Push the limits on your strength, speed, and endurance in this 5-day total body challenge designed to improve one of the most popular performance goals for athletes and fitness enthusiasts alike: get faster.
Who is this challenge for?
This challenge is for anyone looking to test their strength, speed, and stamina! From recreational athletes looking for a training edge to help outperform their competitors to anyone invested in expanding their physical capabilities, this short challenge is a great way to kickstart and benchmark your improvements across several fitness modalities.
Power is a combination of speed and strength and directly affects athletic performance as well as the ease with which you complete your daily activities. Just as your body is a kinetic chain of interconnected muscles, tendons, and joints, training efforts in one discipline impact your performance across the board. Therefore, even if your training has a primary focus (such as strength training), your proficiency in this target area is affected by your capabilities across a variety of fitness modalities. Thus, you have the opportunity to lift heavy (improve strength), move quickly (improve speed), and get your lungs burning (improve endurance) in this 5-day endeavor.
What to expect
The challenge breakdown is as follows:
- Day 1 = lower body strength + power
- Day 2 = upper body strength + burnout rounds
- Day 3 = total body speed, agility, and core
- Day 4 = total body strength (lower and upper body split)
- Day 5 = total body endurance and core
Select your heaviest weight selections for each exercise during the strength-focused workouts (Days 1, 2, and 4). Day 3 will test your coordination with athletic drills-inspired exercises, and you finish out the challenge with a test of your endurance on Day 5 with long intervals of cardio and high-reps strength exercises.
Note that this is a high-energy demand challenge! All workouts are a level 4 averaging about 45 minutes a day. Don’t be afraid to add recovery days between workouts if needed, take at least a day or two off from intense workouts after completing the challenge, and make sure you’re fully recovered before repeating the challenge. This is a fun challenge to repeat at least two to three times a quarter (two to three times within a three-month timespan) and note your progress.
Equipment needed
A set of light, moderate, and heavy weights relative to what challenges your upper/lower body muscles are recommended for this challenge — Day 3 is the only bodyweight-only workout. A mat is also a good idea for core/floor exercises if you’re working out on a hard or slippery surface. You might also want to bring along a sweat rag unless you have a personal assistant at the ready to mop up your sweat puddles (I don’t have one…yet…).
Enjoy (safely) pushing yourself throughout this challenge! Find a sense of success in the journey itself and don’t get too bogged down in performance metrics. Improvements aren’t always found in heavier weights or faster movements. If you start looking forward to your workouts rather than dreading them, you’ve made tons of progress.