Tips For More Time Efficient High Intensity Training Workouts

One of the biggest advantages of high intensity training over other training methods is that it allows you to stimulate improvements in all general, trainable factors of functional activity at once, and provides the same or better results with much less time. If you value your time, if you’d rather spend it with family and friends, pursuing recreational interests or hobbies, or doing work you are passionate about, you don’t want to spend more time working out than you have to for the best possible results. The following are a few tips for making your high intensity training workouts even more efficient.

Favor compound exercises over simple ones

Minimally, your workouts should include one set of at least one exercise for every major muscle group, and for muscles and muscle groups which are capable of producing movement in a variety of planes, two. Fewer exercises would not effectively work your whole body, and more exercises or sets can be counterproductive. With high intensity training, less is usually more.

Compound exercises should form the base of your workout, and include pushing and pulling exercises in both vertical and horizontal planes, and hip and thigh exercises that are both quad and glute and hamstring dominant. Round out your workout with simple exercises for muscle groups that aren’t effectively worked during the compound exercises like the neck flexors and extensors and calves, or muscle groups you are unable to work with compound exercises due to injury (for example, performing a leg curl, leg extension, and hip extension instead of squats or leg presses to work around a foot or ankle injury).

It also helps to compare the muscles targeted by each of your exercises in your workouts and cut redundant exercises or alternate between exercises with overlapping target muscles. Unless you’re doing a 3×3 workout and want some variety you don’t need to do chin-ups, close underhand-grip pull-downs, and parallel-grip pull-downs in the same workout.

Move quickly between exercises

I almost didn’t include this, as it seemed too obvious, but decided to add it any way because if I didn’t someone would probably end up asking about it. As a general rule, you should move slowly when performing exercises, but quickly between them. In addition to reducing your total workout time significantly, this appears to produce greater cardiovascular improvements than longer rest periods between exercises and will not interfere with muscular strength or size gains. You may not be able to use as much weight on subsequent exercises when you rush between them, but this will not negatively effect your results as long as your intensity of effort is high. You should move from one exercise to the next as quickly as you can without becoming light-headed, dizzy, or nauseated. If you start feeling any of these wait until it passes before starting your next exercise.

Use a workout chart

I almost didn’t include this as well, but since there are still a lot of people out there who don’t keep track of their workouts I also decided to include it. A workout chart is necessary to objectively evaluate performance between workouts and determine whether or what changes you might need to make to your program to optimize progress. If you’re not tracking your workouts you are probably wasting most of your time in the gym.

Having a well organized workout chart lets you know in advance exactly what exercises you’ll be doing, in what order, and how much weight you’re using for each. This removes any guesswork and gives you a plan to follow when you get to the gym.

Set up equipment in advance

This is much easier if you work out at home or can go to the gym during off-peak hours and don’t have to share equipment, but it is possible in a gym if you have a training partner. Unless you need a spot or assistance with forced reps, forced negatives, or other advanced high intensity training techniques, while you are performing an exercise your training partner should be setting up your next one and holding it for you. If the equipment you need for your next exercise is in use they should set up for the exercise after that, while keeping an eye on the equipment and going back to hold it for you if it is available before you finish your current exercise.

Unless you are both performing the exact same workout with similar weights if using free weights, it is more efficient for one of you to train first while the other spots, assists, and sets up equipment, then switch, than to both go through your workouts together.

If you have to perform your exercises out of sequence to avoid waiting for equipment record it on your workout chart. Since every exercise effects your ability to perform every subsequent exercise the order influences performance, and knowing it is necessary when comparing workouts and evaluating progress. The best way to record this is drawing squares in the upper-right corners of the weight/reps boxes and numbering the exercises in the order you performed them.

If you work out at home setting up equipment in advance is much easier, and can be made even more efficient by using quick adjust dumbbells like the Bowflex SelectTech, and if you are using the same bar or belt for multiple exercises loading it in a way that minimizes the amount of plates you need to move around between exercises. For example, if you are using the same forty five pound bar for both squats and standing presses, and you are using one hundred and forty pounds for the standing presses and three hundred twenty for squats, you would load the weight for the standing presses first, then add the extra forty five pound plates for the squats, so you only have to remove the two plates after squatting for the bar to be ready for pressing.

If your gym has good selectorized machines, use them

It takes much less time to move a machine’s weight stack selector pin and adjust the position settings than it does to load and unload barbell plates, especially for compound exercises which require more weight. However, if a machine doesn’t feel right or if it is too small or big for you to fit or properly position yourself on, use free weights instead. If you prefer to work out at home and have the budget and space having even just a basic line of machines – leg press, pull-down, chest press, compound row, overhead press, trunk extension – can cut your workout times down considerably.

This is an extremely important consideration when equipping a personal training studio. While free weights and plate loaded machines are less expensive than good selectorized machines like Nautilus and MedX, if you’re training a dozen or more clients a day you don’t want to be loading and unloading bars or plate-loaded machines all day long. It’s not just inefficient, it can also be very hard on your shoulders, especially for females and older instructors.

Use bodyweight exercises

Many bodyweight exercises require no equipment at all, and when equipment is required it usually needs little or no adjustment, so it takes almost no time to move between them. You can substitute exercises like chin-ups and dips for pull-downs and chest presses, or even do your entire workout with bodyweight.

Keep track of workout duration

In addition to recording basic information like the date of your workout, the weight used, and the repetitions or TUL performed for each exercise, I like to record the start and end time of my workouts so I can compare the duration. The better your conditioning the more quickly you will be capable of moving between exercises, so this should also be considered a measure of workout performance and progress.

If you have a tip to add or questions about any of the above, please post them in the comments.