3 Quick Workouts To Keep Your Heart Healthy

Enjoy another guest post, this time from a new friend I met during the wonderful word of networking, Eric Piccione, a former Division 1 Collegiate Athlete turned blogger. Eric and I share a passion for health and fitness, which shines brightly in this article about three fantastic quick workouts that will get your heart pumping in no time.

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Quick workouts are great if you have minimal time and want to be efficient.

Quick workouts, if done right, can have some amazing health benefits, some of which include:

•  improved cardiovascular health
•  increased metabolism
•  fat loss and weight loss
•  faster brain function
•  more time to do what needs to be done in the day

Quick, efficient workouts are great for people on the road, or if one really wants to challenge himself in a short time frame.

Throughout this article, we will do our best to explain the benefits in more detail, and hopefully give you a better understanding of why you might want to consider doing a quick workout in the future.

 A few points we will talk about will be:

•  The circuit-style quick workout
•  The AMRAP quick workout
•  Big set workout
•  Which quick workout is best for you?
•  Other alternatives to quick workouts
•  Conclusion

 I know you are on the edge of your seat at this point, so let’s get into it!

The Circuit-Style Quick Workout

When training in a circuit style, this will likely be the most structured and organized method for your workouts.

This will include lots of supersets. Meaning, after you finish with one exercise, you immediately go over to another exercise and repeat this for a set amount of rounds. For example, if you do 15 pushups, you will immediately transition into mountain climbers for 15 reps, and back again to pushups.

By alternating exercises, it challenges your muscles in different parts of your body without affecting one another directly. When doing a superset, it’s best to focus on a specific muscle group, and the next set should focus on a different muscle group.

That way you are not overdoing or fatiguing your muscles to where you can’t perform the exercises with good form.

Alternatively to supersets, you can simply transition to multiple exercises for one specific amount of reps and sets.

 A great layout of a circuit-style quick workout would be:

• 10 Pushups
• 10 Mountain Climbers, each leg
• 10 Jump Squats
• 5 Burpees

That’s one round. Rest for one minute, and then repeat for three more rounds.

The next round:

• 10 Tricep Dips
• 10 V-ups
• 10 Jump Lunges
•  5 Burpees

Again, rest for one minute, and then repeat for three more rounds.

You can easily design your own circuit-style quick workouts. Whatever the case, it all comes down to your creativity. A great way to approach a quick workout is to think about how to target each muscle at least some point during the exercises. If you’re only going to work out for a short amount of time, you might as well get the maximum results from it.

The AMRAP Quick Workout

As many reps as possible, (AMRAP) is a workout style designated to maximize your effort in a specific time frame.

While the workouts are simple, you are really going to have to dig deep in order to finish them.

They consist of simply performing as many reps as you can within a specific time frame.

You can either structure it to be one-minute per exercise, or simply finish the reps and move on to the next exercise until you complete the round, and repeat it all over again for as many rounds as you possibly can do.

A workout might look like:

Do as many rounds as possible in 12 minutes:

• 10 Burpees
• 20 Air squats
• 10 Burpees
• 10 Pike Pushups
• 10 Burpees
• 10 V-ups

Or

• 10 Jump Squats
• 10 Wide Grip Pushups
• 10 Jump Squats
• 10 Crunches
• 10 Jump Squats
• 10 Diamond Pushups

You can even do burpees for 15 mins straight.

Whatever the format for your workout, aim to challenge your body to the max level.

The Big-Set Workout

This one can be complicated without writing it down. You can format the workout however you want, but we typically do each movement for 1 min – 1 min 30 seconds.

You simply perform each exercise one time, then move on to the next.

A quick example would be:

Do each exercise for one minute 30 seconds for as many reps as possible.

• Pushups
• Air Squats
• Diamond Pushups
• Reverse Lunges
• Crunches
• Dive bomber pushups
• Jump squats
• Russian twists

If you really want to get bigger arms, make a majority of the exercises focused on the arms. However, we recommend focusing on the entire body for these workouts.

Which Quick Workout is Best for You?

There really isn’t one “best” workout style. They are all just ideas that you can use for your workouts.

That being said, we like to do the circuit-style because it is so organized and you know what to expect.

It may not be the most challenging, but I like structure in my life.

AMRAP would be ideal for a day when you really want to crank out some sweat.

They all have their benefits. However, do the one that looks the most appealing to you!

An Alternative to Quick Workouts

Personally, as fun as making a structured workout can be, I’d much rather be coached every step of the way.

That’s why I use the Nike Training Club App. 

The workouts are simple, easy to follow, and very challenging. I have attempted to use well over 20 different workout apps, and this one is by far my favorite.

If you have access to some dumbbells, that’s really the only equipment you need for a majority of the workouts. However, you can definitely do many of the workouts without equipment.

One of my favorite exercises to do in the app is the bodyweight leg workout. They’ve challenged my legs in ways that I didn’t even think was possible!

I’m thankful for this app and the fact that it’s free with over a hundred workouts to choose from!

Conclusion

Whatever your workout preference, make it fun, make it challenging, and make the most of it!

A quote I really like to reference when I think of slacking off for my workout is:

“If you do what’s hard, life will be easy; if you do it easy, life will be hard.”

Find ways to challenge yourself even if it’s only for a 10-minute workout. You are the master of your life, so make the right decisions, not the easy ones.

A few topics we talked about today were:

• How quick workouts can challenge your body and boost your metabolism just as much as a traditional workout
• The different types of quick workouts
• How you can structure your own quick workouts
• Using workout apps can guide you through the exercises

At the end of the day, the one who will benefit from this is you. If you don’t take action, then the few minutes you spend reading this will have been wasted. Take out a pen and paper and write down a very simple and easy-to-follow quick workout you want to try. Then do it!

Thank you so much for reading, and as always, stay amazing!

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As always, I love having guest bloggers. If you have something you’d like to say and you’re looking for a good forum to get your word out, please be in touch!