Circuits Plus

A lot of OT at work, not a lot of time to write, lately.

I’ve been doing a combination of 2 types of workouts that when mixed create a tremendous amount of variety over a period of time.

The first part is I pick come core exercises, by core I do not mean ab/lower back core, I mean like squat/ bench/ deadlift/etc, to do on 3 days of the week [ Mon. – Wed.- Fri.]
My example will now be as follows:
Monday - Squat and Rows
Wed – Bench and Sandbag shoulders
Fri. – KB Clean and Press and Atlas Stone lifts

Depending on your goals you can work these in a variety of ways, let’s go with strength for now, sets will look like this.
Week 1 – 5x5
Week 2 – 4x4
Week 3 – 3x3
Week 4 – Test
There are few ways you can test – you can go for your 1 rep max, which maybe hard in some execises like atlas stone lifts. What you can also do is test your reps at a given weight, for example if on squats you were able to do 5 reps at 405lbs, test what you can do now for 1 set.

Now depending on your conditioning or how you feel week 5 can be a back off week or start week 1 again, using heavier weights of course.

Now I know you are thinking, “that’s it?” no it is not. At the same time you will also do circuit training after the 1st part. You will create 2 circuits of 4-6 exercises, an exaple would be:
Circuit 1
Thighs
Upperbody push [chest shoulders]
Biceps
Calves
Abs
Grip

Circuit 2
Hamstrings
Upperbody pull
Tris
Calves
Obliques
Grip
You can see how with 2 circuits being done with the 3 part 1 workouts it creates some variety.
You want to do 2-4 rounds of the circuits without overtraining. It is easy for me to say week 1, 2 rounds, week 2 3 rounds, etc, but life happens. I know for my self I may want to do 4 rounds one day and work takes its toll and I get 3 in. The bottom line is after your workout you only have yourself to answer do, “was it your best effort?”.
I also like doing my circuits interval style using “Workout Muse” for this. “Workout Muse” is premade MP3s in various time intervals. Give them a look >>>>Click Here <<<<<