I just recently took a class at my College about weightlifting and the final was to design a six month program for myself. In the exercise portion of it I stated that was going to be mainly therabands and exercise ball workouts for the weightlifting part of my routine. Does anyone know which are the best or if they work well at all?

I had to laugh when I read your question - because my first response was - well, what did you get on the final? And the followup, what did your class teach you about the constant resistance of free weights vs. and the varying resistance of resistance bands?

I got an A on the final but it was kind of a B.S. thing, just a required course to get me to spend more money. Anyway, my professor, who does seem to know his stuff swears by therabands and exercise balls. He says they are better than the uncertainty of machines and just as good, if used correctly, as free weights. I was pricing items at Wal-Mart today and the one I looked at had all the attatchments needed to make a nice little gym in a small room which is exactally what I am going to need this summer.

here's the thing - picture something like a bench press. Your mechanical advantage changes throughout the lift as the relationships btw the joints and lever arms changes. With free weights, the resistance is fixed, though the leverage and ease to move the weight changes as you move through the range of motion. With bands, the resistance increases as you complete the movement rather than being constant.

One thing about variable resistance - it can help when you have problems with a sticking point in your motion while allowing you to complete the rep with more weight at the top of the movement. You can also use it for explosive reps.

here are some links to get you started:
http://www.strengthcats.com/explosi...eresistance.htm
http://www.strengthcats.com/VariableVsStandard.htm
http://www.performbetter.com/catalo...ame_E_Training1

I'm not sure I quite understand the question!

I have seen some of the PTs in my gym getting people to do bench presses etc on exercise balls with dumbells, and the core workout I'm doing as recommended by my PT is all done on an exercise ball (lower back, obliques and abs) I've also seen some stuff in some of the magazines about doing incline push-ups with feet on a ball but never tried doing them.

Thanks for the added info and the links, I will look into them.