This morning Lee and I got up ready to conquer the world, or at least conquer our workout. We were a little sore from our kick boxing yesterday but that never stops us.
Shoulders and chest were the focus this morning. We started the workout with a 5 minute warm up. This was similar to yesterdays warm up. We mixed in jumping jacks, burpees, push-ups, mountain climbers, and body squats. It’s a sure way to get your heart pumping real quick.
The first leg of the workout consisted of four stations. Instead of having a time limit at each station, we just completed a number of reps. We circled through each station four time. Here is how it went:
Station one: Using a two cable pull-down lat machine, we did ten reps of rows from a squat position. Good form meant keeping your chest out, shoulders down, and pinching your shoulder blades together on each row.
Station two: Here we set up two 10 inch aerobic step pads a little wider than shoulder width apart. We did an exploding push-up from the ground, ending with our hands on the step pads, and walking our hands back down to the ground. We did 15-20 reps, to exhaustion if possible.
mma routine, cable machine
Station three: Here we used the pulley machine. We positioned the arms to do a push/pull movement, left arm pushing forward and up while the right arm pulled down and back. Good form, again, meant keeping your chest out and shoulders down. If you are tall, squat a little so the cable doesn’t rub against your arm. We completed 15 reps at this station.
Station four: This station was the same as station three, only the movements were reversed. Here the right arm pushed forward and up while the left arm pulled down and back. To avoid having to reposition the pulley machine arms from station three each time, we just used another pulley machine to do station four. Again, we did 15 reps at this station.
The second leg of this workout consisted of only two stations. We rotated through each of these stations three times.
Station one: Here we used a pilates ball and two 3 lb. hand weights. We laid on our stomach with the ball under our hips and the weights in each hand. The movement starts with your arms hanging down doing a rowing motion so your arms are out and elbows bent 90 degrees hanging down. From there you rotate your arms up 90 degrees, keeping your elbows in position and then press your arms up over your head similar to a military press motion. Reverse the motion and you’ve got it. Using 3 lb. weights might not seem like a lot, but it will work your rotator cuff like crazy. I promise, if you are doing it right it will burn really quick. We did 10 reps of this.
Station two: For this station all we needed were two dumbbells. I used two 17.5 lb dumbbells. Lee used 15 lb dumbbells for the first two sets, but raised it to 20 lb dumbbells for the third set cuz he felt like a wussy. This was a balancing row exercise. We balanced on one foot, bent over and extended the other leg back straight. From there we did 10 rows with the dumbbells. Good form meant pinching your shoulder blades together and keeping your chest out. We did 10 reps balancing on each leg.
This might not seem like a lot to do in one workout, but believe me, Lee and I were pretty beat after that workout. The key is to maintain good form throughout each exercise. It is so tempting to cheat (since it’s way easier to do) but you will never work out the right muscles and never get stronger.
MMA Workouts 