Learn How to Build Your Own Strength Workout

Hello! I am so glad that you are taking an interest in strengthening the miracle that is your body. When we use exercise to improve our functional fitness and strength, it is so much more fulfilling than working out solely to "get in shape". You can have BOTH, and in an efficient way.

This article is ideal for those of you who want to start strength training on your own, but are unsure of where to start. You can use this to help build out and structure your sessions, and choosing exercises that you enjoy from the database that I have used in my early days of working out.

These exercises can also be adapted to the equipment you have available to you. If you are unsure how to adapt them, reach out to me via DM on Instagram, or contact me via the contact box on my homepage!

A bit about me:

I am a certified Strength & Conditioning Coach. I come from a competitive Olympic Weightlifting background. Dabbled in mixed martial arts throughout my childhood, teens and early 20s, played basketball through my teens and 20s, and swam competitively throughout my childhood and early teen years.

I became interested in lifting weights when I was around 16-17 years old, and taught myself through various exercise articles and from the infamous, bodybuilding.com website. I would write my own programs, improving my strength in my tiny bedroom, using the furniture I had available, and the tiny dumb bells that I could afford with my pocket money. Eventually I got a gym membership, some personal training sessions, and built up from there before training under my Oly weightlifting coach from 2018- early 2022.

Now, part of what I do is writing custom strength programs for clients, based on where they’re at in the journey and what they have available to them.

With that all said, let’s get into it!

FIRSTLY — WHAT IS YOUR GOAL?

Your goal for strength training will determine the repetitions, weight and rest that you take in between sets. Please note that you will gain strength in all categories, but one element will be most improved than the others at any given rep/weight/rest range.

TERMINOLOGY:

• Reps - how many repetitions to be performed of the exercise.

• Sets - a group of repetitions.

• 1RM - 1 repetition max, which is the heaviest weight you can complete, of a given exercise. E.g. if the program calls for 70% of your 1RM back squat, and your best squat is 1 rep at 50kg. Then the prescribed weight would be 35kg (which is 70% of 50kg).

CAUTION:

If you are brand new to weight/strength training, I do not recommend that you do these type of workouts more than 2-3x per week to begin with, as your body needs time to adjust to the new stimulus. When starting out, I also recommend working with a trusted personal trainer, or coach to ensure you are performing movements safely and effectively.

THE TABLE EXPLAINED

The table below tells you how many reps, sets, weight and rest you should do, based on your specific strength goal. These ranges have been tried and tested with professional athletes. I recommend sticking with one category for a minimum of 4-6 weeks before moving onto a new category.

For example, if I wanted to really focus on putting muscle mass, I would program my workouts to be within the "hypertrophy" column, for at least 4 weeks. Increases in weights will likely occur as you get stronger, but do not rush the incremental weight increases.

Then, if I wanted to achieve more strength and power in my muscles, I would focus on that respective column for another 4 weeks.

NEVER SKIP YOUR WARM-UP

Warm-ups are important not just for your muscles, but for the little tendons and ligaments that don't get as much blood flow. This is how injuries happen. Warm-ups also gives your nervous system a chance to activate and "fire on all cylinders", so that you can not only get the most out of your workout, but perform the movements as effectively as possible. Again, reducing the likelihood of injury.

Ensure you are appropriately warm and have activated the required muscles that will be used in your session. There are plenty of general YouTube tutorials that can assist you with this, just search key terms such as "full body warm-up", "upper body warm up", "lower body warm up", depending on what body parts you are working out for the day.

If you are training for sports specific movements, or have known injuries, it is best that you do warm-ups that are more specific and targeted for your needs. I recommend working with a coach, or other professional to help you with this initially.

After your general warm-up, it is important to work up to your prescribed weight. For example, if you have programmed to do bench presses at 40kg. Your warm up should be incremental and slow, but not so slow that you gas yourself out before you even begin doing your prescribed working sets at 40kg.

You might want to do 2-3 (sometimes even 4) warm up sets. For example: 1 set with an empty barbell, 1 set @ 25kg, 1 set @ 32.5kg. Use discernment and listen to your body.

SELECTING EXERCISES

There are so many ways that you can choose to structure your workouts. Examples of how people like to structure workouts:
Push/pull/legs and ab days,
Upper body & core workout on one day, then a lower body workout on another,

Anterior (front) chain muscles on one day, then posterior chain muscles on other days. Sport's specific movements and training,
Movement categories: Explosive, Squat, Hinge, Push, Pull, Single Leg, Core, Rotational.

It really depends on you: your goals,

• how you like to exercise,

• how often you like to exercise,

• and how well you are eating to ensure adequate recovery.

When you decide how you would like to structure your splits, you can choose which exercises you want to do. In my early days, I used this exercise database from Bodybuilding.com, and various fitness magazines. The diagram on bodybuilding.com is particularly helpful in learning and understanding which muscle groups you are targeting with specific exercises.

Choosing between 4-6 exercises is usually a good place to start. You do not want to be exercising for too long - from a practical perspective, and also from a health perspective. Exercising for long periods (more than 60mins) and at a high intensity shortens your telomeres, which leads to cell damage, and thus ageing.

COOL DOWN STRETCHES

Are effective for winding down the nervous system and can feel good to the muscles. If you have any mobility/stretching exercises that you like to do, save them for this portion of your workout where your muscles, tendons and ligaments are warm.

You may like to use the sample exercise planner below.

Let me know how you go!

Was it tricky to design a program for yourself? Was it an empowering experience?

Is this something that you would like more help with so you can do for yourself, or do you prefer to have someone do this for you?

Happy lifting!

— Amya