Best Exercises If You’re Already Athletic

I work with people in Calgary, Canada, who are at every fitness level. Some are already athletic and search for exercises to take them to the next level. They need workouts that push them to perform their best. If you’ve modified exercises in various ways to make them tougher and completed hundreds of reps of more traditional exercises but don’t get the adrenaline rush from challenging yourself with workouts that push you to the limit, here are some options you might like.

Make every workout more difficult by turning it into a HIIT, Tabata, or HIIT circuit.

HIIT stands for high-intensity interval training. It’s not a specific exercise but a way of doing any exercise. You alternate between pushing yourself at peak intensity and a recovery pace. Tabata is a more strenuous form of HIIT. It consists of eight rounds of 20 seconds of maximum effort followed by a ten-second rest. It takes four minutes and pushes you to capacity. HIIT circuit training consists of several exercises completed in a row followed by a rest.

Here are some modifications of push-ups you might not have tried.

Making a push-up more difficult usually involves lifting one arm or doing it with weights. An Aztec push-up is far more difficult than that. You must push yourself up in a forceful burst of energy, lifting your hands and feet off the ground. Then, touch your toes in the air on your upward movement. If that is one step beyond your ability, consider a similar one. You lift your hands off the ground. Instead of touching your toes, you clap on the upward movement.

Use a stability ball to improve your workouts.

Stability ball exercises can challenge every core muscle by forcing your body to maintain balance. One particularly difficult exercise is doing a side plank with a leg lift on a stability ball or doing a Russian Twist. You need a large stability ball to do it. Lower your upper back down to your waist onto the stability ball. Your knees are bent. Your feet are flat on the floor. Do Russian Twists while holding a weight or a smaller ball with both hands outstretched.

• Make burpees even harder by including a box jump. You need a strong knee-high step or box. Do a traditional burpee, except after you bring your feet back to a squat position, jump up on the box or step. Try doing it with one arm extended in front of you and one hand, instead of two, on the ab roller.
• Add weights to almost any exercise to make it more difficult. Walking lunges carrying weights will test your muscles and balance.
• Do Spiderman push-ups. It’s called that because you bring one leg up to the side in a movement similar to one you’d use to climb up the side of a building as you drop down and put it back in the starting position. On the next downward movement, bring up the other leg.
• Try a one-legged squat or one-legged windmill. It’s all about maintaining balance when you put your weight on only one leg.

For more information, contact us today at Get RIPPED! by Jari Love