Many fitness experts will recommend that you do push-ups, sit-ups and planks if you want to tone up your muscles without having to join a gym, but if you are looking for an exercise that will tone up your muscles and help you lose weight, then the burpee is undoubtedly the number one exercise.
That’s because this move will not only work a number of different muscle groups with every rep, but it will also help you burn lots of calories because it is such a challenging exercise to perform.
What Is A Burpee?
Before I discuss which muscles you will work by doing burpees and how many calories you can potentially burn, I should start by discussing what a burpee actually is first of all.
Although there are a few different variations of this exercise, the basic movements are essentially the same.
Starting in a standing position, all you need to do is drop to a squat position with your hands placed on the floor in front of you, push your feet back behind you to adopt a push-up position, bring them forward to your chest and then jump up as high as you can.
To make this exercise even harder, you can actually do a push-up every time you kick your feet back and adopt a push-up position, as demonstrated in the video below:
Muscles Worked
One of the reasons why the burpee is so popular is because it works many different muscle groups (in both the upper and lower body).
In addition to working your arms, chest and core abdominal muscles, it will also help you build stronger legs as well because it will work your quads, glutes and hamstrings.
Indeed if you do burpees every single day, you will notice that your overall strength will increase quite considerably in a relatively short space of time.
Weight Loss
As well as being a great toning and strength-building exercise, the burpee is also one of the most effective weight loss moves, which is why it is often included in many HIIT and Crossfit workouts, and is a favorite with many personal trainers.
The reason why is because this is exercise incorporates several different movements (squat, kick back, kick forward and jump), and will subsequently get your heart pumping fast.
So by doing as many reps as you can, you will inevitably burn lots of calories (240 – 355 calories in 30 minutes depending on bodyweight), which in turn will help you to burn fat reserves and lose weight if you continue to do lots of burpees on a regular basis.
Closing Comments
Burpees can be done anywhere because you don’t need any kind of equipment, and they will definitely help to tone your muscles, improve your fitness and promote fat-burning.
Therefore you should seriously consider incorporating them into your existing workouts if you want to increase your core body strength and help to burn some more calories.
Alternatively, if you have limited time to work out, or if you don’t necessarily want to pay for a gym membership every month, you can just do this one exercise because it is one of the most beneficial full-body exercises that you can do.
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