The 3 Best Workout Tools for Men and Women to Build Their Muscles

Reviewed by: | Author: Manoja Kalakanti

Have you ever been to gym and wondered which workout tool would put you in right shape? Well, there are professional trainers who can guide you on how to take the initial steps in achieving a perfect figure. But there is also something more important to understand before starting your workout plans. The thing is, not all the workout tools can suit your body physique and type. Different persons have different body types, and using a perfect workout tool will completely depend on your requirement. When you start using a particular tool, make sure that it doesn’t turn out to be a bothersome tool in future. Especially when it comes in choosing better equipment, both men and women are suggested to opt based on their body type. Here the body type includes whether you are fat, round, weak, muscular, heavy or light weighted.

The 3 Best Workout Tools for Men and Women to Build Their Muscles
Credit: getfityou.com

Avoid the confliction that arises in your mind at the time of using a fitness tool of your choice. Here are some of the top three best tools suggested for both men and women to achieve what they want. Let us go in an orderly fashion concentrating initially on shoulders, abdomen and then leg exercises.

Shoulder Press Exercises:

Shoulder press is the easiest and a great training exercise for both men and women. Especially men prefer to exercise their shoulders which help them in building bigger shoulders and acquires them a V- shaped look with a thinner waist. There are different variations in doing shoulder exercises. Of all, doing a shoulder press using barbell, dumbbells and a smith machine are quite common. The equipments barbell and dumbbells are referred to as free weight equipments and the machine equipments are referred to as selectorized machines.

shoulder press exercises
Credit: printableworkouts.com

Let us now take a look on how to use the most common shoulder press workout tools. Apart from just shoulders, all these tools can better be applied in order to build different muscle groups like abs, chest, triceps, biceps, back and legs.

Barbell Exercises:

Barbells exercises are usually done in order to stabilize your shoulders from every point. The beneficiary point relating to this exercise is that it builds up smaller muscles simultaneously developing bigger muscles. You can increase your weights in a progressive fashion by adapting to lesser number of weights first.

barbell extensions
Credit: menshealth.co.uk

Dumbbell Exercises:

Dumbbells exercises are the easiest of all exercises. They do not need much equipment and one can easily workout without any further add-ons. One thing that is to be maintained while doing dumbbell exercise is that you must keep a check on your body position. Your body must be in a good posture especially the upper part of your body must be still enough to carry on the exercise.

dumbell exercises for shoulders
Credit: lovemymuscles.com

Smith Machine Exercises:

Other than shoulders, smith machine’s can be used for various other body parts gradually. This machine helps in stabilizing muscles by replacing the free weight exercises. They are very much beneficiary in terms of solo training, as the shoulder exercises using this machine would result in high stress when compared to other workout equipments.

smith machines for shouders
Credit: pumpjunkies.com/

Advantages: Shoulder exercises are advantageous when it comes to the amount of effort one had to put in and also it requires little and inexpensive equipment. All you need to concentrate on your body posture while doing shoulder exercises. Muscle strength is the core development of one getting trained in shoulder exercises but not muscle endurance.

Disadvantages: There are not many disadvantages when coming to the shoulder press exercises. One must be careful in lifting the barbells or dumbbells and placing them again in the right position. They must be careful in holding the barbells and they need to be caught in balance using both the hands. These shoulder press exercises are not good enough to acquire overall balance.

Swiss Ball Exercises:

Swiss ball also referred as physio ball, was developed by Switzerland physiotherapists for physiotherapy treatments. Swiss balls are mainly considered as an alternative for yoga and Pilates. Swiss balls are primarily used in building a fitness regime by building the core muscle parts such as abdominal, back muscles, pelvic muscles and hip muscles. It is usually 55 to 85 centimeters wide in diameter and is made of soft elastic.

swiss ball exercises
Credit: leanitup.com

When the human body comes in contact with the instability of the ball, it responds in gaining a balanced position. One necessarily need not go to gym in order to do this exercise. The equipment is so little to use it in any part of your home. Swiss ball gives you a fun and playful experience instead of the usual daily routine exercises. You can just carry out your daily work even while exercising with your physio balls. It can be called as one of the best functional ways of exercise unlike other exercises.

Advantages: Physio balls mainly target the core muscular part and the abdominal part of your body. This helps in reducing the back ailments of your body, and can also be helpful to burn the calories more efficiently with minimal effort. In the long run, this exercise also improvises the neuromuscular conditions. You can also try out few pushups using a fitness ball. pushups with swiss ball

Disadvantages: While using the physio ball one must make sure that they are using the ball of right size. The benefits of Swiss ball may not be achieved if the workout is overdosed. Usually they say that exercises which are done using this ball are worthless, but they are useful for those who suffer from lower back pains.

Leg Press Exercises:

Leg press is one of the most common equipment that is sited in most of the gyms at the very first glance. Leg press is one such machine which helps you in attaining the body composition and thus builds and develops your muscles in the right manner. Usually, exercises that include Leg press are called the compound exercises, which means they make use of more than one muscle at a time. This is used as an alternative to squats, a tool which is used for leg- extensions.

leg press exercise

The primary reason to drop squats over Leg press is that squats doesn’t help in growing your legs and also it is not suggestible for everyone. Leg press helps in growing your legs and can be called as the right exercise for all. Leg press usually knocks your door with two different types.

Vertical Leg Press:

Vertical leg press or the sled type leg press is one type where the weight disks are attached to the sled which is mounted on rails. The user needs to sit below the sled and push it upward with their feet.

Credit: fitness-equipment.com
Credit: fitness-equipment.com

Seated Leg Press:

Seated leg press or the cable type leg press is another type where the user sits in an upright position and pushes forward with their feet. Here, the weighted plates are attached to weight stacks by a long steel cable.

Credit: bikejames.com
Credit: bikejames.com

Both the exercises must be performed and applied as per the mentor’s suggestions and a cause of failure in any of the tips would result in bad ailments especially in the knee portions of the leg. In such leg extension exercises, it is always good to position your knees and feet in the same line and they shouldn’t be bowed inward or outward.

Advantages: Leg press is a low- workout method of helping your legs to attain the required shape and strength. Leg press exercises are worth your time, as they sculpt your legs according to the effort and time you put on it. Leg press mainly focuses on Quadriceps which covers the thigh regions of your legs extending to knees, Hamstring that fully exercises the fat and muscle behind your knee, Gluteus Maximus Muscle that makes up a larger portion of buttocks and Gastrocnemius Muscle which covers the back part of lower leg (shin area). It also helps in reducing your lower back pain sufferings. leg press exercises

Disadvantages: As it has many advantages in giving your legs a tighter look, besides this they also have disadvantages. Usually these kinds of exercises are best suitable for the ones who would prefer to have a masculine shape. So someone who doesn’t want to acquire a macho type look this isn’t great. Often while doing leg extension exercises one is more prone to knee pains. Though this is an exercise that helps the knee muscles in gaining strength people who are already suffering from bad knee ailments would be better if they oppose it. Don’t try out by including heavy weights initially. Workout with smaller ones and if you really think you are feeling comfortable with this exercise you can continue and gain healthy long legs.

Whenever you are doing such exercises, one thing to keep in mind is that sometimes poor application/ execution of work would also result in delivering bad results. You need concentration and putting little effort would definitely fetch you the desirable outcome. I hope this article helped you in understanding the best ways of strengthening your muscles with some solid tools. Please leave your queries under this article via comments section. Happy Workout!

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