Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Two of my routines

Normally, I don't post too much about what routines that I'm doing. I have a couple of reasons. There are a lot of blogs out there where people post little else other than the routines they're doing. Frankly, I think that's boring as hell. Aside from a shortage of insight, I find them dry because often times I have little or no interest in their routines. They might be too easy or hard for me. They may be using equipment that I don't have access to, doing exercises that I have no interest in doing or trying.

Apparently, more than a couple of people are interested in my routines. I've gotten several questions. While I'm not going to lay out every routine and exercise that I do, I thought it would be worthwhile to share a couple that I've been doing lately. What's more important about sharing them isn't the exercises that I do and the reps that I do of them is the principles behind them. If anything, that's what I feel is most worth taking from these routines.

Lately, when I want to work my chest and shoulders, I've been doing what I'll call my 5-10-15 push-up workout. I've found a lot of very valuable push-ups out there. Trying to fit them into a single workout is essentially impossible. What I did discover was that if I took 3 or 4 and did them at about a third of my maximum reps, done with little break between sets, was very effective at getting strong and staying injury resistant at the same time. Moving the body in different directions, through its various planes, can be key to keeping your body healthy.

So, my favorite set of push-ups lately has been this:

5 One-arm push-ups, for each arm, 10 total
10 Handstand Push-ups
15 Dive Bomber Push-ups

This is merely a fragment. I've also thrown rock training or miscellaneous planks in between this circuit, depending on my mood.

When it comes to conditioning, sometimes I feel conflicted between my two most travel-friendly exercises: Jump rope and burpee/8 count bodybuilders. Both deliver full-body workouts but I feel like the rope better develops coordination, balance and timing. The latter develops even more full-body conditioning along with moving the body through multiple planes. So, my Gymboss provided the solution: Doing 4-6 of 2-3 minute rounds, alternating between jumping rope and burpees/8 counts (I lean towards 8 counts when in a hotel room since the jumping disturbs others). This is how it usually breaks down:

3 minutes jump rope
30 seconds rest
3 minutes burpees
30 seconds rest
3 minutes jump rope
30 seconds rest
3 minutes burpees

Ultimately, you can fit in an awful lot of exercises into a compact amount of time with a little creativity and know-how. These are good routines for me but feel free to modify them according to your needs. Physical training isn't doesn't have one size shoe. Don't ever forget it.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Justin,

I think it is another byproduct of the commercial fitness/bodybuilding brainwashing of today.

They are used to the classic weightlifting prescriptions (the list of exercises with the exact reps and sets scheme). They don't realize that there is much more to training and being strong.

Bodyweight is also a totally different animal than lifting weights. I believe that the key of bodyweight training is the concept of PROGRESSION (example: pike press--->handstand hold--->handstand negatives--->handstand pushups).

Alberto (italy)

Anonymous said...

hey justin,
nice push workout there, is it me or 3 minutes are a lot because you can't do 3 straight minutes of burpees?

cheers
-Workout Warrior

Justin_PS said...

Ahmed,

If I couldn't do 3 minutes of burpees, I'd say so. I chose three minutes because it's the same as a boxing/ameture MMA round.