Is there another way to build muscle and get stronger without weight training?

Well, yes, it’s called: isometric exercises!

And the good news is that you can get fit with isometric exercises and you don’t have to go to the gym or buy expensive home exercise equipment.

Sounds hard to believe you’re saying… right?

Isometric exercises are essentially muscular contractions that are performed against a fixed or stable resistance. Isometry received scientific validation in 1953, when two German researchers from the Max Planck Institute published a study showing that people who performed isometric exercises had a greater than 300% increase in their strength (over the control group).

Dr. Theodore Hettinger and Dr. Eric A. Muller conducted tests on frogs to determine the effectiveness of isometric exercise. The results were conclusive: it works!

(This training system that Joe Weider coined the name isotension became very popular in the United States.)

Isometric exercises have been around since the beginning of Chinese martial arts. In fact, most martial arts systems use one form or another of isometrics. Many of the strongmen of yesteryear used isometrics as part of their strength and muscle building programs. One of the most notable was a young man named — Charles Atlas.

Atlas, whose real name was Angela Siciliano, partnered with Harold Roman. Mr. Roman was considered at the time a marketing genius. It was their association that propelled the Charles Atlas Dynamic Tension Training Program into the history books.

Thousands of people clamored for the Charles Atlas course, parts of which used isometric exercises and bodyweight training. One of the most notable students of Atlas was Mahatma Gandhi.

Gandhi wrote a letter to Charles Atlas requesting help in using isometric exercises in his training. Atlas responded by recommending a specific diet and exercise program. Unfortunately, Mahatma Gandhi was left as Charles Atlas referred to him as “a bag of bones” but much stronger.