5 KILLER Upper Body Exercises For a KILLER Summer Body

WOW!  Does the weekend move fast sometimes or what?  Here it is  Monday morning already and I am pumped up and excited to do work.

This past week I received an email from one of our Mayhem Maniacs who wanted some ideas on some great upper body strength training exercises that they could do from home.

With that said I wanted to give you some great tips to get your week off to a great start!

Here are my TOP 5 Killer Exercises for a Killer Summer Body!

1. Rope Climb / Pull-ups / Inverted Rows - Ok, I know Pull-ups aren’t doable yet for everyone so I have some different progressions until you can get your feet off the ground and body up to new heights.  Lets start with the lessor of these 3 exercises (although still very challenging) The Inverted Row.  You can use the Kitchen table or throw a strong rope around a low hanging branch of a tree in your yard.  Perform this exercise by getting up under your table and pulling your chest up as seen in the pic below.  From here you can move into the Assisted Rope Climb.  Essentially the same movement as the inverted row, you’ll start by lying flat on the ground and grasping the rope.  You’ll climb the rope hand over hand until you are almost in a full standing position.  Keeping your feet in contact with the ground at all times reverse the movement by walking hand over hand back down till your laying flat on the ground again.  Both of these exercises are great for beginners who can’t get their first pull-up yet or struggle to climb a rope.  
   
2. Push-ups - These are the most basic of all upper body pressing movements however many times folks get them wrong.  To execute the perfect pushup make sure you keep a tight core.  This means from the base of your neck all the way down to your heels you have one solid, straight line and from your chin all the way to the toes, same thing.  No bowing in the back, no sagging in the stomach.  Keep your elbows slightly back instead of flared out to the sides to protect your shoulders and come all the way down till your triceps (back of the arms), upper back and floor all make one parallel line.  Another tip you can do is place a tennis ball under your chest and come all the way down till your chest hits the ball, then back up to full extension.  Its ok to keep the elbows soft at the top and not lock them out.  I actually prefer this as to not put unnecessary pressure on the elbow joints.  You can hit many different variations of the push-up to keep up the challenge.  Choose from regular, close grip, wide grip, spider crawl, burpee, bear crawl, box, explosive, weighted, etc  - Check out this video of our members hitting different pushup challenges.  
3. Odd Object Throw - This one is as basic as it sounds but a heck of a lot of fun and will build tremendous strength and give you a great metabolic conditioning workout as well (cardio to burn fat!)  Execute this movement by finding any large, heavy object (Big Rocks, Bricks, Concrete Blocks, Weighted Medicine Ball, Sandbag, Even a Dumbbell) pick it up off the ground and heave it as far as you can with a variation of different throws.  Try doing this for time.  2-4 minutes will do the trick here :D
4. Sledge Hammer Chops / Split Wood - Sometimes, the ol’ fashioned household chores growing up were the best workouts I have ever done.  Splitting and sawing wood was definitely one of those winter chores that I never looked forward to because it was HARD WORK!  Dad would do most of the splitting but my brother and I would carry and stack the wood into nice piles to burn later in the wood stove.  If you don’t have firewood to cut, get out a heavy sledgehammer and “chop wood” by hitting it into an old tire.  The heavier the hammer, the better the workout :D
5. Farmer Carry - One of my all time favorite movements that’s pretty much the Ultimate in a Strength and Conditioning exercise.  Not only will you test your entire bodies strength and endurance from your grip, to forearms, biceps, shoulders, traps, upper back, core and even legs but you’ll also be huffing and puffing trying to manage the weight for more distance or time.  Of course once you get good at a certain weight, its time to take it up or increase your distance, time, etc.  Simply grab 2 heavy objects in your hands and start walking.  Keep your body as tall as you can (think tall spine) and try not to drop.  Don’t need anything expensive here, just grab a couple of 5 Gallon buckets and fill them with water or sand.  They’ll get the job done!

So there you go.  5 Great Upper body (and really full body) drills you can do at home with things you already have laying around.

Try these exercises on this week and let me know how you do!

Get Work Done!