The Rules of Effective 30 Minute Workouts

I was recently asked to write a post on 30 minute workouts. There are many out there. Take a look at the most popular fitness magazines and you will find articles such as "the 20 minute office workout" or "the 15 minute park bench circuit." Although these workouts are often based on full body and well balanced exercises they miss out physiological principles that are important to follow during a short workout. There is no time to burn a substantial amount of fat during a 30 minute workout and therefore we must focus on the calorie deficit we can produce through raising our metabolism. As we are low on time we must also keep working. There is very little time to stop.

Metabolism booster #1: Utilise Resistance Exercise Properly

Use compound exercises. Compound exercises will produce more calorie burn. The more muscle fibres we recruit in an exercise the more calories we burn.

Centre your resistance routine around ground based leg exercises. Ground based leg exercises will increase the heart rate and pressurise the axial skeleton. The axial skeleton is basically the spine and cranium and placing pressure on your spine raises your core body temperature. Squats, lunges and dead lifts are ideal.

Use dynamic tension. Flex your muscles throughout the full range of each and every exercise that you do. This will recruit more muscle fibres for a raised metabolism and development of muscle tone.

Use tri-sets. Place three exercises back to back. This saves time and improves circulation.

Here's an example of a body weight circuit.

10 Bulgarian split squats on the right leg
10 Bulgarian split squats on the left leg
10 press-ups

Repeat 2x

Metabolism booster #2: Use High Intensity Interval Training (HIIt) to your Advantage

A good HIIT workout will improve your cardiovascular health in under 5 minutes but will also fire up your core body temperature. You need short work periods but even shorter rest periods. My favourite is a Tabata. This simply involves 20 seconds of hard work and 10 seconds of rest for 4 minutes. Attempt this brutal body blast with mountain climbers as your exercise of choice. I find this to be a wicked heart raiser.

Follow these rules and you will carry on burning calories for hours after you've completed your workout.

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