Back awhile ago, I posted this workout by Craig Ballantyne on a great 300 workout.
I was at a seminar a few weeks ago where I found out the Original 300 Workout was actually only 3 exericses: Pullup, Pushup, and Squat. You did 100 Pullups, 100 Pushups, and 100 Squats and tried to get that done in 30 minutes.
Now i don't know if this workout was created by someone recently who is calling it by that name or whether this is actually a workout that was done 2000 years ago in ancient Rome.
I tried it out last week and it was pretty good. I made one slight adjustment in that I did inverted rows instead of pullups (I might be able to squeak out 50 pullups, but I'll be honest, there's no way I could have pulled out 100 of them).
How I did it though was I did everything in sets of 5 in circuit fashion. I did 5 inverted rows, 5 bodyweight squats, and then 5 pushups and then repeated that over and over again until I had done a total of 20 sets.
My time wasn't too bad. 14:30 the first day I did it, 13:45 the second time I did it.
I'll tell you what though, for a workout that lasts less than 15 minutes, I was drenched in sweat when I was done and boy did my upper body feel it the next day.
Another good example of how designing workouts effectively using the biggest muscles you've got can cut down on the amount of time that you have to workout but give you the same (if not better) results than if you worked out longer.
Give it a try and e-mail me at mike@leanbodyfitness.com to let me know how you did.
www.leanbodyfitness.com
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Showing posts with label squats. Show all posts
Showing posts with label squats. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Friday, March 13, 2009
Michelle Obama's Arms
There's been a lot of chatter about First Lady Michelle Obama's arms and yes, they're pretty impressive.
Here's an article that talks about how to get those arms into "show off" shape like hers.
I'm not a huge fan of using resistance bands, especially when it comes to isolation exercises such as bicep curls. But I like the advice that you need to challenge the muscles with a heavy enough weight to get the biceps and triceps to grow using rows and pushups (and the article doesn't mention it but, don't forget about dips.
Remember, if you want to get your muscles to grow even in places such as your arms, you need to do exercises that use a lot of muscle groups in order to get that hormone release that is going to be more of a factor in building muscle then doing isolation exercises (check here for a post where I talk about doing squats to help build your arms for a more thorough explanation).
Have a good weekend everyone.
www.leanbodyfitness.com
Here's an article that talks about how to get those arms into "show off" shape like hers.
I'm not a huge fan of using resistance bands, especially when it comes to isolation exercises such as bicep curls. But I like the advice that you need to challenge the muscles with a heavy enough weight to get the biceps and triceps to grow using rows and pushups (and the article doesn't mention it but, don't forget about dips.
Remember, if you want to get your muscles to grow even in places such as your arms, you need to do exercises that use a lot of muscle groups in order to get that hormone release that is going to be more of a factor in building muscle then doing isolation exercises (check here for a post where I talk about doing squats to help build your arms for a more thorough explanation).
Have a good weekend everyone.
www.leanbodyfitness.com
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Why Your Workouts Aren't Working
This article from Shape gives a list of ten reasons why your workout isn't working anymore. Let's briefly go through them:
1. You're doing the same routine over and over again and your body has adapted. Change it up every 6-8 weeks (although, there's some studies that show that you don't even need to change exercises, just change the rep range and the amount of weight you're using for each exercise and that should be enough to get past a plateau).
2. You're performing the repetitions to quickly (the article states to take 6 seconds for each rep and I think that's a little slow. If you take a controlled movement going down, pause a second, and then come up in a controlled manner, you'll be fine).
3. Get your rest between hard workout sessions. Your body repairs the muscle and breaks down the fat after the workout so give time for that to happen so you don't overreach.
4. Mix some intervals into your workout (it doesn't take a genius to see where I stand on this).
5. Lifting the wrong amount of weight. This is absolutely on the money. Go progressive. Don't just lift the cute little pink weights, challenge yourself but do it progressively so that you don't overtax your muscles too soon.
6. Squats and don't let your knees go past your toes. Absolutely disagree with this. I won't get long winded as I've already written about this.
7. Bend Over Lat Row. It's a good description of the correct form for these. The important piece of it is to make sure you're pushing your butt back to support your body and not just lowering your back down with your legs straight.
8. Tricep Kickback. These are just stupid in most cases. As a friend of mine Lou Schuler once said in an article, these are like Chinese water torture. You're doing a lot of them but not getting any real benefit because they're an isolated exercise and only working a very small muscle. Do pushups and their variations instead.
9. Crunch. I'm actually falling away from doing these as I've found other ab exercises to do that I think are much more effective, such as planks, side planks, bird dogs, mountain climbers, elevated pushups, just to name a few. But, a weighted crunch on a stability ball isn't so bad.
10. Dumbbell Bench Fly. I don't like this for the same reason I don't like the tricep kickback. So see number 8 above.
Clear as mud?
www.leanbodyfitness.com
1. You're doing the same routine over and over again and your body has adapted. Change it up every 6-8 weeks (although, there's some studies that show that you don't even need to change exercises, just change the rep range and the amount of weight you're using for each exercise and that should be enough to get past a plateau).
2. You're performing the repetitions to quickly (the article states to take 6 seconds for each rep and I think that's a little slow. If you take a controlled movement going down, pause a second, and then come up in a controlled manner, you'll be fine).
3. Get your rest between hard workout sessions. Your body repairs the muscle and breaks down the fat after the workout so give time for that to happen so you don't overreach.
4. Mix some intervals into your workout (it doesn't take a genius to see where I stand on this).
5. Lifting the wrong amount of weight. This is absolutely on the money. Go progressive. Don't just lift the cute little pink weights, challenge yourself but do it progressively so that you don't overtax your muscles too soon.
6. Squats and don't let your knees go past your toes. Absolutely disagree with this. I won't get long winded as I've already written about this.
7. Bend Over Lat Row. It's a good description of the correct form for these. The important piece of it is to make sure you're pushing your butt back to support your body and not just lowering your back down with your legs straight.
8. Tricep Kickback. These are just stupid in most cases. As a friend of mine Lou Schuler once said in an article, these are like Chinese water torture. You're doing a lot of them but not getting any real benefit because they're an isolated exercise and only working a very small muscle. Do pushups and their variations instead.
9. Crunch. I'm actually falling away from doing these as I've found other ab exercises to do that I think are much more effective, such as planks, side planks, bird dogs, mountain climbers, elevated pushups, just to name a few. But, a weighted crunch on a stability ball isn't so bad.
10. Dumbbell Bench Fly. I don't like this for the same reason I don't like the tricep kickback. So see number 8 above.
Clear as mud?
www.leanbodyfitness.com
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