Sample 20 Minute Workouts20 minute workouts can be incredibly effective when time is of the essence! Within 20 minutes you can increase muscular strength, improve cardiovascular endurance, build muscle, and turn your body into a fat loss inferno!
If you are considering trying one of the following 20 minute workouts,PLEASE ensure that you have checked with your Doctor or GP first. The same applies if you have any form of medical condition. It’s always better to be safe than sorry! Assuming a clean bill of health, the routine should always start with a warm up. The Warm Up itself should be done for 5 minutes, starting gently and picking up the pace and range of movement towards the 3rd minute. It serves the purpose of increasing lubrication of the joints, warming up the muscles and preparing the mind for the task ahead. I like to use dynamic exercises focusing on increasing the mobility of the shoulder, hip, knee and elbow joints, such as arm circles, body twists, hip striding, push ups, hip and knee circles and so on. The warm up should be a continuous flow of movements, completing 15 - 20 reps of each movement until 5 minutes is complete and the body is fully warmed up.
Once the body is warm, prepare to enjoy one of the best 20 minute workouts ever! The choice of exercise is PARAMOUNT. Exercises should be chosen that work as many muscle groups as possible, ensuring that the workout is kept as efficient as possible, given the time constraints. One way of tackling the 20 minute workout is to choose two exercises, and work them back to back for designated time periods. For example, I like to combine one arm Kettlebell Clean and Press, with Two Handed Kettlebell Swings. The two exercises combined provide a challenging whole body workout, working most of the major muscle groups within the body. A typical kettlebell workout program may look something like this:- Two handed kettlebell Swing: - 30 seconds work, 30 seconds rest.Repeat until 5 minutes total time is complete One arm kettlebell clean and press: - 1 minute per armSwap arms each minute until 6 minutes have elapsed. 90 second rest Two handed kettlebell swing: - As above for 5 minutes. One arm kettlebell clean and press: - As above for 4 minutes. Cool down for 5 minutes with light walking on the spot, stretching and mobility exercises. Another example can be seen by using one exercise. The kettlebell one arm snatch is a huge exercise for working the body as a complete functional unit. It arguably works more muscle, than any other single exercise and as such, can lead to some serious improvements in cardiovascular fitness, muscular strength and muscular endurance, while assisting to burn body fat. After completing the warm up as listed above the main body of the workout set will start. When using snatches, I like to use strength and conditioning coach, Ethan Reeve's Density Training approach. The aim for the 20 minutes would be to complete, for example, 40 snatches per arm within the workout. At the start of each minute:- Complete 2 snatches per arm (so 4 in total) Repeat this on the minute until 20 minutes have been completed. Over the weeks, the aim of the session would be to achieve 80 reps in as few a minutes as possible, gradually increasing reps per minute as you adapt to the workout and find the rest period to work ratio fairly easy to complete. Once 20 minutes of kettlebell snatches have been completed cool down, stretch off and relax!
One other example is to use a combination of kettlebells, medicine balls and body weight drills.
For example:-
Hindu push ups 1 Minute Medicine ball slams 1 minute Kettlebell clean and press 1 Minute This would be 1 Complex Set, totalling 5 minutes. Repeat a further 3 times to total 20 minutes of fat burning, muscle toning, heart pumping exercise! Cool down (as above) and Relax! So there you have it, three simple examples of incredibly effective 20 minute workout programs, for those people who simply don’t have enough hours in the day, or anyone else who fancies something a little different. The only limitation to what you can do with a 20 minute workout is your imagination! Happy Training!
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