Total-Body U-Turn Workout
by Kathy Smith
IT’S TIME TO U-TURN YOUR WORKOUT with this 15-min density circuit to tone every inch of your body.
What’s a “density circuit?” It means that you include just a few moves in your circuit, so you can pack a lot of movement into your 15 minutes!
Doing this lets your body train longer with less fatigue and more movement quality. And you know what that means…the more moves you can fit in during a 15-minute pre-shower workout, the better your metabolism-boosting results.
What makes the workout a U-Turn?
You start the workout off by doing 5 moves in sequential order. For the next round, you reverse the order, or in other words, you U-Turn.
Here’s how it works..
- Complete 15 reps of each move
- Do two rounds. Here’s where the U-Turn comes in…For the 1st round, complete moves #1-5. For the second round, do the sequence backwards and complete moves #5-1
- Repeat for 15 minutes!
- Start in plank position, but this time, rest on your elbows instead of your hands. Be sure to keep the shoulders depressed back and down and the neck nice and long throughout the movement.
- Keeping your abs engaged, slowly swivel the hips underneath you to the right. Feel your obliques driving this motion as you swivel to the other side with a slow, controlled motion.
- Holding a dumbbell in each hand, step your left foot directly behind you, taking a wide stance, and bend your legs, lowering your torso down into a lunge. Be sure and maintain that core stability to prevent injury.
- While in lunge position, keep your shoulders over your hips, back knee slightly bent, front knee in alignment with your front toes, shoulders back and down.
- Feel your weight in your right (front) heel as you push yourself to standing.
- As you return to standing, do a tricep kickback: Reach your arms back behind you and extend, feeling a squeeze in the tricep.
- Stand with dumbbells in each hand in hammerhead position, with palms facing each other.
- Step out to the right side, with a wide stance. Bend the right leg and lower your hips down as you keep the left leg straight out to the side, feeling a slight stretch in the left inner thigh.
- Pressing off the right foot, keeping your core engaged, push yourself back up to standing.
- As you return to standing, curl the weights up toward your shoulders, squeezing the muscles on the front of the arms for a bicep curl.
- Rest dumbbells on your hips as you place your left foot behind you. Instead of stepping directly back, the left foot should move diagonally back, with the back knee bending down directly outside the right foot
- Fire up the core muscles as you squat down with the right leg, feeling the emphasis on your right glute (weight placed firmly in the right heel) as the left foot lightly supports you.
- As you return to standing, bring the left foot forward, landing with a wide stance.
- Punch the right hand across your body, toward the left wall, allowing your right foot to rotate as your torso twists to the left, engaging your right glute.
- Squat down to rest both hands on the floor, similar to the Mountain Climber move. But instead of lunging one leg back behind you, jump both legs at the same time into a plank position.
- Return to standing, and reach up to the sky.
Kathy Smith, New York Times bestselling author, has stood at the forefront of the fitness and health industries for over 30 years. The numbers speak for themselves: Kathy has sold more than 20 million exercise DVDs - landing her in the Video Hall of Fame - and $500 million in Kathy Smith products. With her revolutionary approach to fitness, Smith has touched millions of people, inspiring them to move, live, and love.
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