Your Goal
Exercise five days a week for 35 to 50 minutes a day, completing cardio and strength training in the same session.
Cardio
Keep your walk or jog to 20 minutes, but ramp up the intensity and speed as you aim to travel an extra half mile. Bonus: Try mantra meditation, in which you repeat a mantra in your mind, for the duration of your walk or jog. Whenever something else comes to mind (Did the caterer reply to my email?), simply release the thought and return to repeating your mantra.
Strength Training
This week, you'll add two new moves and increase the reps or duration of the exercises from the first portion of the plan.
- Crunches: Do 25 reps of a tabletop crunch, 25 reps on each side of a bicycle crunch with hold, then 25 tabletop crunches to complete the set. That's a total of 100 crunches.
- Superman: Do two reps, holding for 30 seconds each.
- Plank: Do three reps, holding for one minute each. (For increased difficulty, try a plank with knee tap.)
- Bridge: Do three reps, holding for one minute each.
- Push-ups: Do three sets of 15 to 20 reps. Beginners should start with a knee push-up to get the form right.
- Squat holds: Do three reps of a basic squat, holding the squat for 30 to 45 seconds each.
- Triceps dips: Do three sets of 10 to 15 reps each.
