Consider COMPLEXES:
It’s simple: take one barbell (or a set of dumbbells or even a kettlebell) move it around without ever putting it down and you’ll work your ENTIRE body.
DON’T underestimate its power to not only get you stronger, but they will shatter any and all of your fat loss plateaus, too.
Your workouts need to be structured so that you get the best benefit, set your body up to burn calories (you already know this as the “afterburn”) and AVOID overuse injury.
After all, you can go into any gym and do a complex, but destroy your shoulders or other body part, possibly get injured and have minimum results. That’s why you’re here.
You’re looking for structure… something that will give you results without getting injured or without living at the gym for 90 minutes a day.
Complexes are like High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) with MORE benefits.
Let me explain…
I love HIIT, but let’s face it, you can get too much of a good thing. If you notice that you’re feeling your performance is lacking, you’re getting weaker, losing muscle and generally just looking ‘soft’, it may be time to put HIIT on vacation for a while and add more strength building to your plan. That’s where complexes come in. If you LOVE doing HIIT, but aren’t gaining the benefits of it as you think you should, complexes will solve that problem.
Cardio of the long, slow intensity sort is not only BORING, its counter productive. For one reason, studies have shown that appetite can be increased with low intensity cardio so you’re not only wasting your precious time, you’re setting yourself up to fail on your nutrition plan too.
On the other hand, there’s ONE secret about complexes that most people don’t even know (including trainers):
Because of the nature of the complex, you go from one exercise to the next with zero transition time. That means an elevated heart rate without any down time.
No downtime = an even FASTER metabolism
And you already know the “holy grail” of fat burning is your metabolism. If your metabolism is not at its peak… your fat burning ability is not at its peak.
They work hand in hand.
And because you’re actually using resistance, you’ll build muscle. You already know that, too. So it’s the best of all three worlds…
Boost Metabolism
Builds Muscle
Burns Fat
But…
• As a replacement for boring cardio
• As a conditioning tool for sports
• As an off-day “bonus” workout
You need to know how to put complexes together…What exercises? How many reps? How many sets?
Let me explain…
Despite the fact that they’re named ‘complexes’, movements done in a complex should be fairly simple. Stick to the basics. Your primary concern is to maintain exercise FORM. In general, ensure that exercise form is never compromised.
To add additional challenge, add load or reduce rest instead of increasing speed on exercises. You see, this is the #1 mistake you see in gyms all over the world when it comes to complexes.
“You Must Go Faster” is the mantra… and it’s a disaster wreaking havoc on your core, back and shoulders.
Usually what will happen in an effort to improve number of reps or rounds, you’ll shortchange yourself in terms of workout form. This not only lessens the effectiveness of your workout, it sets you up for injury. You’ll want to use a full range of motion on all exercises, quality reps over quantity of reps is your goal.
Some complexes are done AMRAP (As Many Reps as Possible) style or with timed sets.
BUT, BE CAREFUL. DO NOT rush these complexes. A worthy goal would be to match the number of rounds you’ve previously done with a heavier load instead of increasing the number of reps or rounds.
There are many benefits of complexes, one of which is the time the workout takes to do. No one can ever use the excuse that they don’t have ‘time’ to do a workout. A super effective fat burning, muscle building and fat blasting workout can be accomplished in less than 20 minutes…
… when the workout structure is right and I’ve got you covered here. Read on…
Since the nature of complexes is such that there’s little rest between exercises, you significantly lighten the load on all lifts. This provides an opportunity to perfect lifting technique while still providing a challenge for you body.
A complex will work more specifically on muscular strength and endurance. You’ll surprise yourself at how ‘heavy’ relatively light weights will feel in the midst of a complex workout.
Like I said ealier… the exercises are simple… but the workouts are HARD. But I can promise you this, they will strip off body fat and build rock solid muscles in no time flat.
See, when doing a complex, your muscles fatigue in a way that they wouldn’t if you were doing a single movement. That’s what complexes are all about – pick up the weight and working the entire body through multiple exercises without ever putting the weight down.
So, you’ll add load, you’ll build muscle, but you’ll need significantly LESS weight than with typical lifting because once you pick up that load you’re not going to put it down until you finish the total body complex set that I’ve designed for you.
This allows you to train with very little equipment and still get amazing results. You can get away with a few sets of dumbbells, possibly one barbell and a kettlebell.
Who needs all that equipment and weight in a gym?
Hard lifts first
Avoiding injury is KEY to any program. I’ve got you covered here. You’ll perform the more difficult lifts earlier in the complex to avoid injury or sloppy technique. You’ll need more strength and concentration for more technically difficult exercises; I’ve put them in the complex at the start or just after a rest in the series so you can do these with precision.
Up and down
On full body complexes, you’lI alternate upper and lower body exercises so that you can give your grip a rest.
This is just one “hidden gem” inside my complexes so that you can squeeze out 1-2 more quality reps, taxing your muscles more so that you BURN more.
When alternating between upper and lower body exercises, half the body ‘rests’ while the other half of the body works. By the end of the workout, you’ll be able to demand more from yourself. I refer to this as workout density: getting more work done in less time.
Limit upper body complexes
Typically you will be limited by grip strength when doing upper body complexes exclusively. The upper body doesn’t have the same endurance as the lower body.
You’ll see that upper body exercises are certainly thrown into a complex, but I’ve concentrated on full body complexes or even lower body complexes since the lower body tends to be able to tolerate complex work better. You’ll get a better workout and have a lowered injury risk rate when you stick to full body or lower body complexes.
This is probably one of the biggest mistakes I see in those popular complex “classes”. I’ll show you just the right combination of exercises to get maximum results.
Flow
This is really the “secret sauce” to a structured complex.
Movements need to flow from one to the next. You’ll notice that with my complexes, that one exercise flows fairly seamlessly into the other. You won’t have to put a bar down and go find a pull up bar or set of DB’s. Each exercise leads to the next and there will be a minimal amount of time needed to change exercises. Maintaining a good rhythm in the complex is important.
Load it up
When I considered flow, I wanted to ensure that you wouldn’t have to stop to load or unload weights. That would really kill the workout if you had to continually stop.
That rips out the BEST benefit of a complex. You don’t want that.
Whether you’re doing a DB, BB or even KB exercise, you’ll see that you’ll use pre-fatiguing techniques so that on some lifts a lighter load will feel significantly heavier due to the order of the exercises.
Typically the load for the complex will be limited by the weakest exercise, which is often an upper body exercise. For example, what you can bicep curl and squat will vary drastically. I use complex movements versus single joint movements for this reason. However, on occasion, you’ll see that I’ve thrown in some single joint exercises. These tend to be less exhausting and are almost like active rest in the set.
Now, I’ll cut to the chase and tell you that you may not be ready for complexes. So before you read on, I’ll need two commitments from you, OK?
#1 – Your form must be SPOT ON. I take issue with other fitness programs that encourage poor form in an effort to beat a previous record. (You probably know what I’m talking about here.)
Don’t be that person.
# 2 – Use the load I recommend so that you don’t hurt yourself, but at the same time, you won’t reach for the pink vinyl 3-pound dumbbells that you see on TV. Like anything else, fitness doesn’t happen by just going through the motions. You need to push the weight all the while keeping principle one (FORM) in mind.
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