Four Ways To Create Short But Effective Workouts
60If you lead a very busy life, this shouldn't necessarily mean that you need to forgo your workout programs and goals to lose weight. It's perfectly doable to create fast, yet effective fat loss workouts that will not only help you burn away those calories that are necessary to reach your goal weight, but also improve your overall fitness level as well.
It really is true that all the little things you do from day to day will add up over time, so a fifteen minute walk here and a fifteen minute walk there will go a long way towards helping you reach your target goals.
Now that said, here are four ways you can create fast, yet effective fat loss workouts.
Perform Supersets
One of the best ways to cut back on time during your workouts is to opt for supersets to replace the traditional weight lifting technique.
When doing so, you will alternate between two different exercises, usually ones that work opposing muscle groups.
So for instance, you would start by doing a bicep curl, then progress to doing an overhead tricep extension.
This allows you to perform two sets back to back and then take your rest period, which shortens the entire workout considerably.
Perform Cardio Between Sets
Another way you can shorter your workout is by doing cardio bursts between the weight lifting sets you do. So for instance, you could perform one set of bench press, and then go run on the treadmill for a minute. Next, follow up with another set of bench press, then another run.
It's important to keep in mind here that if you're doing leg training though, I'd avoid doing intense cardio as this will likely hinder your ability to lift.
It's all going to come down to your overall goals - if max strength development is your primary focus, then type of set-up may not be right for you.
Focus On Compound Lifts Only
The next thing you can do is increase the time you spend only doing compound lifts. So for example, rather than going to the gym and performing three sets of bicep curls, three sets of rope-pull-downs, three sets of lateral raises, and so on, go to the gym and perform a couple hard sets of bench presses and a couple of hard sets of rows.
These will simultaneously work a large number of muscle fibers and will essentially take care of all those smaller muscles that you're trying to work elsewhere.
Do Abs Between Sets
Finally, the last thing you can do to decrease the total time you need to spend in the gym is to perform abdominal crunches in between each set you do.
This will allow the main muscle groups to rest while the ab exercise is being performed, and remove the need to dedicate an extra ten minutes to ab training at the end of your workout session.
So, if you're in a time crunch, keep these points in mind. Even if you can only get to the gym for twenty minutes, this is still going to be a whole lot better than if you were to skip it entirely.
