Workout Wednesday For 25JAN23

Woman performing leg press exercise — The leg press is a great option to add mass to your legs, or tone them up (which is the same thing…shhhhhh, it’s a secret)

Welcome to Workout Wednesday. Every Wednesday, I’ll be talking a little about my training philosophy, explaining the exercises and giving you a free workout. As I’ve mentioned before, by night I’m a Catholic writer and nerd, but by day I’m a strength coach, personal trainer and strength athlete. I’ve done this as my full-time job since 2016, and part time in some capacity or another since 2006. As always, you should check with a doctor before embarking on any exercise journey. If you have any specific questions, you can ask them directly on either my Facebook fitness page, or my Instagram fitness page. Remember, our most intimate interaction with Creation is with our own bodies, and if we don’t take care of them we are not taking care of what God has entrusted to us.

The why of this Workout Wednesday

Strong legs are a must for any endeavor, athletic or not. Runners will be able to create more force per stride, grandparents will be able to play with the littles, moms will grow thicker bones (staving off osteoporosis by building calcium reserves) and dads will get to be super dads (and isn’t that the most important reason?).

And…come on. We are meant to be the best versions of ourselves. God did not create any of us for mediocrity (relative to our own gifts). Doing your best to be your best can only glorify God.

The what of this Workout Wednesday

But first, a few conventions for those that might not know. You’ll need to understand that exercises are given in terms of “sets” and “repetitions” or “reps”. For example, “Goblet Squat 3×12” means to perform a set (or group of repetitions) of goblet squats (which you can see this nice gentleman doing in the video above) 3 times. Each set will consist of 12 repetitions of goblet squats before resting. Unless otherwise noted, you should always warm up with lighter weight, and move up to heavier weight over 2-3 increments before you reach the “working sets” (in this case, the 3×12). Form is crucial. I will go over form for some of the more esoteric exercises I give to you, but a great resource that I often send clients to is www.exrx.net/Lists/Directory. I have yet to fundamentally disagree with any of their information.

And second, it is crucial that you know how to perform a 2×3 (or 2×5, or 2×1…) when I program them. You will warm up with lighter weights and then start doing only 3 reps while adding a little weight each time you successfully get 3 reps. At some point, you will think to yourself, “Self, if I add more weight to the bar, I doubt I’ll get 3 more reps.” At that point, you stick at the already-completed weight and do one more set of 3. Hence 2×3.