Two light dumbbells and space to stand are all it takes to improve your fitness and strength with this simple but effective full-body workout.
It’s been put together by fitness trainer Maddie Lymburner, who goes by MadFit on YouTube, and it’s a fantastic way to get stronger, leaner and fitter in just 15 minutes. The whole workout is done standing to avoid any pressure on your wrists from moves like push-ups.
For the workout, Lymburner is using two 10lb weights, but you can do the whole workout using just one dumbbell, or whatever you have to hand that can increase the resistance for the exercises.
If you have a set of the best adjustable dumbbells available, that would work well, because you can change the weight quickly if you’re finding a move too tricky or easy.
Lymburner suggests doing a short warm-up before you start the workout in the video. If you’re not sure what to do for this, I’d suggest scanning through the video to see what exercises you’ll be doing, then do a round of each of them without weights to warm up the right muscles.
Watch MadFit’s 15-minute standing dumbbell workout
The workout involves doing two circuits of three exercises. You do three rounds of the first circuit before moving onto doing three rounds of the second circuit.
You do each exercise for 30 seconds, then rest for 15 seconds and take a longer 30-second break at the end of each circuit. However, during this longer break, you’ll do active recovery, like marching on the spot or similar, to keep your heart rate up.
There are several jumping moves in the workout, but if you’d prefer to do a low-impact session, Lymburner provides alternatives for each exercise that don’t require jumping.
All the moves in the workout are designed to enlist multiple muscle groups and also raise your heart rate, so you improve your fitness and full-body strength at the same time.
Lymburner herself says that the first circuit of the two is the harder one, so once you’ve completed three rounds of that, you can feel good knowing that the toughest part of the session is done.
While this is a HIIT workout where you aim to boost your heart rate during each workout period, it’s still important not to rush the moves.
You’re working with one or two dumbbells throughout, so focus on form and lifting the weights correctly to engage the right muscles and maintain good technique. If you start rushing, you might well lose your balance, since there are several moves that involve jumping or working on one leg.
If you enjoy this standing dumbbell workout, then you can try another with this 20-minute full-body session. If you’d rather do a workout without weights, this 25-minute full-body session uses plyometric moves like squat jumps to increase the difficulty.
More from Tom's Guide
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.
