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How to Start a Workout Routine for Women

By working out regularly, you can lose weight, build muscle, and improve your overall health and fitness. It is important to find a workout routine that works for your precise needs, though. To help you get started, check out the following helpful recommendations. 

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Before You Start a Workout…

Whatever type of workout routine you decide is right for your own level of fitness, you can increase performance or results with pre-workout supplements. When you start taking pre-workouts for women directly before a workout, you can increase your motivation and energy, burn more calories, and last longer. Caffeine is one the best types of pre-workout supplements to take, and it is readily available in tea and coffee too. Aim for a serving of caffeine between 150 and 225mg. Vitamins, minerals, and electrolytes can also help you to increase your energy, endurance, and hydration. Other great supplements that can boost your workout routine include l-citrulline, beta-alanine, and branched-chain amino acids. 

Begin with the Basics

If you are new to working out and trying to find the right routine for you, the best place to start is with bodyweight exercises. Most bodyweight exercises are compound ones, which means they work for multiple muscle groups simultaneously. Begin with basics like squatting, lunging, pressing, pushing, and rotating. They are great movements to do because they mimic how your body moves in everyday life. When you perform exercises like lunges, push-ups, and squats, you also work your core. By mastering basic exercises, you will establish the proper form and build a good foundation of strength for tackling more complex and demanding workouts. 

Group the Basic Exercises Together to Create a Workout Routine

While there are many specific workout routines you can follow, when you are just starting out, it is a good idea to first group the basic exercises you have been doing together and create an easy-to-follow workout routine. Do each move for a designated amount of time, and rest for a set amount of time in between each one. It is a good idea to select five or six moves that focus on different movement patterns. Do each one for forty-five seconds and rest for fifteen seconds between each move. Perform the routine three times for a fifteen-minute workout.

Cardio Workouts

The next step is to look at workout routines that target specific things. For instance, some workouts are designed to help you lose weight while others help you to gain muscle. Determine your own fitness goals so that you can determine the exact workouts you should be doing. Cardio workouts come highly recommended. The exercises use repetitive contractions of large muscle groups to get your heart beating fast. By regularly doing cardio workouts, you can strengthen your heart and your blood vessels. Try treadmills, stationary bikes, rowing machines, stair climbers, and elliptical machines at the gym, as they are perfect for cardio workouts. Start with a fifteen-minute routine using one or more of the above machines and then gradually increase both your time and the intensity of the workout.

Strength Training Workouts

If you want to build strength, perform a full-body workout routine. That could comprise of things like leg curls, leg presses, crunches, shoulder presses, back rows, and chest presses. If you are strength training for the first time, try beginning with two to three sets with eight to ten repetitions. Start with light weights and then gradually move to heavier ones and increase your amount of sets and reps. By getting into a strength training routine, you can increase muscle, improve your bone density, and speed up your metabolic rate. 

HIIT Workouts

When you get into the swing of things with your workout routines, you can move on to more intense workouts. One of the most popular workout routines for women is high-intensity interval training, which is known as HIIT for short. It involves short but intense bursts of exercise followed by less intensive activities. HIIT workouts are particularly good for losing weight and reducing belly fat. There are lots of different types of HIIT workouts. Consider beginning with this one using a treadmill:

  1. Warm up at an easy pace for three to five minutes.
  2. Run at a pace that is challenging for one minute.
  3. Walk or jog for two minutes.
  4. Repeat the block of exercises five times over a period of fifteen minutes. 
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