In the first blog-post of this year’s series, we talked about the number one body-weight training accessory – gymnastic rings. In order to balance your pushing movement patterns with you pulling movement patterns and keep you body symmetric and health, gymnastic rings are a must. After getting your first set of gymnastic rings, there is a lot of other supplementary equipment you can consider acquiring. Especially if you train outdoors or if you have the space for it at home, my recommendation is the jump-rope.
WHY JUMP ROPES ARE A MUST-HAVE BODYWEIGHT TRAINING TOOL
1. Portability: First of all, the jump rope is easy to carry around. Since it doesn’t weigh that much and it doesn’t take a lot of space, you can throw it in your backpack with your gymnastic rings or even have it with you when traveling.
2. Great way to warm up: Jumping rope is one of the most fun and efficient ways to warm up the whole body (personally my favorite way). The jump-rope is my favorite warm-up tool. It gradually elevates your body’s temperature & heart-rate.It prepares sensitive upper-body joints such as your shoulders way better than a conventional jog. You can do it on the spot since it doesn’t require a lot of space and it looks cool.
3. Fun to do: Besides an efficient warm-up, it’s also more fun way to warm up. By adding new tricks to your skipping routine, you can keep it interesting and challenging in the long run.
4 .Good for the brain : Learning to jump rope and adding tricks to your routines involves a lot of new motor patterns for the brain. You also improve your coordination and agility – all good things for your brain, especially as you age.
5. Good for martial artists: If you’re into martial arts, jumping rope can increase your reaction time, lightness on the feet and therefore also improve your stance and footwork as well.
My favorite tricks to throw in my skipping rope sets are side-swings, crossovers and double-unders which are even more challenging if you use a weighted rope as I do. I’m not by any means a pro at jumping rope but learning to jump rope again with a prosthetic leg has been a fun challenge. Taking into account all that I think I do ok.
Jump rope to Build Lean Muscle & Burn Fat?
Ok, now that I used the number one fitness catch-phrase to catch your attention, let me explain this properly. Jumping rope is a high energy-expenditure dynamic exercise but… adding a few minutes of jumping rope to your day will not get you a six-pack because… well, no exercise can do that for you. Sure, you can jump rope for an hour or two and that will burn a lot more calories. But very few people have the time and patience to do that every day.
On the other hand, a well-structured workout plan that combines speed, power and strength training (these are the plans that you’ll be seeing more and more here in BM) is the most time-efficient, practical and therefore also effective plan for most modern people who want to build an aesthetic lean and strong physique. Jumping rope is simply one of the best exercises to incorporate in such a plan.
“Workouts that combine speed, power and strength are the best way to build muscle and burn fat…”
In the following video we’ll talk about what types of jumping ropes are the best to get started, (weighted ropes, speed-ropes, etc) budget ropes, more expensive ropes and which is my favorite brand!