When it comes to physical fitness, a gym will have various equipment such as stacks of free weights, training machines, and other equipment designed for specific body areas to fit a person’s individual needs. There isn’t a perfect one-size-fits-all type of equipment since every kind of equipment is engineered to achieve certain fitness outcomes.
If your goals are within the strength training realm, then there are various options for adding strength and adding lean muscle. Using dumbbells, barbells, weight machines, or even specialized equipment such as oversized tires, sandbags, medicine balls, and kettlebells are great types of equipment for strength training. Each piece of equipment has its purpose. Weight-training machines are made for toning, adding muscle definition and burning belly fat, while barbells are great for increasing max strength. Some equipment like kettlebells and medicine balls will increase movement-related power output.
First, you may wonder what are dumbbells and what do dumbbells work out? Dumbbells can be defined as free-weight equipment that is designed for weight training. They have the functionality to work out your full body or key in on specific muscles.
This equipment is excellent for increasing strength for isolated muscle groups and joints. But you should think about how long exercise equipment lasts. Exercises with dumbbells include shoulder raises, chest flyers, and bicep curls. There are many benefits of using dumbbells, such as strength in multiplanar movements, muscle mass for specific muscle groups, and even cardiorespiratory fitness. Here are five specific benefits of dumbbells and a few ways on how to use dumbbells. You can also read about essential fitness tips for women.
One of the many benefits of using dumbbells is muscle growth. It will overload your muscle leading to growth through a mechanical and metabolic process. Mechanic overload happens when the muscles are damaged when muscle contractions occur. This increases muscle size by stimulating the repair process. Metabolic overload happens when the muscle is fatigued, allowing the muscle to adapt to greater stress. Muscle cells store additional glycogen leading to the size of the muscle to grow. Lifting moderate-weight dumbbells to the point of fatigue or usually high reps will lead to metabolic overload, while heavy dumbbells in short bursts will cause mechanical overload.
Users will have higher levels of muscle activation since dumbbells increase intermuscular coordination. Intermuscular coordination means that multiple muscle groups work together to create the stabilization of joint motion. Intramuscular coordination means that various muscle fibers and muscle motor units work together to activate a certain muscle. Heavier dumbbells will cause more muscle fibers to be activated for one muscle. Lighter dumbbells will improve the coordination of multiple body segments at the same time.
Every muscle has an elastic and contractile component. This means that every exercise will cause an eccentric lengthening or concentric shortening. The elastic part is the connective tissue and fascia linked to groups of fibers or individual muscle fibers. Inside of the elastic component, it stores a lot of mechanical energy while it’s being lengthened. This energy is released for rapid and quick muscle shortening. Multiplanar movement patterns combined with light dumbbells will improve the strength and resilience of the elastic component. Heavy dumbbells combined with traditional exercises will increase the production capacity of a muscle’s contraction element.
If you’re wondering what other benefits of using dumbbells there are, then we have to mention it’s versatility. Machines can only allow one movement pattern to one muscle group. Barbells can only follow one particular plane of motion. Since dumbbells can be held in each hand, it can be lifted in many movement patterns to develop movement specific strength.
One of the many benefits of dumbbells is that it enables the person to key in one leg or arm at a time. It will provide heavy overload to create strength gains. A few examples of a single dumbbell exercise are split-leg goblet squat or one-arm overhead press. This way, you can overload one muscle or one limb at a time.
● Hold the dumbbell in the center in the palm of your hand.
● Rotate your body to the right and then extend the left arm. Then swing your arm back down. Then rotate to the left and extend the right arm.
● Switch off between eight to ten reps and make sure to do three sets. Rest about 45 seconds after completing each set.
● Bend your knees slightly and keep your spine straight. Make sure to hinge your hips slightly forward.
● Hold the dumbbells in the center with your palms.
● Rotate to the right while pulling your right arm toward your rib cage. Then lower the arm and rotate your body to the opposite side.
● Complete three sets with eight to ten reps for each set. Make sure to rest 45 seconds after each set.
● Lift the dumbbell so that it’s vertically placed in the front of the chest
● Step your left leg right behind your other leg. Keep your spine tall and sink your right hip in
● Then move your left leg towards the left and plant your right foot into the ground.
● Continue to switch off legs for eight to ten reps. Make sure to do three sets and rest 45 seconds after finishing each set.