Workout Routine

nursespoony87
nursespoony87 Posts: 11
edited September 30 in Fitness and Exercise
Hey!

My girlfriend and I started going back to the gym a few days ago. Our current routine is this:

1) 60 minutes on the elliptical.
2) 60 minutes on the bicycle.
3) Strength training
a) Switching between upper and lower body on different days.

Now, my question is how can we be a little more productive while at the gym? We go six days per week for at least 120 minutes per day. We're beginning the C25K challenge, as well, so I want to fit that in there on the treadmill.

Any thoughts? Suggestions?

Replies

  • End6ame
    End6ame Posts: 903
    My personal recommendation would be to full body compound barbell lifts Mon/Wed/Fri and ditch the split routine, do full body every day. Look into Starting Strength or StrongLifts 5x5, you can both do either program. Then add your C25k or any other cardio on after your strength training.

    Now, this is just my personal recommendation, many other methods will work. Since you are both beginners (I am assuming) compound lifts and the 5x5 method would be a great place to start and are the best way to build all around strength.

    Also on your plan you are in the gym for 2.5 hours plus; that is really not necessary. 45-60 minutes of strength training followed by 30 minutes of cardio is more than enough.
  • nursespoony87
    nursespoony87 Posts: 11
    My personal recommendation would be to full body compound barbell lifts Mon/Wed/Fri and ditch the split routine, do full body every day. Look into Starting Strength or StrongLifts 5x5, you can both do either program. Then add your C25k or any other cardio on after your strength training.

    Now, this is just my personal recommendation, many other methods will work. Since you are both beginners (I am assuming) compound lifts and the 5x5 method would be a great place to start and are the best way to build all around strength.

    Also on your plan you are in the gym for 2.5 hours plus; that is really not necessary. 45-60 minutes of strength training followed by 30 minutes of cardio is more than enough.

    Grglandr: Where can I find the routines for compound lifts and the 5x5 method? I'm not familiar with either of those. Thanks for your recommendations!
  • Pete_Mann
    Pete_Mann Posts: 94
    Is that the order you do it in? Do you do them all on the same day?

    You should do what works for you, but for me I make sure to get some cardio in every day. I try to match it to whatever strength training I am doing, so for me its:

    Day 1) Chest/Triceps - Elliptical
    Day 2) Stairmaster (low resistance)
    Day 3) Legs - Stairmaster High Resistance (you could do bike)
    Day 4) Elliptical - Low resistance
    Day 5) Biceps/Back - Elliptical
    Day 6) Stairmaster low resistance

    Try to switch things up every 6 weeks or so. Like right now, I have dumped my schedule and I am just swimming for the next six weeks as that does strength and cardio all at once.
  • End6ame
    End6ame Posts: 903
    My personal recommendation would be to full body compound barbell lifts Mon/Wed/Fri and ditch the split routine, do full body every day. Look into Starting Strength or StrongLifts 5x5, you can both do either program. Then add your C25k or any other cardio on after your strength training.

    Now, this is just my personal recommendation, many other methods will work. Since you are both beginners (I am assuming) compound lifts and the 5x5 method would be a great place to start and are the best way to build all around strength.

    Also on your plan you are in the gym for 2.5 hours plus; that is really not necessary. 45-60 minutes of strength training followed by 30 minutes of cardio is more than enough.

    Grglandr: Where can I find the routines for compound lifts and the 5x5 method? I'm not familiar with either of those. Thanks for your recommendations!


    Starting Strength
    http://www.amazon.com/Starting-Strength-2nd-Mark-Rippetoe/dp/0976805421/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1312468277&sr=8-1

    StrongLifts 5x5
    http://stronglifts.com/stronglifts-5x5-beginner-strength-training-program/
  • nursespoony87
    nursespoony87 Posts: 11
    Is that the order you do it in? Do you do them all on the same day?

    You should do what works for you, but for me I make sure to get some cardio in every day. I try to match it to whatever strength training I am doing, so for me its:

    Day 1) Chest/Triceps - Elliptical
    Day 2) Stairmaster (low resistance)
    Day 3) Legs - Stairmaster High Resistance (you could do bike)
    Day 4) Elliptical - Low resistance
    Day 5) Biceps/Back - Elliptical
    Day 6) Stairmaster low resistance

    Try to switch things up every 6 weeks or so. Like right now, I have dumped my schedule and I am just swimming for the next six weeks as that does strength and cardio all at once.

    Pete_Mann: She and I only use the elliptical, bike, and treadmill. We use the mechanical weights (rather than the free weights). I've heard that doing strength training on your full body everyday can cause more harm than good. A trainer I had several years ago told me that I need to do do upper body one day, lower body the next day, etc.

    I think we're spending too much time in the gym, as well. I think what we'll start doing is working on upper body strength training followed by 30 minutes on the elliptical and then doing C25K on the treadmill.

    What's suggested as to how many times we should lift? For example, how many times should we lift on one machine before moving to the next?
  • H_Factor
    H_Factor Posts: 1,722 Member
    wow. 2+ hours in the gym 6 days a week!!!! there are more efficient work-out programs out there (if you want to spend less time in the gym). I know most folks have been taught that good cardio work requires long, slow, boring cardio. More recent research shows that this isn't necessary. I have come across different high intensity interval training (HIIT) routines that are efficient and purport to give you more fat burning 24-48 hours after each exercise then your standard long, boring cardio exercise. I would recommend doing some research on Craig Ballantyne and his Turbulence Training method. See if that interests you. bodyrock.tv also offers some very good HIIT routines.

    in addition to the foregoing, and getting the cue for this from one of Craig's videos, I like to do a sprint/bodyweight exercise interval training where I sprint 10-20 seconds, do a bodyweight exercise, rest 20-45 seconds, and repeat with a different bodyweight exercise for 8-12 intervals. this is an awesome workout for strength training and cardio....and including warm-up, you can do it in 30 minutes. that gives you and the girlfriend more time for other activities. these exercises are the ones I'm currently doing with this workout....push-ups, one legged bounds (aka one legged squats), spiderman push-ups, hip raises, breakdancer, Y squats, ape step, leg curl with stability ball, kong, plank, superman.
  • End6ame
    End6ame Posts: 903
    Is that the order you do it in? Do you do them all on the same day?

    You should do what works for you, but for me I make sure to get some cardio in every day. I try to match it to whatever strength training I am doing, so for me its:

    Day 1) Chest/Triceps - Elliptical
    Day 2) Stairmaster (low resistance)
    Day 3) Legs - Stairmaster High Resistance (you could do bike)
    Day 4) Elliptical - Low resistance
    Day 5) Biceps/Back - Elliptical
    Day 6) Stairmaster low resistance

    Try to switch things up every 6 weeks or so. Like right now, I have dumped my schedule and I am just swimming for the next six weeks as that does strength and cardio all at once.

    Pete_Mann: She and I only use the elliptical, bike, and treadmill. We use the mechanical weights (rather than the free weights). I've heard that doing strength training on your full body everyday can cause more harm than good. A trainer I had several years ago told me that I need to do do upper body one day, lower body the next day, etc.

    I think we're spending too much time in the gym, as well. I think what we'll start doing is working on upper body strength training followed by 30 minutes on the elliptical and then doing C25K on the treadmill.

    What's suggested as to how many times we should lift? For example, how many times should we lift on one machine before moving to the next?

    Full body every day is only bad if you do the days back to back. As long as you leave 48 hours for rest, you can do full body every day.

    That being said, machines are generally bad. Everything from height, torso length, and limb length can effect a person’s natural movement patterns and machines cannot account for these variables. Typically they only account for a person’s height, which then forces your body into an unnatural fixed movement pattern that over time and under load can cause injury. You would be better served with learning proper technique and using barbell exercises.
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 48,992 Member
    Hey!

    My girlfriend and I started going back to the gym a few days ago. Our current routine is this:

    1) 60 minutes on the elliptical.
    2) 60 minutes on the bicycle.
    3) Strength training
    a) Switching between upper and lower body on different days.

    Now, my question is how can we be a little more productive while at the gym? We go six days per week for at least 120 minutes per day. We're beginning the C25K challenge, as well, so I want to fit that in there on the treadmill.

    Any thoughts? Suggestions?
    You're in the gym too long. First do your strength training. No more than 45-60 minutes. Then hit the treadmill for cardio. You can alternate the elliptical and bicycle, but really no need to do more than that. Doing more than 60 minutes of cardio after a weight lifting session is catabolic to lean muscle tissue.
  • elizabethblake
    elizabethblake Posts: 384 Member
    Dude, you're doing way too much! You're both going to burn out, and you could injure yourself because you're not giving your body time to recover between workouts.

    If you up the intensity of the cardio, you don't need to do more than 20 minutes - 30 max. You'll actually burn more fat than spending an hour on a machine at a lower intensity. The C25K program could work for this, as you alternate between jogging and walking, but it'd be better for fat loss if you sprinted (don't do this on a treadmill!) for 10-20 seconds and then walked/lunged to let your heart rate come down, repeat for 20 minutes. Warm up first and stretch after your cool down.

    Search the message boards for high intensity interval training - you'll get ideas and recommendations for more programs than you can shake a stick at. Check out Tom Venuto's books from the library if you don't want to make the financial commitment, plunk down $20 and get the New Rules of Lifting for Women and it's companion for men. Six months of workouts for less than $10/each on Amazon.
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