Body Weight Workouts on the Rise, Study Shows

?But it?s snowing and I can?t make it to the gym.?
?I?d work out but can?t afford a decent set of weights.?
?There?s no room in my house for a bench so I don?t lift anymore.?

Cut the excuses right now. Even if your house is completely blanketed in snow, even if you?re so broke you can?t afford a bag of Funions, even if you live in a 4×4 closet-sized room in Brooklyn ? you can get a decent workout. Thanks to the ancient ?secret? that is body weight training, you can get a decent workout sans gym, money, or Bowflex.

That?s right guys, as I wrote in last week?s column ?Get Fit Without Gadgets?, you don?t need to use special equipment to execute a solid workout. As it turns out, ?special equipment? consists of dumbbells and all kinds of weight equipment.

According to a survey that appeared in the American College of Sports Medicine Health and Fitness Journal?s November/December issue, body-weight workouts are going to be one of 2013?s top fitness trends.

Use it!

If you?re a fitness noob or have grown so accustomed to the seated row machine that you find yourself rowing in your sleep, you might not be aware of what a body-weight workout entails. Well, to put it simply, it?s using your own body weight for resistance. You?ve most likely performed a great deal of bodyweight exercises already and might not even realize it.

Done any push-ups lately? Sit-ups? How about pull-ups? Consider yourself a damn trendsetter then as these are three of the most common body-weight exercises ever.

There are plenty more body weight exercises where those came from however. Everybody?s done push-ups. But how about squats or planks?

If you?d had enough of P90X or the Insanity workout or whatever fitness trend you may have latched onto in 2012 (Zumba, really?), then you might get a kick out of body-weight exercise.

There are a ton of body weight exercises out there. This list features a good deal of them categorized by body part/section (e.g. legs, upper body) and difficulty (e.g. intermediate, beginner).

The best part about these exercises is that you can do pretty much all of them anywhere you?d like. Stuck in your house all day? Work in some barbwire pushups and flutter kicks. At your job with nothing to photocopy and no boss around? Get out of your ergonomic chair and do some hip dips and karate squats? Don?t know what the heck I?m talking about? Consult that list.

There?s bound to be a crapload of really popular, really stupid fitness trends in 2013, so why not save yourself some money and get fit with body-weight exercises? If you?re not up for gaining weight and looking like hell, body-weight exercises are the way to go. With body-weight exercises being a viable workout option, you really have no excuse not to work out no matter how bad it?s snowing or how much money you blew on strippers last weekend.