Hey, everyone.

I reccently purchased a book called Body-4-Life. The author reccomends the following split:

upper/cardio/lower/cardio/upper/cardio. Repeat, starting with lower instead of upper.

The problem is, I have bad knees so I have to be careful with impactful exercise such as cardio. Plus, I don't go to the gym- I workout from home so I don't have any low-impact alternatives. I, do, however, try to walk for 45-60 minutes a day or atleast every other day.

Do you think a push/pull/legs & core/rest - repeat split would be best?

My goal right now is to gain some lean muscle.

Thanks!

Haylie,

That will work fine. The rationale behind full body workouts is to increase calorie burn and intensity. I do a 4-day modified push/pull regiment. The bottom line is find something that you will stick with and works with any injuries or limitations you may have. None of these suggestions are gospel and they are merely guidelines for individuals to tailor something to their body and physique goals.

John

Hey Haylie,

Good news: not everything that is called "cardio" has to be just running / jogging or hours on the treadmill. You can utilize almost every exercise that includes a bigger area of your body to burn fat. Just a few examples: Kettlebell Swings, Lightweighted squats (if you can do them with your knees- might prefer front squats as the knees stay more backwards), spider crunches (as a bodyweight exercise), or also box steps (which aren't too taxing on the knees).

Cardio is all about getting the heartrate going, either for en extended period of time with some medoim pace cardio - which is not helping you with your goal to build muscle though, because this long and slow cardio rather will make you loose muscle along with fat.

Cardio is also everything that goes into the realm of conditioning.. meaning: High intensity interval training (HIIT).

And you can basically execute a lot exercises (of course with lower weight or bodyweight only) if you do this for 10-15 minutes in really intense intervals of burst phases and rest phases. (i.e. 10 second - give all you got, 20 second rest - do this for 10-15 minutes. Future goal: 20 seconds - give it your all , 10 seconds rest.. rinse and repeat)

You might even want to cut down a bit on the long walks. 45 minutes every other day is quite taxing on the knees and ankles. Which is not a problem if you wouldn't have issues with them. You could try to do 1 day of long walking, best not after a leg day, and for the rest try as described to find exercises that you can turn into HIIT cardio.

And as John wrote - nothing is written into stone - except for physical basics and how the body functions in general - and all of us have their little injuries or special requirements when it comes to our own bodies and have to adjust our training accordingly, and you'll have to find yours.

One thing though, as far as i remember Body-4-Life is mainly build as a gym / or personal trainer program. Since most of their exercises revolve around benchpress, squats, legpresses etc. I don't know how your setup and equipment at home is, but maybe you can find one that is more speciffic for bodyweight or at home training ? Unless you have all equipment needed of course :)

Haylie,

I'm glad you've started your fitness journey with us! That's awesome! What Crood and John said are spot on. What's going on with your knees? What kind of things cause pain? Make them feel better?

Thanks, everyone!

I appreciate all of your help.

You could also try doing squats with a slightly wider stance holding your lighter weight between your knees. It helps to kinda throw your butt back and take pressure off your knees. They also, at least for me, really engage the hamstrings and butt. With those and a super set of weighted glute bridges, you can get that whole rear chain on fire without much impact to the knees.