It’s Like Recess, But Better!

Jumping rope burns mega calories. Check out this awesomely fun workout…

What you’ll need:
1. Jump rope
2. Music
3. Your body

Begin with a 7-10 minute warm-up of things that will gradually get your heart rate up. The idea is to get your blood flowing, but not to spike your heart rate too high (that’s coming up!).

Next put on an upbeat song, about 3 minutes or less in length and jump rope until the song is over. If your arms get tired or your legs start to burn too much stop jumping, but keep moving around until you can start up again or the song ends.

For the next song lie down and do as many crunches as you can until the song ends (try to make it till the end of the song – your abs will be screaming!). Keep alternating between jumping for one song and doing body weight exercises for the next song for a total of 45 minutes. Some exercises you can include are dips, push-ups, bicycles, squats, and lunges. Sky’s the limit, just use your imagination and have fun! You’ll break a serious sweat and the 45 minutes will fly by making you wish there was more.

5 Simple Exercises To Get You Moving And Losing

This is a workout that I’ve done on my cross training days when I’m not running. It seems like a lot of repetitions, but it goes by fast and the best part is that you don’t really need to think about it. You will get a total body workout in under 45 minutes with no fancy equipment needed! All you need is a floor, a chair or step, and you. The faster you do it, the higher your heart rate, the more you’ll burn. While watching your favorite show you can fit each set into those annoying commercial breaks instead of going to the kitchen for another cookie.

– 15 Jumping Jacks (yup, school’s in session!)
– 30 Push-Ups – You can do these on your knees if you’re not quite ready for toes yet. See how! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nlprm-lhcsw
– 30 Dips – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKjcgfu44sI
– 50 Squats – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZ6eTiEsWkQ
– 40 crunches – Make sure you’re doing them correctly! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3W6bVf1QAKo

Do each exercise one after the other without pausing, then rest for 2 minutes when all the exercises are completed. Repeat this cycle up to 3 times. If you’re a beginner, you may want to complete the cycle only once and see how you feel the next day. If you’re not conditioned and ready for this amount of exercise you may do yourself more harm than good by pushing yourself further than that. With that said, if you feel ok the next day with only minor muscle soreness than you can bump it up to 2 cycles next time. For some of you these numbers may seem a little high, so do as much as you can. Just remember to challenge yourself and not let yourself off the hook so easily. You know what you’re capable of, so go for it.