The Body Weight Training seminar was a blast.We covered some of the latest techniques in body weight training and finished on a high note – a 20 minute personalized exercise program you can do anywhere, anytime.

If you missed the seminar, you missed a good one.

The good news, I’m going to share some of the key lessons we covered with you here.

Let’s get to it!

The 5 Lessons learned from the Body Weight Training Seminar

1. Keep it simple: Find exercises that aren’t complex. Ones you can repeat and perform even when you are tired. This is critical because when you get tired it’s difficult to focus on technique. Your movements can get a little sloppy and that increases your chance of injury. Something you want to avoid at all cost. Try basic exercises like push ups, squats, lunges and planks.

2. Keep the session short: 20 -25 minutes is the ideal time frame for a short and intense work out. Any longer and you risk injury.  Your exercise intensity and your focus will start to lower. Worst case scenario, you end up just going through the motions and watching the clock eagerly waiting for the end of the session.

So keep it short and sweet.

You’ll have better technique and your program can fit into your schedule easier making it more likely that you’ll be consistent with program.

3. Mobility warm up: It’s not recommended to jump into any exercise program with out a proper warm up. I wish there was a way around but there isn’t. In the seminar we used a bit of a short cut that I think you can use too.

Using mobility exercises is a simple alternative to the standard warm up. It’s all about continuous circular movements at all the major joints. Start with your neck, then move to shoulders, elbows and wrists. Circle your hips (like a hula hoop) and do a few leg circles along with knee (bend the knees) and ankle circles. You basically want to flow from one joint to the next with out pausing in between. This can all be done in about 3 minutes.

4. Make it full body: The exercises that you choose must be full body because it will provide you more “bang for your buck”. That means when you’re using both your upper and lower body muscles at the same time you’re going to burn more calories per minute than if you just did an isolated exercise (exercises just for your legs or arms). This can make a sizable difference in the results that you experience.

5. Short burst of training: One of the best formats for burning fat is doing 20 second bursts of exercise with 10 seconds of rest between sets. Try working up to 8 sets of one exercise in a row. That’s a complete 4 minutes of work using only one exercise.

It’s important to use a timer of some kind here so you can solely focus on the exercise and not on how many reps or how much time is left. Have the timer set up for 20 seconds of work and 10 seconds of rest for 8 intervals total. Make sure you turn up the volume so you can hear the beeps.

Here’s a quick example of a program:

Each exercise is performed up to 8 sets of 20 seconds work and 10 seconds of rest before moving on to the next.

1. Upward facing Plank

2. Stationary Lunges

3. Standard Planks

4. Body Weight Squats

5. Mountain Climbers

This is just a starter template that you can use when designing your own body weight program. You’ll have to modify each of the exercises based on your own fitness level however.

You now have the information to design your own body weight training program. Now you have to go out there and apply it. Remember you just need 20 minutes and you can do this program anytime, anywhere.

Keep the 5 key points in mind and work out consistently!

I know you can do it!

Stay Healthy, Stay Strong,

Ed Scaduto

Colorado Springs Precision Fitness

P.S. If you have any comments or questions please leave it below in the comments section. I would love to hear from you.