Machines vs Bodyweight: Which is Better?
A popular question I get is “should I be doing more machines and weights or more bodyweight workouts?”. Unfortunately there isn’t a clear cut answer to which one is “better”, however I can tell you my preference and why.
Machines and weights are good for isolating muscles, while bodyweight workouts are better for getting more of a full body workout. Now what does this mean exactly? It means machines and weights are good for targeting 1 or 2 muscle groups at a time. Let’s take benching as an example. If I were to bench, I’d be engaging solely my chest and triceps. However, if I were to do push-ups, I’d not only be engaging my chest and triceps, but my entire core as well.
So bodyweight is better because we engage more muscles at the same time?
Well yes and no.
Yes because we’re getting a better bang for our buck. By engaging multiple muscles at once we’ll tend to burn more calories and be more in tune with our entire body as 1 unit.
No, because sometimes it’s good to work on isolating certain muscles to get rid of any discrepancies and weaknesses we may have. For example, we can do one arm rows to isolate each side in case we feel one side is stronger than the other. It can be argued we can do this with bodyweight too, however weights is a different type of resistance and is good to throw in as well.
So what’s the final verdict?
You should do both! Why limit yourself? They both have their own benefits. I’ve done only weightlifting before and I’ve done only bodyweight before too. You want to know which got me stronger? When I started incorporating the both of them together! That’s when I started leveling up even faster! Why do one when you can do both?
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