Reason 2 – Obtaining a realistic & natural physique

The second important reason is that Calisthenics makes it easier to obtain a more realistic and natural physique. For a lot of people, the main goal of weightlifting is to become as big and muscular as possible. As you can see in the picture. This was in the first place not our goal. Our goal was to get an athletic physique and a good looking body when going to the beach for example. Our dream was definitely not to become a pumped-up bodybuilder. However, if your goal is to get a muscular physique, then you should still consider Calisthenics over weightlifting. This is because a lot of people think that it is easy to obtain a lot of muscle with weightlifting in a few weeks or months. However, we experienced that it takes years to obtain a muscular physique with weightlifting.

Another important reason, when looking at Calisthenics or weights, is that Calisthenics is way more accessible than the gym. If you choose for weightlifting, you need to have access to a gym or weights. Nevertheless, with Calisthenics you only need your body weight to train. That’s why it is also called bodyweight training. We always say: ‘’Your body is your gym’’. You can do it anywhere: at home, at the park, during vacation, etc. Of course, there is some equipment which you can use such as parallettes or gymnastic rings. The advantage is that you can just carry it with you in your bag. Moreover, Calisthenics is completely free. You don’t need any gym membership!

Furthermore, when considering Calisthenics or Weights we think Calisthenics is better because it’s a more functional way of training. When we started lifting weights we didn’t feel functional at all. When we started doing more flexibility routines it became better. Calisthenics really forces you to work on a bigger variety of different training styles. You have to improve your flexibility, mobility and you have to work on your joints and balance. For example, take a look at an obstacle run: a Calisthenics athlete will perform much better than a bodybuilder because a Calisthenics athlete is more functional and will be more able to climb over obstacles. We did the Strong Viking Obstacle run ourselves and experienced that Calisthenics made the obstacles much easier for us. To summarize, you can definitely take advantage of Calisthenics in your daily life!