The Angle and Lever Principle

Today, we'll be talking about body position. Being a bodyweight exercise enthusiast, I've often run into problems of how to make things harder...or how to make a really hard exercise easier so I can progress toward it. I've found that there are two important factors when it comes to the difficulty of exercises: body angle and lever length. Let's look at these in detail:

Body Angle

This determines how you are loading whatever exercise you're progressing (making harder) or regressing (making easier). Say you're doing a pushup: a standard pushup distributes your weight fairly evenly on your hands and feet. Now, say you want to make it easier. All you have to do is change your body angle so less weight is on your arms. You can do this by doing incline pushups on a bench, or wall pushups. Same goes for making them harder, just reversed. Elevate your feet and you suddenly have a lot more weight on your arms.

Another angle example is the use of a ramp. Say you're doing lunges. If you want to make them more challenging do them down a ramp. If you want to make them easier, just turn around and do them with the leading leg up on the ramp (stationary lunges, anyway. Walking lunges would be opposite).

The angle of the body (or the surface you're on) directly effects the amount of weight on the part of the body you're working. Play around with it!

Lever Principle

This one is a little more complex in the explanation, but it's easy in application. I'm no expert on levers, but I do know how to use them to progress or regress a workout.

Let's go straight to examples for this one. I present to you the sledgehammer. It has a fairly long handle with a hardened steel head on it. It comes in a variety of weights, but they all serve the same purpose - to create force on one end. Now, the hammer is actually designed to create force without as much effort from the user, but here we want to look at it from another perspective: try to hold the hammer parallel to the ground by the end (as far from the head as you can get). Even the measly six pound hammer is challenging (if not impossible) for most people. Now hold the hammer vertical, arm still straightened. Easier, right? Want to make it easier? bring your arm in - you're shortening the lever. You're bringing the weight closer to your center so your body doesn't have to work as hard.

Now let's look at a couple exercise examples:

Say you're doing a flat knee raise. You lie on the floor with your knees bent and your hands by your hips. You lift your legs, keeping that knee angle. Too easy? Try this: Keep your knees bent on the way up, then straighten them on the way down. Much harder, right? You just lengthened your lever. Knee raise too hard? Make your knee angle smaller. You just shortened your lever.

One more lever example before we wrap up: Look at a gymnast doing a lever on the rings (I know, right? It's a perfect example!). His lever is quite long during the lever. If you were to learn it, you would most likely start with your knees tucked, shortening your lever. The progressions are basically incrementally lengthening your lever.

Here's a great example of both principles together: the hanging straight leg raise. This changes the angle so none of the weight of the legs is supported. The straight legs also lengthen the lever as far as it can go, ensuring the abdominals and hip flexors have to do all the work, which is the ultimate goal of the leg raise.

As you can see, these principles can be used either together or on their own. They can add whole new levels to your bodyweight training, and beyond! Try using this principle during a weight session. You'd be amazed at where you can apply it!

Train Smart!