Burpees Exercise - How To Do Burpees Workout In Correct Form
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When it comes to full-body exercises that pack a punch, few can match the intensity and effectiveness of the burpee. This explosive movement combines squatting, planking, push-ups, and jumping, challenging your strength, endurance, and coordination. While the burpee may seem straightforward, nailing the proper form is crucial to maximizing its benefits and avoiding injury.
In this comprehensive guide, we'll explain the burpee step-by-step, explore its origins, and discuss its many benefits. We'll also delve into burpee variations to keep your workouts fresh and challenging and ensure you never hit a plateau.
The Origins of the Burpee
Before we dive into the nitty-gritty details, let's take a moment to appreciate the brilliant mind behind this infamous exercise. The burpee was created in the 1930s by physiologist Royal H. Burpee, who designed it as a simple yet effective way to assess physical fitness levels.
Little did Burpee know that his creation would become a staple in military training programs, athletic conditioning regimens, and workout routines worldwide. Today, the burpee is revered (and sometimes dreaded) for its ability to push the limits of strength, endurance, and mental toughness.
The Anatomy of a Burpee
At its core, the burpee consists of four main movements:
1. Squat Thrust
2. Plank Position
3. Push-Up
4. Jumping Your Feet Back
Let's break down each step to ensure you're executing the movement with proper form:
- Standing Position: Start by standing tall, with your feet shoulder-width apart and your arms at your sides. Engage your core and keep your chest up and shoulders back.
- Squat Thrust: Initiate the movement by sending your hips back and bending your knees to lower into a deep squat position. Once you've reached the bottom of the squat, place your hands on the ground in front of you, shoulder-width apart.
- Plank Position: In one fluid motion, kick your feet back to assume a straight-arm plank position. Your body should form a straight line from heels to head, with your core engaged and your weight evenly distributed between your toes and hands.
- Push-Up: From the plank position, bend your elbows to lower your body weight towards the ground, performing a full push-up. You can modify it if needed by performing the push-up on your knees.
- Frog Kick: Engage your core and use your chest and triceps to push yourself back into the plank position. Then, explosively jump your feet forward, landing outside your hands in the squat position.
- Jump: From the squat position, explosively extend your legs and drive through your heels to propel yourself upwards, reaching your arms overhead. Land softly on the balls of your feet, immediately bending your knees to prepare for the next repetition.
Mastering the form is essential, but listening to your body and modifying it as needed is critical. If you're new to burpees or returning from an injury, consider stepping back instead of jumping or performing push-ups on your knees.
The Benefits of Burpees
Now that you know how to execute the burpee with proper form, let's explore the multitude of benefits this dynamic exercise offers:
- Full-Body Workout: The burpee is an actual full-body exercise, engaging every major muscle group, including your legs, core, chest, back, and arms. This comprehensive muscle recruitment builds strength and boosts your overall metabolic rate, leading to increased calorie burn.
- Cardiovascular Conditioning: Burpees are a high-intensity exercise that quickly elevates your heart rate, making them an excellent addition to any cardiovascular conditioning routine. One minute of burpees can burn up to 10 calories, depending on your weight and intensity.
- Improved Power and Agility: The explosive nature of the burpee, particularly the jump component, helps develop power and agility. This enhanced athleticism can translate to improved performance in various sports and activities.
- Increased Endurance: Incorporating burpees into your routine will challenge your muscular and cardiovascular endurance, improving your ability to sustain high-intensity efforts for extended periods.
- Versatility: Burpees can be performed virtually anywhere, making them convenient and versatile exercises for home workouts and gym sessions.
Spicing Things Up: Burpee Variations
While the standard burpee is an effective full-body exercise, incorporating burpee variations can help keep your workouts fresh, challenging, and engaging. Here are a few variations to consider:
- Push-Up Burpee: Instead of a regular push-up, try a push-up with a shoulder tap or a push-up with a clap at the top.
- Lateral Burpee: As you jump back into the plank position, shift your body to the side and back to the center before jumping your feet forward.
- Burpee Box Jump: After the push-up, jump your feet forward and explode upwards, jumping onto a plyometric box or stable surface. Step back down and repeat.
- Burpee Pull-Up: If you have a pull-up bar handy, add a pull-up to the movement after the jump.
- Weighted Burpee: Hold a dumbbell or kettlebell close to your chest throughout the entire movement for added resistance.
These variations add diversity to your workouts, target specific muscle groups, and challenge your body in new ways, helping you break through plateaus and continue progressing.
Incorporating Burpees into Your Routine
Burpees are an incredibly versatile exercise that somebody can incorporate into various workout styles and routines. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
- High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT): Burpees are a staple in many HIIT workouts, where you alternate periods of intense effort with periods of active recovery.
- Circuit Training: Include burpees as one of the exercises in a full-body circuit, alternating between strength and cardiovascular movements.
- Tabata Workouts: Perform burpees for 20 seconds, followed by 10 seconds of rest, repeated for eight rounds.
- Warmup or Finisher: Use burpees as a dynamic warmup before your main workout or as a metabolic finisher to push your body to its limits.
Remember, proper form and gradual progression are crucial to avoiding injury and maximizing the benefits of burpees. Start with a manageable number of repetitions and gradually increase as your strength and endurance improve.
The burpee tests overall fitness, challenging your strength, endurance, power, and mental toughness. By mastering the proper form and incorporating burpee variations into your routine, you'll achieve a more robust, fitter, and resilient physique. Embrace the burn, push through the discomfort, and reap the rewards of this full-body blast.
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The number of calories burned during a burpee workout can vary depending on your body weight, intensity level, and duration. However, research suggests that a person weighing around 155 lbs (70 kg) can burn up to 10 calories per minute by performing burpees at a high intensity. A 20-minute burpee workout could potentially burn around 200 calories.
Burpees are a high-impact, full-body exercise that can be challenging for beginners. Starting with a lower-impact variation, such as stepping back instead of jumping or performing push-ups on your knees, is essential. Gradually work up to the entire burpee movement as your strength and coordination improve. Proper form is also crucial to prevent injury, so it's best to learn the movement under the guidance of a certified fitness instructor or trainer.
Burpees are an actual full-body exercise that engages multiple muscle groups simultaneously. The primary muscles worked during a burpee include the quadriceps, hamstrings, glutes, calves, core (rectus abdominis, obliques, and erector spinae), chest (pectoralis major and minor), back (latissimus dorsi and trapezius), shoulders (deltoids), triceps, and biceps.
To perform burpees only a few times a week, especially at a high intensity, despite being an excellent full-body exercise. Burpees are a high-impact movement that can significantly stress your joints and muscles. It's best to incorporate burpees into your routine 2-3 times weekly, allowing for proper rest and recovery between sessions. Additionally, consider alternating burpee workouts with other forms of strength training and low-impact cardio to avoid overuse injuries.
If you have knee or wrist issues, there are several modifications you can make to the burpee movement to reduce the impact and strain on these joints:
- For knee issues, try stepping back instead of jumping during the plank portion or perform the burpee from an elevated surface to reduce the squat depth.
- For wrist issues, consider performing the push-up portion on your fists or using push-up handles to alleviate pressure on your wrists.
Absolutely! Adding weights to your burpee variations can increase the intensity and challenge of the exercise, leading to more significant strength gains and caloric expenditure. Some options include:
- You hold a dumbbell or kettlebell close to your chest throughout the movement.
- You are performing a push-up with a weight plate or medicine ball on your back.
- Use a barbell or resistance bands to add resistance to the jump or push-up portion. Just maintain proper form and start with a manageable weight before progressing to heavier loads.
