With the beginning of Quarter Two and temperatures rising, the professional business world is picking up the pace just as fast. My business world is no different, but I know that one powerful way to stay effective and creative is to keep exercising regularly at least 4 times per week.
I made a commitment to myself that I will be in the gym 5-6 times per week. I am already witnessing a boost in my daily productivity and overall well-being.
But as most busy people agree, going to the gym is a big time commitment: travel time, changing, warm-up, exercise session, stretching, shower, dressing up, travel again – we’re looking at 1.5 hours or more.
The Clock is ticking
I am very fortunate to work and live about 3 minutes walking distance from my gym. The changing, dressings, showers, and protein shake to go take me about 9 minutes. That’s a total of 15 minutes for travel and “administration.”
I do my 3-minute warm-up in the steam room or sauna, already dressed in the workout clothes. While the heat is warming up my muscles and increasing oxygen flow, I breathe deep and do a few static stretches (leg stretch, toe touch, arms in front and behind).
Depending on the day, I either spin on the Elliptical machine for 20 minutes, punch and kick a punching bag for 8 and do some body weight exercises (push-ups, jumping jacks, planks) for 12, or do weights and machines for 20 minutes.
I usually do supersets of 2-3 exercises with 5-15 seconds rest between each, and 3 sets and 12 reps for each exercise – all with medium-heavy weights. After each superset I rest for 2-3 minutes.
It is critical to isolate major muscles groups per exercise in the superset and add variety over time (not repeating precisely the same exercise more than 4 times per periodization period: 1-3 months).
For example, first exercise can be squats with loaded barbell or holding dumbbells in both hands and standing on a bosu. Then I would move to a bench press – again either with barbell or with dumbbells (straight up or flies). Final exercise can be push-ups, plank, bicep or tricep curl, or leg adduction/abduction machine.
With 6 seconds per rep and 12 reps per exercise, 12 second rest, before next exercise, total of 3 exercises, 2.5 minute break, and then 2 more supersets just like that, the total time for 1 giant superset is about 20 minutes [((6 x 12 + 12)x 3 + 150 ) x 3 = 1206 seconds or 20 minutes].
I finish the workout with 2 minutes of stretching of the muscles worked in this session, and I am out to the change room after 25 minutes total workout time. Total gym time: 34 minutes + 6 minutes of travel time = only 40 minutes a day!
Side Note: The most effective duration of an exercise session for many physiological reasons is around 40-50 minutes (source: fitness industry experts). That effectiveness starts at a 20 minute mark and ends at 60 minutes. In other words, EXCLUDING warm-up, the exercise session should be bare minimum 20 minutes, but no more than 1 hour.
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