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If you have ever used heavy ropes to do an interval workout you will feel my pain!

If you haven’t had the ‘pleasure’ of doing so yet, then look forward to it and make sure you add ‘Heavy Rope Intervals’ to the list of things to do before you die!

Apparently these ropes were named ‘Best New Cardio Tool of 2009′ by Men’s Health magazine and all I can say is that after a few minutes my lungs, arms, legs, shoulders……lets just say EVERYTHING was burning!

This workout was designed to be hard, fast and effective. I’m pretty sure it ticked off all of these boxes and then some! Following a 40 seconds work into 20 seconds rest interval, I did five work sets followed by a full minute rest (very generous I know!!). Do this for four rounds and you have a nice 20 minute workout. (30 minutes if you include a warm up before and lying in the foetal position for 5 minutes afterwards!)

Round One:

1. Double Waves
2. Alternate Waves
3. Double Waves
4. Alternate Waves
5. Double Waves

Round Two:

1. Outside Circles/Spirals
2. Inside Circles/Spirals
3. Double Waves
4. Outside Circles/Spirals
5. Inside Circles/Spirals

Round Three:

1. Rainbows/Throws
2. Alternate Waves
3. Rainbows/Throws
4. Alternate Waves
5. Rainbows/Throws

Round Four:

1. Double Waves
2. Alternate Waves
3. Inside Circles/Spirals
4. Rainbows/Throws
5. Outside Circles/Spirals

I got Rach to film some of the action, so you can see exactly what the exercises are if you aren’t familiar with them.

Ropes supplied by Australian Kettlebells

Interval Workout Music supplied by Workout Muse

Hey there,

I’ve been sent these two little video clips which have some nice little challenges for you!

First up is the ‘Ultimate Warrior Workout Challenge’ which is brought to you by Nate Green.

Pretty simple concept really, push yourself for 60 seconds, rest for 15 seconds and repeat for a total of four sets.

The exercises: Push ups, Chin Ups, Sit ups and Dips.

The goal: Maximum reps.

Second up is the ‘Three Minute Push Up Challenge’ brought to you by Craig Ballantyne.

Pretty simple this one. Just bang out as many push ups as you can in 3 minutes.

Let me know how you go. I will give them a crack and post my results.

We’ve all been there before. Looking for the holy grail of programs. We find it and give it everything.
Great results follow and you are chuffed that you have finally found THE workout.
But then things change, all of a sudden your trusty workout isn’t delivering the same results as it was before.

You decide to have a break and start seeing other programs, thinking that ‘grass is always greener…’

You get the drift anyway! Find a good workout, go hard at it, but know that it will need changing sooner or later to keep delivering results.

Personally I think 3-6 weeks is the sweet spot for changing your gym workouts. Less and you may not get any progress, any more and you may be holding your progress back (compared to if you changed).

You can go for wholesale changes (as in completely change the workout) or you can make smaller adjustments that will keep you rolling for the next 3-6 weeks.

1. Have a goal weight or reps on a certain exercise. Push yourself extra hard to hit this goal and then set a new benchmark. For instance, you might want to be able to do 50 pushups with your body weight. Once you can, either aim for 60 or use another exercise as your focus. This will get you motivated to work harder on all of the exercises that help with pushups (upper body pushing exercises).

2. Train with odd shaped objects. Still use the same exercises but instead of using the traditional barbell and dumbbell try using kettlebells, club bells, sand bags, aqua bags etc. The movement will be the same, but the training object will provide your body (and mind) with a fresh challenge. For example, bent over rows can be done with all of these objects but will all give you a different workout on the same ‘movement’.

3. Try cables or bands for different angles. Similar to the previous point, but here you just want to make small changes to the angles you are using. If you always do cable presses on the same setting, move it a peg higher or lower. It doesn’t matter which way, as long as it is different than before. Same goes for the bands, change the height of the anchor point (or your body relative to the anchor point) and you’ll be challenging your body in a different position to before.

4. Start supersetting if you aren’t. Pick two exercises and do them back to back. THey can be the same muscle group, opposing muscle groups or completely different muscle groups. It doesn’t matter! What matters is the intensity and the slight variations you are doing. If you normally do squats followed by presses, do presses followed by squats. Simple yet effective.

5. Sweat in the warm up. You shouldn’t lift your first ‘real’ weight until you are properly warmed up. This means you should be warmed up! That means you should be sweating. It doesn’t have to take forever though. Some skipping, rolling, mobility swings, kettlebell swings and presses will get the heart rate up, body temp up and have you ready for your workout in less than 10 minutes.

There you go, 5 quick ways to spice up your workouts. Let me know what you are doing to keep your workouts alive and kicking by leaving a comment below.

Workouts don’t need to be overly complex.

Especially when the goal of the workout isn’t that complex.

If the goal is to get fitter, stronger and leaner, then you want to move as much weight as possible with just little rest in between.

Give this workout template a crack next time you are ready for a change of pace.

After warming up get cracking with the following circuit.

A1: Barbell Deadlift x 6

A2: Chin Up x 6

4 sets, no rest between A1-A2, 60 seconds rest between A2-A1.

B1: Dumbbell Lunge x 12

B2: Push Up x 12

4 sets, no rest between B1-B2, 60 seconds rest between B2-B1.

C1: Barbell Clean and Press x 6

C1: Mountain Climber x 30 seconds

4 sets, no rest between C1-C2, 60 seconds rest between C2-C1.

Now this is where the fun starts and why you never have to be bored with your workout or stuck in a rut.

Follow this workout for three sessions (ideally over a week to 10 days), then push all of the exercises down the list one. So instead of starting with A1-A2, you will do B1-B2, C1-C2 and finish with A1-A2.

Once again do this for three sessions, then bump the exercise order once more. Start with C1-C2, then A1-A2 and finish B1-B2.

This give you nine workouts (three goes at three different exercise orders) to get going with. You can do each one more than three times is you are still making progress with the numbers you are lifting (as in you can lift more weight – not reps- than the last session), but you don’t have to.

When you have had enough of this series of workouts, all you need to do is flip the combos so that your workout will now look like this.

A2 -> A1 rest, repeat

B2 -> B1 rest, repeat

C2 -> C1 rest, repeat

Then, once again you can bump the starting lot down one and do B2-B1, C2-C1 and finish with A2-A1. Do that one three times and you are onto C2-C1, A2-A1 and B2-B1 combo.

Do each of these at least three times each and you have 18 workouts, which is enough for about 6 or so weeks.

Now remember, we have only used six exercises here. After you have completed the 18 workouts, change each of the exercises (like for like, ie front squat for deadlifts, alternate chin grip, bench press for push up etc) and you have another 18 workout ready and waiting for you!

No more excuses to be stale and boring with your workouts. Keep your mind and body progressing and guessing and you’ll find that you are able to take your fitness and strength to new levels.

(Btw, I couldn’t find any relevant pics, so I used some weird ones! – Can you tell?)