It wouldn’t be right if I didn’t introduce myself to Bronco nation!

My name is Kyle Garner.

I currently live in Eau Claire, Wisconsin with my wife Amanda and two kids, Coby (girl) and Bodin (boy).

I created this home bodyweight fitness course alongside the good people at the Boise State Kinesiology Department.

Each module will generally contain the following sections:

• Read
• Watch
• Activity

The reading and watching will be minimal.

I’ll deliver useable info in these sections, but the course is designed to get you moving.

You’ll learn more by participating in the workouts than reading or watching them.

Module 1

The first couple of modules are mainly reading and watching, sorry. 😐

It’ll consist of familiarizing with key fitness terms, principles, and ideas.

Make sure to scroll to the end to watch the Tedx talk about the benefits of exercise.

Exercise is INCREDIBLE, jam-packed with benefits.

But, exercise is also overwhelming for a lot of people to think about.

Where do I start?

How often should I exercise?

Doing what?

How many reps? How far? How long?

What? Where? When? Who? How? Why?

AAAAhhhhhh! 😱

If you’re new, bodyweight fitness is an ideal place to start your fitness journey. For those who are more experienced with fitness, I guarantee there are elements of this course that you have not used or considered.

They’ll be a little bit here for everyone.

My goal is to coach you up on how to build fitness using nothing but bodyweight and a few other household items (chair, backpack, tennis ball, different surfaces, door, etc)

Have access to a gym? GREAT! You can use gym equipment to scale exercises to your current fitness level.

Knowing what to do when you’re short on time, resources and space can:

Keep you fit for life, no matter what.

A few well-known limitations to sustainable fitness:

• Budget
• Time
• Space and resources
• Know-how
• Consistency, temptation, discipline, etc

In this course, I’ll share a good roadmap of techniques, tools and tips to overcome budget, time, space, resources and know-how.

These become non-factors, cancelled out completely.

Now, the last bulleted point is the foundation of staying fit for life: consistency, temptation (to skip exercise), discipline.

That’s 100% up to you.

But here’s the deal. You can stay the course, I know it.

The more you learn about how to exercise and “do” exercise, the more exercise tends to become more fun and less of a pain in the behind.

Good physical activity habits become integrated into your daily life and progressively better habits take shape.

Perform those habits long enough and there’s no turning back.

You’ll feel too good to revert back to old habits.

Major advantages of bodyweight training

• Free of charge
• Time efficient
• Workout anywhere, using anything
• Imperfect space approved

One of the biggest myths in fitness is that equipment is MANDATORY to get a satisfying workout and make progress.

It’s not true.

Equipment opens doors to new exercises and while enhancing basic exercises (progressive loading, etc). So, this is not to say equipment is bad.

It’s just a matter of perspective. You don’t want to find yourself completely reliant on fancy equipment to stay fit, strong, conditioning and healthy.

Bodyweight training, like anything else, thrives off of exploration and seeking the next big challenge.

Too often, people who don’t believe in its effectiveness simply haven’t explored far enough.

Inch your way forward with me, let’s discover this together.

Read

• How to Start Working Out When You Don’t Know What You’re Doing (James Clear)
• American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) Common Fitness Components:

• Overload Priniple (ISSA)

SAID Principle

• SAID = Specific Adaptations to Imposed Demands
• The adaptations you make are specific to what you’re doing.
• In order to improve unique skills, you must practice those skills.  
• Want to improve squat strength?  Practice the squat, add weight, etc. 
• Want to run a marathon?  Practice running and increase the distance over time.

Overload Principle

• You have to increase the intensity, duration, time or type progressively in order to see adaptations. 
• In other words, you must keep challenging your exercise habits to make progress.  
• Doing the same thing over and over without any change in difficulty will yield the same results. 

Wolff’s Law

• You either use it, or you’ll lose it.
• Exercise regularly to preserve/improve fitness.
• Stop exercising long enough, fitness declines. 

FITT Principle

• Frequency
  • Frequency is how often a person performs the targeted health-related physical activity. For each component of health-related fitness, a safe frequency is three to five times a week.
• Intensity
  • Intensity is how hard a person exercises during a physical activity period. Intensity can be measured in different ways, depending on the related health-related component. For example, monitoring heart rate is one way to gauge intensity during aerobic endurance activities, but gives no indication of intensity during flexibility activities.
• Time 
  • Time is the length of the physical activity. As with the other aspects of the FITT principle, time varies depending on the health-related fitness component targeted. For example, flexibility or stretching may take 10-30 seconds for each stretch, while the minimum time for performing aerobic activity is 20 minutes of continuous activity.
• Type
  • Type or specificity, refers to the specific physical activity chosen to improve a component of health-related fitness. For example, an individual wishing to increase arm strength must exercise the triceps and biceps, while an individual wishing to increase aerobic endurance needs to jog, run, swim or perform some other aerobically challenging activity.

Watch

• The Brain Changing Benefits of Exercise (TED Talk – Wendy Suzuki)

Here’s a glimpse into some of the movements we’ll be working through in the coming weeks…