Whether you are a person that loves the gym or a person that hates the gym, we all have something in common: none of us should want to be in the gym forever.  The reality is that we have lives.  Even professional bodybuilders have lives outside of the gym, although I have heard stories of bodybuilders missing important events to get a workout in.  Then again, that’s their prerogative.

While we don’t want to spend all day in the gym, we still want to get an effective workout in that will bring us closer to our goals.  Here are three ways to make sure that your workout is not only effective, but that you only spend time in the gym that you NEED to spend there.

 

  1. Set a timer for your workout

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If you are one of the people that claims to never have time to workout, one way to solve that problem is to block out workout time in your schedule.  A step further is to set a timer for your workout that is equal to the time you blocked off.

This helps to keep you focused and going.  That timer is your deadline.  Get your butt moving before it runs out.

This also prevents you from being “that guy” in the gym.  You know the guy that stands around talking to people in between sets?  Yea we all hate that guy.  Don’t be him.

  1. Use less exercises in your workouts

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I see so many programs that are simply overkill.  People with so many exercises in just one day of their program that I thought it was the full week’s program!  You don’t need all of that.  No, you aren’t your favourite bodybuilder or athlete, and just because it was posted on the latest issue of “insert name of generic fitness magazine”, doesn’t mean that person even does it.  

Choose 2-4 exercises per workout, targeting the muscles you want to work.  The fewer the better.  Remember what Bruce Lee said:

“I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who had practiced one kick 10,000 times.”

Bruce Lee knew how to train efficiently!

Get a few exercises in your programs that are its core, and focus on making progress on them.  Everything else is bonus. Make it a habit of always getting your core exercises in, and only do the “bonus” stuff if you have extra time and feel like doing it.  This is the premise we use when creating our program at LPS.  

Don’t know what exercises to choose?  Which parts of your body do you want to target?  Simply choose movements that effectively target those areas.  Which leads to number 3

  1. Make compound exercises the core of your program

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If you are not in a structural balance phase and yet you do isolation exercise after isolation exercise, you are wasting your time.  Compound exercises, like their name suggests, work multiple muscle groups at a time in comparison to isolation exercises which usually work one.  Which one do you think is going to allow you to spend less time in the gym and still get a great workout?  It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that out.

While training is fun and fulfilling, we still have the rest of our lives to live out.  Use these three methods to make sure your time in the gym is effective and well spent.