8 Week Bikini Workouts

Whether you’re planning for a winter getaway in a warm place or because beach season always seems around the corner, a bikini-ready body requires dedication, a nutritious diet and an effective exercise program. Avoid fad diets and rapid weight-loss plans -- these are not longterm solutions. An eight-week bikini workout program is designed to whip you into shape, and give you a sense of ownership over your body; this can lead to positive lifetime changes. Increase the weight you use, number of repetitions or sets as the weeks progress to keep the exercises challenging as your body gets stronger.

  1. Weight Loss and Toning

    • To lose weight or fat, you need to burn more calories than you take in. To lose one pound of body weight, you need to reduce your calorie intake by 3,500. This can be done through a mix of exercise and diet changes, and while the number might sound daunting, cutting 500 calories from your daily diet already gives you a 3,500 calorie deficit. However, to get a toned and fit body, you need to engage in regular cardio and strength training exercise to build lean muscle and firm up your body. While you might be afraid of adding on bulk, gentle resistance exercises and cardio will actually make your body appear firmer and slimmer as muscle is more compact than fat. As an added benefit, muscle also burns more calories than fat does, so you will be increasing your metabolic efficiency, helping you sculpt and tone a bikini-ready body.

    Aerobic Exercise

    • Aerobic exercise improves your cardiovascular endurance while helping your body burn calories more quickly which results in fat loss. Aerobic exercise requires you to raise your heart rate to between 65 and 80 percent of your maximum heart rate. Try jogging, the treadmill, jumping rope, biking, running stairs, elliptical, swimming, tennis, kickboxing, belly dancing and aerobics class -- these are all effective aerobic exercises. Integrate several of them as part of your eight-week bikini workouts.

      The American Heart Association recommends at least 150 minutes of moderate-level and 75 minutes of high-intensity aerobic exercise each week. Space your cardio workouts throughout the week for optimal results. For example, schedule 30 minutes of moderate-level cardio on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and 25 minutes of high-intensity aerobic exercise on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, with Sunday your rest day.

    Strength Training

    • Strength training will help build lean muscle and give you those shapely, toned limbs you desire. Do a mix of lower body and upper body exercises to get an all-around workout, building the muscles in your arms, legs and core all at once. Do dumbbell squats, dumbbell lunges, dumbbell shoulder presses, planks, side planks, ab pulse ups, reverse crunches and hanging leg raises. The American Heart Association recommends two to three sessions of 20 to 30 minutes of strength training each week. Pair your strength training sessions with your moderate-intensity cardio workouts on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

      To avoid boredom, you can switch up your exercises each time; mix up squats, lunges, calf raises, leg lifts and leg raises for your lower body. For your upper body do pushups, bicep curls, triceps kickbacks and shoulder shrugs to tone your arms and chest. For your core, do stability ball crunches to help build your abs and create a tight tummy.

    Pilates and Yoga

    • Pilates and yoga are two multi-muscle workouts that will condition your whole body, elongating and building muscles through a series of dynamic and static stretches. Include Pilates or yoga in your weekly exercise rotation to build an even leaner bikini body. Don't do yoga or Pilates to the exclusion of strength training and aerobic exercise. Space yoga or Pilates exercise days so they aren't consecutive. Do a yoga or Pilates routine on your "rest" day -- Sunday -- and then an extra session on Thursday, one of your high-intensity cardio days. Eight weeks of yoga twice a week will help you obtain the bikini body you're after.