Lerentia Strydom This three-day hypotrophy workout is designed to make you look as good as you perform. Who is this for? It is for those of us who wants to look good, but not at the cost of losing athletic ability. If you have been training long enough, you’d know that looking fit and being fit, is not always the same thing.
In fact, the path to gaining huge amounts of muscle, is almost always at the cost of optimal health. But it need not be. With intelligent training, you can get the body you want and be really fit.
About the workout:
It only takes about 45 min to complete. Everyday start with upper body. Total just 5-6 exercises per day. Most hypertrophy programs you’ll find on the internet will have you do a lot of back squats, deadlifts and bench presses. There is good reason for this, because they are some of the best exercises to make you stronger and build muscle. And yes, they are included in my program in some form, but you won’t see the standard 4 sets of 8 reps back-squats here.
What makes this program different are three things-
- You don’t start with heavy leg exercises.
- The volume and weights is just what you need.
- It is designed to turn you into an good looking athlete
If you want to be an all round extremely fit athlete, I bet you don’t like off-days too much. Once a week of no workouts, should be enough on most weeks.
Your standard muscle building workout leaves you feeling drained, sore, exhausted and often just in a bad mood for days to come. If you have tried some of the workouts on the most popular websites or even those books written by big names in the fitness industry, you know what I am talking about.
Worse of all is that your progress on these programs are likely to be very slow and you’ll plateau fairly quickly. The type, duration and frequency of stress you put your body through makes all the difference.
Plus if you do heavy weights five to six times a week there is not much room for any type of other training.
This is the basic set-up for phase 1: Full body workouts. Two to three times a week.
What do you do on the other days? You train, preferably outside. You run, sprint, do short body weight circuits, stairs for cardio is great option. The best program is off course our own professionally designed weekly workouts.
One of the best ways to become a complete athlete is to follow this free 5 week body weight program and combine it with this weight training program. In fact, it is what we here at StrydomFitness did to get in the best shape of our lives.
But please don’t just jump into it blindly and do both at once. Read this short article on how to combine different types of training.
If 200m or 400m sprints aren’t your thing yet, there are other ways to get a very healthy, fit and good looking body.
But honestly, if you are not doing some kind of fast running, you are not training for optimal health. To stay young, you need to sprint. To look good, at least for now, you don’t have to.
Regardless of what you do on the other days, this is great workout on its own to increase strength, muscle, flexibility and functional movement. I strongly suggest you do this before following any other programs. After this, you can go into higher volume workouts, or splits, pure hypertrophy, strength, fat loss, sport specific workouts… it is not just a good solid base for any goal you pursue, you will see results quickly!
Sample workout:
I prefer super-sets to save time and to increase the intensity of the workout.
You’ll notice descriptions like “Light medium”, “heavy medium” etc.
Look at this scale to understand what I mean. The numbers in brackets indicate the max reps you will be able to do if you do only one set with that weight.
Light (25+ reps); Light-medium (15-25); Medium (12-18); Medium-heavy (6-10); Heavy (1-5).
No need to go to complete failure in this program. Best to choose a weight that will allow you to do the prescribed reps with one or two reps short of failure during each set.
Day A
1A Barbell Bench Press.
1B One Arm Row
1st set 12 reps (Light-medium)
2 sets 6-8 reps (Medium-heavy)
2 sets 15 reps (Medium)
2 A Leg Press
2 B Deadlift
1 x warm-up set for 10 reps (Light)
1 x 15 reps (Light medium)
1 x heavy 6-8 reps (Medium)
1 x 10-15 (Medium light)
3 A Turkish Get ups
1x 10 medium weight. Practice perfect form.
3 B Dumbbell Side plank with rotation.
1 x 15 each side
3 C Barbell overhead squat
1 x 10-15 (Barbell only, no plates). Practice good form. Feel the stretch.
Day B
1A Incline Dumbbell Bench Press
1B Bent over row
1x 10-12 (light medium)
2x 8-10 (medium heavy)
2x 10-15 (medium)
2A Front Squat
2B Straight leg deadlift
1x 10 (light medium)
2x 10 (medium)
3. Cable One arm press
2x 12-15.
4. BB clean and press
2x 10 (medium)
5. Hanging knees to elbows or leg raises.
1-2 sets x up to 20 reps.
Day C
1A. One Arm Dumbbell Chest Press
1B. Lat Pull down (Chin-up style)
1st set 12 reps (medium light)
2 sets 4-6 reps (Heavy)
2 sets 12-15 reps (Medium)
2A Barbell Walking Lunges
2B Sumo Deadlift
1 x warm-up set for 10 reps (light)
1 x 15 reps (medium light)
1 x heavy 6-8 reps
1 x 10-15 (medium)
3A Kettle Bell Swings
1 x 10 (medium heavy)
3B Shoulder Presses + Hold
With a light weight (men 4-10 kg, women 2-6 kg)
Do 30 sec presses or push-presses, then hold dumbbells in the air (straight arms) for 30 sec.
Repeat 3A and B three times.
4. Cable Wood Chop Down
3-5 sets of 8-10 reps.
Repeat this for two to three weeks. Then move on to the next phase.
Phase 2
Example and Alternative Exercises for phase 1:
1 Upper Body Push
- Bench Press
- Dumbbell Press
- Machine Chest Press
- Incline Bench Press
- “Soccer Ball” or One Armed Push-up
- Push-ups
- Cable single arm chest presses
- Shoulder Presses
1 Lower Body Push
- Goblet Squat
- Back Squat
- Front Squat
- Pistol Squats
- Weighted Step Ups
- Weighted Lunges
- Reverse Lunges
- 45 Degree Leg press
- Bulgarian Split squats
1 Upper Body Pull
- Pull-ups
- Chin-ups
- Upright Row
- Bent Over Row
- One Arm Row
- Cable Row
- Lat pull down
- Inverted row
1 Lower Body Pull
- Deadlift
- Suitcase Deadlift
- Trap Bar Deadlift
- Romanian Deadlift
- Sumo Deadlift
- Single Leg Deadlift
- Straight Leg Deadlift
1 Total Body and Functional and Assistance
- Kettlebell Turkish Get-ups
- Man Makers
- Bear Complex
- Dumbbell Clean & Jerk
- Overhead Squat
- Single arm cable press
- Wood chop up
- Wood chop down
- Medicine ball side rotation throw
- Cable rotational exercises
- Kettlebell swings
