Posted on April 26, 2017 by Jenny Cromack
Because of my background in strength and conditioning and sport science, I am usually against ‘body-builder’ type workouts. I always recommend to my clients to train their whole body every workout. Firstly, it is much more functional and relateable to everyday life (when would you ever just use your biceps and triceps?). Secondly, it allows you to train each muscle or muscle group more than just one time per week.
Although the above is my usual philosophy, sometimes rules are there to be broken! So, I’ve created an awesome hybrid shoulder and core workout.
Another big belief of mine is to keep your training as varied as possible, as this will keep you engaged and on track. With variety, comes different modes of training and one of those could be splitting your training into alternating body parts throughout the week.
So how exactly would this look, well it is simple…..
Monday- Chest
Tuesday- Arms
Wednesday- Rest
Thursday- Shoulders
Friday- Legs
Saturday- Back
Sunday- Rest
Like I said, if I were to have my arm twisted and provide a programme focusing on a specific area or areas of the body, the workout I would select would probably be my hybrid shoulder and core workout, a secret favourite of mine. A great workout for building muscle cross-sectional area (hypertrophy) and muscle strength.
Hybrid Shoulder and Core Workout
Full warm-up protocol, following the raise, activate, mobilise and potentiate (RAMP) rules.
A1) Landmine strict single-arm press 8 × 4
B1) Rotational single-arm dumbbell press 8ea × 3
B2) Dumbbell single-arm farmer’s walks 20m ea × 3
C1) Bent over shoulder Y (with plates) 8
C2) Barbell rollouts 6 × 3
C3) Reverse dumbbell fly 8 × 3
D) Conditioning core circuit:
Strick inline bear crawl
Rainbow MB slams
Rope whips
ALL 30s on 30s off × 3
Another reason I would encourage this hybrid shoulder and core workout, is because a lot of the exercises are big compound movements using multiple joints at one time and therefore expending more energy.