The Best Weight Loss Compound Workout

Along with cardiovascular activity, strength-building exercises help you maintain or lose weight. Exercise physiologist Cedric Bryant says the average person can gain 3 to 5 pounds of muscle in 3 to 5 months. Since muscle helps burn calories, even at rest, work to ensure you perform exercises using multiple big muscles and more than one joint known as compound exercises.

  1. The Exercises

    • Think of exercises like squats, push-ups, dips, lunges and pull-ups. Perform squats and lunges for the lower body. Stand with your feet parallel for the squats. Sit down as you would on a chair or bench. For the lunges, use a staggered stance and lower your body by bending both knees toward the ground. Keep your torso straight.

      Push-ups, dips and pull-ups work the lower body. For push-ups, modify using a ball, your knees or the wall. Place your hands on the floor in line with your shoulders, slightly wider then shoulder-width. Lower your chest toward the floor and push back up. Using a chair or bench, sit on the edge and place your thumbs under the outside of your buttocks. Scoot off the chair and lower your body toward the floor by bending your elbows. Most people cannot perform pull-ups easily. Modify these by using the lat pull-down machine.

    The Workout

    • For the workout, organize five exercises in this order as a circuit: push-ups, squats, pull-ups, lunges and dips. Do 12 to 15 repetitions of each, one after the other. Rest one minute at the end of the circuit and repeat 2 to 3 times. Do this workout three times per week for maximum results.