Article By: John Fontana

If I were to take a poll on how many people go into the gym with absolutely no plan for their workout, I am confident the results would be well over 50%.  For years, I have watched people in gyms and noticed the overwhelmed and confused looks on people’s faces. I think people typically know a handful of exercises or machines they like, and just cycle through those based on their mood that day. I get a kick out of that sad look a person makes when their machine gets taken right as they are walking over to it. Panic kicks in and it takes a few minutes to regroup and think of another exercise.

Another astonishing thing to me is watching people’s process of a workout from the time they walk in until the time they leave. Guys will typically start off with some curls or bench press and girls will typically do a bunch of crunches or hop on an elliptical for 30 minutes.

Setting up a workout is pretty simple once you get some structure and guidelines set. A yoga class will flow one movement to the next, from hard to easy.  Your workout should as well. There is a beauty and bit of grace to a well structured workout, which in turn will lead to quick results with a lot less effort. Every movement should lead into the next winding the body up and then settling the body down.

Proper Warm-Up

Each workout should start off with some type of warm-up to get the muscles going a bit so they can function maximally during the workout. Your muscles work as a whole unit but individual muscle fibers are required in order for that unit to work. If you do not properly warm up, this may affect which muscle fibers are utilized and which aren’t. If the correct muscles are utilized through the warm-up, then you can assume your workout will use them as well. If you warm-up is sloppy (or non-existent), you may run into some trouble. Because of this, many people won’t get the most out of their workout or even worse, get injured.

A warm-up can be anything, from stretching to jogging on a treadmill. Test a bunch of different things out to see which works best for you. I prefer an “active” warm-up that is directly correlated to the movement that you will be performing during the actual workout. If I am squatting and benching, then I will move through similar movement patterns to get a stretch. If done correctly, it will actually get your heart rate up a bit and even get you sweating.

Prehab & Core

As previously stated, getting the right muscles to turn on is imperative if you expect to get the most out of your workout. This is especially true with your pillar and core. If you are curious about what your pillar is, check out this article check out this article. Prehab consists of different exercises that focus on activating the stabilizer muscles in your joints (shoulders and hips). You can knock both prehab and core out at the same time by doing exercises such as planks and glute bridges.

Plank

Glute Bridge

If you are working out correctly, it will require your core to be activated throughout almost the entire workout. By getting your core muscles warmed up and ready early in the workout, you can ensure that they will be ready to go during the more challenging parts of it

Power or Anaerobic Movements

It seems like there is a whole lot of warm-up-type movements to do in the beginning and performing power exercises or anaerobic movements are another stage. This will actually be a cross between a warm-up and the actual “work” part of your workout.

Depending on your goals, you will want to do either power exercises, anaerobic exercises or both. In this case, power exercises are things such as heavy olympic lifts (snatch, power cleans or high pulls) or ballistic medicine ball drills (chest pass or side tosses).

Those exercises will be reserved more for those of you who are looking to add muscle or strength. Those of you looking to lose weight or lean out a bit, would want to do more anaerobic exercises in order to get your heart rate up and your muscles excited.  This will help you burn more calories overall. You can do a few quick intervals, or perform some plyometric exercises (sprinting, bounding or jumping). Medicine ball exercises such as slams or tosses are good for you here as well.

Strength

Now that you have properly gone through the whole warm-up process (which should take no more than 15-20 minutes), you are ready to get into the real “work” part of your workout. This is the part of the workout where I actually see most people begin, bypassing the earlier stages. Since most people do that, they are not allowing the right muscles to be used during the workout. Sure they may be doing a chest exercise and working out their pecs, but as I stated earlier, they may not be getting the right muscle fibers to work during the exercise. On bigger and more complex exercises such as a squat or a lunge, where more muscle groups are required, they may be utilizing the wrong muscle group all together.

In the part of the workout where resistance training is more common, I like to group exercises together for complete super-sets or circuits. A super set is when you combine two exercises and perform them back-to-back with little or no rest. A circuit is the same idea as a super-set, just with 3 or more exercises in a row. I typically never throw more than four exercises in a circuit unless there are special circumstances. You should aim to perform around 3 super-sets or 2 circuits per each workout.

Stretch or Cool Down

When it comes to stretching, you should think of your muscles as a rubber band.  If you tug on a rubber band many times in a row, stretching it to its putter limits, it will start to loosen up. The same goes with your muscles. After the workout they will be warm and ready to be stretched further than if they were still cold. During this time, your stretches will have a more powerful impact on the muscles, which will lead to you becoming more flexible overall. Also, stretching allows more oxygen and blood flow to get into the muscles, which is what is needed to help you begin the recovery process right after a workout.

Another cool down technique I like to use is a foam roller or trigger point tool. Your body will naturally develop scar tissue and your muscle fascia (essentially the glue that connects bones and muscles) will begin to tighten up in ways that are not meant to happen. Using a foam roller on your muscles is like using a rolling pin on dough.  It flattens everything out so that there is no inconsistency in your muscles. By using these tools you will be limiting the amount of knots in your muscles, and in turn, reducing sensitivity and tightness.

Thats It

While there are millions of different dynamics and variables that can go into a workout, following this structure will ensure that you reach optimal results. Sticking with this workout system allows you to plug in certain exercises and change up the amount of sets or reps without having to lose that structure. Once you get a hold of how this workout system operates, you will be able to walk into the gym with no plan and still be able to get a good workout. The flow of the workout progresses the body at a good rate, which allows you to get the most out of each different section. Sometimes the different sections can overlap a bit depending on which exercises you perform, but you should always keep the structure there. If you have some confusion on exactly how to put this into play, check out this link to get a free custom workout. Shadow Fit’s workout system follows these guidelines and has been proven time and time again. Just fill out the questionnaire and you will immediately get a workout to follow.

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