PREPARE FOR BATTLE

Battle ropes are a simple-but-effective training tool that do double duty as a cardio killer and a muscle torcher. How's why you need to learn the ropes.

HONESTLY, training with battle ropes looks a helluva lot easier than it is in practice. You've probably seen aboxer, MMA fighter or sports athlete work the ropes before, and it looked impressive but relatively easy, right? Wrong. Spend at least 30 seconds whipping heavy ropes up and down to make those signature waves and you'll quickly work out that it's very demanding on your muscles and your heart rate. Those ropes get heavy quickly and you'll find yourself sweating and breathing hard in no time. But if you nail the coordination and timing, you'll be rewarded with a challenging workout that only gets more demanding the longer you can keep making waves, cross-overs, and in-and-outs.

The question is: what are the origins of battle ropes? While ropes have been used in manual labour, climbing, tug of war and on building sites for centuries, it was only recently turned into a certified training tool. In 2006, trainer and athlete John Brookfield created and trademarked the Battling Ropes system in his backyard. John was inspired by the wave-like movements that a rope was making while being tied to a boat, so he wanted to recreate it in his home gym. He wanted a new way to train at home, something that would replace interval training and help him to sustain strength, power, speed and mental endurance.

Once John had thoroughly tested the system on himself, he recruited elite Special Forces soldiers, the Cincinnati Bengals NFL team, and then the US Olympic wrestling team to adopt the battling ropes system in their training schedules. The result: the 10kg rope training tool improved fitness levels and strength markers across all three groups. Fast forward a couple of years, and now almost every self-respecting gym has battle ropes, and it's a smart home gym investment, too.