Tag: full body workout

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This Group Fitness Instructor’s True Love? Resistance Band Workouts

Fitness instructor loves resistance band workouts

This Valentine’s Day, I can’t help but celebrate all of my loves. And let me tell you, I love a lot of things. Sweet potatoes. Margaritas. Hi-rise leggings. Ponytails that don’t pinch. Words that stick. But, at the top of my list of loves this year? Resistance band workouts.

I know I talk about resistance bands all the time, but they are seriously the perfect exercise tool to use in your next fitness class. Resistance bands are great, because everyone in a class full of varying fitness levels can pretty much all use the same resistance band and get a good workout. The bands have so much versatility — they help us get a full body workout, especially when mixed with bodyweight exercises.

When leading your class through resistance band workouts, instruct participants to first inspect their band for rips or tears to prevent the band from breaking during the exercise. Then, grab the band and get started.

Here are my five favorite exercises that you should include as part of your upcoming resistance band workouts.

  1. Lunge with Reverse Fly

Resistance band workouts: lunge with reverse fly
Grab the band in both hands and extend your arms out in front of you so the band is already taunt. Step out with one foot, and bend both knees to lower into your lunge, while also bringing your arms away from each other. Remember to keep your elbow slightly bent, but you don’t move at the elbow joint in this exercise. Instead, you’re moving at the shoulder joint to bring your arms further apart.

  1. Push-ups

Resistance band workouts: push-up
Wrap the band around your back and put your hands over the band securely. If it bothers participants to rub the band against their body, they can either put a towel between their clothes and the band or they can do push-ups without the band. From there, do push-ups as you normally would. The most important part is to make sure that the band is taunt when you’re in the plank position at the top of the push-up.

  1. Squat with Overhead Press

Resistance band workouts: squat with overhead press
Place the band underneath the arch of your shoes for one or both feet. Then grab the handles and bring your arms up so that your palms face away from your body. If this makes the resistance too heavy, then you can leave the band by your sides as you squat. You can also do one arm at a time. If this makes the resistance to weak, you can “choke up” on the band and grab the band itself until it feels more challenging.

Squat with your hands by your shoulders, and as you stand bring your arms overhead in an overhead press.

  1. Side lunge with Bicep Curl

Resistance band workouts: side lunge with bicep curl
Place the band underneath the arches of both shoes with your hands in the handles by your sides. Step out to one side, keeping the band under the arch, and bend into a side lung with one leg bent and the other straight. Then, come back to standing with your feet together and bring your arm into a bicep curl.

  1. Tricep Extensions

Resistance band workouts: tricep extensions
Place the handle in one hand, then swing the band behind your back and grab the band with the other hand. The more you “choke up” on the band, the more challenging it will be and vice versa. Bend your elbow so that it faces the front of the room with your hand behind your head. Then, keep your elbow where it’s at and bring your hand up to the ceiling.

Make sure to switch and do the other side for this exercise and the others that are unbalanced left side to right.

These five exercises will give your class a full body resistance band workout. For more exercise ideas, check out the workout routines page.

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A Full Body Workout for Group X Strength Classes

Full Body Workout

I like to get the biggest bang for my buck when I strength train. So, I’ll often do compound exercises, which involve more than one muscle group to get a full body workout faster. I typically take a similar strategy in my Group X classes. Since weights in group fitness studios are usually lighter, they work well for endurance strength exercises engaging upper and lower body at the same time. As you know, there are so many ways to work the same muscle, and now here’s a look at how to work more than one muscle at once.

Introducing Compound Exercises for a Full Body Workout

What’s great about most compound exercises is that you can add in options to support many different fitness levels. My favorite compound exercises involve two doing two exercises simultaneously. So, when teaching these to your class, let participants know the simplest way to ease into it is just to do one of the two movements.

Plie Squat with Bicep Curls

A full body workout with plie squats and bicep curls

To do a plie squat, point your toes towards the corners of the room, making sure that your knees are comfortable the whole time. Then, you’ll bend at the knee to lower your hips. Your goal is to get your hips in line with your knees, so that your legs look more like a box than a house. Keep the shoulders over the hips the whole time. The shoulders DO NOT come forward like they do in a traditional squat.

Adding on, participants can start to do a bicep curl as they come down. Other options include bringing the feet together while doing just bicep curls, doing the compound exercises without holding dumbbells or just doing the plie squat.

Plie Hold and Bicep Pulse

A full body workout with plie hold and bicep pulses

On your last one, hold the plie squat at the bottom and pulse the bicep curls up towards the ceiling. You can also pulse the curls toward the wall in front of you. Or, hold the curls and pulse the legs.

Plie Squat and Bicep Hold

A full body workout with bicep hold and plie squats

Then, you can transition to doing plie squats with an isometric bicep hold. You can also do this vice versa with an isometric plie hold and bicep curls.

Side Lateral Raise Lunge

A full body workout with side lateral raise lunge

After the plie lunge sequence, plant one foot forward and one back, ready to do lunges. Start lunges, keeping both knees between your toes and feet wide apart. Also think about bending that back knee. Both knees should be in 90 degree angles. And, shoulders are still right over the hips, NOT leaning forward.

From there, add a side lateral raise with a dumbbell in hand. Keep your elbow slightly bent and raise your arm to the side. Your arm should come roughly to shoulder or ear height. Make sure that you’re not bending your elbow too much.

Lunge hold and tricep extensions

A full body workout with lunge hold and tricep extensions

Hold your weight(s) so that your hands are right next to each other at your belly button. Sink into an isometric lunge, holding the lunge when your legs are in 90 degree angles. From there, bring your weights up overhead to do tricep extensions. Bending at the elbow, bring your weights behind you, pointing your elbows towards the wall in front of you. Then, extend your arms overhead, keeping your elbows in the same spot the whole time.

Your options here are just to do the isometric hold for the lunge, or just tricep extensions. You can also play around with using one weight or two.

Since this full body workout focuses on compound exercises, it’s a quick one to complete. This is a great opportunity to work a ton of muscles at the same time in your Group X class, so that participants get a lot out of it. For more exercise ideas, check out the workout routines and playlists page.