We’ve told you before how important it is to fit cardio into your weekly fitness regimen, you can read more about that here if you need a refresher! Yet cardio does not have to be limited to your usually treadmill or elliptical workouts, although those have many benefits as well.
As we have mentioned before, it is important to switch up your routine, which you can read more about here, not only to prevent boredom but to make sure your body is not adapting to the same workout over and over.
So for those of you looking to mix it up a couple days of the week, complex workouts are going to be just the thing for you. Complex workouts can replace your traditional cardio workouts, and add a little strength training benefits as well.
According to an article What Are Complex Workouts, which you can read more about here, “Complex training is done using strength training exercises, yet you are still primarily focusing on cardio”. With complex workouts you are performing whole body exercises that flow together with no rest between exercises.
The constant flow of moves keeps your heart rate up to burn a significant amount of calories, while the strength training moves also help to create that afterburn effect. Another benefit of complex workouts, besides high calorie burn with increased strength and muscular endurance, is that they can completed anywhere from ten to fifteen minutes time.
Now that we’ve raved all about them…now it’s time for you to give them a try, and although it looks like a short workout, which it is, you’ll definitely feel the burn. You can range in the number of exercises you do, your weights used, as well as your reps done.
Keep in mind you are going to use the same weight throughout the entire workout, so be sure to select a weight that you can handle using with no rest and multiple moves. MuscleandFitness.com suggests in this article to use a heavier weight and doing lower reps if strength is your goal, while doing light weights and higher reps if endurance and calorie expenditure is your goal.
Here is an amazing 4-Exercise Barbell Complex Workout we’ve found from BuiltLean.com, they also have a video example along with explanations of each move here. Workout and photos courtesy of BuiltLean.com
Start out by choosing your weight, BuiltLean.com suggests making sure you can press the weight overhead at least 10 times. You are going to complete 6 reps of each workout with no rests between sets; the weights “should not touch the ground from the time you pick it up until after your last exercise”.
Exercise #1 ~ Hang Clean
Exercise #2 ~ Overhead Press
Exercise #3 ~ Bent Over Row
Exercise #4 ~ Stiff Legged Deadlift
Complete each of these exercises for 6 reps, then take a minute break and repeat 5 times. Your heart should be pounding and muscles aching by the end of this complex. Be sure to stretch and do a cooldown when finished!
Try it out, let us know what you think!
Have you ever tried complex workouts?! What are some of your favorite moves?
