Last year I decided to purchase a body bar for our home gym. If you haven’t seen these before imagine a weighted broom handle, the one I got was 20 lbs and I decided that this week I’d share a workout I did with the body bar. If you’re looking to get your own body bar I recommend the Cap Barbell brand or weighted bars (Amazon affiliate link), and I’ll be uploading a review on mine soon. So here is the workout video I uploaded to YouTube, remember to subscribe to my channel for instant updates when I upload a video.
So breaking down the workout first up we have 45 seconds of a FRONT SQUATS. As I do a lot of back squats in BodyPump I like to mix things up out of class and decided on front squat. Take the bar across the chest, supporting the weight with the crossed arms. Feet slightly wider than hips and toes out slightly. Sit down into the squat keeping the chest up. Aim for hip crease below parallel.
After the squats time to keep the burn in the legs with LATERAL JUMPS. Place the bar on the floor and then jump over side to side. Be sure to land simultaneously with both feet and soft knees. 45 seconds should be all you need to fire up the heart rate!
After getting the heart rate up, back to strength and more side movements with LATERAL LUNGES. I show two variations in the video but my favorite is the one below with the rotation. Start standing with the bar resting on the floor, parallel to the body, holding the top of the bar. Step the right leg out to the right side into a lunge, while releasing the bar to the right foot with the left hand. Pull the bar up and step back to standing, repeat for 45 seconds, ensuring you alternate sides.
For another pumper it’s a 45 second burst of PUSH PRESS. Standing with feet slightly wider than hips, bring the bar to a rack position at the chest. Bend the knees, and explode up pushing the bar overhead. Make the movement come from the lower body to push that bar overhead.
After four exercises standing time to come down to the floor for some core with this CANOE PADDLE. 45 seconds of this is tough with a 20lb bar, so try it without if you need to. Sit down with the bar in the hands. Tilt the upper body backwards and then use the bar to paddle that ‘canoe’, bringing the bar to alternating sides, parallel to the body. Harder: feet up off the floor as shown below.
Lastly time for arms with these SKULLCRUSHERS. 45 seconds of arm isolation. Begin lying on your back with the bar extended away from the body, narrow grip on the bar and hands above the shoulders. Bend at the elbow to bring the bar down towards the forehead, bringing elbows to 90°. Keep the core engaged.
With 15 seconds of rest between exercises this should take 6 minutes. Repeat for multiple sets if you have more time.
Let me know in the comments if you tried the workout!