Shoulder Progession Circuit

Life can be hectic. You don't always have an hour or two to devote to working out. So what are some ways to get in a butt kicking workout but in a short amount of time? There are lots of ways, HIIT is definately one of them, but circuits are a great way too!

Saturday I was in a rush to get my workout done. I had plans and got a late start to my day. So I needed to hit shoulders, abs, and cardio and I only had one hour, no more! Here is how I got that done!

For my shoulders I decided to do a progessive approach to my workout. This helps get in a fare share amount of exercises, in a short amount of time, while still fatiguing the muscle.

Make sure to warm up the shoulders for 5-10 minutes. This can be done with shoulder circles, internal and external rotation, stretching, and foam rolling.

The goal here is to progessiviely add additional reps and additional exercises as you progress through the circuit. So for example, set one begins with one exercise, low reps. Set 2 will have two exercises, but the first exercise will require more reps to complete. Go ahead and just add 5 reps to each exercise each set for a good progression. Set three..3 exercises, etc etc. I completed 5 sets here. You need to make sure each set is difficult so choose weight appropriately. Obviously you won't be able to get 25 reps of something you did for 5 reps, so lower the weight to make each set challenging, but able to complete WITHOUT JEOPARDIZING FORM! Try for zero rest in between sets. The video below is of the shoulder circuit, set 5. (Face pulls not recorded) As you can tell I am struggling to not rest between sets but I powered through. This video is sped up, and I apologize for my awkward facial expressions, haha.

Routine:

Set 1

Barbell Clean & Press, 5 reps

Set 2

BB Clean & Press, 10 reps

BB Upright row, 5 reps

Set 3

BB Clean and Press, 15reps

BB Upright Row, 10 reps

Front Plate Raises, 5 reps

Set 4

BB Clean and Press, 20 reps

BB Upright Row, 15 reps

Front Plate Raises, 10 reps

DB Lateral Raises, 5 reps

Set 5

BB Clean and Press, 25 reps

BB Upright Row, 20 reps

Front Plate raises, 15 reps

DB Lateral Raises, 10 reps

Face Puls, 15 reps

Cardio and Abs

At this point, my shoulders were shot and I only had 20 minutes to get cardio and abs done. So here came the HIIT routine. I set my treadmill to sprint level 8.5-9.0. I obviously did this workout in my studio so I can get away from this, but most gyms won't have a problem with this. Ether way you can swap this part out for jump rope, sled, or some plyos.

The goal here is to sprint for 30 seconds, then jump off and do an ab exercise for 30 seconds, and then continue to sprint. I did this for 20 minutes and I was wiped! I changed up my ab exercises from rope cable crunches, to hanging knee raises, to planks!

Hope this helps get your sweat on!

Hope you all have a great week!