5 great resistance band exercises for beginners…

Part of the reason we love exercising with resistance bands so much is because you don’t have to be an elite athlete to have an effective workout. Even people who are brand new to exercise can reap the benefits. In fact, complete beginners may see lots of progress very quickly when you start adding some resistance band training into your routine!

Here are our five favourite resistance band exercises for beginners.

Resistance Band Row

The resistance band row primarily targets the muscles in our back and arms. It’s very functional, great for upper body strength and is excellent for improving our posture. If you find that your shoulders are often rounding forwards, usually due to lots of time hunched over a phone or computer, the resistance band row is the perfect way to open up the front of the body again!

There are lots of different variations that you can do with a Resistance Band Row. Here’s a video showing some great options to add to your workout:

Link to/embed band-its pull exercise

As you can see from the video, it’s important to have a stable anchor point on which to fix your resistance band. If you don’t have a suitable bannister, the Band-ITS Upper Limb Kit comes with a handy door jam, which means that you can create a fixed anchor point using any doorway in your home.

Chest Press

The Chest Press is a push exercise, which targets the front of the body (the chest!) and the arms as well. You can easily turn this exercise into a full-body movement by adding in a step, a twist, or a lunge.

Pushing exercises are very effective to work on strength and power. They are particularly important for older adults to help develop the upper body strength needed to push yourself off the floor - especially after a fall.

Watch this video for some excellent ‘press’ exercises with the Band-ITS Upper Limb Kit:

Link to all things push

Lunges

The lunge and the squat (below) are gold standard exercises for pretty much anyone. Whether you’re a total novice or an elite athlete, both of these exercises should be incorporated regularly into your workouts.

Lunging is excellent for lower body strength, and also helps to train our balance and core stability. Lunges raise the heart rate very effectively, and so can be used as part of your cardiovascular, as well as your strength training.

Lunge variations are endless - you can go forwards, backwards and sideways, you can include jumps for added power, or a row/push/twist to make the movement a full-body option.

Lunging with a resistance band is a great exercise for beginners, who may want to add a little extra spice to their bodyweight workout. One of the best features of the Band-ITS Lower Limb Kit is that the bands add resistance to the top of the legs to boost hip, core & gluteal strength, but the comfy leg straps mean that the bands don’t scrunch up or roll down - even when lunging in lots of different directions!

See our demo of a lunge here:

Lunge link

Squat

The other ‘must-have’ exercise in your repertoire, Squatting is super functional, not to mention excellent for leg and core strength.

You may have seen people squatting in the gym with barbells or dumbbells - but squatting with the Band-ITS Lower Limb Kit is just as effective at adding resistance to this movement and ideal for beginners who may not feel comfortable with the heavier pieces of equipment.

Remember that a strong body is one that is adaptable - so try to add as much variety to your squat as possible. Try wide legs, narrow legs, or an ‘offset’ stance with one foot in front of the other. You can add jumps, upper body movements, twists with the torso and so much more!

You can see some of our favourite variations here:

Squat matrix Link

Resistance Band Woodchop

Last but not least; the woodchop! Because no workout would be complete without a little core training.

Our favourite thing about this exercise is that it’s a really functional way of exercising the core muscles - no sit-ups, crunches or two-minute planks! The Resistance Band woodchop uses the functional ‘twist’ movement to strengthen the abdominals in standing. Make sure you have a stable anchor point!

Create variation using direction (low to high, high to low), movement (static or dynamic) and timing (fast, slow or adding a pause).

Watch Sally and Ros demo some woodchop variations in this ‘All Things Twist’ workout video:

All things twist