Overcoming Gravity Kindle

[Desmond Hutchins]

StevenLow, who holds a BS in Biochemistry and a Doctor of Physical Therapy from the University of Maryland, takes the reader on a journey through logically constructing a strength-oriented bodyweight workout routine. With a highly systematic approach, he delves into the physiology behind strength training and equips the reader to adequately prepare their body for the rigors of bodyweight training. This book covers much ground that other books do not, offering information on health and injury management, factors that contribute to a successful routine, and actual program implementation. If you prefer your health and fitness books to include scientific data, comprehensive sample programming, and effective recommendations, Overcoming Gravity is the ideal choice for your library.

This Second Edition has been revised, expanded, and re-organized to read easier, provide more content, and offer easily accessible next-steps for beginner, intermediate, and advanced populations. Notable improvements include the following:

These charts, combined with Methods of Progression in Chapter 10, will help you progress through the various levels until you can perform movements like handstands, hanstand pushups, planche, front lever, back lever, elbow levers, and many other movements to show off your strength and skill.

Question: Is the First Edition required for purchasing the Second Edition?

Answer: No, the Second Edition is stand alone. If I were rating the clarity and depth of content, the first book was 5/10 for beginners and 7/10 for intermediate and advanced. The second book is 9+/10 for beginners, intermediate, and advanced.

Question: If I have the First Edition, should I buy the Second Edition?

Answer: The Second Edition is not your average college textbook that sees a few changes and is published again. The book was expanded from about 165,000 words to about 250,000 words, some injury content was dropped, and I added a ton of new material. Everyone who has bought the second edition and had the first edition has told me that they were more than satisfied with the quality and amount of extra content added.

Question: Is the physical book only available on Amazon?

Answer: It is only available on Amazon and a select few climbing gyms. The Digital edition (PDF/ePUB) is available here.

Overcoming Gravity Second Edition was written for the beginner, intermediate and advanced in mind. The main goal of the book is bodyweight strength training education in the vein of the common proverb:

Chapter 10: Methods of Progression is one of the big additions to Overcoming Gravity Second Edition. This chapter was not in the previous edition and is also the first of its kind in any gymnastics, bodyweight, or calisthenics product. This section was designed to educate you on the methods of progress for bodyweight exercises. Barbell and Dumbell exercises are very easy to know how to progress: simply add weight. However, bodyweight exercises are very difficult to understand how to progress safely and effectively. It is simply more than just adding repetitions until you can reach the next progression.

The third part of the book discusses various factors that influence training such as endurance, cardio, cross training, hybrid templates, and routines. It also discusses factors such as overreaching, overtraining, health and injury management, and lifestyle factors such as optimizing sleep, nutrition, and stress for your goals. All of these factors are important to understand how they influence your training, especially if you are going to add or subtract elements from your routine. Most fitness books may sparsely mention these things here and there, but Overcoming Gravity Second Edition makes you aware of everything that can influence how you progress and perform.

Part four of the book discusses program implementation giving sample routines, real life examples, and commentary about common pitfalls that beginners, intermediates, and advanced may run into in their training. This section is not so you can go about copying the routines that have been constructed or others have used in the past. However, it is there to give you a reference and structure on how routines can be built and managed during a cycle, so that you can take what you have learned and implement it well.

Finally, the fifth part of the book is everything to do with keeping your body health and exercise. The first part of this section is about common bodyweight training injuries to make you aware of factors that can derail your training. Likewise, the prehabilitation, mobility, and flexibility section gives illustrated examples of these attributes for the wrists, elbows, shoulders, core, and legs. This allows you to combine these elements into your routine along with your strength work to ensure that you are building the requirements to make it to the next level. The last part of this section is about all of the handstand, pulling, pushing, and combined exercise progressions that you need to work toward high level strength.

One of the best parts of the book is the support from the community. Overcoming Gravity Second Edition has its own subreddit on /r/overcominggravity and is one of the most highly rated training materials in /r/bodyweightfitness, which is the largest gathering of bodyweight enthusiasts in the world at over 3,400,000 users. If you want to discuss the material from Overcoming Gravity, post up a training routine for critique, get an exercise technique critique, or simply discuss bodyweight training with like-minded users, you can do all of it! I personally check /r/overcominggravity to help users understand and apply the material through questions and routines, and I also moderate bodyweightfitness as I love the bodyweight community.

I may earn a small commission for my recommendation and/or link to any products or services from this website as an Amazon Associate. Your purchase helps support my work for education on health and fitness.

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