Regarding the Elite Cords resistance bands, I received the following question the other day via email:

Are the weight lbs on the clips of the Elite Cords?

My response (sent via email and reposted here):

No, because it’s impossible to accurately put poundage weight on resistance bands. The tension of the bands is based on how much you stretch them out. If you’re a 5’2″ person doing biceps curls with the red band, the weight of the band would be significantly different than if you were a 6’4″ person biceps curls with the red. Shoulder press is even more noticeable. When you’re using the door anchors, the tension will change depending on how far you are from the anchor point.

Bodylastics puts poundage weights on their resistance bands and I think it’s absurd to do that because the poundage numbers are so inaccurate.

Since the Elite Cords resistance bands system is a new product, surely many people will be comparing our product to Bodylastics, which have been around for over 10 years. The weight equivalents that are printed on Bodylastics clips are nothing more than a gimmick. The poundage numbers are completely meaningless and useless, much like the bad aerobics workout DVD included with Bodylastics, or the atrocious meathead workouts they do on their website.

I did a short workout today that included resisted squats and reverse flys, both of which were performed with the Elite Cords.

For resistance squats, I used all five bands, and for reverse flys I used just the orange band for the first set, and orange plus yellow for the second set.

Having two sets of handles saved me a ton of time and hassle switching bands during the the workout. If I had only had one set of handles, I would have had to unclip 4 bands before doing the reverse flys. So having the extra set of handles cut my adjustment time in more than half.

Having the extra set of handles is a really big perk that cuts down on your exercise time and makes the workout much more enjoyable because you’re not constantly fiddling around clipping and unclipping bands. That is why we include two sets of handles with every Elite Cords system.

I came across an old patent for an exercise device invented by a man named Gustav Gossweiler:

My invention relates to exercising devices; and the invention consists in an exercising device made of elastic material and designed to be used to exercise the arms and all parts of the body, substantially as shown and described, and particularly pointed out in the claim.

Gustav’s invention was issued a United States patent in 1896, and looks similar to modern day resistance bands such as my Elite Cords exercise system. One of my main competitors in the resistance bands market claims his product is “the original exercise bands system”. He launched his product in 1998, over a century after Gustav Gossweiler patented his own resistance bands exercise device.

So let it be said that a set of resistance bands created in 1998 is not “the original exercise bands system”.

Kettlebells are a pretty popular piece of exercise equipment, and people often ask me about them, or more specifically why I never talk about them in any of the nearly 200 fitness videos I’ve got on my YouTube channel.

The answer is simple, I don’t like kettlebells. Don’t get me wrong, they’re unquestionably an awesome piece of exercise equipment that’s sure to produce fantastic results for anyone who uses them, but I personally hate using them.

I did a “Kettlebell 101″ workout back in the summer of 2008 because I was interested in learning more about kettlebells in order to see if I could introduce them into the workouts I run for my clients in Vancouver. It was an intense workout where we ran through many of the most common kettlebell exercises. Despite the workout clearly being incredibly effective, I found the workout (i.e. exercising with kettlebells) to be a miserable experience and not something I would remotely enjoy doing again, much less on a regular basis.

I believe that exercise should be fun, and since I didn’t remotely enjoy exercising with kettlebells, I don’t exercise with them. I use exercise tools that I do enjoy, such as resistance bands and the suspension gym.

But don’t avoid kettlebells just because I don’t like them. Maybe you’ll love them. So if you’re interested in exercising with kettlebells, I encourage you to try a kettlebell workout and then decide for yourself whether exercising with kettlebells something you enjoy and want to do on a regular basis.

I was just doing some research on Google for some new fitness businesses that I’m planning on starting (pertaining to affiliate marketing), and I came across this incredibly ridiculous product.

Behold the Cardio Twister:

What an incredibly stupid product.

Please do yourself a favour and never buy the Cardio Twister. You’ll get better results and save a ton of money with a set of resistance bands, or a suspension gym, or even just by doing bodyweight workouts.

I received the following question today via email:

Do you think a male can build a significant amount of muscle just using resistance bands and suspension straps?

My answer:

Yes, males can build significant amounts of muscle using resistance bands and suspension straps. The reason is very simple. Building muscle requires that you overload your muscles with progressively more challenging amounts of resistance from workout to workout. As you increase the demand on your body by adding resistance to the exercises, your body adapts by building bigger and stronger muscles. The type of resistance you use it irrelevant. You could lift barbells and dumbbells at your local health club, or you could flip tires in a junk yard, or you could use elastic resistance in the form of resistance bands, or you could use your own bodyweight as resistance with suspension straps. Certain bodyweight exercises are difficult to add more resistance as you get stronger (pushups are a good example), but most suspension strap exercises have progressions that should be challenging enough for you to keep putting the demands on your body necessary to build muscle. And for things like pushups where you’re likely not going to be extremely challenged, you can either use pre-exhaustion (tire out the chest muscles before doing pushups), or use the resistance bands for your chest exercises.

Keep in mind that not all sets of resistance bands are equal. If building muscle is your goal, then you’ll need an adjustable set that let you clip multiple bands onto the same set of handles for a really challenging amount of resistance. It’s simply not possible to get that from resistance bands that have the handles permanently attached to the bands.

I received the following question today via YouTube:

I’m curious, do you ever workout with weights? The reason I ask is that I’m getting a little tired of working out in the gym with weights and stuff.

My answer is posted below:

No, I do not workout with weights any more. I haven’t so much as touched a barbell or dumbbell in nearly a year.

I stopped working out with weights approximately one year ago after I got extremely bored with exercising at my local health club. I had been exercising in gyms and health clubs ever since I was 15 years old (I’m 31 now), and last year after a decade and a half of that scene I just plain got sick and tired of exercising that way.

After officially deciding that I do not want anything to do with gyms and health clubs any more, I’ve spent most of last year learning how to have effective workouts at home, or outdoors, with little to no equipment. Part of that journey involved launching an Vancouver boot camp program where I learned through trial and error exactly what works, and what doesn’t work, when it comes to effective “gymless” workouts.

Here are a few suggestions based on my discoveries over the past year:

1) You absolutely positively do NOT need to lift weights to get ripped and into the best shape of your life. Take a look at gymnasts. Most of them have never lifted a barbell or dumbbell before in their entire lives and they are among of the most shredded and chiseled athletes on earth.

2) In order to effectively work your legs without any weights, you need to do one-leg exercises. Your legs are simply too strong to get a great workout doing bodyweight only exercise where you’re lifting with both legs (e.g. bodyweight squat, prisoner squat, y squat, etc). But only a very miniscule percentage of the population can do unassisted 1-leg pistol squats, so one of the reasons why I love suspension gym training is that it allows you to effectively do assisted 1-leg squats while you work towards being able to do them unassisted. 1-leg squats on the suspension gym are as effective, if not more so, than any two-leg exercise you could do you in your weight room with a barbell on your shoulders.

3) Suspension gym training WILL provide you with a total-body workout that’s every bit as effective, if not more so, than any workout you could ever have at a health club with free weights and all of the most modern and expensive machines.

4) Resistance bands WILL also provide you with a total-body workout that’s every bit as effective, if not more so, than any workout you could ever have at your local gym using free weights and expensive machines.

5) Combining suspension gym training with resistance band training WILL give you a total-body muscle sculpting workout that’s SUPERIOR to any health club workout. Period. End of story. I guarantee that. I truly consider the ultimate home gym (or just gym, period) to be the suspension gym combined with resistance bands.

So to summarize: no, you do not need to lift weights to get in amazing shape. You can have the same, or better, workouts at home using just a couple of pieces of inexpensive equipment such as the suspension gym and resistance bands.

I hope this response was helpful.

I just saw a TV commercial for a product called the Ab Coaster. What a useless looking piece of exercise equipment.

On the TV commercial, they won’t even say how much the product costs. All they talk about is the “$14.95 trial offer”. I was curious how much the Ab Coaster costs, so I went to the company’s website to have a look. To my utter astonishment, it costs $414.75 USD, or “one convenient payment plan” of $399.80 USD. Jiminy.

Here’s my main problem with the Ab Coaster: it’s not a total-body workout product. It’s a gimmicky ab machine that allows you to perform 2 exercises: leg raises and oblique leg raises. Is that worth $400 to you? I doubt it, unless you have a bunch of extra money lying around to purchase (not to mention space to store) expensive ab exercise equipment that has extremely limited use.

For most people, the only type of home exercise equipment that’s worth buying is compact equipment that is ultra-versatile (i.e. one single piece of equipment that allows for a vast selection of total-body exercises). For this reason, the only two pieces of home exercise equipment that I recommend are the suspension gym and resistance bands. Get them both, or choose one or the other (pick whichever one you think you’ll enjoy exercising with the most).

But stay far away from gimmicky ab gadgets that cost $400+ and allow you to perform only two exercises.