gym workouts:
Going to the gym and working out regularly is one of the best things you can do for your health and wellbeing. Building the habit of exercise takes determination and commitment, but the payoff is huge. There are many benefits of consistent strength training and cardio workouts.
Benefits of Working Out at the Gym
Working out at the gym on a regular basis provides many physical and mental benefits including:
- Building muscle and increasing strength
- Burning calories and boosting metabolism
- Losing weight and improving body composition
- Reducing risk of disease like heart disease, diabetes, and cancer
- Improving cardiovascular health and endurance
- Increasing energy levels and fighting fatigue
- Reducing stress and boosting mental health
- Improving confidence and self-esteem
- Living a longer, healthier life
The variety of equipment and resources at a gym allow you to reap these benefits efficiently. Let's take a closer look at how you can make the most of your gym workouts.
Creating a Gym Routine
One of the hardest parts of working out is just getting to the gym consistently. Here are some tips to help form the habit:
- Schedule specific days and times each week you will work out and treat them like important appointments. Working out first thing in the morning can lead to fewer excuses.
- Start slowly - don't overwhelm yourself trying to get to the gym 5-6 days a week right away if you've never been consistent before. Aim for 2-3 days a week at first.
- Recruit a workout buddy to hold each other accountable and make it more social. Working out together pushes both of you.
- Track your workouts in a fitness app, calendar or journal. Recording each gym session can help build the routine.
- Prepare your gym bag the night before so you never skip because you forgot something. Being prepared removes obstacles.
- Notice how much better you feel after a good workout. Let the mood boost and energy motivate you to keep coming back.
Once you've built the habit of regular gym sessions, it's time to structure your workouts. A good fitness routine incorporates multiple components:
Resistance Training
Resistance or strength training should form the foundation of any workout routine. Using weights, bands, machines or your own bodyweight, resistance training builds lean muscle. The more muscle you have, the more calories you burn at rest. Resistance training also keeps your metabolism boosted long after your workout by triggering protein synthesis.
Aim to do resistance training 2-4 days per week, allowing at least a day of rest in between sessions targeting the same muscle groups. Compound exercises like squats, deadlifts, rows and bench presses build overall strength while isolation moves like bicep curls target specific muscles. Performing 3-5 sets of 8-12 reps with moderate weight challenges your muscles effectively. Make sure to progress by increasing weight lifted over time.
Cardiovascular Exercise
While strength training shapes and tones the body, cardiovascular exercise is still important for overall health. Cardio improves heart and lung function, endurance, circulation and mental wellbeing. It's a key component of burning fat and creating a calorie deficit.
Low or moderate intensity cardio like walking, jogging, cycling, swimming and elliptical can be done most days of the week. Interval training and HIIT sessions with shorter bursts of maximum effort burn more calories by pushing to higher heart rates. Work up a sweat and keep your heart rate elevated for 20-45 minutes.
It's ideal to combine strength training and cardio by doing short bursts of cardio between your lifting sets or doing one dedicated cardio and one weights session each week. This allows you to burn fat while maintaining and building lean muscle.
Core and Flexibility Training
Your core includes the abs, lower back, hips and glutes. Strong core muscles improve stability, posture, and balance while protecting against injury. Core training like planks, crunches, and compound lifts is vital. Stretching and flexibility work enhances mobility and muscle recovery. Take 5-10 minutes at the end of each workout to focus on these areas.
Putting Together a Complete Routine
Your gym workout will be most effective if you incorporate full-body strength training 2-3 days a week along with 2-3 days of cardio. Abs and flexibility work should happen each session.
Here are two sample weekly gym routines:
Workout A (3 days/week strength training)
Monday
- Full body weights circuit: squats, bench press, rows, shoulder press, lunges
- 30 minutes cardio: treadmill, bike, elliptical
- Core work
- Stretching
Wednesday
- Full body weights circuit: deadlifts, overhead press, pull-ups, goblet squats, step-ups
- 30 minutes cardio
- Core work
- Stretching
Friday
- Full body weights circuit: front squats, incline bench press, lat pulldowns, step-ups, glute bridges
- 30 minutes cardio
- Core work
- Stretching
Workout B (4 days/week upper/lower split)
Monday
- Lower body: squats, deadlifts, lunges
- 10 minutes HIIT cardio
- Core work
Tuesday
- Upper body: bench press, rows, shoulder press, curls, tricep extensions
- 10 minutes HIIT cardio
- Core work
Thursday
- Lower body: front squats, hip thrusts, leg press
- Stairmaster cardio 20-30 minutes
- Core work
Saturday
- Upper body: incline bench press, lat pulldowns, flyes, overhead press
- 20-30 minutes cardio
- Core work
This gives you a template for full body stimulation with different rep schemes and load to spark growth. Listen to your body and take rest days whenever needed.
How to Structure Your Gym Sessions
To get the most out of each gym trip, follow this framework:
Warm Up
Spend 5-10 minutes warming up with light cardio or dynamic moves that raise your body temperature and prepare muscles for exercise. Jumping jacks, high knees, bodyweight squats or cycling work well.
Strength/Resistance Training
Start each workout focusing on compound movements while you have the most energy and lowest fatigue. Squats, deadlifts, presses, rows, pull-ups. Use challenging weight for 3-5 sets of 6-15 reps with 1-2 minutes rest between sets.
Isolation Exercises
Next focus on smaller muscle groups like arms, shoulders and calves for 2-3 sets of 10-15 reps. Good moves include bicep curls, tricep extensions, lateral raises and calf raises. Reduce rest time here to 30-60 seconds between sets.
Cardio
Spend 20-45 minutes on the cardio machine of choice. Treadmill, elliptical, rowing machine and bike are great options. Vary high intensity intervals with steady moderate pace. Stay in your target heart rate zone for maximum calorie burn.
Core Work
Train your abs 2-3 days a week allowing a day of rest in between. Crunches, planks, knee raises, leg lifts, Russian twists. Shoot for 2-3 sets of 10-15 reps of several moves targeting the entire core.
Stretching/Flexibility
Finish each workout by stretching all major muscle groups. Hold static stretches 30-60 seconds. This improves flexibility, mobility and supports muscle recovery.
Tips for Proper Form and Technique
Using proper technique during your gym sessions prevents injury and leads to better results. Remember these form pointers:
- Maintain a straight, neutral spine during moves like squats, deadlifts and presses. Don't round or overarch lower back.
- Keep chest up and shoulders back, avoiding a hunched posture.
- Initiate exercises by driving through the heels, keeping knees aligned over ankles.
- Slowly lower weights under control for 2-3 seconds to maximize time under tension. Lift explosively.
- Squeeze targeted muscles at the top of each rep and flex fully.
- Keep neck and head in line with spine instead of looking up or down.
- Use a full range of motion, lowering until a light stretch is felt before reversing motion.
- Keep wrists straight and elbows close to body to avoid strain.
Having a trainer observe you and provide feedback can help perfect form on challenging moves like squats and deadlifts. Poor form jeopardizes results and leads to injury over time.
Programming for Progress
To continually build strength and muscle, you need progressive overload in your program. This means slowly increasing demands over time. There are a few ways to systematically progress:
- Add more weight each week to lifts like squats, presses and rows
- Slowly increase reps per set before adding weight
- Reduce rest time between sets to increase workout density
- Add additional sets for each exercise over time
A good approach is trying to increase total workout volume by 5-10% each week by manipulating these variables. Tracking workouts in a journal makes it easy to monitor improvements. When you plateau on an exercise for multiple weeks, change up variables like grip, stance, speed or angle. Our bodies quickly adapt to the same stimulus so changing it up promotes continued gains.
Listen to your body and be sure to take a light recovery or rest week every 4-