What is a finisher?

What is a Finisher?  And why add it to your workouts?

A finisher is an exercise or series of exercises done as intensely as possible in a short period of time, 5 – 10 minutes, which targets most of the major muscle groups and causes a very strong metabolic response.

Basically it is the longest 5 or 10 minutes of your life.  And just like the name implies, it should be performed at the end of your workout.

There are two reasons why to do a finisher:

Firstly, your available energy stores are lower than normal after a strength training session.  This depletion creates the ideal time to augment the demand for energy since your metabolism will trigger hormone sensitive lipase in adipocytes in order to provide this energy.  In other words, you can stimulate a lot of fat burning at the end of a workout.

Secondly,  If you do a finisher correctly, you won’t want to do anything afterwards.  A finisher should be exhausting up to the edge of nausea, and even though you might feel a bit queasy for a few minutes, you can take pride in the fact that you stoked your fat burning engine.

The proton accumulation and muscle acidification that caused the nausea are a powerful stimulus for fat loss.

Here is an example of a finisher:

60 seconds jump rope as fast as possible plus 10 burpees

Rest 45 second

Repeat x 5

Want more finishers? Well then checkout the best list of workout finishers on the web:

The ultimate list of workout finishers

Make sure to add a finisher to your workout!