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Nov, 2009
Circuit Training Workout For a Lean Body – The Hell With Old School Cardio
This is an advanced fat loss workout for those who want a lean and tone body…by Brad Campbell
Happy fat hater Friday everyone. Today I’m going to arm you with a deadly circuit training workout that you can use this weekend to declare war on your body fat. This is ‘new school’ cardio…and I say the hell with ‘old school’ cardio. Okay, maybe that’s a lil harsh – standard cardio does have it’s place in your fat loss workout plan…it’s just not near as effective as the accelerated methods I’m preaching about in these posts.
Standard, slow paced cardio workouts can be useful as an additional calorie burning tool that you can use to further the caloric deficit you’re creating through diet, strength training and these more intense interval based workouts. They can also be used to give your body, and especially your legs, a rest from the highly-demanding workouts you’ve been doing all week long. But that’s about it…
My ‘new school’ cardio, as I’ve been calling it, will make those 45 min jogs on the treadmill look like child’s play (speaking of which, that movie used to scare the shit outta me when I was little). And it will do so in about 1/4th of the time.
There’s really only one drawback to using this advanced fat burning cardio system – it sucks…bad…I mean it really requires you to dig deep and work hard, but only for a short amount of time. And I know you’ll suck it up and do it anyways, because of the lean body it’ll help you sculpt in less time…much less time.
We all know that HIIT cardio is the latest and greatest thing for fat burning…but this type of circuit training workout I’m about to share is kind of like HIIT on crack. This workout will hit all of your muscle fibers and put your strength and conditioning on blast.
There are several reasons this type of circuit training puts standard cardio and even traditional forms of HIIT cardio (such as jogging, walking for recovery and repeating) to shame:
–> Most cardio workouts, even many HIIT workouts, only work your lower body muscles…and even then, it’s not at an intense-enough level to reap the muscle building and fat burning effects of strength training.
–> If we can involve the upper body muscles, core muscles AND the lower body muscles —> this leads to a far greater number of muscle fibers that need to recover —> causing more calories to be burned post-workout to fuel the recovery process —> this also releases more fat burning enzymes, which means even more fat loss (can I get a Boo-Yah Jim Cramer?).
So what exactly is this crack-like, advanced HIIT, circuit training workout?
You’ll be performing 6 exercises for 1 minute each, with virtually no rest in between exercises (you’re allowed just enough time to transition to the next movement and that’s it).
We’ll be hitting muscles of the upper body, lower body and core, so we can cash-in on the benefits I just talked about.
One circuit should take you just over 6 minutes (it’ll take a few seconds to transition between each exercise) and if you don’t pass out or puke after one circuit, go ahead and rest just 1-minute and repeat another circuit.
Once you can do 3 circuits and you’re using the most advanced form of each movement, you’ve increased the intensity of each exercise and you’ve increased the weight of your dumbbells…you’ve graduated and are now a total lean body bad ass…just don’t forget to mention me when you start your new career as a fitness cover model.
Brad’s Advanced Circuit Training Workout:
–> Alternating lunges – can start with body weight only and progress to holding dumbbells
–> Upright dumbbell rows – start with lighter pair of dumbbells and try to increase the weight each time
–> Plank hold – forearms and toes only, with back perfectly straight and abs tight…if this gets easy, you can lift one leg for 30 secs each during the 1-minute hold
–> Squat jumps – explode up as high as possible, landing softly and going immediately into a deep squat (this will probably bring tears)
–> Dumbbell shoulder presses – start with light pair of dumbbells and press both together, using full range of motion, at the same time…aim to increase the weight when you repeat this workout
–> Hip thrusters – keeping back flat, jump both feet up and in, as you bring your knees up to your chest…if this is too difficult to do for the entire minute, you can step one foot at a time up and in (think slow mountain climbers)
*Remember, all exercises are done for 60 seconds (don’t stop early) and you need to transition immediately to the next exercise without resting…complete the entire circuit, rest only 1-minute and repeat 1 or 2 more times as your conditioning improves.
Give this advanced circuit training workout a shot this weekend and let me know what you think. Before I wrap this up, I’ve got another semi-dirty joke for you. I saw this on someone’s blog I was reading this morning and thought I would ‘borrow’ it to send you into the weekend with a smile on your face. Here goes:
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A kindergarten teacher is trying to explain to her class the definition of the word “definitely” to them. To make sure the students have a good understanding of the word, she asks them to use it in a sentence.
The first student raises his hand and says: “The sky is definitely blue.”
The teacher responds: “Well, that isn’t entirely true…because sometimes it’s gray and cloudy.”
Another student says: “Grass is definitely green.”
The teacher again replies: “If grass doesn’t get enough water it turns brown…so that isn’t really correct either.”
Another student raises his hand and asks the teacher: “Do farts have lumps?”
The teacher looked at him and said: “No…but that isn’t really a question you want to ask in class discussion.”
So the student replies: “Then I definitely just shit my pants!”
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Your Fat Loss Coach,
Brad Campbell
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