Oddbean new post about login | logout One reason to stick to free weights over exercise machines: traveling. No matter where you go, a pound is a pound and a kilogram is a kilogram - for free weights. But machines can vary by brand and even by age / wear. It's frustrating when you're trying to follow a precise schedule of graduated weights.
training with your own body weight brings many advantages 💪
True, although your body is rarely stable in weight. If you’ve lost 25lbs over a year, you have to make up for it with more reps. Free weights are definitely the gold standard if trying to increase strength via a protocol for the reasons Lopp mentioned.
True
Only problem with dumbbells like say in a hotel gym is that they often only go up to like 50 max.
Or you could put together a routine with body weight only exercises for when you're traveling. With a pair of wooden rings and straps you can target any part of your body
Free weights also recruit more muscle fibers..
Henry Rollins has a on weightlifting … "The Iron never lies to you. You can walk outside and listen to all kinds of talk, get told that you're a god or a total bastard. The Iron will always kick you the real deal. The Iron is the great reference point, the all-knowing perspective giver. Always there like a beacon in the pitch black. I have found the Iron to be my greatest friend. It never freaks out on me, never runs. Friends may come and go. But two hundred pounds is always two hundred pounds."
But the bar is always unknown though 😆 The real problem with machines is you're not using your stabilising muscles which limits how much strength transfers to real world. There's nothing like maxing the weights on machines in a hotel gym to make you feel strong though.
Calisthenics >>>