Workout Schedule for Beginners at Home
A beginner’s workout schedule from home doesn’t have to look anything like a gym workout schedule. This is especially true if you are working from home. There are a few concepts you can incorporate into your workout program that will help you make gains quickly without spending hours on end of training.
Grease the Groove
I’ve argued with people online about “the true meaning of grease the groove.” I include a mental side into greasing the groove that teaches your brain to always complete your prescribed number of reps so you don’t train your brain to fail. This is the piece that people argue with me about.
Concept in reality – You have a pull up bar near your bathroom. Every time you get up to use the bathroom you do 1-5 pull ups (the prescribed number of reps will vary based on your current max.) If you can do 5 pull ups the 1-5 range would work, and you should vary the number to not let your body get used to a specific number (for example, you can do 4 reps without issue then the brain freaks out on rep 5.)
If you have weights in your house you could do the same thing with presses, deadlifts, squats, etc, etc. Get up to grab water, do X amount of reps then move along. The trick is picking an activity you do throughout the day often (but not too often so your body has some time to recover) so you can get some reps in.
Breaking up the routine into pieces
You can also break up 3 to 5 sets throughout the day. Let’s say you have 3 meetings during the day. Pushups, pull ups, plank, squat, hinge, and lunge before and after the meetings to get to 3 to 5 sets.
The exercises you’d do would obviously vary depending on the gear you have at hand, so push ups could be replaced with dumbbell chest press for example.
Morning, Lunch, or Evening Routine
This would be a more traditional routine. You do everything back to back. Or even go with a “75 Hard” style routine where you do one thing in the morning then another at lunch or in the evening (two workouts in the day.) Your routine would still consist of a cardio component (walking, running, Cardio Muay Thai, rowing, etc) and a strength component.
MacGuyver-ing Strength and Cardio Equipment
What you’ll need –
- A pillow case (or two)
- Clothes
- A sturdy bar across a doorway (pull up bars #ad are literally $20-30)
- A belt
- A bag or suitcase
- Books
Punching Bag
Fill a pillow case with clothes. Tie a pillow case around the other pillow case then tie that thing to your sturdy bar. Now punch it pretending its the face of the enemies of the NFFW. You can also hook, uppercut, and elbow the pillow case. If the doorway and pillow case were larger you could teep and knee it as well (kicking would probably be awkward, depending on the year of your house and how wide the doorway opening is.)
Suspension Trainer
Go read how the TRX was invented. The TRX started as a training tool for Navy Seals. He took his Jiu Jitsu belt and wrapped it around things to train in the field. If you’ve got a belt you can loop it over the bar in your doorway and do lots of things (suspension lunges and 1 arm / 1 leg mode would be tricky, but you can still do biceps, triceps, back, assisted squats / lunges and probably some other things I can think of at the moment)
Lat Pulley System
Loop said belt through a suitcase or gym bag and fill it with books (or sand in a trash bag if you have sand, or rocks.) You’ve built a cheap pulley now and can do pretty much anything you can imagine on a pulley machine.
Suitcase Carries
As the name implies, carry the suitcase or gym bag filled with stuff. This will help your obliques and grip. It’s also good for cardio as you walk up and down the driveway. Depending on the bag and handles on said bag you can do this from along your side (low), in a racked position (chest level), or overhead.
Front rack squats
Hold the bag in front of you and squat
Presses
This one might have a funny angle depending on the bag but in theory you can chest press or overhead press the bag. You can probably even toss it in the air and catch it (I’d do that with sand over books though.)
