Overcoming Gravity: A Systematic Approach to Gymnastics and Bodyweight Strength (Second Edition)

Overcoming Gravity isn’t just a book—it’s a blueprint for transforming your approach to fitness from the ground up. After years of inconsistent routines and second-guessing my progress, this book completely reshaped how I think about training. The level of detail, structure, and science-backed guidance Steven Low provides is unmatched. What truly sets this book apart is its emphasis on building intelligent, sustainable progressions—it teaches you how to think like a coach, not just follow a cookie-cutter plan. I’ve revamped my entire lifestyle and training routine around what I learned here, and the results have been both physical and mental. I feel more in control, more knowledgeable, and more motivated than ever before. And the cherry on top? Steven Low himself took the time to answer my questions directly on Reddit. That kind of dedication to the community speaks volumes about his passion and integrity. Whether you’re a complete beginner, a seasoned athlete, or anywhere in between—Overcoming Gravity is the resource you didn’t know you needed. Don’t just work out. Train with purpose. Read this book.

I’ve had this book for a week and it’s transformed my approach to training. It has everything you need to take control of your own training (instead of relying on YouTubers) and explains the reasoning behind everything to empower you to be able to create your own workouts and progress effectively. The book is touted as ‘the body weight bible’ and though I’m usually skeptical of such lofty claims, this one is apt.

Overcoming Gravity is the body weight equivalent of Mark Rippetoe's "Starting Strength" on barbell training, and Thomas Kurz''s "Stretching Scientifically" on flexibility training. It teaches you everything you need to know in a systematic manner. Steven Low has a very neutral and simple writing style, and he is very careful to make it clear when he is stating his own opinions and preferences. While not the most "exciting" writing style, it is easy to read and understand, which is important when we are dealing with these complex topics. The first 300 or so pages are theory on how strength training works in general, things to consider when doing body weight and ring training, how to structure a program based on your current skill set, and so on. The book aims at the beginner, but has plenty of juicy material for the advanced athlete. The last 300 pages are instructions and progressions for a wealth of different exercises. The best thing about this part of the book is the overview it gives you. You'll always know how to find easier/harder exercises for your current needs. The "worst" thing is because it covers so many exercises, it doesn't go into much detail. I currently struggle with the Muscle Up transition, and the book provides very little detail on what to do here in specific. BUT! There is a whole new chapter in this second edition teaching you "Methods of progression", which has made it much easier for me to think up my own assistance exercises. All in all, this book is much recommended. If you are into exercise, don't skip this one. It is one of THE base books to have. With that said, it won't be "the final book". I can warmly recommend doing further research on specific exercises and goals you are currently trying to master. Not a perfect book, but easily a 5 out of 5.

Bought the first edition, read it cover to cover and it's a fantastic resource, in depth, technical and comprehensive book. Its only flaws are it needed better proof reading. There are quite a few spooling mistakes or prunting errors! The second edition has made great in-roads into correcting those flaws. It has also been completely rewritten and the book has developed into something even better, more comprehensive & thorough in every area. Training plans and progressions, development charts, referencing, the whole nine yards. One of the other great things about it is, if you have any questions about anything, something you don't understand or something's not quite working out for you, all you have to do is ask and the author, will answer those questions and queries and he'll do it really quickly. Usually via the Reddit forum. He'll also tell you where the mistakes are! I think there are 5 in total. One of them being the drawing I pointed out that didn't look quite right. These things matter! Excellent Book.

Great book but is very detailed, far beyond a light read. For me as a reference guide it can’t be bet, the author knows his stuff

Only one world for this: extraordinary. Only had it a day and I'm already highlighting and annotating pages. For those who haven't heard of it, this has for years been THE bible of bodyweight training, and this second edition tidies up and restructures many quibbles from the first book. The organisation and arrangement of topics is superlative; I started reading at the start, but was able to dip into my currrent focus (pullups) without trouble. My only complaint was not enough margin space to make my notes in! Yes, it's a big, dense book, but remains readable. When reading, I'd suggest a ballpoint and highlighter will be essential; you'll be returning to key points again and again. I'm not a gymnast but I train bodyweight, and that's who this book is aimed at - enthusiasts. Working on the principle of progressive resistance - gradually building up your skills in one exercise before "levelling up" to a harder one - it shows you a path upwards that starts easy, but leads (if you want to reach the higher levels) to master moves like one-armed planches and thigh-slapping pullups. Perhaps 0.0001% of readers will ever get to those upper levels - but that's not the point. It also teaches a great deal of muscular function, the "why" of the moves as well as the "what". It's hard to describe, but it feels more like a trainer standing next to you than reading a book. From understanding comes confidence, and that's important when you jump up to an overhead bar for the first time. Finally: it's rare to find a book that feels like such a labour of love. Reading it you feel a genuine warmth for the author; thousands of hours go into a work like this. I just don't buy books that aren't on Kindle, yet I bought this one.

Extremely comprehensive, I’m only about a quarter into it. I’ve been lifting weights for over a decade, I recently fancied a change and decided to cancel my gym membership to burn the bridge and commit myself to seriously making an effort with Calisthenics. Based on reviews this is far and away the best book available on the subject of body weight training. It offers a real detailed insight into just about every aspect of the subject and most importantly it details how to progress from one stage to the next which is crucial with body weight workouts because it’s not as straightforward as simply adding plates to the barbell. I’ve started to implement some of the principals and seeing a slight improvement in my workouts, I plan to review progress after one year to decide if I will stick with calisthenics or revert back to good old free weights. My only criticism of the book is that the writing style is quite boring and it’s hard for me personally to focus, that’s why I am only a quarter of the way through despite being a fast reader. There’s so much info that you can only really digest it properly in small chunks. Definitely worth the price though and probably a must for anyone serious about body weight training instead of traditional weights.

If you are serious about taking your body to another level this book is priceless. The sheer amount of information it contains is enormous but in a very beginner friendly way. It can take you from not knowing how a pushup is performed to programming micro and meso cycles, how to stress the body enough to stimulate adaptations and other advanced stuff. Everything is explained simply with a lot of examples and at the end of each chapter there is a summary so you can't miss a thing. It is based on the simple principle: Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. Several interesting things that are included: It teaches about strength as well as hypertrophy. Principles, programming etc It teaches you about flexibility, how it works, how to implement it so you know what your are doing General lifestyle advices such as nutrition, sleep, supplementation etc Exercises and progressions to work towards them A ton of details on how to construct your own routine and how to advance with it. If you put enough dedication this book alone can take you in a SAFE MANNER(super duper important) from Beginner to Elite Strength. (as a sidenote, this revised Second Edition vastly improves and builds from the last one, infinitely better)

As one can see I'm an amazon customer/member since about 15 years and I only submited two reviews. But I have an intrinsic need to write an review about Overcoming Gravity 2 by Steven Low. This book is worth every minute I put in this review! Enjoy. I read several good books about bodyweight training (for example “Be Your Own Gym” by Mark Lauren) and training according to the principles of bodyweight training and plans provided in the books was fun. My endurance and bodyshape improved a little bit and I felt better in general. But despite my efforts I put in the workouts it seemed that my actual goals – getting STRONGER and getting a little more MUSCELS didn’t progress at all (getting stronger and muscle-growth are not the same!) Despite the fun and positive changes something was missing (no gadgets or training-machines though). So I stared to search the Internet and stumbled across “Calisthenics”. I read a lot about calisthenics and thought “that’s it – with calisthenics I can work towards my goals (strength and a little more muscle mass)”. First I bought “Convict Conditioning” by Paul Wade. It was an okay/good book but I was not fully pleased with the amount and quality of the information provided (way to much "BroScience" in it). The description of the exercises and progressions were solid but I would have liked more or to say better information. And the training plans at the end… Well let’s say not well at all :-) Nevertheless having read Convict Conditioning confirmed by resolution to do calisthenics und most of all – I WANT TO PROGRAM MY OWN WORKOUT ROUTINES so that I would not depend on routines throughout the internet or routines from books. So my goals at this stage were: - I want to do bodyweight training in general and calisthenics in specific - I want scientifically correct and well written information for beginners and intermediate athletes about: (I) How to program my own workout routine (II) Descriptions how to do the exercises correctly (healthy and efficient) (III) Ways to progress from “easy” to “advanced” or even "hard" exercises So I searched forums and the like to find a book which could cover these bases and so it happened that I stumbled over “Overcoming Gravity 2” by Steven Low. After all the positive reviews (here at amazon and throughout the internet) I decided to give it a try. And this is what I say: Everyone seriously interested in bodyweight training should buy this book! Seriously this book is absolutely incredible! Among many other things you will find: - A well written book that everybody interested in the martial can understand - A book written with passion und true intend to transfer knowledge to the reader - Very well exercise descriptions! I never had such good descriptions even for the basic exercises like the pushup! As YOU read this please don't say “I don’t need a description for pushups I can already to 3 sets of 20 pushups easily” – have von open mind and read the damn description I’ll bet a) you doing pushups wrong and b) not as efficient as one could do them (aside form long-term health issues) and c) if you are going to start to do them right you most probably will not get to your 3x20 pushup exercise :-) - Principles about training and bodyweight training an general (SAID-principle, progressive overload, etc.) - How to train the nervous system and muscular to get stronger and gain muscle (not the same!) - How to properly triger optimal strenght-based training, optimal hypertrophy-based training (added muscles) or to triger both strenght and hypertrophy at the same time. - How to develop a spot an workout routine and how to handle the parameters like sets, repetitions, rest, volume, intensity, tempo, frequency, how to work to failure (and when/if you should train to failure), deloads and how to handle plateaus - How to build full-body or split workouts and what the difference is (positive/negative) - How to periodize your workout - The book helps with rehabilitation and prehabilitation, warmup and cooldown, skill work, mobility, flexibility. - The book covers imported factors that influence your training - And of course how you progress from easy exercises to the hard ones In addition to all of that the author answers question personally and within 1-2 days (in my experience)! His answers are always helpful und contain a lot of information. The answers are also no “off the rack” answers by all means! You can find him on reddit.com under subreddit /r/overcominggravity After you read this book you will: (I) You will have a much better understanding how to perform the different exercises/movements and hence increase the quality of your workout (II) You can write your own routines regardless of the goals you peruse (or like Steven says: "...teach a men how to fish...") (III) You will be equipped with methods how to progress in general (INTRA-exercise-progression) and how to progress towards specific exercise progressions (INTER-exercise-progression) I'm 100% sure I forgot to mention A LOT about the book but this is just because it contains so much! You can't get a bigger bang out of your buck when you buy this book. Five stars are just not enough! I don’t know what else to say except: Thank you Steven for this beautiful piece of work and your support at reddit.com. Last comment: The book is written in English and not translated in German but everyone with a solid English foundation can read it with no problems at all.

Esse livro é espetacular, dos livros que eu li em relação a calistenia e exercícios com peso corporal em geral esse é o mais completo e informativo. Uma dica se você também é iniciante e está querendo aprender a programar sua rotina na calistenia ou em exercícios com peso corporal também, é usar a rotina que ele da pra iniciantes no "Appendix B" do livro enquanto vai lendo porque assim você não precisa ler o livro com pressa para começar a treinar logo./ This book is awesome, this is the most complete and informative book i have read about Calisthenics and exercises with body weight in general. One tip if you are a beginner too and is wondering to learn how to program your calisthenics or bodyweight exercises training is to use the training he gives for beginners in the "Appendix B" because this way you don't need to read the book in a hurry to start training soon.

TONS of information, well-put by Steven. Appreciate the perspective he takes as he knows the readers of this book aren't solely gymnasts, but also people doing other sports, calisthenics athletes, etc. Truly an "exercise bible" and will be using this for me and my clients programming for years to come. Thanks Steven!

Such a great book. Learning how to construct a strength building routine, how to progress/advance the routine over time and why is invaluable. This is the book I rely on and refer back to offer for my workouts with great results.

This book feeds you with enough knowledge and doesn't bore you, at every turn you the information presented is highly usefull. This book is divided into two parts, the first one sets you up with all the necessary information (and i literally mean ALL) you need to proficiently train towards whatever goals you have (strength, hypertrophy, endurance) The second part is a detailed discription on almost all the great bodyweight exercises, the book tells you the cues, the technique, proper form, progressions and regressions, provides some tips and common mistakes, Lastly you should note that this review is given by someone who is relatively new to training, as of writing this review i am on level 3 for most of the exercises on the progression charts(search online or on the author's website) but if you are someone high level, like after level 7 you might not enjoy it as much. But that doesn't necessarily mean this is a beginners book either as the stuff presented becomes usefull when you've had a fair bit of trial and error and injuries at the gym. But you can read this book anyway. Summing up : great book, but can only recommend it to a limited number of people. Practitioners of the recommended routine (the RR) from r/bwf will find this book indispensible. A must have.