Training without weights. Ideas?

[hardrock]

A friend is in prison for the next few years and wants to build some muscle while he's there. He's realistic and knows he aint gonna get huge, but he's gonna be there for at least 3 years and I'd think he could start a good base in that time. Only problem is there isn't any weights. Can someone help me lay out a plan for him for overall development. Things he can do in his cell. I don't know what his set up is like. If he has a bar for pullups or not. His last letter said he'd been doing pushups and curling his pillow case full of 20oz pop bottles filled with water. This is basically what he has to work with from what I have heard.


A few movements for each bodypart would be great.

 

[DaPit26]

no weights???? prison? i've seen the nicest gyms in prisons... anyways- push ups (different variations), bridge pushups, sit ups, pull ups (if you can find something to do pullups on; pipes, bunks etc...) the air chair, navy dips...

 

[d3track]

in a package
send him some bands

 

[hardrock]

in a package
send him some bands

Thats actually a great idea. I don't know if he can get shit sent to him or not. He's actually my GFs friend who I know and I'm trying to help him out.

 

[tsolis]

i used to do shoulder presses my doing a hand stand and putting my feet against the wall. at first i was able to do a couple now i can do about 15, so after a while its not going to be much use building muscle. in the racks at basic combat training we would position two bunks together and do dips.

 

[|D_J^B_J|]

Agree with the above post. Get him to do exercises involving his body weight - pullups (with a backpack of weights/bricks), pushups (with a backpack of bricks), dips (with a backpack of bricks) on the arms of two chairs or something more stable. Pushups in the handstand position with feet against wall - once he has mastered that he can try doing it without the wall, with added weights or even in a planche or 45 degree handstand. Finally, squats (first start out with body weight, then he can put a backpack of bricks or heavy weights on his back).

It can be done.

 

[tsolis]

doing regular pushups is just going to allow him to do more pushups but it wont increase muscle mass. he should have someone apply resistance on his back to get him in the 4-6 rep range.

 

[blut wump]

You might be able to pull something out of this thread from a couple of weeks back.
Not quite the same situation but the poster was asking a similar question.
http://www.elitefitness.com/forum/showthread.php?t=396349

This comes up often enough that it might be worth another sticky.

 

[musketeer]

I'm not an expert in it, but there are a lot of non-dynamic positions (to hold) that really are tough. Tey would be great to do in arestricted space and would probably become a lot like meditating when he got good at holding them.

 

[eat big]

You can try bands, but chances are they wont let him have them as they can be used for other purposes. And you can do the shoulder presses. But without weights its hard to train.