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The Top 5 Exercises You Need to Be Doing in the Gym

Do you want to build muscle or drop a few pounds? These are the five best exercises for you to perform whether at Gold's or in a home gym.

By Thomas StairsPublished 7 years ago 3 min read
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Do you want to build muscle or drop a few pounds? These are the five best exercises for you to perform whether at Gold's or in a home gym.

5. Flat Bench Press

The flat bench press may be the most famous exercise of all time. It's pretty much the one exercise every teenage boy and gym bro knows how to do flawlessly. However, besides boosting your ego, the flat bench press is one the most beneficial exercises you can add to your work out. It's a compound exercise that focuses on the chest, triceps, and front delts while also being one of the best forearm exercises you can do. But if you're looking to build up mass in your chest then this is your best option. Go ahead and give it a try but make sure you are executing perfect form at all times. Flat bench press is performed by lying flat on the bench, grabbing the bar from about shoulder length then slowly bringing it down to the chest and pushing it back up. Make sure to keep your shoulders retracted and don't push too much weight.

4. Pull-Ups

The almighty granddaddy of all body weight exercises, the pull-up is going to activate your entire upper body and a bit of activation in the core for stabilization. You want to go up to the bar and grab it a little wider than shoulder length grip with an over hand grip. Crossing your feet is helpful to ensure that your legs don’t try to kick and assist you with the pull up. Now just as the name implies, pull yourself up. You can also do a chin-up, where you use an underhand grip in order to hit the biceps much harder.

3. Bent Over Rows

No other exercise is going to help you achieve the thickness of the back and widen your lats as well as the bent over barbell row. This can be performed by grabbing the barbell with an over hand grip a little over shoulder length apart, bending at the knees slightly and bending at the waist until you’re almost parallel with the floor. Now, pulling with your lats, bring the bar to your chest and back down

2. Squats

This isn’t just the best exercise for legs, this is debatably the best compound exercise of all time. The squat hits almost every muscle in your legs and depending how deep you let yourself go can determine what parts it hits harder. Before we get into proper form I need to stress that is important that you have someone teach you squats in person, reading or watching video is not enough to full understand the form of this exercise especially considering how dangerous it is. That being said, approach the bar and grasp it a bit wider than shoulder length apart, and place the bar on your shoulders (DO NOT LET IT REST ON YOUR NECK), now keep your spine straight and squat down as if you were sitting in a chair. Now go all the way down in order to activate the glutes a bit more on the way up or stop about have way to put pressure on the quads and force yourself up. Make sure you keep your back straight and if you’ve never squatted before make sure you start with body weight only.

1. Deadlift

Despite what some people online may tell you, deadlifts are for more than just power-lifters. Deadlifts are an almost complete full body exercises hitting the legs, arms, abs and especially the back. The deadlift is performed by walking up to the back and grabbing it a bit more than shoulder length apart bending at the knees then more or less straightening your body and standing up, then bringing the bar back down to the floor. This is a great exercise for an overall back work out and can fit well in your plan to overwork certain muscles that are indirectly active.

fitness
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