30 Day - 500 Reps A Day Challenge!

With the holiday season only a few months away, I know a lot of you will have your schedules going a bit crazy, and that’s the exact reason I made this challenge. If you do this workout every single morning for the next 30 days (you can do this in the morning AND train in the gym in the evening if you have the time), then even if your day gets crazy later on and you can’t make it to the gym, at least you got a full body workout in, burnt some calories, and really got the blood pumping to start your day.

The way this routine is going to work is you’re going to be performing 5 rounds, and in each round the exercises are going to change. There are actually 2 full sets of exercises to complete. As far as reps, sets and rest periods go, the reps will change per exercise, and you should be resting AS LITTLE as possible in-between exercises and rounds. There are no sets – you’re basically going to complete all 5 exercises, take a bit of a rest, and then complete all of the other 5 exercises, take a bit of a rest, and continue to go through it as fast as you can.

Every time you do this workout, I want you to time yourself, and every time you attempt this workout, try to beat your previous score. If you do that and set that as a goal for yourself, you’re going to train harder and harder every single time you tackle this workout. Now let’s take a look at the exercises and how each round is structured.

Rounds 1, 3 & 5

Exercise #1: Pull-Ups (10 Reps)

I like to use a doorway pull-up bar for these, such as an iron gym. When performing your pull-ups, I want you to make sure you’re going all the way up and all the way down on every single repetition. For those of you who can’t do pull-ups, the alternate you can do is jumping pull-ups. The way these work is you’re going to jump off the floor, hold yourself at the top of the movement, and then slowly lower yourself down to the floor for all 10 repetitions.

Exercise #2: Deep Push-Up (10 Reps)

I like to have push-up bars at home because they come in handy for a variety of exercises, and they also help you get a bit deeper at the bottom of the push-up as you’re no longer restricted by your chest hitting the floor. Again you’ll perform 10 repetitions here, and if you don’t have push-up bars, all you’re going to do is do regular push-ups on the floor for 10 repetitions.

If you can’t do regular push-ups for all 10 reps, then the other alternate you can do is knee push-ups. Make sure that if you do your push-ups on your knees you’re still keeping your core nice and tight, and you’re bringing your chest to the floor on every single repetition.

Exercise #3: Floor Crunch (40 Reps)

For this exercise I want you to make sure that you’re going all the way up to the top so your chest is touching your thighs/knees, and then when you go back down to the ground make sure your shoulder blades touch the ground on every single repetition. You can either do this just on the ground with your toes on the floor, or if you want to put your toes underneath something for a bit more stability and support, that’s totally fine.

Exercise #4: Air Squat (30 Reps)

When you do your air squats, it’s really important to make sure you’re going all the way down and all the way up on every single repetition. There should be no reason why you stop halfway when doing an air squat. I like to put my hands behind my head when doing this exercise, and drop my butt completely to the floor, before pushing myself back up to the top and completing all 30 repetitions that way.

Exercise #5: Hand-Stand Push-Up (10 Reps)

This is a really intense exercise which is really going to target those shoulders, and if you can’t do a hand-stand push-up, you can do an alternate called a pike push-up. Pike push-ups are very easy, all you’re going to need is a table or a chair, just something to put your feet on that’s going to displace half your body weight, so that you can still get the exercise done.

Once you’ve completed all 5 of those exercises, you’re going to move into doing 5 sets of a 10 second hold of stomach vacuums. Instead of just sitting around and waiting to perform your next round you can do this to get a bit more core activation, and start tightening up your mid-section. By the time you’ve finished 5 sets of 10 seconds, you’ll have enough strength to go back and start the next round of exercises.

Rounds 2 & 4

Exercise #1: Suspended Bicep Curl (10 Reps)

For this exercise you’re going to use your pull-up bar, hold yourself in the air, keep your core nice and tight, and then begin to lower yourself and pull yourself into the pull-up bar, performing the same range of motion that you would do for a bicep curl.

Now clearly this is an intense exercise, and if you don’t have the upper body strength to do this, the alternate you can do is a towel curl. All you need to do is grab a towel, wrap it around the pull-up bar and keep your feet on the ground and perform your repetitions this way. You can make the exercise more or less intense, depending on where you place your feet. The more forward you place your feet the more intense it’s going to be, the more upright you are the less intense it’s going to be.

Exercise #2: Dip (10 Reps)

When performing the dip, all you need once again is a steady surface like a table or chair or couch, anything that’s going to make it so you can basically get your butt to the floor on every single repetition. Also make sure that you’re fully extending your arms at the top of every repetition as well.

Exercise #3: Plank Oblique Crunch (20 Reps Per Side)

To perform this movement you’re going to place one elbow on the floor, keep your legs together and your core nice and tight, dip your hips down as low as you can, and then extend them to the ceiling as high as you can. As soon as you perform 20 repetitions on one side, you’re going to switch to the other arm and perform 20 more repetitions. You want to really try to target and isolate those obliques, I don’t want you to just swing your hips around for this movement. Dip low, get a nice hard contraction, and then extend your hips to the ceiling, once again getting that nice hard contraction in your obliques.

Exercise #4: Calf Raise (30 Reps)

You can do the calf raise just by standing on the floor, or, if you have the opportunity, go over to the edge of a stair case and perform your calf raise repetitions there. This is going to allow you to get more range of motion out of the exercise, and a lot more engagement in your calves. Definitely use stairs if you have them available to you.

Exercise #5: Reverse Iron-Cross (10 Reps)

This is a really great exercise to target your rear delts, especially when you don’t have a lot of things to work with at home. The way you’re going to perform this movement is you’re basically going to slide your hands in towards your torso, which is going to lift your upper back off the ground, and as your upper back is lifting off the ground you kind of want to flex and contract all the muscles in your upper back and shoulders as hard as you can at the top. Hold that contraction at the top for a second, and then lower yourself back down to the ground, and repeat for 10 repetitions.

Once you’ve completed all of the exercises in that round, you’re again going to complete 5 sets of 10 seconds of a stomach vacuum, before going back to the first round of exercises for round 3, then the second round of exercises for round 4, before completing the workout with the first round of exercises for round 5. Remember, you’re going to be doing 5 sets of the stomach vacuums in-between ALL ROUNDS.

Conclusion

Home workouts like these are a really great way to get a full workout in, especially when your life starts to get busy, whether it’s family stuff, work stuff, or whatever you have happening in your life. We often start the day thinking we’ll get everything we want done, but then if it gets to the end of the day and you haven’t been to the gym yet, you end up feeling defeated. So do this EVERY SINGLE DAY, every morning for 30 days straight, and see the results for yourself!