Bodyweight Exercise - Disadvantages

Disadvantages

Bodyweight exercises use the practitioner's own weight to provide the resistance for the movement. This means that the weight being lifted is never greater than the weight of one's own body. This makes it difficult for less experienced athletes to achieve a level of intensity that is near their one rep maximum, which is desirable for strength training. Bodyweight exercises can be increased in intensity by including additional weights (such as wearing a weighted vest or holding a barbell, kettlebell, sandbell or plate during a sit up) or by altering the exercise to put one's self at a leverage disadvantage (such as elevating the feet, hanging from straps to change leverage, using one limb, and incorporating isometrics).

Gymnasts make extensive use of this last technique by doing much of their training with straight arms (such as iron crosses, levers, and planches), giving them a mechanically disadvantaged position. Furthermore, a unilateral progression scheme can be used. Instead of a bilateral movement, such as a two-handed pull-up, the practitioner may decide, for strength increases, to choose a set of exercises that will allow him/herself to complete the one-arm pull up. In the bodyweight-training community, unilateral movements are highly regarded and sought after.