Due to miscommunication, one of our Efficiency Is Everything creators thought I was doing a 5 Minute Per Day workout. When I corrected her, she mentioned: “A 5 minute per day workout would be really cool”. (Note from the Editor: I personally would want to warm up and cool down, but the purpose of this article is efficiency. Add a warm-up/cooldown and you can still get in a quicker strength workout).
I couldn’t get it down to 5 minutes, at least not with enough warmups. You might do better.
As a note, given the countless studies suggesting good looks = more confidence = more money, I will propose that exercise is profitable.
The goals are to be healthy, save time, get stronger, look good, and make more money.
Don’t get injured, the weights are heavy and typically done to failure. Two suggestions: Be conscious of form by ensuring the targeted muscles are getting hit rather than joints or unwanted muscles. Stop when you feel pain. (You already got stronger this week, come back next week)
Be deliberate. If your goal is to get in your workout and save time, look at the biggest sources of waste. A 20 minute drive to the gym would justify doing 2 of the lifts in a single session. How long does it take to get dressed/ready for the gym? Can you do warmups more efficiently?
Each week the goal is to move up in weight, or do more reps. You will get stronger if you do this. To ensure this happens, record your weights somehow. I use either pen and paper or Google Sheets on my phone.
Muscle looks good. Combine this with eating right, higher protein diets, potentially alternating between bulking(excess calories) and cutting/losing weight.
Good looks will help you do better in interviews, performance reviews, and general conversations with everyone you encounter.
The classically recommended Bench, Deadlift, Overhead Press, Squat. 1 per day, 1 heavy set, 4 times total per week. Each lift is done on a separate day, the advantage here is that you rest during your day, rather than between sets at the gym. This isnt significant and if you want to stack Bench and Deadlift on the same day, and Squat and Overhead Press another day to avoid traveling to the gym, it could be more efficient. With a home gym, the rest time is greater than the time it takes to travel to my weight set.
I recommended the classic 4, but feel free to add and subtract as you see fit. The process/system is important. Although there is a reason these 4 are classic, they are good. For vanity reasons, I added bicep curls as an additional day.
Whatever you do, you want to keep close to 0 strength left in you. This means you will *always* need a spotter for bench; you cannot do this program without a spotter on bench, because you will be failing.
Sets: the less warmups the faster, the more warmups, the better your performance. You warm up to 1 final set, it’s the heaviest and you will do enough reps to fail or be close to failing.
For bodybuilding, I like eccentric/negative training. Where you do ~8 reps, but you count for 6 seconds doing negatives.
For strength, I like warming up to a single heavy set aiming for 2-5 reps.
The first time you do the routine, you may or may not get under 7.5 minutes. Maybe it’s due to having to create a brand new Weight/Reps sheet, or not finding the clips.
You will want to work fast, everything should be more upbeat than normal.
Find ways to reduce transportation time. Driving to the gym is never going to hit 5 minutes/day. This is nearly exclusive to the home gym crew. However, you can see there may be applications of a quick workout in a gym setting. Given the friends and connections I made at the gym, I frequently consider getting a membership for social rather than health reasons.
Efficiency Kandice insists on this: Disclaimer: Efficiency is Everything is not a physician or healthcare provider. This article is for general information purposes only. Follow this exercise regimen at your own risk.