Can you get a decent body with only dumbbells? Imitating bar exercises with them and such?

Can you get a decent body with only dumbbells? Imitating bar exercises with them and such? I don't have room for a full bar and such and these adjustable dumbbells are genius.

What differences will I notice in bodybuilding?

Will it be less time efficient? Can you do the big three just the same?

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  1. 12 months ago
    Anonymous

    Sure you can do just fine with dbs. Some way to do pull/chin ups would be good too but there are cheap options.
    The amount of weight you have access to matters though. The fancy adjustable sets like in your picture usually don't go super heavy. Pic related can usually be found up to 100lbs pretty handle and she pretty easy to work with.
    You can do lunges and split squats and unilateral deadlifts first legs after the weight becomes insufficient, or just do more reps or something.

    • 12 months ago
      Anonymous

      Forgot picture sorry

      • 12 months ago
        Anonymous

        Those max out at 65lbs. 12 x 5lb plates+ 5lb bar.

        • 12 months ago
          Anonymous

          I own a set just like that that goes to 200 total. 16 x 10lbs, 4 x 5 lbs, 4 x 2.5 lbs, each handle+locks is 5 lbs. I guess my picture might be a smaller set but they look basically the same. I've never seen a set like in OP's pic that went that heavy.

      • 12 months ago
        Anonymous

        The key is to find 18" versions of
        They're most commonly found as 14" handles, but those are too short to stack serious weight on. The 18" spinlock handles are the sweet spot, you can put some serious (for dumbbells) weight on them, and they aren't too long to totally kill your range of motion

      • 12 months ago
        Anonymous

        I have those dumbbells and am looking to upgrade to something like what OP. The cheap spinlock dumbbells will get the job done, but the chrome paint eventually starts to chip off the handles.
        The chrome flakes from the handle get all over the place and can cut you. Back during quarantine when I was frequently using them, I got a chrome flake stuck in my inner thigh. I didn't notice for a few days, I dug it out with tweezers a few days. Thought it was an ingrown hair when I first saw it.
        You get what you pay for.

  2. 12 months ago
    Anonymous

    Yes, although you might want to consider plate loaded dumbells because you'll never grow out of them. The heaviest adjustables I've seen go up to 90lbs though which can get you pretty far.
    >What differences will I notice in bodybuilding?
    If by bodybuilding you mean pro IFBB shit then you need to be in warehouse gym blasting pints of roids and using every station but if you just mean looking muscular compared to normal people then heavy dumbbells are more than enough.

  3. 12 months ago
    Anonymous

    Nope.

    If youre gona limit yourself to light weight you need a ton of variety and volume in different exercises and equipment

    Goto the gym and do a bodybuilding routine using all different kinds of cables, machines and dumbbells if you want to only lift with light weights

    • 12 months ago
      Anonymous

      >If youre gona limit yourself to light weight you need a ton of variety and volume in different exercises and equipment

      This is so moronic.

      You can make dumbbells go to around 120lb per side. If 240 slow bench press is not enough for your to build a chest in the usual variations then you might as well rope. https://www.dumbbellpepin.com/product-page/adjustable-dumbbells-from-5-to-120-lbs-120-lbs-each
      And sure those are expensive. You can still get pretty close with the cheapest shitty adjustable ones

      At 240 lb you're getting to lmao2pl8s for legs. Which you can hit unilaterally. So tell me again how 480lb is not enough to build legs.

      • 12 months ago
        Anonymous

        The logistics of that is silly and impracticable

        A minimalist home gym only works with a barbell, rack, and plates, and that only works because you can focus on purely strength gains to get bigger

        If you are limited in weight, you will require variety and volume to grow muscle

        You pick 2 options for growth

        A) getting stronger

        or

        B) doing lots of volume/variety

        • 12 months ago
          Anonymous

          The logistics of what? Dumbbell bench and dumbbell lunges seem pretty simple. Shit takes up way less space in a home gym than a bar does and you're not going to kill your self if you miss on dumbbell bench.

        • 12 months ago
          Anonymous

          >f you are limited in weight, you will require variety and volume to grow muscle
          Yeah, it's a shame dumbbells are only good for concentration curls and can't possibly be used for hundreds of other lifts.

        • 12 months ago
          Anonymous

          >A) getting stronger
          >or
          >B) doing lots of volume/variety
          very misleading. doing volume/variety only matters if you are strong enough to load up those exercises. there is no coherent program without basis in a strength component, no matter how short the program is.

          take whatever program you think you want to do, cut it in half, spend the first half doing strength training instead, then do your bullshit curl circuit or whatever you think you should be doing. you will make far more gains than doing the volume shit for the whole program.

        • 12 months ago
          Anonymous

          >The logistics of that is silly and impracticable
          Logistics of what exactly? You need dumbbells and maybe a bench and you can workout in a literal corner. You need like 2 square meters. Vs a literal children's park worth of shitload and a lot more space. The cage and plates alone take like 4 at minimum.

          >A minimalist home gym only works with a barbell, rack, and plates, and that only works because you can focus on purely strength gains to get bigger
          This is an absurd statement. 1 dumbbells allow strenght gains. We already stablished they can go up to 120lb per side and that is enough for the great majority of people to make gains in all muscle groups. 2 "strenght gains" is relative to each person. Someone might make better gains with 100 lb than someone else with 170.

          >If you are limited in weight, you will require variety and volume to grow muscle
          1 you're not limited by weight as we already established. 2 you always need variety and volume to grow muscle in a balanced way. If you want to look like a powertroony then you might not.

          >You pick 2 options for growth
          >A) getting stronger
          >or
          >B) doing lots of volume/variety

          Both are always required and depend on their interaction and you don't know what you're talking about.

  4. 12 months ago
    Mihai

    >Can you get a decent body with only dumbbells?

    no, hit the gym insecure lazy gay

    • 12 months ago
      Anonymous

      Name off runt

    • 12 months ago
      Mihai

      yes*

  5. 12 months ago
    Anonymous

    Yeah there's decent plans out there for them. You'll max out your standard compounds pretty quick so you'll end having to do some weird variations of lifts to keep gaining. It's probably easier to just buy a barbell at that point.

  6. 12 months ago
    Anonymous
    • 12 months ago
      Anonymous

      thanks for this, I've been looking for a dumbbell program

  7. 12 months ago
    Anonymous

    They;re better than barbells as they work stablisers

  8. 12 months ago
    Anonymous

    >Can you get a decent body with only dumbbells?
    lol, no.
    >What differences will I notice in bodybuilding?
    you'll notice that you can't build mass to save your life.
    >Will it be less time efficient?
    no, you will plateau within weeks.
    >Can you do the big three just the same?
    no, big three are BARBELL exercises, you need to be doing BARBELL exercises. you will be able to do three times the weight or more with a barbell. you reach for dumbbells when you are trying to modify your BARBELL based routine.

    90% of people who ever lift will meet and exceed their goals long before barbells become inefficient for them and they need to start thinking about dumbbells.

  9. 12 months ago
    Anonymous

    >Can you get a decent body with only dumbbells?
    define decent, with low bodyfat skinny ottermode or so yes but generally, no. trust me.

    • 12 months ago
      Anonymous

      >trust me.
      What are your qualifications?

      • 12 months ago
        Anonymous

        sandow used 5lb dumbells though

  10. 12 months ago
    Anonymous

    i use 10 kg (22 lbs) dumbbells
    5'9, 71 kg (156 lbs)

    am i weak? how come some of you guys are claiming to use extremely heavy dumbbells? i'm not buying it. never been gym, home workouter here

    • 12 months ago
      Anonymous

      I used to be homeshitter with 10kg dbs like you and they always felt heavy enough. Just the second month I started gym I was high repping 25kgs. Reason is db alone you can only hit a few things but going heavy deadlifts, tb rows, ez curls, bb curls, cables and rest of the stuff btfo your arms in ways you never could with dbs. just the grip training from heavy dl and row alone is literally necessary to up your db in any meaningful way.

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