Are you ready to start your own resistance training, but aren’t quite sure how to structure it so you get good results without risking injury? Or maybe you’re already working your muscles regularly, but you want to switch things up a bit in order to improve your results?
No matter what your reason for needing a new resistance training workout, here are a few options to consider:
- Option 1: If you want to work your muscles to the max, then you want to use as much resistance as you can stand without compromising form, but you only want to work your individual muscles only every few days so they have time to recover. Therefore, you could do upper body Monday, lower body Tuesday, take a day of rest, and repeat like this the rest of the week. Or you could do a full body workout Monday, take two days of rest, and then do another full body workout on Thursday, continuing with this schedule.
- Option 2: To go for a little bit of tone without building muscles that look like they belong on the body of a professional weight lifter, you want to use lighter resistance and more reps. Since you’re not overly stressing your muscles, you don’t have to put so much time in between your workouts to give them time to heal. So you could do upper body one day, lower body the next, and continue with that progression or do full body one day, take one day off, and then do full body again.
- Option 3: Keep your body guessing and your muscles progressing by choosing this third option and doing a light resistance training one day, a heavier one the next, then taking one or two days rest before repeating.
Remember also that when you’re working your upper body, you want to include exercises that work your chest, shoulders, biceps, and triceps. Lower body workouts involve your thighs, hamstrings, calves, and abs. The more muscle groups you work, the more muscle you build!
