Full Body Home Workout

I have written this post because I want to share with all of you the workout that I am recommending the most lately. It is designed for beginners who want to start working out at home with the minimum equipment necessary, although it is very similar to the one I would recommend to someone who starts going to the gym but with some exercise modifications.

The problem with most home workouts

To maximise success in creating a new habit it should be as simple and feasible as possible but not more. In our case, which is creating the habit of training and strengthening our bodies, we don’t want to sacrifice results, balance or health for convenience or comfort. This implies we are going to train the full body in order to avoid imbalances, including the back, which means we will have to incorporate an upper body pull into the routine. I am specifically talking about this because most home workouts are done without any equipment and almost always fail to include pulling exercises, which creates muscle imbalances.

This problem can be easily solved by buying an adjustable dumbbell for one arm dumbbell rows or a suspension trainer that can be secured to the door in order to perform australian pull ups (APU). Note that though this may be good enough to start training, in this last case you will only be able to progress to a point since the door limits how much you can move your feet forward, which is the main way to progress in APU besides switching to one arm APU. When possible, what I recommend is finding a place to hang the suspension trainer, preferably gymnastic rings, near your place if not at home. Read this post to get some ideas about where to hang your suspension trainer or rings from.

Now that we have already solved this issue, let’s start talking about creating the habit to work out and the actual routine you’ll be doing.

Strength & Mass for Athletes

Every time I walk into the weight room in my school, I meet a lot of good friends from my rugby team. They like going to the gym, they train together, don’t miss a workout, and are committed. They want to get big, strong, and look good! And why not, if this also helps them in the field, even better.

But, because of the way I am, I can’t help but notice that they are doing some exercises that fuck their shoulders, like bench pressing bodybuilding style with weights they can’t control and doing forced reps. Then they tell me that their shoulder hurts, and it doesn’t surprise me at all.

Other things they do is super wide pull ups, which apart of not being the best thing you can do for your shoulders, especially when you play rugby and use them to tackle day in and day out, don’t allow them to pass their chin over the bar, or load themselves with any significant weight. When I ask them why they do it this way, they’ll tell me it is because “it hits the back”. Doesn’t regular pull ups hit the back, on top of having a much larger ROM (Range Of Motion)? I can tell you that when I do heavy chin ups, the next day my lats are sore as hell.

Of course, as any beginner, they’ll squat bringing their knee forward and putting them at risk of injury, and doing quarter reps. Actually, they do half reps in every exercise they do, because to start, their hand placement or hip/knee break isn’t correct.

But because I love these guys, I want them to succeed, and to avoid wasting years of training, effort, and getting injured on the way. That’s the reason why I promised them to make a routine to help them get big, strong, get a nice looking body, and avoid getting injured in the process.

I recommend this routine to any beginner. It is a classic A/B, training 3 times a week the whole body, with lots of basic compound exercises, progressive overload being the focus, and also with some curls at the end of the workouts, optional of course, just to make them happy.

Where to hang your rings from

People love making excuses. They'll say they ain't got time for making it to the gym, or that they ain't got money for it, even if they have very expensive phones, and go out to party and dinner every single week.

So you tell them, "Hey, you don't have to have those problems anymore. Just make a little investment in a pair of rings, or suspension trainer. This way you will be able to train at home, without spending time and money going to the gym."

But then they will come with a new excuse. They'll say there's nowhere at home to hang the straps from.

So my intention with this post, is to give some ideas to those that really want to train but do not know where to hang their rings from, and at the same time to avoid those excuse-makers from lying to themselves with poor excuses. Now, they will have to invent another lame excuse about why they do not train, or face the truth, and maybe start to man up and train!

Find a place to hang your rings from

Change your point of view

You have to start seeing the world as your gym. Look for things to hang from and do Pull ups, places to climb and heavy shit to lift, be it wood logs or stones.

Now, start searching for a place to hang your rings from. Where do I usually hang them, or would if I had no other place?

How to do Pull Ups

The mighty Pull  Up!! Everyone has at least once tried to do one pull up, even if it is jumping, kipping, and with horrible form! But not everybody knows how to do a correct pull up, and most of the time it is just because they started doing pull ups before having the strength and preparation to do it.

What I am going to suggest you is a progression towards your first proper pull up, so you can then focus on adding reps or progress to a harder variation, because there is no way you can do a one arm pull up if you can't do one proper pull up.

How fun are Pull Ups, and they make you a Beast!!

How to do Australian Pull Ups

The Australian Pull Up is a splendid exercise for your back and arms, and a good one to start building your pulling power. It is also a good way to gain strength when preparing for your fist pull up, and it will teach total body tension, a good technique for pulling and proper posture for your shoulders and shoulder blades.

Besides, it will keep your shoulders healthy by balancing all the horizontal push you may do (push ups, bench press…).

They are also known as inverted rows and fat man pull ups, but don’t get me wrong, they can be as hard as you want them to be, going from a vertical pull for total rookies, all the way to one arm Australian pull ups to advanced trainees.

In these two videos I show you how to go from vertical pulls, which are the easiest version, to the regular Australian pull up, which is an intermediate level version. Even if Australian pull ups are not the hardest exercise you can find, it is important to do them with great technique and don’t underestimate them.

Once you have mastered this movement, you will notice you have a better mind-muscle connection with your back, an important thing to get bigger, and you’ll feel stronger. A strong back lays the foundation for a strong push, so you can expect your push power to increase as you train properly your back.

Here’s the video where I show how to do them on rings:

And here you can see me doing them on bars:

Don’t hesitate to ask me any question you may have, be it on this blog, on my Facebook Page, or on my youtube channel.

Train hard!

Gabri

                                       To read this post in Spanish, click here.