Matt Furey & Geo Takoma Calisthenics???

[deborahsaipan]

Has anyone ever heard of these guys?
They both do body weight only exercises and have programs for sale on their respective websites. I found them on a google search of body weight only exercises. Matt Furey calls his Combat Conditioning and the book/dvd is supposedly a best-seller on Amazon (he also has an advanced version of Combat Conditioning called Gama Fitness). Geo Takoma (58 years old, looks 35, Vietnam Vet) claims to have coined the phrase power yoga, his program is called Fearless Flexibility (power yoga with an attitude?). They both have programs that do body weight only exercises/calisthenics, Geo Takoma's version more yoga like. Has anyone ever heard of, purchased or used these programs?
Both of these guys claim that the only weight you should be swinging is your own. They say that the best way to avoid exercise induced injury is by training your body as a whole, ie, instead of isolation exercises like back, then biceps, etc. Matt Furey talks about one-legged Hindu squats and Hindu pushups and handstand pushups (ouch). Anyone know what these are?
I would just love to see Cathe put her indelible stamp on this kind of exercise.
Anyone have any thoughts or knowledge?
Thanks!

 

[Juliebeth]

Hi Deborah,

I have Matt Furey's Combat Conditioning book and my husband bought his flexability DVDs.

The book has lots of good body weight exercises. The one-legged squats are just that: hold one leg out at waist level and squat down with the other. Hindu push ups are kinda like doing a push up from downward dog...kind of a scoop down then back up. Some call them "dive-bombers". Handstand push ups are where you do a handstand close to a wall to support your legs, then down and up! Yikes! A lot of the stuff in the book are exercises that my DD does at the Karate studio. If you are the kind of person who can make your own program and follow it, you could absolutely condition your body and get strong with this book, but I believe there is potential for injury here as well as with using weight: it all goes back to having perfect form.

The DVDs have a very poor production quality: they are DVD-R, and we had to get a new player for them. (Might have something to do with the region code??) They are in cheap CD cases, sent in a "Priority Mail" cardboard folder. It is just Matt in what appears to be a motel living room, showing the stuff and talking about it. Sort of a home video feel to it. I did a couple of his exercises and did feel very stretched out, but I didn't think they were worth the $$, personally. Plus, I got stupid and injured myself at my wrist, and have a real hard time with regular push ups now because of it. My DH never uses them.

Any more questions, let me know!
HTH, Julie

 

[deborahsaipan]

Wow, thanks for the info. I guess I'll just have to nag and nag Cathe until she comes up with her version! Although Boot Camp is a pretty good approximation of calisthenics (especially those nasty Terminator Climber thingies). Thanks!