The ultimate beach-body workout

Get ripped for the beach in six weeks with this simple routine

Get a beach body in your lunch hour

Will you be ready to unveil your abs when the summer sun finally emerges? The workouts are relatively short so you should be able to squeeze them into a lunch hour if necessary. They are also grouped by movement rather than muscle group, so if the gym is busy you can quickly choose another exercise. Whether you're vacationing, staycationing, or just want a great new routine, read on for your foolproof plan to a stacked summer.

The routine

This routine is designed to strip away body fat, define your chest, abs, shoulders and arms, as well as sending your strength level soaring. Combine it with a decent diet for six weeks and you'll have a beach-ready body to be proud of.

Monday: Resistance Workout 1
Tuesday: Cardio (30-45 minutes steady-state cardio at 80-85% maximum heart rate – eg. cycling or running)
Wednesday: Rest
Thursday: Resistance Workout 2
Friday: Cardio (20-30 minutes of interval training)
Saturday: Rest
Sunday: Freestyle cardio

Pragmatic performance

The way this routine works is that you can use any exercise that fits the bill. For example, with the horizontal row you can substitute any horizontal rowing movement (e.g. seated row, dumbbell row, inverted bodyweight row). So if the bench-press station, for example, is busy, you can just use the machine press or dum-bell press instead. If all the horizontal pressing equipment is busy, you can just do press-ups instead. Feel free to change the days to suit your schedule, but try to leave at least two days between the resistance workouts.

How do you do supersets?

Using the first superset in Resistance Workout 1 as an example...

1. Start with the bench press (or any horizontal pushing exercise) and do 6-8 repetitions.
2. Then, move straight to the dumbbell row (or any horizontal pulling exercise) and perform another 6-8 repetitions.
3. Rest for 60-90 seconds.
4. Repeat for the prescribed number of sets.

You'll be using supersets to increase the intensity of your workout. These involve moving quickly from one exercise to another, with little or no rest between. Rather than resting between sets, you perform an exercise for another muscle group. Compared to workouts that involve resting for several minutes between sets, supersets allow you to get twice as much work done in the same amount of time.

Resistance workout 1

Deadlift 3 sets x 6-8 repetitions (rest for 2 minutes between sets)

SUPERSET 1
4 sets x 6-8 repetitions
Horizontal push (e.g. bench press)
Horizontal pull (e.g. dumb-bell row)

SUPERSET 2
2 sets x 12-15 repetitions
Vertical pull (e.g. lat pulldown)
Vertical push (e.g. overhead press)

SUPERSET 3
2 sets x 12-15 repetitions
Face Pulls
Bent Over Lateral Raise

CORE
2-3 sets x 8-10 repetitions
Ball rollouts

2-3 sets x 12-15 repetitions
Reverse Ab Curl

Resistance workout 2

Barbell squat 3 sets x 12-15 repetitions (rest for 60-90 seconds between sets)

SUPERSET 1
4 sets x 6-8 repetitions
Vertical pull (e.g. pull-up)
Vertical push (e.g. seated dumbbell press)

SUPERSET 2
2 sets x 12-15 repetitions
Horizontal push (e.g. incline dumbbell press)
Horizontal pull (e.g. seated cable row)

SUPERSET 3
3 sets x 8-10 repetitions
Incline Dumbbell Curl
Triceps Pressdown

CORE
2-3 sets x 8-10 repetitions
Woodchopper

2-3 sets x 12-15 repetitions
Swiss Ball Crunch

With both workouts, rest for 2 minutes after completing the low rep (6-8) sets and for 1 minute after completing the high rep (8-10 and 12-15) sets.

Finally, for the 'freestyle' cardio on Sunday, you could go for a long walk, play some sport or just do the same thing as you did in the week. It's up to you.
Happy honing.

Get a six-pack in four weeks

This workout can get you the body you want in four weeks

Sculpting a decent four-pack requires tenacity, but it's carving out your lower abs to complete "the six" that really takes some dedication. And not just in the gym. You can’t out-train a bad diet. Forget what you think you need to do to pack muscle on your midriff and combine this simple nutritional rules with workout routine to get great definition in just four weeks.

Diet

Use this 10 simple nutritional tenets to supercharge your core musculature. Employ these dietary changes and you’ll spark up your metabolic rate and get your mid-section functioning correctly.

1. Avoid refined and processed foods wherever possible.

2. Try to eat six times a day – around every three hours.

3. With every meal, use a portion of protein as your base. Think eggs, fish, chicken, and other lean meats.

4. Between meals snack on nuts, seeds, avocado, olives, or small bags of snap peas.

5. For breakfast and your second meal, make sure you get some starchy carbs – oatmeal, rye, or sprouted bread – and a piece of fruit.

6. For lunch, sweet or regular potato, brown rice and quinoa are all excellent options.

7. For your evening meal, try to get some veg – but avoid root veg and any starchy carbs.

8. Drink lots of water.

9. Every 10 days give yourself one cheat meal. It can be anything you want. This might seem strict, but if you’re trying to reveal your abs in just four weeks such gastronomic sacrifices are necessary.

10. Consume a post-workout shake as soon as possible after your workout. Aim for around 40-50g carbs and 20-30g protein. “This stabilises your hormonal system to enable tissue regeneration and keeps blood sugar stable,” explains Learney.