Daily workout routines at home

Henroid

So this is a thread I've been thinking about making for a while but for some reason I kept hesitating on it, even though there's no good reason whatsoever.

The premise (initially) is simple: I'm not an out of shape guy, but I'm not as fit as I feel like I should be. So, I basically wanted to pick up any sort of advice about things to do (pushups, pullups, jogging, etc). I know that doing the absolute peak of my performance in any of those day to day isn't the smart thing since muscle recovery time is important, but I wanted to know what other sorts of things people do to get in or stay in shape.

And depending on the way this thread turns out, maybe I can tink it out for a more permanent post of advice people have to give.

Oh also, I forget how the run / walk routine works; is it 5 minutes walk, 5 minutes jog, or is it 15 minutes of each alternating?

JJ

Well, ideally you should be running up to 30 minutes straight walking as little as possible. I don't do cardio for more than 30 minutes because by then your body will also start catabolizing muscle. Do you plan on using any free weights or just body exercises?

Right now I'm trying to jog 3 days a week with the first 2 days doing intervals of a light jog and a goal pace I'm trying to reach for and then the last day is going a steady speed working towards my goal pace. I'm one out of shape motherfucker so my goal right now is 30 minutes of 8 minute miles. Right now I'm doing 30 minutes at a little under 9 minutes a mile.

Henroid

I'm just gonna do body exercises. The point of this is to more or less figure out and plan stuff to do without any additional equipment. Well, pullups aside, since the closet coat hangers here are super fragile.

The_Glad_Hatter

I recently picked up jogging again. In the past i did an alternating schedule based on a podcast (mixing up walking and running). Now i just took a 3km lap in my neighbourhood and have been trying to improve my time ever time i run, which is much more fulfilling for me.

As for working out at home: Pushups alone are an awesome way to start (i gave up on the http://hundredpushups.com/ program, but maybe it works for you).

If you have a little money to spend you can read up on home workouts over at http://www.scoobysworkshop.com/. The guy is a bit.. quirky.. but from what i gather his advice is pretty good and i like that he stresses good form and safety so much.
All you really need is 2 adjustable dumbells.

Syrdon

I can't recommend a good set of dumbbells enough. It should be cheap. Same for a pull up bar (sounds like you're on that already though). Regardless, when I was doing working out regularly I was doing a mix of push ups, sit ups (well, or crunches. depended on what seemed like a good idea that day) and squats. If I was still doing them I might swap the squats for lunges, but only because squats can be hard on your knees (they mostly just require you to not screw up on form too badly).

If I was to start fresh today (which, really, is about where I'm sitting at the moment), I might go with the site that The Glad Hatter linked. He seems to at least be consistently reasonable and not suggesting anything too crazy.

Qliphoth

http://www.c25k.com/

The couch to 5k is really good at getting beginners into jogging at a pace that they can both progress on and not get burnt out by.

In terms of body weight exercises there are a dozen different types of push ups you can do. If I didn't have free weights I'd try to do, chin ups, pull ups, crunches, planks, push ups, dips etc

BoomShake

I'm really digging JP Muller's "My System", and have actually brought it up in a few other threads. Despite being written in 1904, it's a good every-day routine that takes only 15-20min once you're familiar with the routine as each exercise is meant to flow together without pause. You can probably start on on of the later week routines if you're got any fitness. I find it puts a lot of emphasis on core/trunk strength and flexibility infused with deep breathing, and can get the heart rate up if you do it at a decent pace. Combine it with your normal weightlifting routine for the other areas (arms in particular) and you'll be good to go.

Death Cab For Albie

I've had a lot of friends who have used p90x and had pretty amazing results. It's not easy, but if you can stick with it, you'll get in the best shape of your life.

Wolfprint

Simple Fit. It takes at most 20 minutes a workout, but it has endurance training, progression, and is a full body workout. You only need a pull-up bar and a floor.

A dude went from this:


to this:


He's still going strong, and he tracks his progress on the Simple Fit website.

Super inspirational. I've been doing four weeks worth and it's an amazing workout for such a short period of time.

Drakeon

Wolfprint wrote: »

Simple Fit. It takes at most 20 minutes a workout, but it has endurance training, progression, and is a full body workout. You only need a pull-up bar and a floor.

A dude went from this:


to this:


He's still going strong, and he tracks his progress on the Simple Fit website.

Super inspirational. I've been doing four weeks worth and it's an amazing workout for such a short period of time.

How do you do the squats it has listed with no bar for your back?

Wolfprint

They're bodyweight squats, so you only need to keep your back straight. I do Prisoner's Squats (hands behind head), and try to make sure my posture is correct.

Drakeon

Wolfprint wrote: »

They're bodyweight squats, so you only need to keep your back straight. I do Prisoner's Squats (hands behind head), and try to make sure my posture is correct.

Oh ok.

Henroid

Wolfprint wrote:

Simple Fit. It takes at most 20 minutes a workout, but it has endurance training, progression, and is a full body workout. You only need a pull-up bar and a floor.

A dude went from this:


to this:


He's still going strong, and he tracks his progress on the Simple Fit website.

Super inspirational. I've been doing four weeks worth and it's an amazing workout for such a short period of time.

Spoiler tagging to save some space. Anyhow, I'm getting started on this plan. It looks fairly simple, and I like the explanations behind the terms and definition behind what's expected in each exercise. So like, see you in a couple months to report on how it turns out I guess!

Kendeathwalker

I find 30 minutes of machine cardio or running boring. I mix it up with this.
http://www.intervaltraining.net/tabata.html

Its just interval training. 20 seconds on, 10 seconds off for four minutes.

I have access to a heavy bag so I do boxing drills/kicking

Platform jumping.

Weighted rope pulls

for pure nothing on hand at home.

Find a curb and do step ups or top taps(where you quickly tap your foot on the top of the curb and then do the other)

Calf raises
Squats
Sprint
Push ups
Sit ups
Up Downs
Bear Crawls
Mountain climbers
etc. etc.

Its just exert yourself hard for twenty seconds and then rest.

just to clarify, each drill is a four minute session of intervals. Do as many sessions as you can handle.

Here is a timer-- im sure you can find an mp3 download somewhere of it.
http://www.beach-fitness.com/tabata/


If you are brand new, only do this once a week.

Lately Ive been doing two or three drills, then doing the renaming thirty minutes on a cardio machine.

hope some of that gave you an idea.

As for results--- I was already in pretty decent shape and ate healthy but I noticed more definition.

piL

I was doing the HIIT workouts on http://www.bodyrock.tv for a while. They were nice because I didn't have to plan and they usually worked out to 20 min or so bodyweight and cardio workouts. Some are a little short, so if you wanted a little more endurance, I might recommend doing them twice in a day (either double up or do last week's).

Dorkman

If your in to purchasing a book, then Never Gymless, http://www.rosstraining.com/nevergymless.html, is fantastic!

He is a boxing trainer, so is a huge advocate of training for Maximum Strength, Explosive Strength and Endurance Strength. Most of his routines are only 20 minutes and pretty much all of his stuff revolves around HIIT.

He also uses a wide range of programs like Tabatas, Isometrics and what have you.

krapst78

I'm also a big fan of Ross's books. Haven't personally checked out his Never Gymless, but I have his other books, and they are all excellent. I trained in boxing for a year and those books were great in building strength and endurance. One awesome bodyweight exercise to learn is the burpee. You can read more about that exercise at http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/rossboxing2.htm and http://artofmanliness.com/2010/01/27/the-burpee-the-one-exercise-to-rule-them-all/. I've had the opportunity to train with a Pan-Asian freestyle wrestling champion and even he teaches this exercise for conditioning and strength.

Romero Zombie

Burpees are brutal and a great workout. First couple I did felt like a joke and not a workout at all. But once I hit that ten or fifteen point, my body started screaming. Just make sure you aren't doing them underneath any low hanging ceiling fans....I've got the marks to show you why.

P90X as mentioned above is a great home workout program if you stick with it. When I first started that I could barely get through half of most of the workouts because my body couldn't handle it - but if you do as much as you can throughout the program you will see results.

As far as cardio goes, I hate running, really hate running. I have a mountain bike and love riding up and down some mountains though, I think riding has gotten me in better shape than anything else

Henroid

Romero Zombie wrote:

As far as cardio goes, I hate running, really hate running. I have a mountain bike and love riding up and down some mountains though, I think riding has gotten me in better shape than anything else

Running seems like the best way to accomplish it though, makes the most sense and seems the most natural. I'm not doing it at the moment because of the drought / heatwave though; I'm not about to get started on a walk / run routine when I'm likely to just heat-stroke myself to a hospital bed.

Raneados

you're not going to kill yourself with walking, even if it's like 90 degrees and humid

even with running, chances are slim that you'll get heat complications
and if you're in doubt: drink some water and stand under a tree for 5 minutes

Down here in florida it regularly gets up to high 90s and is ALWAYS humid, sun's out, everything is baking, and yet people aren't dropping from heatstroke everywhere you look

Unless you're running for 6 hours without any water, you'll be fine

Henroid

Raneados wrote:

you're not going to kill yourself with walking, even if it's like 90 degrees and humid

even with running, chances are slim that you'll get heat complications
and if you're in doubt: drink some water and stand under a tree for 5 minutes

Down here in florida it regularly gets up to high 90s and is ALWAYS humid, sun's out, everything is baking, and yet people aren't dropping from heatstroke everywhere you look

Unless you're running for 6 hours without any water, you'll be fine

You're just trying to kill me! But no I'm highly paranoid about things is all. The last couple days, we've had a lot of cloud cover in the morning, first time in like two months, so the temperature should finally dip.

webofink

Death Cab For Albie wrote:

I've had a lot of friends who have used p90x and had pretty amazing results. It's not easy, but if you can stick with it, you'll get in the best shape of your life.

I'll second this. The exercises are all simple to do at home, although you may want to grab some gear:
dumbells
pullup bar or a resistance cord
optional pushup bar

All the exercises can be modified to be as simple or as difficult as you want. The trick is to just do it every day.

I'm on round 2 at the moment. I've never really exercised much in my life, but hit a bit of a turning point and decided that if I don't do something now I'm going to be in bad shape in the near future. Round 1 (3 months) I lost 10kg and increased my general fitness level dramatically.

Fairchild

If you're starting from zero then ANY exercise is good. Lots of tips already posted here, so I don't have much more to add than to suggest that you try several different workout combinations and choose the one that you like the most. The most important thing about regular workouts is that you do them regularly. If your workout includes exercises which you hate hate hate so much that you never do them then you should change them up.

If the heat is bothering you, then you're most likely not drinking enough fluids. I can't emphasize this enough. Drink drink drink, that's how your body cools itself down. Make sure that you are drinking good stuff rather than soda or alcohol. Even coffee, which has many physical benefits, is dehydrating. Just plain water is all that you really need. I drink Gatorade G2 when my workout is finished but stick with water and fruit juice otherwise.

Bagginses

Starting roughly one half hour after dinner, I like to do four sets of crunches and four sets of pushups on twenty minute intervening intervals, like so:
30 mins after supper: one set crunches
40: one set pushups
50:crunches
1hr:pushups
et cetera

Fairchild

That's a pretty long wait between sets, long enough for your muscles to cool down which you really don't want to happen.