Calisthenics and Street Workout for all 😎
The workshop took place in the Kick-Off event, its objective was to present the Street Workout like a tool of social inclusion. This method (Street Workout) can create a good atmosphere in the neighbourhoods and is a good tool to prevent the violence, drugs and school dropout. With this method, the young people will participate in their environment, and then take care of the public places.
We put some ideas 💡 to work with kids, young people and adults.
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History
Street Workout, better known previously as Thug Workout, originated between the 1990s and 2000s in New York City, specifically in parks located in reputedly disadvantaged neighborhoods such as Brooklyn, Harlem, and the Bronx. Initially, the training aimed at body development with minimal equipment (pull-up bars and parallel bars) on the streets, without the need to join a gym typically associated with the middle class. Practitioners began by combining various exercises and training techniques derived from bodybuilding and gymnastics. They filmed these videos under the name Ghetto Workout on DVDs. A few years later, with the introduction of tutorials and demonstrations on YouTube in 2005, their videos quickly gained worldwide popularity, particularly the one featuring “Hannibal for King” in 2008.
At that time, teams started to form, such as Ruff Ryders Workout, BarStarzz, and BarTendaz. Small competitions emerged to showcase strength and performance. However, Hasaan Yasin Giant and Dr. G, founders of BarTendaz, recognized the potential of this sport and utilized it as a tool for social cohesion in their neighborhood, the Bronx. Their goal was to create a sports group to bring people together and instill healthy values in the younger generation, providing them with a different lifestyle and also challenging existing prejudices against the African American community in the United States.
Giant and Dr. G encouraged their comrades, including athletes and former inmates, to organize and establish an association to undertake social projects such as workshops in schools, free training sessions, seminars, and the creation of video clips using Hip-Hop as a means of expression against injustices. This group successfully shared social values to steer young people away from drugs, violence, and other negative habits, with the aim of fostering a healthy, supportive, and active community.
Callisthenics is the birth and development of a cult of beauty and strength, originating from the Greek words “kallos” meaning beauty and “sthenos” meaning strength, which formed the basis of physical culture in ancient Greece. Physical development was primarily intended for military activities and individuals of high economic and social status (Richer, 2018). However, it was long before it became a competitive sport with the establishment of the European Gymnastics Federation in 1881 in Liège (Palmer & Seller, 2009). The use of bodyweight exercises can even be traced back to the Shaolin monks, who employed them for educational purposes in Asian culture (Tsatsouline, 2003).
There were two types of training in Sparta and Athens.
In Sparta, the main objective of exercise was to improve efficiency in order to create skilled soldiers. Callisthenics became a set of military exercises during the 6th and 8th centuries BC. In this culture, heavy exercises forged the body and mind, enabling individuals to endure fatigue and gain greater resistance in combat. Therefore, Spartan culture prepared for war by developing individual physical fitness to defend their territory, and both men and women who were physically capable practiced certain exercises (Richer, 2018). The earliest mentions of the effectiveness of callisthenics exercises come from the ancient historian Herodotus, who claimed that a well-trained group of three hundred Spartans was able to withstand a well-trained Persian army.
In Athens, the primary goal was to develop beauty and “agathos,” which encompassed physical condition, morality, mental attributes, and a well-developed and harmonious physique. During that time, the beauty of Greek bodies could be admired through numerous sculptures, where the most beautiful muscles were depicted with excellent precision. Over time, the focus on physical beauty diminished, and the Romans attempted to adopt Greek ideals to “take care of themselves for the purpose of well-being and bodily hygiene.” Callisthenics was subsequently forgotten for many decades but reappeared in the 19th century thanks to the German educator F.L. Jahn, who sought to assist his compatriots in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars. He developed training tools such as the pull-up bar and parallel bars, and he advocated for their use by soldiers in military exercises to train using their own body weight (Tomczykowska et al., 2014).
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International Calisthenics and Street Workout Federation