Aside from the fact that it is a kind of exercise, I don’t really believe the burpee has any other benefits that can be quantified. The burpee is going to bring some benefits just by virtue of the fact that it is an exercise. However, we need to keep in mind that we only have a certain amount of time and energy to train, and we choose which exercises are included in our programs. Simply stating that something is “exercise” is not an acceptable explanation for including it in a program. We have room for improvement.
Due to the fact that the burpee is such a fundamental component of my workout program, I will make a break from my general policy of attempting to avoid criticizing specific exercises or actions. I have particular preferences and beliefs regarding different types of workouts. The burpee poses a unique set of challenges since it is so frequently performed incorrectly and because it is most frequently utilized in settings designed for weight reduction or boot camps, which means that those who perform it are typically inexperienced and/or more prone to injury.
And nobody likes them.
It is reasonable to inquire, what if they are carried out in the correct manner? If a person performs a burpee correctly, there is no risk that they may injure themselves as a result of doing it. However, what are the particular advantages of the burpee that justify including it in the exercise routine? That gets to the heart of the matter. There is nothing that the burpee provides that you cannot get from other activities that are either safer, more fun, or provide vital benefits that the burpee does not. This is true even if the burpee is performed precisely and under the guidance of an instructor.
The fact that nearly no one enjoys performing burpees is also significant. Zumba is a very popular kind of exercise, despite the fact that I do not believe it is particularly beneficial. A lot of people who wouldn’t normally exercise end up getting up and moving when they do Zumba. Because of this, Zumba is an extremely valuable kind of exercise.
I was required to perform some research in order to determine the primary advantages that are being cited by coaches who advocate for the burpee. I discovered four recurring themes:
- The exercise burpees are great for burning calories.
- Burpees develop agility
- The burpee is a great exercise for the entire body.
- Burpees increase your heart rate up
Let’s go through each of these to see whether or not it is possible to justify integrating burpees into a workout routine.
Burpee Benefit #1: Total Body Workout
The phrase “whole body workout” is one of those phrases that is catchy to hear but does not actually refer to anything specific.
Is it essential to exercise every part of your body? Yes.
Is it necessary to exercise every part of your body at the same time? No.
It is also not accurate to suggest that performing burpees is a full-body workout. The adductors, glutes, tibialis anterior, lats, and forearms, among other muscle groups, aren’t getting much of a workout from it. There is no single exercise that will adequately train all of your muscles.
The third thing and this is the most crucial one, is that despite the fact that the burpee includes movement in all parts of the body, HOW exactly is the body being trained by doing burpees? Is it an effective method for gaining muscle mass, getting stronger, or getting more powerful? Not particularly, not at all. Simply because something requires effort on your part does not necessarily mean that it will improve your performance, which should always be the goal.
You could practice each of the burpee’s component exercises on your own rather than doing the full exercise. When people break the movement into its constituent parts, they are able to carry out each step of the activity with greater intention, focus, and improved skill. One example of a total body workout is a circuit that consists of squats, push-ups, and jumps.
Boxing Bayside is the place to go for additional information on this subject.
Burpee Benefit #2: Burpees Get Your Heart Rate Up
Yes. Absolutely 100 percent. Your pulse rate will surely and unquestionably increase when you perform burpees. But so does running. Jumping Jacks. Swimming. Cycling. A circuit designed for strength training. Because doing any kind of physical activity will cause an increase in your heart rate, it is important to select a form of exercise that will also improve some other aspect of your physical health.
The examples that I just provided are all excellent, but one of my personal favorites is the sort of exercises used in track and field. This is because track and field drills assist establish strong gait patterns, which is a movement ability that is essential to human existence.
Burpee Benefit #3: Burpees Develop Coordination
Burpees undoubtedly require a coordinated motion of the upper and lower body, but are they building coordination in a way that will aid you in any environment that is not related to burpees?
Those field and track drills that were mentioned in the prior section would be my first choice if the objective is to improve one’s coordination. A coordinated and efficient walking pattern not only increases sports performance but also lowers the chance of injury. This is the kind of collaboration that may be helpful to everybody and everyone.
Burpee Benefit #4: Burpees Burn Calories
When you do burpees, your heart rate goes up, which is essentially the same thing as what we just said. Calories can be burned by any activity that raises your heart rate, and any physical exercise can accomplish both of these goals.
Even if your primary objective is to reduce your body fat, the number of calories that you burn throughout your workout doesn’t really matter all that much. It is possible that an intense workout burns 500 calories, but in the lack of a determined nutrition strategy, it is quite simple to replace those calories through more eating because extreme workouts have a tendency to make individuals hungrier. And because calorie burning is a side effect of any form of physical activity, even if that is your primary objective, it is best to choose activities that also improve other aspects of our physical fitness. This gives rise to the following question:
What Should We Do Instead of Burpees?
There are literally hundreds of other exercises that can be used in place of the burpee that will provide a higher benefit while also reducing the likelihood of damage. As was mentioned earlier, one approach to thinking about it is to disassemble the burpee into its separate parts and examine each one individually.
It seems that various people perform burpees in various ways. They obviously require getting down into a pushup stance, but a jump may or may not be a part of them at any point. Additionally, push-ups may or may not be a part of them at any point.
Push-ups are a wonderful exercise. When performed correctly, they not only strengthen your upper body and your ability to regulate your core, but they can also improve the health of your shoulders. The majority of people would benefit from adopting push-ups of some variety in their exercise routine.
We are able to jump with greater concentration and purpose as well as an improved technique when we perform each jump independently. This results in greater advances in power and strength with a corresponding decrease in the likelihood of injury.
Ask yourself what physical traits you want to enhance with the burpee so that you may choose exercises and workouts that especially build those qualities. This will allow you to get the most out of your workouts.
The burpee is one of the most popular exercises, despite the fact that the vast majority of people do not enjoy performing it. Because of this, I felt it was vital to explain why I and many other trainers do not encourage doing burpees. Other exercises are not particularly successful either. Burpees: Just say no!
Boxing Bayside is the place to go for additional information on this subject.
The Benefits Of Doing Burpees:
Are you ever going to fail a burpee? The answer is no.
The act of falling and getting back up requires very little talent, despite the fact that it can occasionally become unsightly or sloppy. Burpees are more accurately described as “fall get-ups” in my mind. They serve as the ideal metaphor for life in that if you get knocked to the ground by a challenge, you have to figure out a method to pick yourself back up and keep pushing forward. Because of this, burpees are the ideal exercise for developing one’s personality and character.
To perform a burpee, you should first hop your feet back, then kiss the floor with your chest, then push yourself up off the ground while snapping your feet forward into your hands, and the last jump and clap your hands. However, you may always make it easier on yourself by taking a step back, connecting the chest to the deck, taking another step forward, and reaching above your head. Those who have difficulty performing push-ups and maintaining core stability will benefit tremendously from this exercise.
Burpees are an excellent exercise for building strength all throughout the body because they are a full-body workout. Your arms, chest, quadriceps, glutes, and hamstrings will all get a workout with each repeat. Your core will also get a workout. When you’ve built up enough volume with burpees, your legs and arms will feel like they’re made of wet noodles and start shaking.
Burpees are distinctly diverse from workouts that focus on a specific muscle group, such as tricep extensions and bicep curls, due to the fact that they train the entire body as a single kinetic chain. Burpees train the entire body. When you perform burpees at a higher intensity level, you get more value for your money and burn more fat in less time than when you perform them at a lower level.
You don’t need any special equipment to do burpees, and you can do them anywhere. You can always do burpees, even if you are unable to make it into the gym, the hotel does not have a gym, you are traveling, or you are stranded outside. They are simple movements that just require you to use your body to accomplish, making them very accessible. They leave you with no justification for avoiding physical activity.
Burpees are a great exercise for anyone looking to immediately increase their conditioning as well as their respiratory endurance, whether their primary focus is on body composition or basic performance. Burpees are excellent for athletes who are training for a particular sport, and those athletes will discover that burpees help them.
I have used burpees to train basketball players, imitating the need to pop back up to your feet after diving for a loose ball. I have also used burpees to train soccer athletes, simulating the need to rise up fast after a collision or after a shot at a goal. Burpees have been quite effective for me. I have also used burpees as a training exercise for volleyball players who needed to pop up after a dig, for baseball players who needed to quickly get to their feet after fielding a grounder, and for surfers who needed to practice making a quick transition from the paddling phase to the standing phase of their sport.
The dynamic and high-intensity exercise known as the burpee is a wonderful way to spice up the pace of any workout. Because of the fast flexion and extension of the hips, it is an excellent exercise for learning how to produce force from the core all the way out to the extremities.
If you are short on time, burpees are an excellent movement to perform since they cause you to feel tired and gassed in a fairly short period of time. Incorporating them into a Tabata interval or taking on the challenge of performing one hundred burpees is a fantastic way to increase the difficulty of your exercises.
No matter what your exercise objectives are, burpees have the potential to improve not just your physical but also your mental health and fitness. Character and tenacity are developed as a result of repeated repetition and dissatisfaction with the activity. You will learn how to persevere even in the most trying of circumstances as a result of this.
The Ultimate Guide to Burpees: Muscles Worked, Benefits, How-to, and Variations
One of those types of workouts that most people absolutely despise is the burpee. A difficult round of burpees might leave you feeling weary, but they can also yield astonishing increases in fitness without the use of pricey gym equipment or complicated programs. Burpees are great because they don’t require a lot of space and they’re easy to learn.
The burpee is a full-body workout that may be modified for people at all levels of fitness, from beginners to advanced athletes. You can perform burpees by yourself for a straightforward and time-efficient workout, or you can incorporate them into high-intensity interval training (HIIT) or circuit training schedules.
In this comprehensive guide, we’re going to talk about where burpees came from, explain why and how to perform them, and offer you a whole lot of different versions that you can use to keep your exercises exciting and new.
A burpee is considered to be a difficult exercise since it combines multiple different exercises into one continuous routine that is performed in rapid succession. The following are the exercises:
- Squat jump
- Squat
- Push-up
- Squat thrust
Since then, the burpee has established itself as a fan favorite among individuals who are interested in achieving a high degree of fitness. Burpees are a popular exercise in the CrossFit program, and they are also used by members of the military and special forces, MMA fighters and other athletes, and people who are serious about working out in order to enhance their fitness and endurance and to better control their weight.
Burpee Muscles Worked
The only muscles that are spared from being worked by burpees are the biceps and the latissimus dorsi. Burpees are an excellent exercise for virtually every muscle in the body. As for the rest of your muscles, you can rest assured that burpees will provide an excellent workout for them as well.
Boxing Bayside is the place to go for additional information on this subject.
Burpees work the following major muscles:
Quadriceps – the muscles that are located on the front of your thighs and are responsible for extending your knee.
Hamstrings – the hamstrings, which may be found in the back of the thighs, are the muscles that are responsible for bending the knee and extending the hip.
Gluteus maximum – this enormous butt muscle, which extends the hips and is most commonly referred to by its acronym, the glutes.
Erector spinae – the term used to refer to the group of muscles located in the lower back.
Core – the aggregate name for the muscles that can be found in the abdominal region.
Triceps brachii – this muscle, which is positioned on the back of your upper arm and is important for raising your elbow, is most commonly referred to by its short name, the triceps.
Pectoralis major – the pectoral muscles, which are found on the front of your chest, are responsible for horizontally flexing your shoulder.
Deltoids – There are 3 different muscles that make up the deltoid: the anterior, the medial, and the posterior muscles. Throughout burpees, all three function simultaneously, but the anterior deltoid, often known as the front deltoid, is the most powerful. The deltoid muscles are the most important ones in your shoulders.
Iliopsoas – Your iliopsoas muscle, which may be found at the front of your hips, is the primary hip flexor in your body. The iliac and the psoas major are the two muscles involved here.
Triceps surae – the name given to both of your lower legs’ calf muscles collectively. The gastrocnemius, which is the larger and uppermost muscle, and the soleus, which is the smaller and lowermost muscle, make up the triceps surae.
A set of burpees with a high repetition range will leave you puffing and huffing like an old steam locomotive, which means that in addition to working these muscles, it will also work your heart and lungs quite hard.
The Benefits and Advantages of Burpees
You probably already have an idea of how challenging this workout maybe if you’ve ever tried to do burpees. The encouraging news is that each repetition of the exercise that you undertake is beneficial to you.
The main benefits and advantages of burpees include:
Total-body conditioning – the burpee is a great exercise that works almost all of the major muscles in your body. Your body will be trained to function more as it does in its natural environment, which is one reason why they are so functional. Burpees are a great option for anyone who wants to get their entire body in shape quickly and easily, whether they participate in sports or not.
Do them anywhere – because they do not require any special apparatus, burpees can be performed virtually anywhere and at any time. They are the ultimate excuse-free exercise since you can perform them anywhere: in a commercial or garage gym, at home in your bedroom or living room, in a hotel room, or even in a park.
Burpees can be modified to suit most fitness levels – the difficulty of burpees can be adjusted in a variety of different ways. For instance, you can make them easier to manage by omitting the final squat leap from the sequence. On the other hand, modifications such as muscle-up burpees and box-jump are significantly more challenging.
Burn fat – your metabolism will speed up as a result of executing a set of burpees that have a high repetition count since you will burn a lot of calories while you are doing them. Burpees are a great exercise to do whether your goal is to slim down or simply keep your current weight.
Increase leg power – your power is measured by how rapidly you can generate force. Most burpee variations require a squat jump. Power in the muscles can be significantly improved by performing jumping exercises such as burpees.
Build your cardiovascular fitness – your heart rate and breathing rate will both increase as you perform burpees, providing you with beneficial cardiovascular training in the process. This is because burpees use so many different muscles. They are a useful alternative to activities such as jumping rope, jumping jacks, and jogging, and they are also beneficial for building fitness.
Time-efficient – short on time? A good workout that can be done virtually anywhere can be obtained from performing ten minutes’ worth of burpees. Because you work your arms, core, legs, and shoulders all at once with burpees, there is no need to perform separate exercises for each of these muscle groups.
Burpees – Wrapping up
The fact that burpees require relatively little equipment does not negate the fact that they are an efficient form of exercise. The entire conditioning impact that can be achieved by performing this (un)popular action is comparable to very few other exercises. Even though not many people enjoy burpees, even those people who don’t like doing them adore the effect and value of this traditional calisthenic. Your body and your mind will both benefit from doing burpees.
Even if you can only work out in a jail cell, the simple burpee will help you burn fat and get in shape, regardless of whether you incorporate it into your next circuit training session, HIIT workout, or complete one of our tried-and-true burpee-only workouts.