if resistance bands work well with exercises that have ascending strength curves, they probably suck with exercises that have descending strength curves, right?Yes.
In general, that means pulling motions.Think about chin-ups- when you reach failure, you usually make it most of the way up, but then can’t get your chin over the bar.Or rows- you usually make it about halfway, then can’t bring the weight all the way to your chest, unless you’re using a row machine with a camshaft specifically designed to match the resistance curve to the strength curve.
Resistance bands don’t just leave this problem unfixed; they exacerbate it by giving you more resistance where you’re weakest and less resistance where you’re strongest.There is a way to somewhat mitigate this (more on that later), but it will never not be a problem.
Pro: They’re lightweight and easy to transport
A set of resistance bands weighs about two pounds.The Black Mountain compact resistance bands go into a bad that’s the size of a small purse, while the Bestope fitloop bands are so small they could be stuffed into the pocket of most gym pants.
That makes resistance bands perfect for travellers.If I knew then what I know now, I would have taken a set- maybe one set of each- on my nine-month backpacking adventure last year.
Con: Lack of support/bracing inhibits some movements
Remember how I said resistance bands offer an optimal resistance curve for stuff like the chest press?Well, the bad news is that if your chest press is really strong, you’re going to have a lot of trouble doing resistance band chest presses.
There’s no back support, so what you’ll end up doing is pushing yourself back towards the anchor point.Yes, you can brace yourself by standing in a lunge position, and you could go with a lower resistance and high rep range, but that only takes you so far.
Similar problems occur with most heavy compound movements in which the bands are anchored, rather than being held in place by you standing on them.You don’t have chest support for the mid row, or a leg brace for the pull-down.It’s no an issue with stuff like shoulder presses where you’re pressing upward though, since in those cases the resistance is mostly pushing you down into the ground rather than back towards the door.
Printable Resistance Band Exercises Pdf
In my estimation, this really becomes a problem if you can do an equivalent gym exercise- bench press, cable rows, pull-downs, etc- for more than your body weight.If you’re overweight, female, or a total newbie, this probably won’t be much of a problem for you, but for intermediate to advanced male trainees, it limits what you can do with resistance bands.
Rules for adding resistance bands to barbell movements
If you want to use fit loop bands to modify barbell movements such as the squat and bench press, follow these three simple rules.
Use the band to add weight, not subtract it
The normal way to add resistance bands to a barbell exercise is to anchor them to the bottom of the bench/cage/squat rack, so that they’re pulling down on the barbell and adding weight.If you’re in a power cage you could instead anchor them to the top of the cage, so that they assist the movement by pulling upward.DON’T DO THIS.
I’ve seen one person do this in person, videos of people doing it on YouTube, and people talking about it in forums.You can probably guess what’s wrong with this, but just so we’re totally clear:
If you do it that way, you have to load the barbell with more weight than you could otherwise lift.So…what if the bands break?Now you’re holding a weight, possible with an asymmetrical load if you have separate resistance bands for each side, that’s about 20-30% heavier than anything you could actually lift.
I’ve never seen resistance bands break, but they all come with warnings that you should replace them every few months to prevent breakage.Don’t take the chance of getting squished.
And while this is technically a risk when using fit loop bands to assist bodyweight exercises, I don’t see a problem with that- at worst you’d fall slightly, but you wouldn’t get crushed under a four hundred pound barbell.
Start out light
Another safety rule.If you’re adding bands for the first time, you’re about to do an unfamiliar exercise.A bench press with bands doesn’t feel quite the same as a regular bench press.
With that in mind, don’t go heavy the very first time you add bands.If you’re doing sets of six or less, lower the weight ten or twenty percent to begin with, until you get used to using bands.
Replace about 20% of the weight with bands
20% is usually the optimal amount of variable resistance to use if you want to match the resistance curve to the strength curve.That is, if you replace 20% of the weight with resistance bands providing the same amount of resistance, you should find the exercise becomes equally difficult at all points.
So for instance, if you normally bench press 205 pounds, you would lower that to 165 pounds, and add a 40 pound resistance band.At least, if you’re working in the weight-rep range.
If you’re benching 205 for five reps, you would instead lower the weight to 145 or even 125 pounds, while adding the same 40 pound band, and then add ten pounds after every couple of sets.By the end of that first session, you’d be back up to the weight you actually want to use.
Rules for incorporating standalone resistance bands
Hold yourself steady
Make sure you’re standing in such a way that you won’t knock yourself off balance when pushing/pulling the bands.If you’re standing on the bands, keep your feet next to, and parallel to each other.If the exercise calls for you to stand on the bands with only one foot, or keep them anchored to a door, stand in a lunging position to maintain your balance.
If standing on the bands, go barefoot or wear flat-bottomed shoes
Most shoes will damage the resistance bands.You want shoes with a soft, flat bottom, and little or no tread.Wrestling shoes are ideal for this.But since I always use my resistance bands at home, I just go barefoot, and that’s what I’d recommend for anyone doing this at home or in the office.
Match the resistance curve to the strength curve
You want to do exercises that are equally difficult across the entire movement, rather than exercises where some portion of the movement is too easy, and another portion is so difficult it becomes a sticking point.
In large part that just means picking the right exercises- as mentioned earlier, pressing exercises are almost universally better than pulling exercises for just this reason.Exercises with curved movement paths, such as bicep curls, can be great or terrible depending on how the movement is oriented relative to the bands’ anchor point.
In some cases, the resistance curve can be adjusted to more closely match the strength curve by either changing your stance, changing the angle of movement, or moving your body with the exercise.I’ll give a few examples of this in the videos.
Here are some of the best resistance band exercises
There are dozens of exercises you can do with resistance bands- below are a few of my favorites.Bear in mind that due to the lack of chest/back support with the exercises, many of them- particularly those where the bands are anchored to a door- will also work your core to some degree, as they force you to stabilize your body and resist being pulled off balance.
Fawkes Resistance Band Bicep Curl
My own creation, the Fawkes Curl is how I added half an inch to y biceps this summer.They are a far superior alternative to regular band curls- or indeed, regular barbell and dumbbell curls.This video also demonstrates some of the principles for picking the best exercises, or modifying existing exercises to improve their biomechanics and provide a better training stimulus across the whole range of motion.
My own creation, the Fawkes Curl is how I added half an inch to y biceps this summer.They are a far superior alternative to regular band curls- or indeed, regular barbell and dumbbell curls.This video also demonstrates some of the principles for picking the best exercises, or modifying existing exercises to improve their biomechanics and provide a better training stimulus across the whole range of motion.
Resistance Band Ab Crunch
Muscles worked: the rectus abdominus, on the front of your belly.
Band Single Arm Tricep Extension
Muscle worked: the triceps.
Band Squats
Muscles worked: the glutes and the entirety of the legs, but particularly the quadriceps.
Lateral Walk
Muscles worked: Primarily the abductors on the outside of your thighs, but it also secondarily works the quadriceps and calves.
Resistance Band Chest Press
Muscles worked: Primarily the pectorals, and secondarily the shoulders and triceps.
Resistance Band Decline Chest Press
Muscles worked: Same as the chest press, but with an emphasis on the lower chest, and less emphasis on the shoulders.
Resistance Band Pull-Down
Muscles worked: The biceps and upper back muscles, including the trapezius, rhomboid, and levator scapulae.
Band Reverse flye/bent row
Muscles worked: The biceps and the entirety of the back.
Upright row
Muscles worked: The biceps and the upper and middle back.
Front raise
Resistance Band Exercises Pdf Download For Pc
Muscles worked: The shoulders, primarily the anterior deltoids on the front of the shoulders.Also secondarily works the triceps.
Resistance band workouts
Generally, I prefer not to use resistance bands for “workouts,” as such.Instead, I do sets of resistance band exercises spread throughout the day, in addition to my main workouts at the gym.This is both very convenient, and allows for a lot of volume with minimal fatigue.
That said, you can design some short, simple and effective workouts by combining resistance band and bodyweight exercises.Here are four that I’ve used on occasion when I can’t make it to the gym.
Upper body only
A1) Decline chest press, 2 sets of 8-10
A2) Pull-down, 2 sets of 8-10
B1) Upright row, 2 sets of 10-12
B2) Front raise, 2 sets of 10-12
C1) Single arm triceps extension, 2 sets of 12-15 per arm
C2) Pushups, 2 sets to fatigue
Lower body only workout
A1) Band squats, 3 sets of 6-8
A2) Jump lunges, 3 sets of 6-8 per side
B1) Lateral walk, 2 sets to fatigue
B2) Unweighted Bulgarian split squats, 2 sets of 10-12 per leg
C) Resistance band ab crunch, 2 sets of 12-15
Full-body workout
A1) Band ab crunch, 2 sets of 10-12
A2) Mountain climbers, 2 sets of 20-30
B1) Chest press, 2 sets of 6-10
B2) Band upright row, 2 sets of 5-6
C1) Band bent over row, 2 sets of 8
C2) Wide stance pushups, 2 sets to fatigue
Arm specialization workout
A1) Decline chest press, 2 sets of 6-8
A2) Upright row, 2 sets of 6-8
B1) Single arm triceps extension, 4 sets of 8-10 per arm
B2) Fawkes bicep curl, 4 sets of 8-10
C1) Front raise, 2 sets of 12-15
C2) Bent over row, 2 sets of 12-15
How to start incorporating resistance band training this week
There are three ways you can start incorporating resistance bands into your training.
First, you can grab a set of compact resistance bands and add a resistance band workout– or a mixed bodyweight and resistance band workout- to your training schedule.One home workout with resistance bands for every two or three gym workouts is a training split that many people have used to great effect.
Second, you keep your training schedule exactly the way it is, and pick up a pair of fit loop resistance bands and start using them to modify a few of your main lifts- particularly the bench press and squat.
Third, and this is my preference, you could do ad-libitum sets with compact resistance bands.What do I mean by this?I mean that instead of doing a “workout,” you do sets here and there throughout the day, whenever you have a few minutes and feel like you have the energy for it.
Resistance Tube Exercises Pdf
This makes it easy to get a large amount of training volume- sometimes even more than you would get from a workout- and yet it never feels difficult or strenuous.It’s great for building muscle; the main downside is it doesn’t keep your heart rate up for an extended period of time, so it doesn’t build cardiovascular fitness to the same degree as an extended workout.
Resistance Band Exercises Pdf Download Pdf
My personal preference is to perform ad-libitum sets at home using resistance bands, adjustable weight dumbbells, and bodyweight exercises, while continuing to do traditional bodybuilding-style workouts- like my 45 minute leg workout, or my high-frequency full-body workouts– in the gym.
Resistance Bands Exercises
Whichever method you choose, resistance bands are an incredible tool for making your workouts more convenient, adding more training volume, and modifying exercises to provide a better training stimulus.