Creative Workouts

Depending on the day of the week, efficiency in the gym may be our top priority. If you're ever struggling with what to do in the gym, here's a simple way to get an effective total body workout that will save you time, energy and be sure to leave you sweating. You have two options.

Option number one requires you to be a member at a gym with a great deal of machines or, you may own a great deal of machines. Either way here's what you're going to do: you start on one side of the row of machines and you do one set of every machine as you work your way down the line. I recommend going to failure and chosing10 to 20 reps is sufficient. Often times, gyms will be set up for this, having one row of a certain brand, say Nautilis or PowerTech for example.  These machines will work synergistically with each other, isolating different body parts. There's infinite ways you can complete a total body workout on these machines so you can rest assured that constant gains are achievable. If you have different brands available, I recommend trying different ones on different days of the week because even though they may advertise isolating the same muscle or muscle group, the principles of leverage, resistance over the range of motion and the angle of attack are almost certainly different to some degree, which can be used to your benefit. Mixing it up amongst these machines creates muscle confusion and doesn't allow your body to adapt as easily to the exercises at hand which leads to stronger, more profound gains.

Option number two is a great choice when you have access to only one piece of equipment or you're looking to get into the gym, grab one piece of equipment and complete five exercises, back to back to back etc. Two or more sets of each exercise may be required depending on how many exercises you're doing and this method may require a bit more creativity but it’s definitely worth it! Even though there is room for endless creativity, and effective workout routine of this nature can be very simple and straightforward. For example, you can go into the gym and grab a barbell (weight of your choice) and complete a set of overhead presses, barbell curls, overhead tricep extensions, inclined barbell push-ups (feet up hands on barbell, wide narrow or neutral grip), bent over rows (one set palms in, one set palms out), squats and RDLs. Again as with the machines, I recommend going to failure and choosing a weight that allows that to land between 10 and 20 reps. Complete two sets of each exercise and call it a day! This works with any single piece of equipment including but not limited to your body weight, a pull-up bar, a kettle bell, a set of resistance bands, a jump rope, a big hill, open field, a sledge hammer, a tire of any size an so on. This is also a great trick on those days you find yourself in a rather crowded gym. Sometimes you can go in there and take up five pieces of equipment doing supersets and other times you're lucky to grab a barbell and have six or seven square feet to work with. This option is great for the latter.

In conclusion, as you can see there's not many excuses for you to not pick up something heavy today. So get out there and do it! If you post workouts like this, be sure to tag us using #MakeItAHabit We’ll be sure repost!

Until next time! Ryan out.