What Should A Good Workout Program Include in 2024?
Are you getting the most out of your time in the gym? Because without following the right program, you might just be spinning your wheels.
By the end of this episode, you’ll know how to get more out of your workouts by knowing the 5 critical elements of an effective workout program
By the way, I’m Jonathan. My wife Blakley and I own Digital Barbell. For over 15 years, we’ve been helping regular people get stronger, build muscle, get fitter, and feel more confident in their skin.
Our training method can get you better results than ever without burning you out or trying to figure it out on your own.
Jonathan, Blakley, Buttons, and Lacey
Checking out Palo Duro Canyon State Park
Since you’re into health and fitness, check out our Podcast on Apple, Spotify, or YouTube.
Let’s start by defining what an effective workout program means. You might already be working out 3, 4, or 5 days a week, thinking your program or group classes are effective, but not getting the results you want because you’re missing some of these elements.
You also might not even know what a good goal is for a workout program, so you just end up doing what feels good, or jumping from program to program never really seeing any progress.
Our definition of a program that’s effective means that it does these things:
Continues to make you stronger over the long term
It builds muscle, and you can see the proof of that in the mirror, and how your clothes fit
It improves your V02 max, resting heart rate, blood pressure, and other health markers
It improves your endurance
It improves your mobility
It builds functional skill, strength, and power for your regular life
It improves your overall confidence and mental health
You enjoy it enough to be excited about doing it most of the time
What about weight loss? While regular physical exercise is a non-negotiable for overall health and longevity… And it can help with weight loss and weight loss maintenance, it’s not the goal of a workout program.
Weight loss is largely driven by your food environment, daily habits, overall lifestyle and activity levels, and how you cope with stress.
Work out, but not with the motivation just to lose weight.
One of the reasons our clients get better results than they’ve gotten in the past is because our training method is designed with the right definition of effective.
You might not need to work out MORE, you just need the right recipe for success.
Ok, let’s get into the 5 Elements of an effective workout program.
1 - RESISTANCE TRAINING
Any effective workout program has to include resistance training. Bodyweight workouts are a great option for travel, but a workout program that doesn’t have resistance training will fall flat quickly.
This is the reason why classes like Zumba, yoga, or HITT classes without weights don’t help you look more toned or build strength. There’s not enough resistance to make your muscles grow.
Resistance training is also the foundation of all strength gains.
Resistance training means using your muscles to push against an external force that’s resisting them. It could be a barbell, a dumbbell, a band, a tonal machine…
As long as you’re creating tension on the muscle with an external resistance you’re good.
Now…I have to tell you that if the resistance you choose is easier than what you encounter in your regular life, you’re not getting the benefits.
Is your purse heavier than your dumbbells? That’s not resistance training.
If your child is heavier than your deadlifts, that’s not resistance training.
Resistance training needs to be challenging if it’s going to be effective.
The second thing an effective workout program has to have is the right…
2 - EXERCISE SELECTION
This one might sound obvious, but it’s really easy to get wrong.
Think of the exercises you choose to do in your workouts just like the ingredients in a recipe.
What’s going to come out better? A chocolate chip cookie made with Godiva Milk Chocolate, or one made with the store brand chocolate chips that have been sitting in your pantry since the Clinton administration.
Ingredients matter with food, and with your workouts.
An effective workout program has a balance of the following ingredients
Multi-joint compound exercises that can be loaded heavily like squats, deadlifts, bench presses, rows, glute bridges, and overhead presses. These should be heavy enough that you can only do around 5 reps per set.
Isolation exercises for your smaller muscles like your biceps, triceps, deltoids. Rhomboids, traps, abs, and calves.
Power development exercises like cleans, snatches, and jumping.
Exercises that require balance like lunges, and side planks.
Rotation and anti-rotation exercises that develop core strength.
Exercises that challenge your muscles in different postions and at different angles so you develop strength and muscle size in both the shortened and lengthened positions.
And last but still critical is that an effective workout program avoids repeating the same movement pattern too often, to help avoid overuse injuries.
The next Element of an effective workout program is a game changer if you haven’t been using it.
3 - PROGRESSIVE OVERLOAD
Progressive overload is a simple principle that can transform your physique and make you stronger than you ever thought possible.
Think of progressive overload as cycle. You do a challenging workout, you get adequate sleep, calories, and protein, and your body adapts to make you a little bit stronger, and a little more fit.
I’m talking about almost imperceptile amounts of improvement on a day to day basis.
But as you stay consistent and keep making those small daily, weekly, and monthly gains, the magic of compounding progress takes over, and you become a totally different person.
The way people mess this up is by doing random stuff from workout to workout, not challenging their muscles enough, not tracking the weights they lift and how many reps they do, and by neglecting the sleep and nutrition side of the equation.
I’ll put a link to a short episode that talks more about using progressive overload in the notes for this episode.
The next element of an effective workout program is:
4 - A BALANCE OF AEROBIC AND ANAEROBIC CONDITIONING
Anaerobic conditioning is the kind that’s done in short, intense bursts. Think of a 50 meter sprint or a set of tabata goblet squats instead of a 2 mile jog.
Anaerobic conditioning relies on the energy from carbs that are stored in your muscles. This type of conditioning enhances your power output and trains your body to become more efficient at clearing lactate from your bloodstream.
Unless you’re doing CrossFit, or a similar style workout program, you’re probably neglecting Anearobic training in your workout program, and doing mostly Aerobic work.
Aerobic cardio is longer, less intense conditioning that relies mainly on the oxygen in your blood for energy.
It’s great for building endurance, improving circulation, increasing energy, and improving your overall heart health.
Running, biking, swimming, rowing, and fast walking are the things that most people think about with Aerobic conditioning. We do all of those things, but we structure our workout program so that you can also build muscle while working on your aerobic fitness.
To learn more about the Digital Barbell training method, check out THIS episode of our Podcast.
Ok, the last element you need in an effective workout program is…
5 - PERIODIZATION & RECOVER
Ok, technically those are two things, but they’re related.
I can’t tell you how often I’ve asked someone what their fitness goals are and they say something like: “I want to run a half marathon, squat twice my body weight, get shredded, and build my upper body.”
And I’m like: “Ok, and which one of those did you want to do first?”
I get it though! It’s fun to set goals for your fitness. But the thing is, some goals take different approaches to training and nutrition.
It’s not that you can’t accomplish multiple goals with your fitness, you just need to periodize them out during the year to set yourself up for success.
Even if you’re just working out to stay in shape without a specific goal, spending dedicated periods of time focused on a specialty can be a great way to keep training exciting, and to make progress in something like strength or endurance.
Recovery goes hand in hand with periodization. If you’re truly pushing yourself with your workout program, you should have built-in periods where you bring the overall stress of the program down for a week or so, to let your body heal.
Constantly going hard without an intentional break can be a shortcut to injury, which is the biggest progress blocker of them all.
Ok, to recap… Here are the 5 elements that an effective workout program should have:
1 - Resistance training - strength training
2 - The right Exercise Selection
3 - Progressive Overload
4 - Aerobic and Anaerobic cardio
5 - Periodization and Recovery
If you’re working out but not getting the results you want, we can fix that.
We can take the time you’re already spending in the gym, and turn it into impressive results without wasting any of your valuable time.
How about trying out a free training program that has everything you need to get stronger, build endurance, and see more muscle definition?
Click the Yellow Button below to download our program “Full Body Fit” today. It even includes some bonus nutrition tips to boost your results.
If you have any questions, feel free to reach out HERE.
Jonathan