Resistance Bands Overview.

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Resistance Bands in place of Conventional Weights.

First off I think this picture is hilarious. Not sure which exercise she's performing, but she's got some serious Ballerina Beach Skills.

You'll also notice that she has a Resistance Band. But can something that resembles (and essentially is) a giant rubber band have any serious potential for a piece of exercise equipment?

The answer is absolutely yes, and the facts might surprise you.

When a person performs a movement (let's say an arm curl) the weight of this persons arm alone isn't going to be of much benefit for toning, and certainly not for gaining strength. This is why we use resistance, and it can come in many forms.

Calisthenics, for example, employs a persons Body Weight as the resistance. People can also use dumbbells, barbells, kettlebells and a litany of other contraptions as resistance.

Here's where it get's interesting. Resistance bands do something that none of these other methods can accomplish. let's examine:

The Movement that this Woman is performing is known as an upright row. Notice that in Example A she is holding the resistance bands in her hands, and before she even begins the movement, she is already under resistance. 

As she begins her first rep, something interesting happens. I'm about to get a bit 'Science Dork' on you, but this is important.

Bands follow Hooke's Law of Elasticity, which boiled down states that the more force that is applied to the band, the more resistance it will yield.

This is what sets them apart from other forms of resistance. A 25 Pound Dumbbell is 25 pounds at the bottom, in the middle of a movement, and at the top.

Why is this important?

This is important for many reasons. First of all it's always beneficial to keep the body guessing, so adding band exercises into your existing routine can do you a lot of good.

Bands are also very helpful in the area of assistance. Pull-ups are a fantastic exercise, and could benefit everyone, but a lot of people cannot do a full pull-up.

 

If, however, we can use Hooke's Law to our advantage with the use of Resistance Bands, anyone can perform them. After a few weeks of doing Band Assisted Pull-Ups, a person very well may be able to ditch the bands an use their full body weight.

Resistance Bands are Inexpensive and you only need to buy them once. These things can quite literally take the place of just about every resistance training implement you'd find in a gym. They come in all different shapes and sizes. Light, Medium and Heavy bands and everything inbetween.

But a large portion of my Clients aren't convinced. They don't believe that a band (or group of bands) is enough resistance to accomplish their goals. This thought persists precisely to the point that they use them and realize they were dead wrong.

From MMA Fighters, Professional Athletes to regular Men and Women working out at home these bands are everywhere.

This page will serve as sort of a 'Why use Bands' landing pad to send people before they begin using the Exercises I'll be detailing in later posts. 

Next up: Lower body exercises using Resistance Bands.

Cheers~