Reprintable Article - Top Ten Effective Exercises
Looking to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of your workout routines? Add these exercises in and watch your results skyrocket.
Top Ten Effective Exercises
by Jackie Burgmann, author of "Hot at Home" - The
Transformation Solution for People Who Hate The Gym
There are lots of exercises in this world.
Some are bad and can cause injury, some are good but maybe not as effective as they could be and some are great, efficient and highly effective.
In fact, the ones that fall into that last category are exercises everyone looking to burn fat and build
some great looking muscle should be doing.
Here is a top ten list of incredibly effective exercises.
1) Squats
Squats are a terrific compound exercise , which means it moves more than one joint in your body at a time and also works more than one muscle group at a time.
Squats are a great overall leg workout, glute workout, and core workout.
Squats jack up your heart rate, too, which works your cardiovascular system.
You can use a barbell, or some dumbbells to weight yourself and make your squats more challenging, but there are also a lot of different variations on basic squats. Try some split squats, sumo squats, or Bulgarian split squats by putting one foot up behind you on a bench in order to work one leg at a time.
The list just goes on and on and is only limited by your imagination.
2) Lunges
Lunges are another great compound move that works your entire leg, plus your glutes and core.
Try combining them with other exercises to make them more challenging and to efficiently work more muscle groups at the same time. Add some dumbbell bicep curls to work your arms simultaneously or add some dumbbell lateral raises to work your shoulders at the same time. These exercises take a little bit more coordination but can be mastered with practice.
3) Squat Presses
Squat presses are essentially a basic squat combined with a shoulder press added to the top of the move. You
can use a barbell, dumbbells or even add extra resistance by standing on a fitness band and holding a handle
in each hand.
These kinds of exercises are known as "full body" compound moves and are a great way to get a full-body workout done quickly, efficiently and effectively. They work several muscle groups at once and get your heart rate up as well.
Muscle building and a fat burning cardio component all in one exercise? Believe it!
4) Clean and Push Presses
This is another super-effective full body compound move that works takes squat presses and jacks it up a notch. And they're fun to do.
If you're curious how to do them, start with the barbell (or a pair of dumbbells) at the ground, snatch it up to your shoulders in one clean move then bend your knees slightly and use momentum to press it up into the air.
Bring it back to your shoulders, lower it to your thighs and finish by getting it back on the ground.
You'll discover you're using the muscles in your entire legs, hips, core, arms, back, chest and shoulders to complete this move. You'll also find your heart rate shoots up quickly.
Now that's an efficient and effective exercise.
5) Squat Cleans (with Shoulder Press)
Squat Cleans are very similar to the previously mentioned exercises, but with a twist.
This exercise can be a little complicated to do properly but it's well worth the practice to accomplish correctly.
And squat cleans get the heart rate up extremely quickly, which helps burn even more fat in the process.
You can use dumbbells for this move but it's a bit more efficient to use a barbell if you have one. Start standing with the barbell at your thighs, then in one fluid motion, squat down as deeply as you can, to get under that bar (the bar should not move in space but remain at the level it started at, the idea is for YOU to get under it, not for it to come up to you), then once it’s at your shoulders and you are in a deep squat, stand up.
To work even more muscle groups and make it more challenging, once standing, press the barbell overhead into a shoulder press.
Then lower it to your shoulders and then back to the starting point at your thighs.
Once you have the hang of the series of moves and are proficient at doing them correctly you'll find that they're a lot of fun to do.
6) Push-ups
Nothing beats push-ups to work your chest muscles and your entire body in the process
Make sure your form is 100% correct when you're performing push-ups. Check yourself to ensure your body is 2x4 straight from your toes to the top of your head and your butt isn't riding up into the air nor sagging towards the floor. You'll also want to make sure your forehead isn't dipping towards the floor and your spine is straight, even in your neck. Keep your elbows tucked in beside your body, and your core is fully engaged throughout your exercise.
If you're advanced and your own bodyweight isn't heavy enough to make this an effective exercise, try some more challenging variations like offset push-ups and spiderman push-ups.
7) Interval Training
Interval training is a fast, efficient and effective way to get a fat-burning cardio session done in half the time of traditional cardio.
You can do interval training with any kind of traditional cardio exercise: running, biking, rowing,
swimming, roller-blading or whatever you can think of. Use your imagination.
If you want to fill some time alternately wishing to die from the sheer exhaustion and feeling like ”yah
I could go again” then this is the exercise for you.
Intervals get the heart rate up (and down, and up... and down... and... well you get the idea) and gives your metabolism a huge boost.
8) Hillsprints
Hillsprints are actually another kind of interval training, but they are performed on a hill.
Hillsprints are extremely simple to do. Not easy, but simple.
Simply find a hill, sprint up it. Walk down it, sprint up... walk down, sprint up, etc. Continue for approximately 20 minutes or more.
Yes, hillsprints can be repetitive, sure. But it's short, it's effective, it's efficient, and it doesn't take any special thinking or timing out fast intervals and slow intervals. This is actually a benefit since hillsprints are so exhausting that additional thinking is sometimes not even possible!
9) Endurance Running
Interval training shouldn't be done with every cardio workout, because like any other exercise, your body can adjust to it, and it ceases to be as effective as it could be. The best way to guard against this eventuality is to mix it up when it comes to doing cardio.
Intervals one day, steady state another, running one day, cycling the next. You get the idea.
And running is a great way to get a full body cardio workout . Just turn off your brain and let your body hit a rhythm. Many runners find that once they warm up and hit that rhythm with their bodies, that they actually go into a 'zen' state in their mind when they run, so it can actually become a very relaxing way to workout (I know this sounds strange but it's true).
10) Swimming
Swimming is a fantastic full body cardio workout. And great for anyone that can’t manage
running because of joint or bone issues or past injuries.
Many swimmers prefer to swim in the ocean or a lake, because there’s no limitations to the
distance they can go without having to stop because the end of the pool is reached (but a it's a good idea
to swim parallel to the shoreline if you choose to do this, so you don't get too far away from safety if you
suddenly get a cramp or hit exhaustion.
Oceans and lakes are also the better preference if you're adverse to swimming in so much chlorine for extended periods of time.
You can even do intervals while swimming, too. This may be even easier in a pool since the edges of the pool can be used as the indication that the fast or slow interval is over and it's time to change speeds. If you're attempting intervals in a natural environment, then use trees along the shoreline or buoys positioned in the water as your markers to change speeds.
Add any or all of these to your current routines and enjoy the added intensity for a bigger burn or pump and watch your results happen even faster.
More efficient and effective exercises are what get you better results faster. "Hot at Home" contains over 40 weeks of workouts full of exercises just like these. Grab your copy now: Hot at Home
top ten exercises, effective exercises, compound exercises
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