30 Minute Workout to Hit Every Muscle Group

By Mark de Grasse

Sometimes it can be difficult to know how to balance your gym or at home workouts, whether cardio or strength. Some people seem to have a natural organized tendency when it comes to working lower body Monday, back on Tuesday, upper body on Wednesday, core on Thursday, or whatever their schedule may entail.

However, if that is not you, you are not alone! Many people struggle with finding a good workout routine as well as the time and energy to complete their workouts.

Here is the good news--with these 30-minute exercises to hit every muscle group, you will not only work your entire body, burn calories, and break a major sweat, but it will only take a few minutes of your time and will leave your body feeling healthier, happier, and ready to take on the rest of your day.

What Are the Benefits of Physical Activity?

There are many benefits to physical activity, whether it's strength training, high-intensity interval training (HIIT), or yoga. Some benefits include:

Supporting cardiovascular health
Maintaining healthy levels of blood sugar
Supporting bone health
Supporting joint and cartilage function
Easing feelings of stress and tension, supporting emotional well-being, and relaxing the mood

What Are Some Ways to Increase Safety While Working Out?

If you are not careful, there could be risks involved with full-body workouts. This could occur due to a health condition or pain you experience before the workout, or it could be due to pushing yourself too hard or too often during the workout. Follow these safety tips to protect yourself while exercising:

Be aware of your own limitations and what you are and are not capable of handling. Choose a workout that best meets your exercise needs. For example, if you are unable to handle a lot of high-impact workouts with jumping and running, pick a low-impact full-body workout instead. Adjust the start position for a workout if it doesn't suit you. Safety comes first!
Increase your physical activity over time. If you have not engaged in a workout for three months and decide to jump right into a full-body HIIT routine, you might exhaust or injure yourself to the point of being unable to work out the next several days. Instead, pick a challenging but not too challenging pace and slowly increase the pace and intensity as you are able.
Take time to warm up and cool down. Dynamic stretching is a great way to warm up the muscles and get the blood flowing before a full-body workout, while static stretching is a great way to bring the body temperature back down and cool the muscle post-workout.
Take time off! As important as full-body workouts are, days off are equally as important. Adults are recommended to do 150-300 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise weekly or 75-150 minutes of vigorous-intensity aerobic activity weekly. In addition, adults should engage in muscle-building workouts at least two days a week.
Depending on whether your full body workouts are moderate or vigorous intensity, you should determine how many days a week you will exercise and provide yourself some off days to allow your body time to rest and recharge. Without rest days, you will quickly burn out and lose motivation to keep going.
Be good about hydrating before, during, and after your exercise and eating nutritious foods daily to fuel your body with the proper nutrients. Having a balanced diet of carbs, proteins, and fats is essential for healing muscles post-workout and giving your body the proper energy overall. To see more information regarding foods to eat pre-workout and foods to eat post-workout, be sure to check out these links.

What Are Some Examples of Full Body Workouts I Can Participate In?

When looking into full-body workout routines, you have the flexibility of adjusting the workout to fit your needs. For example, if a workout requires dumbbells but you do not have any available or are not at the strength level to use them, you can instead use water bottles in place of the weights or use no weights at all.

Sometimes it's a good idea to adjust a workout to be low impact on our elbows, knees and heels. On the flip side, if a workout requires only bodyweight and you want an additional challenge, you can always add dumbbells into the exercises. Either way, you will be working your entire body throughout these exercises.

Combine several of these exercises below to amp up your workout routine and get a full body workout:

Lunge and bent row: This move works your hamstrings, glutes, and upper back.
Squat and shoulder press: This exercise targets your hamstrings, quads, glutes, and shoulders. Make sure to always keep your feet hip-width apart to avoid injury.
Sumo squat and upright row: This works your upper back, posterior aspect of your shoulder, and outside of your thighs.
Dumbbell sit-ups: This works your abs, lower back, shoulder, and glutes.
Glute bridge and chest press: This exercise targets your glutes, chest, and shoulders.
Planks: Plank position works your triceps, abs, hips, and torso.
Crunch: This is a go-to ab workout.
Mountain climbers: Because you have to do high knees to accomplish this move, it's a great workout for not only ab strength but flexibility. Properly bent knees are the key to this.
Jumping jacks: This works out your glutes.
Burpees: This exercise is a strength training exercise but can be used for cardio as well.

Directions for this workout: set a timer on your phone to go off in 30 minutes. Complete 20 of each exercise in a row with no breaks.

For example, begin with the lunges and bent rows alternating from right leg to left leg, complete 20, then immediately move into the squat and shoulder presses. Rest for two minutes once you complete the sequence of five moves. Repeat the 20 reps per sequence followed by the two-minute rest period as many times as you can in 30 minutes.

Ski-Row Air and Ski-Row Air + PWR Full Body Workouts

Have you ever considered trying a rowing workout with the Ski-Row Air or the Ski-Row Air + PRW machines? These machines come with many accessories which allow them to be versatile and ideal for any full body workout. Try combining several of these moves below in order to target every muscle group for a perfect 30-minute workout!

Bicep curl
Arms only row
High row
Reverse overhead row
Single arm row
Single leg row
Alternating arms
Alternating reverse lunge
Butterfly
Plyo jump
Overhead triceps extension
Single leg triceps pull down
Staggered leg skiing
Wood chopper
Straight arm pulldown

Set a timer to 30 minutes and pick five of these moves to target several muscles in your body. Complete 20 reps of the first exercise, then immediately do 20 reps of the second exercise without a break. Continue this until all five moves have been completed, take a two-minute break, then complete another 20 reps of each exercise. Continue this pattern until the 30-minute timer is up.

Example for which five moves to choose in order to get a full-body workout in:

Arms only row: Targets abdominal and upper body muscles
Single arm row: Targets upper body muscles on one side of the body
Single leg row: Targets lower body muscles on one side of the body
Plyo jump: Works the whole lower body
Alternating reverse lunges: Works the entire body

The Takeaway

Full-body workouts are the perfect answer for hitting every muscle of the body without having to do several different workouts to accomplish this goal. In addition, the health benefits for physical activity relating to cardiovascular health, blood sugar levels, bone health, joint and cartilage function, and emotional well-being and mood will hopefully encourage your participation in these full-body exercises.

You have options for with weights or without weights, what moves you engage in, where you complete your workout, and if you choose to use a machine such as the Ski-Row Air or prefer to do it with dumbbells and your own bodyweight.

During your workout routine, make sure not to forget the importance of being aware of your own limitations, slowly increasing your exercise routine as tolerated, taking time to warm up and cool down, allowing yourself days off, and nourishing your body with proper food and fluids. Choose a workout and get active!

Sources:

Health benefits of physical activity: the evidence

Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans, 2nd edition

Full-Body Dumbbell Workout: 30-Minute Routine