Happy Thursday to you,
I hope everything is OK and you are coping well during these crazy times.
If like most of us, you are confined to your home then you may be struggling to get your regular gym workout in.
Today I’d like to share with you exactly how you can scale up or scale down your workouts, whether you have just one kettlebell or no kettlebells at all.
Although I used to practically live inside gyms I now exercise at home with only a small collection of equipment.
But…you don’t need any equipment in order to get a really challenging and progressive workout in.
Let’s dive in…
How to scale up and down any workout
Over the previous weeks, I’ve shared the 5 essential movement patterns and described how simply using all 5 will target over 600 muscles in one quick workout.
Here they are again with examples:
- Hip hinge (kettlebell swing, deadlifts)
- Knee hinge (squats or lunges)
- Push (overhead press or push ups)
- Pull (rows or pull ups)
- Core (planks, bird dogs, dead-bugs, woodchops)
A simple workout just includes an exercise from each category and then puts them together into a circuit. Repeat 1 – 3 times and you’re done!
However, the skill of program design is adjusting the various workout variables for the right person at the right time.
There are a total of 7 workout variables, here are the first 2:
1. Reps and Sets
Consider a total of 24 reps, you can adjust your sets like this:
- 1 x 24 reps – endurance
- 2 x 12 reps – muscle building
- 3 x 8 reps – muscle building
- 4 x 6 reps – strength
- 10, 8, 6 reps – muscle and strength
You can see from the sets and reps above a few simple adjustments can affect what you achieve from just one kettlebell weight.
2. Movement Pattern Progressions
Let’s look at the Hip Hinge pattern and see how you can progress it:
- Bodyweight Single Leg Deadlift
- Kettlebell One Arm Deadlift
- Kettlebell Clean
- Kettlebell Swing One Hand
- Kettlebell Swing Alternating Hands
- Kettlebell High Pulls
- Kettlebell Snatch
Looking at the above exercises you can see how 10 repetitions of the One Arm Deadlift is going to be a lot easier with a 16kg kettlebell than 10 reps of Snatches.
Other than progressing the movement pattern, as above, you can also add further complexities to an exercise by combining two exercises.
For example:
- Kettlebell Clean and then Overhead Press
- Kettlebell Lunge and then Overhead Press
These are just the first 2 of 7 workout variables:
See all 7 ways to progress your kettlebell workouts here
So, if you are stuck at home and only have one kettlebell or maybe no kettlebells at all you can use the above variables to make simple workouts more difficult, or more complex workouts easier.
Here’s an advanced workout from my 50 kettlebell circuits program:
- Single Leg Clean – 30 seconds each side
- Alternating Swing – 60 seconds
- Snatch – 30 seconds each side
- Goblet Squat and Press – 60 seconds
The above 4 minute workout uses all 5 movement patterns and will challenge your balance, strength and cardio.
For those who struggle with the single arm clean you can use the regular clean or single leg deadlift instead.
Click to download this workout
BONUS bodyweight workouts:
If you are stuck at home without a kettlebell then here are 3 bodyweight workouts I filmed out on lake Tahoe a few years ago:
Watch the 3 bodyweight workouts here
Plan meals don’t leave them to chance
Recently I was chatting to someone about their problems with their diet and fat loss.
What surprised me was they said they “just ate what they felt like at the time”.
It struck me that so many people just don’t plan their meals for the week or even the next day.
If your priority is fat loss or even just great nutrition, then you really need to plan.
You can’t leave good nutrition up to chance.
You plan for vacations, work meetings, nights out etc. so why not your meals too?
- When you plan your meals, you know what groceries to buy
- When you plan your meals, you make smarter choices
- When you plan your meals, you free up your mind
You don’t need to plan every meal because you can rotate different meals, for example, alternate between eggs and oatmeal/porridge for breakfast.
Cook more than is needed and then eat it again the next day.
Keep a food diary/journal and log all meals you should be eating and then shop for them and tick them off each day.
Don’t leave good nutrition up to chance. Plan. Log. Repeat.
That’s all for today my friend,
Take care of yourself and others,
Greg
P.S. Need a helping hand during these challenging times? Special saving here