6 Different Burpee Variations For Your Daily Workout- Benefits And Step-By-Step Guide
6 Different Burpee Variations For Your Daily Workout: There's nothing quite like burpees when it comes to effective, high-intensity exercises. Though the name may sound unusual and funny, burpees are in no way amusing; they are a great strength and cardio workout in one seamless motion. Whether you're a novice or an experienced athlete, burpees can really push your limits, improve your endurance, and burn calories.
In this guide, we’ll delve into the benefits of burpees, explore their step-by-step execution, and introduce six exciting variations to level up your fitness game.
Burpees are very calorie-intensive. You can burn approximately 10-15 calories per minute if you do this exercise at a moderate pace. That makes it a perfect exercise for weight loss and burning fat.
Burpees work out a lot of muscles in the body, including the legs, glutes, core, chest, arms, and shoulders. This makes them a perfect exercise for building strength and body toning.
Burpees do involve HIIT, and research has proven that such exercises improve cardiovascular fitness. HIIT also burns resistant fat, especially around the abdomen.
You can perform burpees anywhere-from a home to a park and even in a hotel room. You only need your own body weight and some room.
You should first master a basic burpee before moving forward to variations. Follow these steps:
1. Stand with feet shoulder-width apart and keep arms by your sides.
2. Bend your knees and lower into a squat, placing your hands on the floor.
3. Jump your legs back into a high plank position. Keep your core tight and body straight.
4. Perform a push-up, lowering your chest to the floor.
5. Jump your legs forward to return to the squat position.
6. Jump into the air with your arms above your head.
7. Step straight back into the next repetition and land softly.
The foundation for all variations, it's simple yet challenging: offering a great blend of cardio and strength.
Take your burpee to the next level by adding a box jump. Perform a standard burpee, but instead of jumping, explode up and leap onto a box or platform. This variation builds explosive power and increases lower-body strength.
Add a lunge to hit your glutes, quads, and hamstrings.
- After the push-up, jump your feet forward and stand.
- Step into alternating lunges before proceeding to the next rep.
This weighted variation adds resistance for greater strength development.
Hold dumbbells while performing the burpee, and finish with an overhead press for added intensity.
Add core engagement and cardio by including mountain climbers.
After doing the push-up, maintain a plank position and perform 5-10 mountain climbers before getting back to the squatting position.
Add some explosiveness to your burpee by using a star jump.
Instead of a jump, leap into the air with all limbs extended like a star.
Although burpees look pretty intimidating, the benefits behind them make them worth every effort. They are multifunctional, equipment-free, and can be adapted according to the fitness level required. Start with the regular burpee to build your strength and endurance, then explore the variations to keep challenging your workouts.
(Credit-Canva)
The balance our body gives us is something that most of us take for granted. Doing exercises that build core strength and help you gain better balance. However, once you start focusing on exercises and yoga poses that allow you to gain better control over your body, a lot of your clumsy attributes like tripping, being unable to catch yourself when you fall and dropping things constantly will improve.
One such yoga pose that can help you improve your balance and focus, is Vrikshasana. As you may know, there are different types of yoga, while some help you strengthen your body with rapid movements and endurance, others are more movement based, focused on the flow and connection between poses. These consist of many different asanas that focus on different aspects of your health and body.
According to the International Journal of Yoga 2016 study, while most of us focus on backward and forward movement, sideways balance involves hip and ankle muscles too. It's been found that sideways changes are controlled by hip muscles, while forward and backward changes are controlled by ankle muscles. Virkshasana aims to strengthen our ankles and take pressure of your feet with the help of your hip muscles. Here is how it benefits our health.
Tree Pose makes you stand on one leg, which really challenges your balance. Your brain and muscles work together to keep you steady, strengthening this important skill for everyday activities and preventing falls. It helps your body learn to control its center of gravity.
To stay standing tall in Tree Pose, your standing leg muscles have to work hard to support your weight. Holding the pose builds strength in your thighs, calves, and ankles, making them more stable and resilient for walking, standing, and other movements.
When you reach your arms overhead in Tree Pose, it creates a nice stretch along your sides and back. The way you position your lifted leg can also create a stretch in your hips and inner thighs, improving flexibility in these key areas of your body.
By engaging different muscle groups and requiring focus, Tree Pose helps to wake up your entire system. The combination of stretch, strength, and balance work can leave you feeling more energized and connected to your body after practicing the pose.
Although not the main focus, staying balanced on one leg in Tree Pose requires your core muscles – those in your abdomen and back – to work to keep you upright and prevent wobbling. This helps to strengthen your core for better posture and stability.
Credits: Canva
Body Mass Index or BMI is a calculation that is used to understand the relationship between your height and weight. It is very commonly used in healthcare settings and also in gyms or weight training centers. It helps fitness coaches and healthcare professionals to categorize people as underweight, normal weight, overweight, or obese. The goal of BMI is to get a rough estimate of body fat, which can then highlight potential risks for chronic health problems.
But while BMI is easy to calculate and useful as a general guideline, it doesn’t tell the full story of a person’s health.
The formula for BMI differs slightly depending on the measurement system you use.
Metric: BMI = weight (kg) ÷ height (m²)
Imperial: BMI = (weight in pounds ÷ height in inches²) × 703
For example, someone who weighs 180 pounds and is 5 feet 6 inches tall (66 inches) would have a BMI of:
(180 ÷ 66²) × 703 = 29.0
That would place them in the "overweight" category.
BMI is also divided into these categories that then determine where the person falls under the spectrum from underweight to obesity:
Generally, the higher your BMI, the greater your risk of health conditions such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, sleep apnea, fatty liver, and even certain cancers.
While BMI is not a diagnostic test, it can be a helpful screening tool. It is used to track trends in population, raise awareness of weight-related risks, and to initiate conversations between patients and healthcare providers.
However, BMI often leaves out the muscle mass, bone structure, or fat distribution. One of the most common example is when an athlete with high muscle mass is classified as "overweight" despite having a low body fat.
This is why, there are other ways to measure too, including:
Excess belly fat is a stronger risk factor than fat stored elsewhere.
Men: waist > 40 inches
Women: waist > 35 inches
Tools like InBody or SECA scales provide a breakdown of fat mass, muscle, and water weight—offering more detail than BMI.
This scan is the gold standard for measuring body fat, bone density, and fat distribution—but it’s expensive and not widely available.
Lab tests like fasting glucose, cholesterol levels, and inflammation markers help assess overall health more accurately than BMI alone.
BMI could also vary depending on your ethnicity. More South Asians are risk for diabetes and heart disease at lower BMIs. For them, "overweight" may begin at 23 and "obese" at 25. African Americans may have higher muscle mass and lower visceral fat, which can cause BMI to overestimate health risks. Hispanic and Indigenous populations may carry more risk at lower BMIs due to genetic factors.
While it is important to care about your BMI, however, it should not be the only way to measure your health. You must also consider waist size, body composition, fitness level, blood test results, and ethnic background.
Credits: Instagram
Kareena Kapoor Khan, and whatever she does, is always making headlines. Even at the age of 44, she is an epitome of fitness. Out of her duties, she ensures to devote time to fitness, through various workout forms, including yoga.
Her Yoga instructor, Anushka Parwani, revealed in a recent interview with ETimes that Kareena in fact was her first ever student. She had always focused on fitness over weight loss.
Anushka Parwani is a celebrity trainer, who has trained Alia Bhatt and Deepika Padukone. In the interview, she shared insights from Kareena's routine and how her dedication to yoga keeps her fit!
What has helped Kareena is how she has been able to understand her body and its need and thus she compliments those needs with yoga. Her instructor also revealed that Kareena never desired to lose weight, but to maintain her overall fitness, including adjusting her waist size.
"Kareena is the most aware of her body. I know this because I have been with her...she was my first-ever student, not just the first actor I worked with. There is so much to learn form her because she is so aware. She has always loved yoga, and she understands her body as well. So, we know when to push a little and alter the workout or when to do variations and just do breathwork. Right now, we are very balanced. It is also about pausing. With experience and age comes pausing; she knows when to pause," shared her instructor.
Her instructor also revealed that the actor does a lot of mixes of animal flows, and strength, as well as cardiovascular-based workouts.
However, reveals her instructor, her true best friend to fitness has been yoga. This is also because Yoga offers a sustainable and holistic solution. It also combines fat-burning, muscle toning, and core strengthening benefits. Furthermore, yoga also helps one calm there mind.
Here are 6 yoga asanas that can help you stay fit and keep your waistline in check like Kareena Kapoor khan.
Here's for you to try out:
Benefits: Strengthens legs, stretches the spine and waist, improves digestion.
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Benefits: Tones abs, improves balance, strengthens core and hip flexors.
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Benefits: Improves spinal flexibility, aids digestion, massages internal organs.
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Benefits: Strengthens thighs and glutes, improves balanceand detoxification.
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Benefits: Strengthens back muscles, opens chest, relieves stress.
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Benefits: Strengthens arms, core, and legs; improves balance.
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