I just bought the book "you are your own gym" by Mark Lauren and have started the 10 week "basic" program which is laid out very well, especially if you use the accompanying iPad app. It is a combination of body weight exercises and using things you have around the house for resistance. The exercises are explained very well and there are a lot of things I would never have thought about, like different ways to use doors, tables, stairs and railings for leverage. I got it becaue I was getting bored with my routine at the gym and wanted to mix it up.

The iPad app alone is worth the money IMO at $1.99 -- it describes all the exercises and will walk you through training programs at different levels.

You can also do a fair amount with resistance bands at first, although I think their usefulness is limited.

Steve, I'd be interesting in your answer to this too and you impression of this book or others like it. Thanks!

That book actually sounds very intriguing to me. I'll add it to my Amazon wishlist. I'm backlogged in my reading right now so it'll have to wait. I've always referred to a lot of Ross Enamait's stuff from rosstraining.com. His books are excellent and he's one of the rare gems who actually knows his stuff. I really enjoyed his Never Gymless... I think that's the title.

At the end of the day though, beginners don't need a lot of resistance to facilitate muscle growth and strength gains. In fact, in some movements body weight is likely to be too much... especially for things like pushing and pulling movements. For example, many women aren't going to be able to bust out proper push-ups and pull-ups from the get go.

In those sorts of movements, I'm a fan of adjustable dumbbells. You can pick them up for relatively cheap. They're the first piece of equipment I'd recommend for in-home training. I'd find ones that allow adjustments in increments of 5 lbs and go with the heaviest set you can find. Strength gains happen quickly in the beginning and you need 'room on the rack' to move up. If you don't move up, adaptations are likely to plateau.

If dumbbells aren't in the budget, you can always resort to things like gallon jugs, buckets, and backpacks. Fill them with liquid, sand, stones, books, or whatever. Resistance is resistance.

On top of dumbbells, if I were building out a home gym on a budget, I'd include suspension training handles, a pull-up bar, and some bands.

Of course in other movements body weight will suffice - things like squats, deadlifts, hip thrusts, glute bridges, etc. And when they get too easy, you can progress without adding load by simply moving to one leg... things like lunge variations, single leg romanian deadlifts, single leg glute bridges, and the like.

If the goal was to enter into strength/muscle building, I'd set up a basic 2-3 day full body routine that consisted of a big leg movement, a unilateral leg movement, a push, and a pull. Something like:

Day 1:

Body weight squats (when you can get 3 sets of 20 start adding external load to keep you in the 10-15 rep range)
Single Leg Glute Bridge (3x8-12)
Inverted Rows* (3x8-12)
Modified Push-ups (3x8-12)
Core

*Inverted rows can be done off of a table, suspension handles, or whatever. If you don't know what I'm talking about, let me know and I'll get you a vid.

Day 2:

Dumbbell Deadlifts* (3x8-12)
Lunges (3x8-12 each leg)
Bentover Rows* (3x8-12_
Overhead Press (3x8-12)
Core

*these movements can be done with dumbbells, gallon jugs, buckets, or whatever.

If you wanted a third day, you could repeat day 1. So the first week would like like 1/2/1 and week two would look like 2/1/2

And all of the movements are interchangeable with others. Just stick with the same categorizations - squat variations, hip hinge variations, pushing, and pulling. Once a decent foundation of strength is built, one could begin toying around with different rep ranges across the week. For example, you might move to a model where you have a heavy day, a light day, and a moderate day or whatever. I wouldn't worry about that in the beginning though.

Wow, thank you!

This looks similar to the routine I was doing which was basically a three day a week A-B-A routine consisting of quads, horizontal press, horizontal pull for A and hams, vertical press and vertical pull for B. I got it from this site

http://www.aworkoutroutine.com/the-beginner-weight-training-workout-routine/

It's nice to know this kind of thing can be done either at home or at the gym. Lauren's book organizes the exercises by "push, pull and legs" so it makes it easy to find examples, substitutes or mix it up.

Thank you for the other book recommendation and your very thorough response!

Wow, thank you!

This looks similar to the routine I was doing which was basically a three day a week A-B-A routine consisting of quads, horizontal press, horizontal pull for A and hams, vertical press and vertical pull for B. I got it from this site

http://www.aworkoutroutine.com/the-beginner-weight-training-workout-routine/

It's nice to know this kind of thing can be done either at home or at the gym. Lauren's book organizes the exercises by "push, pull and legs" so it makes it easy to find examples, substitutes or mix it up.

Thank you for the other book recommendation and your very thorough response!

Sounds like you are DEFINITELY on the right track. Just make sure that no matter what you implement, you're progressively getting stronger over time.

Thank you so much! I was looking at the adjustable dumbells. I thought those would be good because I just have to buy two of them and not buy sets of various dumbells.

I'm not exactly a beginner. I've done three 6 week sessions of boot camp style classes that did body weight and some weight training. It's been a while though, so I'll start with what you gave me and go from there. I can do 5-8 regular push-ups and several sets of body weight squats. I can't do a pull-up to save my life though :laugh:

You have done exactly what I wanted which was give me a plan!! I just needed some direction on where to start. I already made my work out calendar for September and now I know what to do each day. Thank you again!!!

You're welcome!

Oh, and you're not alone. Very few women can do pull-ups. The way I track my female clients is starting with band assisted pull-ups, assuming they have the strength for them. They work wonders.

If they can't do that, I'll do jumping pull-ups or eccentric pull-ups.

If those are out of the question, I'll do something that I don't really have a name for... but the client hangs from a bar or rings that are low enough to the floor so that their legs are resting. This takes considerable load off. From there, they pull up, helping with their legs as need be.

Definitely not bad. If it were me, I'd do things a bit differently, but that's just me....

<snip for brevity>

...Just my thoughts.

Thanks very much for the feedback, Steve! I appreciate your input and what you said makes a lot of sense. I'm midway through my second 5-week cycle of the above workout - I may finish up the next two weeks, then re-design and run a couple cycles your way. Thanks again!

My pleasure.

My thinking goes like this. I like to stress the body differently across the week... not just with loading, but also with volume. The moderate day will challenge my body with volume. This is where I get close to bodybuilding-esque type of stuff. Ideally it's on a Monday, so I'm well rested from the weekend. Since it'll be a challenging workout that requires some recovery, the next workout will be light... likely on Wednesday. During this workout I will practice/perfect technique, work on activating weak spots in my posture, work in exercises that are conducive to light loading such as unilateral work. Since the light day isn't very challenging, I'll be geared up for the heavy intensity day on Friday. That's where I'm working as close to max as possible while maintaining good form. Like Monday, this workout is very challenging... but it's challenging in a different kind of way. Monday is more metabolically challenging and Friday is more neurologically challenging. It's strategically placed on Friday to allow for a couple of days of recovery before you hit it again on Monday.

Definitely not The Way.... but something I could see working out nicely.

You're welcome. And remember, this is just one possibility of many. Stay strong.

Hey Steve, long term I think it'd be cool to post book reviews and program reviews (there's overlap there obviously). There're some popular programs on MFP that I'm sure people would like to hear your take on.

Hey Steve, long term I think it'd be cool to post book reviews and program reviews (there's overlap there obviously). There're some popular programs on MFP that I'm sure people would like to hear your take on.

Love the idea. I'm more reactive though.... when people ask about certain things, I answer. Plus, one big issue is I don't see a lot of the prepackaged stuff unless a client brings it to my attention. Like p90x for example... I would have never seen the actual program (obviously I've seen the advertisements) had a client not brought it into my gym to ask my opinion.

But yeah, I'm down for giving my 2 cents on anything you're curious about.