Burpees have big benefits
Southern Mail senior reporter ROSHAN ABRAHAMS, who is also a qualified personal trainer, launched her new column Fit Foundations last week. This week she focuses on burpees.
So, what is a burpee? Those who are not familiar with the term, may think it’s a small version of “expelling gas” but it’s actually a very significant type of exercise necessary for one’s overall muscle strength.
Last week I mentioned that when you do not activate specific muscles in your body they become weak especially when one gets older.
A burpee is one of what I call the “Big Five” exercises, including a squat, a lunge, a plank and a push-up.
Strengthening the largest muscles in your body is key to achieving overall fitness and enhancing your physical capabilities.
About 40% of your body weight is made up of muscle tissue. Basically, these muscles are used for body movement.
The strongest muscles in the body including your legs, back, and glutes, play a crucial role in daily movement, athletic performance, and even maintaining a healthy metabolism.
Burpees are essentially a combination of a squat, plank, push-up and a squat jump, so you are working a large number of muscle groups at the same time.
As you lower your body into the first squat position to place your hands on the floor, you’ll be engaging your quads (front of your thighs), hamstrings (back of your thighs) and glutes (your backside). Your lower back muscles will also be engaged to keep your spine straight and your body stable.
Although this bodyweight exercise targets the lower body, you will feel the burn in both the upper and lower body.
When I started doing boot camp fitness classes, which included dynamic and intense group workouts and functional exercises, I was almost 50 years old but never felt intimidated by any of these exercises.
Someone asked if I was not afraid of hurting myself. I said I was too excited to try new things and that fear of getting hurt came afterwards.
Sometimes the most scary things are the ones that benefit us the most.
If you do a few burpees a day, at your own pace, it will not only get your heart rate up, but strengthen major muscle groups, burn lots of calories, and improve cardiovascular fitness.
How to do a burpee:
Stand tall with your feet shoulder-width apart and perform a hip hinge movement to lower your upper body toward the ground and place your hands on the floor in front of you into a frog squat.
Hop your feet backward so that you’re in the high plank position.
Lower your chest down to the mat with your hands on your sides.
Push through your hands to return to the high plank position, and then hop your feet forward (the low plank position is when you rest your lower arms on the mat).
Jump up and raise your arms toward the ceiling to complete the movement and land on your feet, to get ready for the next rep (a rep is a reference to one complete movement).
You can also do a half burpee where you exclude the push-up.
The burpee for beginners:
Lower down into a frog squat
Kick back one foot at a time to perform a high plank
Move forward one foot at a time.
Stand tall and raise both arms up.
Start slowly, if you are a beginner, be consistent in trying to perfect the technique until the exercise feels comfortable to do more reps.
To check out the step by step video on how to do a burpee, visit https://www.southernmail.co.za
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It’s never too late to start your fitness journey
