No gym, no problem

Summer is here (well, thats the rumour anyway) and as the saying goes Suns out guns out. But what if you are carrying a set of glock 9mms instead of a couple of AK47s? What if you can’t afford a gym membership? Or maybe you are the outdoors type? Have no fear all you need is this quick guide, your body, a bar and a set of gymnastic rings to sculpt a body like a Greek God!!We will start from the top and work our way down. If you are not sure of what these exercises are, you will find them all on YouTube. (Over the coming weeks they will be found on my own YouTube channel, Pm Strength and Movement. I’m currently filming content for it)

1. Shoulders: crowstands, cranestands, handstand holds, handstand wall walks, handstand push ups.This list starts from the easiest and works up to the hardest. It doesn’t matter how bad you are when you start, you will find with regular practice, as little as 10 minutes a day, you can progress very quickly.These exercises will help you build strong and healthy shoulders. Also handstands are f**king awesome.

2. Chest & triceps: Plank hold push ups, elevated push up (hands on a bench) floor push up, feet elevated push up, ring push up, single arm push up, dips. When doing push ups make sure you get your chest to the floor each time and keep your body tense throughout. Dips build a great chest and strong arms. Once you have them on the parallel bars try them on rings and experience a game changer.

3. Back & biceps: Inverted row, hanging retractions, protractions, neutral grip chin ups, chin ups, pull ups, muscle ups, single arm pull ups.To build a strong back the pull up is king. If you can’t complete a single rep, begin with inverted rows. You can do all these exercises on both the rings and the bars. It is best to begin with the rings as they allow your body to move through its natural plane of motion. These exercises will also give the biceps a serious going over.

4. Abs: The list is endless but for bang for your buck exercises try a full body tension plank, crawling and hanging knee tucks or leg raises.The secret to a washboard stomach is a clean diet. (You can also use a barbell with a small plate on each end as a make shift ab wheel) Gymnastic ring work. Static holds like front and back levers and planche holds are killers on the abs but would be among the hardest moves to master.

 5. Ass and legs: Glute bridges, hip thrusts, prisoner squats, sprints, split squats, Bulgarian split squats,lunges, walking lunges, pistol squats.Your butt is the most powerful muscle you have, build it!! DO NOT SKIP LEG DAY. For everything from explosive power to fat loss, working your ass gets results faster.

6. Increase complexity: Once you can do a certain number of reps in an exercise, i.e. 20 tempo push up, 12 tempo pull ups, increase the difficulty instead of increasing the reps. There are numerous ways of doing this. Diamond push ups, ring push ups, wide grip pull ups, towel pull ups, they all will challenge your body differently. Each time you progress the exercise, the body has to adapt. As it does this it will make the previous exercise seem easier.

7. Met-cons: Finish your workout with a 5-10 minute met-con. This is a high intensity workout that will help speed your metabolism up. Keep it as simple as possible and try and add level changes into it.Burpees, mountain climbers, speed push ups, air squats, jumping lunges, grasshoppers, sprints. I can go on and on. Set a clock for 30-40 seconds intervals, pick two or three exercises and work at around 85-90% of your max effort for that time. Rest to work ratio should start the same and slowly decrease the rest time as the weeks go by. Air squats to push ups or burpees to grasshoppers are brutal sets because you are always changing levels.

8. Fat loss: Following simple rules for eating will help you burn more fat.Stick to whole food ingredients. If it comes in a packet or has more than four ingredients, don’t eat it.Try to eat vegetables with every meal.Stop drinking calories. The amount of hidden sugars found in carbonated drinks would frighten you. Try and stick to water. (Quick tip. Drinking ice water will drop the bodies temperature forcing it to burn more calories to regulate itself).Earn your carbs. Try and limit your carbs to evenings, ideally after training session. Carbs are not evil like people make out and the body needs them but if you can, focus on eating more fats and proteins in the morning and carbs in the evening.

9. Get more sleep: Most people don’t realise the importance of a good nights sleep.8 hours should be a minimum for everyone.Try taking magnesium before bed or have a bath with Epsom salt.Turn off the TV, phones and computers 30 minutes before bed and allow yourself some light reading to wind down.Sleep in a dark room, use a black out blind and ideally have electronic equipment out of the bedroom.

10. Enjoy it: Don’t become frustrated if things don’t go as fast as you want. Change takes time. The key is to be consistent. There will be days when life gets in the way, that’s ok shit happens. As Dan John says, just turn up. Get down and blast out a few push ups and pull ups. Grab the kids and go out and climb some trees, go for a walk or cycle and leave it at that. Learn to listen to your body. If you are genuinely very sore or sick then allow yourself to recover but don’t allow yourself to find reasons not to train.Follow these simple tips and you will find that getting the body you want is not that difficult at allThanks for reading

Pól