6 Best Weighted Vest Exercises for Building Muscles

Any workout can be improved by wearing a weighted vest, which increases load and resistance while freeing up your hands. The majority of individuals utilize weighted vests to increase fat loss and burn calories.

Weighted vests, however, can also aid in muscular growth.

All workout-related functions, including cardio, respiration, and muscle growth, rise when exercising with a simulated larger body weight. This increases the rate at which you burn calories while improving your endurance.

Best Weighted Vest Exercises

Putting on a weighted vest increases the amount of weight you have to move when exercising. Now, you are moving your body, plus an additional 5–10%, rather than just your own body. Your lungs and heart are the first organs affected by this rise, followed by your heart and eventually all of your physical reactions to your workout, including sweat, endorphins, and your recovery time.

Here’s a list of the best weighted vest exercises:

1) Squat jumps

The advantages of both strength training and cardio are combined in squat jumps with a weighted vest. Leg flexing improves the stability, flexibility, and mobility of your knee joints. Your lower body is strengthened while your legs are simultaneously toned.

Instructions:

• Put your feet shoulder width apart when standing.
• Straighten your back and relax your shoulders.
• To make your legs 90 degrees, lower your hips.
• Get your knees to meet your toes.
• Knees straightened, go back to the starting position.
• Continually leap up while maintaining your legs straight.
• Land on your feet securely.

2) Forward lunges

Forward lunges are another successful lower body strength exercise with a weighted vest. Your knee joints can be mobilized throughout this motion, maintaining their flexibility and impact.

Instructions:

• Place your feet hip-width apart as you stand.
• Maintain a straight back and relaxed shoulders.
• Step forward with your right foot and your leg.
• Knees should be 90 degrees bent.
• Step back into the beginning posture while straightening your knees.
• Now take the same steps with your left foot in front of your right.

3) Push ups

Push-ups are another core-strengthening workout that requires you to maintain a straight body by continuously engaging your stomach, glutes, chest, and back muscles.

Instructions:

• Assume the plank position.
• Keep your arms parallel to your shoulders and straight.
• Straighten your rear legs and extend them.
• Ensure that your hips, back, neck, and head are all in a straight line.
• Make an elbow bend.
• Your body should be as close to the floor as it can be without touching it.
• Return to the beginning posture by extending your elbows.

4) Dips

Dips are another good arm exercise with a weighted vest. They concentrate largely on developing the triceps' strength and growth, but the surrounding muscles of the shoulders, chest, and back also benefit from the exercise.

Instructions:

• Place your feet together as you stand.
• Straighten your back and relax your shoulders.
• On either side of your body, place your palms on the monkey bars.
• They will help you to raise your body off the ground.
• Your elbows should be bent 90 degrees.
• Return to the beginning posture by straightening your arms.

5) Shoulder taps

Since you must maintain a plank position while performing shoulder taps, your abs, glutes, back, and chest are all actively working.

Instructions:

• Put yourself in the plank position.
• Maintain straight arms that are parallel to your shoulders.
• Straighten your rear legs out behind you.
• Make a straight line with your hips, back, neck, and head.
• Use your left palm to lightly tap your right shoulder.
• Place your right palm on your left shoulder and tap.
• Repeat 10 times on both the sides.

6) Lateral lunges

Lateral lunges are an additional form of the weighted vest exercise that involves bending one leg while keeping the other straight.

Instructions:

• You should have a hip-distance stand.
• Straighten your spine and keep your shoulders loose.
• Take another right-footed step.
• Keep your left leg straight and flex your right knee.
• Resuming the initial position, straighten your legs.
• Then take another left footstep and follow the same procedure.

Wrapping Up

A weighted vest is excellent for strengthening tendons and joints and is more realistic than using dumbbells because it adds resistance to more natural planes of motion. Some have set weights, while others have pockets that let you gradually increase the weight by 5 to 30 kg.