Bodyweight Training Burns Fat?

I've been reading a lot on gymnastics training the past weeks since I plan on starting my own routine in a few days.

One thing I've read on one or two websites though kind of confuses me. I tried looking for the websites again, but they elude me. You'll have to do without the source.

They basicly said: bodyweight training burns more fat than freeweights training.

The reasoning behind that statement was this:

- Bodyweight training uses your own body as weight ( ), so the lighter your body, the easier the exercises become. Because of this, your body will 'speed up its metabolism' to get rid of excess fat to make the exercises/movements easier.

- This doesn't happen with freeweights training, since you're moving dead weight and your own bodyweight has no real effect on how much you can lift. Therefore, there is no incentive for your body to try and eliminate excess fat.

I'm just wondering: is this true?

I can't seem to wrap my head around it. How does your body 'know' in the first place that you're either lifting your own body or just a dead weight?

My guess is a more logic explanation (the below are still guesses):

- Because gymnasts have to move their own bodyweight around for their exercises, they might naturally be more concerned about their bodyweight than bodybuilders. Bodybuilders can worry about their bodyfat percentage for aesthetics, whereas gymnasts worry about their performance.

- Perhaps gymnasts have a different mindset/predisposition regarding nutrition/losing and adding fat, leading to different bodyfat percentage levels. This one seems a bit far off, but since science doesn't specifically disprove it, I can't rule it out.

There are others who would know more than me but I don't buy it.

I don´t buy it neither but you never know... :?: .

Usually competitive gymnast have very intense and long work outs, not only conditioning( maybe this is the shortest part their day) but skills, which take a lot of time and are pretty intense too. So although they surely control their diet, I suppose that they are so lean because of their higher activity level. Just guessing but here are my 2 cents.

Phew, I'm not the only one to consider it a steaming pile.

If that stuff was actually true, I'm sure over half the population would be doing push-ups on a daily basis.

Idea based on no evidence, no studies and no scientific data. However, the opposite has been proven to be true in more than multiple studies. The body has no clue what is being lifted, the muscles simply know contractions. You'd do well to steer clear from anyone that spouts out such non-sense.

My BS-O-meter is spiking.

Blairbob said:

My BS-O-meter is spiking.

I'm surprised yours still works. I live in the US, so my BS-o-meter broke ages ago...

Yeah, that seems a little far fetched, however I would say that bodyweight moves are better at fat loss because in (especially gymnastics) Most of them your whole body is working to its upmost. Where as most weight-lifting excercises only have a "Targeted" Muscle group involved.

Newguy said:

Yeah, that seems a little far fetched, however I would say that bodyweight moves are better at fat loss because in (especially gymnastics) Most of them your whole body is working to its upmost. Where as most weight-lifting excercises only have a "Targeted" Muscle group involved.

Fat loss is diet first and strength training a distant second. Factoring that in as a whole plan (proper diet plus training) the difference in fat loss between weights and bodyweight would be virtually non-existant, if any at all.

Saying bodyweight targets the whole body and weightlifting doesn't is extremely shortsighted. Most exercises from both disciplines target certain muscle groups, it's the nature of our physiology. A front lever is a lot of upper back and some posterior delts, a planche is a lot of anterior deltoids and triceps, an iron cross is lats, biceps and some chest/anterior deltoids. There are plenty weight lifting exercises that do the same.

A squat, deadlift, or standing press pretty much work everything. A professional level bench press isolates nothing and recruits everything with tension from the feet on the floor through the back.

And weightlifting such as the clean, snatch, or jerk work everything. Standing and curling, ok probably doesn't nor does sitting and working on a leg press or pulldown machine or the horizonal press machines or Hammer machines.

Of course there are multiple full body movements in weightlifting, my point was that there are alot more in bodyweight.

AlexX said:

Newguy said:

Yeah, that seems a little far fetched, however I would say that bodyweight moves are better at fat loss because in (especially gymnastics) Most of them your whole body is working to its upmost. Where as most weight-lifting excercises only have a "Targeted" Muscle group involved.

Fat loss is diet first and strength training a distant second. Factoring that in as a whole plan (proper diet plus training) the difference in fat loss between weights and bodyweight would be virtually non-existant, if any at all.

Saying bodyweight targets the whole body and weightlifting doesn't is extremely shortsighted. Most exercises from both disciplines target certain muscle groups, it's the nature of our physiology. A front lever is a lot of upper back and some posterior delts, a planche is a lot of anterior deltoids and triceps, an iron cross is lats, biceps and some chest/anterior deltoids. There are plenty weight lifting exercises that do the same.

****** i don't know about bodyweight training but gymnastics is quite a few muscles undergoing contraction at the same time.

Lots of energy being used. Here's another one-the more dangerous or threatening to the body an exercise is the muscles will respond more intensly-Poliquin via Schmidtbleicher (sp?).

Brandon Green