11 Gym Exercises Most People Are Doing Wrong

645

You pay for a gym membership and walk in, confident as can be.

And when the front desk person asks you if you know how to work the machines, you proudly

sayof course”.

Seconds later, uh-oh, you realize you couldve used some help, but youre too shy to ask

for it.

Sound familiar?

In that case, listen updoing certain exercises wrong isn’t just useless, it can

even injure you!

1.

Squats

If you do them properly, squats are a perfect exercise that works out your entire lower

body, puts muscle on your legs, and helps with posture.

The most common mistakes while doing squats are: rounding your back, going only half way

down, rising onto your toes, and caving in your knees.

To avoid all of these, try to practice the proper form.

Keep your back in a neutral position, with your shoulders back, your chest up, and your

feet shoulder-width apart, turned out at 45°.

As you go down, work your core and bum muscles, and keep the weight on your heels as if you

were sitting back into a chair.

Keep your arms straight and in front of your stomach.

When youre doing it right, your knees will push outward and your back will stay straight.

If you want to add weights to it, use lighter ones first and increase them as you gain strength.

2.

Leg press

The leg press seems like a rather simple machine that works out glutes and thighs, but if youre

using it wrong, it won’t do you any good.

Avoid going too deep with your knees from the start, since this can injure your lower

back.

It’s important to keep your legs bent at 90 degrees, and don’t lock your knees as

you straighten them.

A lot of people ignore their heel position and let them slide off the edge of the platform

don’t make this mistake, and keep them on the sled to keep your balance and avoid

unnecessary pressure on your knees.

Also, only load a weight you can work withyou won’t benefit from shallow reps.

3.

Front and lateral shoulder raises The most common mistake with shoulder raises

is believing that the higher you go with the weights, the more effective the exercise will

be.

It’s wrong, and you risk straining your muscles if you do that.

Instead, lift the weights to the height of your shoulders, keeping your arms slightly

forward.

This way you won’t contract the shoulder blades back.

Your pinky finger should be a little higher than the others during the exercise.

As for your feet, they should be at shoulder width with knees slightly bent.

4.

Treadmill

Cardio is an important part of any workout routine, and treadmill training is a perfect

way of doing it.

When youre on the treadmill, avoid the temptation of holding onto the handrails (been

there, done that) – it makes running easier, and thus less effective, and can mess up your

posture as you hunch over the machine.

If you can’t run without holding on, try lowering the speed or incline level.

Speaking of that, don’t set it higher than 8% to save your back, hips, and ankles from

a strain they don’t deserve.

And, never, ever jump off a machine that’s still in motion!

This might sound funny and obvious, but it’s one of the most wide spread causes of gym

injuries.

5.

Stomach crunches Anyone who wants to get a toned belly practices

crunches.

If youre one of those people, but aren’t seeing any results in your abdominal muscles,

you might just be doing crunches the wrong way.

Don’t tuck your chin into your chest like many people do; this strains the neck.

And stay closer to the floor, about 3 inches off the mat should be fine.

Take your timegoing slower will help you do the exercise properly, and engage your

core to the max.

Ten real crunches are better for your body then 100 not so good attempts.

6.

Triceps dips (Mmmm.

Is that anything like French onion dip?

Sadly no.)

Triceps dips won’t give you the shoulder injury that many people fear, if you do them

the right way.

Keep your torso and butt close to the bench, step, or chair youre working out on.

This way you won’t overextend your shoulders.

It’s okay to bend your knees a bit if you can’t do it with straight legs, but don’t

try to make things easier by moving further from the base.

Go down, bending at the elbow, and move back up, contracting the triceps to make them work

hard.

7.

Rower Both rowing in the open water and on a rowing

machine are great calorie burners, affecting all the muscles in your body.

The right technique is the key to success with this exercise.

When you row just with your arms, youre exposing your upper body to too much pressure

and can injure your back and shoulders.

Try to split your efforts in a proportion of 60% going from your legs, and the remaining

40 percent from your core and arms.

This mental splitting of the pressure on your body parts should help keep you engaged.

Sit tall on the roweravoid slouching.

Don’t go for speed over power - make long and controlled rows.

Don’t forget about syncing up your rhythm with your breathit’s important for

any rhythmic activity.

Exhale through the mouth as you go back, and inhale through the nose on reset.

Don’t ignore the damper lever at the side of the machineexperiment with it to find

the most comfortable level just for you.

8.

Pushups Stretching the elbows too far out, moving

with your hips instead of your whole body, bending your back and neck, and going only

halfway down are the most common mistakes people make while doing pushups.

Are you guilty of any of those?

I am.

To avoid them in the future, try to keep your back straight, and let your arms do all the

moving work.

Keep your hands parallel to your chest on the floor.

Your head should be in a neutral position, and your moves should be slow and controlled.

When your chest reaches the surface, push up until your arms lock out.

9.

Bicep curls, dumbbell and barbell What’s the best way to get toned arms?

Most people would say bicep curls.

However, they won’t do you much good if you curl your wrists upwards while exercising,

drop the weights down too quickly, or swing them up, engaging your shoulders and back

instead.

To give your biceps a proper workout, imagine there’s a string running from your shoulder

to the weight youre lifting.

That string should help you move the weight from your hand to your shoulder, and your

biceps will squeeze at the top of that movement.

It’s okay to either keep your wrists straight or somewhat looseit’s just important

that you don’t work and injure the wrist joint.

10.

Cable triceps extensions

As you extend your arms behind your neck, youre giving your triceps a great workout.

You can do it either with an EZ bar attachment, or a rope, but in any case, make sure you

lock your elbows tight to your ribs.

They shouldn’t be going back and forth with the weights.

Try not to stand too straight during this exercise eitherinstead, slightly bend

forward to give your body a full range of motion, and a full extension.

11.

Chin-ups/pull-ups

Probably the biggest surprise on the listpull-ups and chin-ups - are the exercises

most people do wrong, just because they believe there’s no way to mess them up.

In fact, if youre swinging your body as you move up and down, don’t brace your core

and legs, and flop around - you are, indeed, doing it wrong.

Your range of motion also matters, so you gotta make sure you go both low and high enough.

A good starting position is a dead hang with fully extended arms.

You can keep them at shoulder width for pull-ups, and chin-ups need a narrower grip.

You start with retracting the shoulder blades.

Then, you pull hard, engaging your biceps, back muscles, and elbows.

If youre doing chin-ups, keep your chin over the bar.

For pull-ups, just try to make it as high as you can.

To become a pro at it, you can start practicing on a lat machine.

At first, when it’s too hard to handle, try jumping into a chin-up or push-up, and

holding the position for as long as you can manage, then going down slowly.

Were you doing any of these exercises wrong?

Let me know down in the comments!

If you learned something new today, then give this video a like and share it with a friend.

Buthey! – don’t go have lunch with a dumbbell just yet!

We have over 2,000 cool videos for you to check out.

All you have to do is pick the left or right video, click on it, and enjoy!

Stay on the Bright Side of life!