Best Bootcamp Workouts - Best BootCamp Workout

5 Exercises To Tighten And Tone Your Abs In Time For Summer

Many of us are a little shy about our midsections, and with summer right around the corner there is no better time to get your waistline fit and trim.

Of course diet plays a big part in a flat stomach, but with the right ab exercises you should be able to fast-track your progress. Something all of us would like.

With that being said, if you stick to a healthy and active lifestyle while working these 5 muscle burning ab exercises into your regular routine, you will be flaunting flatter, fitter abs before the warm weather hits.

The Abdominal Backstroke
And here you were thinking the backstroke was just for swimming. Well think again fellow calorie counters because the abdominal backstroke is an effective exercise for not only targeting your abs, but it also helps to tone your whole core, including your obliques.

To properly preform this exercise, sit on your mat in a reclined position with your feet on the floor, knees bent, and your hands resting on the floor to the side of your knees.

Circle one arm back behind you while maintaining your reclined position. Make sure you aren’t reclining back too far so that your feet come off the mat and your abs aren’t engaged.

Push yourself to complete 3 sets of 20 reps with each hand and you will be one step closer to sexy abs.

Side Plank Crunches

Yes. It sounds like a lot but if you want the waistline you have always dreamed of, you are going to have to push yourself.
To really target those obliques, and to give the rest of your body a good conditioning while you are at it, lie on your side with your legs, hips, and upper body off the floor. Make sure your body is being supported by your elbow, but don’t sink down in your shoulders. Staying lifted, twist and rotate your upper body towards the floor while keeping your legs off the floor and straight.

Hold your rotation for about 3 seconds and return to your starting position. To really feel the burn, do 3 sets of 12 rotations for each side.
Leg Lifts

They don’t really sound like an effective ab exercise, do they? However if you keep your abs engaged and focus on controlling your movements, these leg lifts can be just as effective as the regular crunch.
Simply lie on your back on your mat and raise one leg in the air so it forms a 90 degree angle with your body. Make sure your abs are engaged the whole time you are lifting and lowering your legs and that your back is not arching off the floor with each movement.

Lift and lower your legs in a scissor-like movement and to really feel it working your abs make sure you complete at least 3 sets of 15 per leg.

If you do this exercise properly you will be effectively toning not only your abs but the rest of your core muscles as well as your glutes, hip flexors, legs and obliques.

Not bad for a simple leg lift.

The Jack Knife

It sounds scary but if you have any sort of muscle tone to your body, this exercise shouldn’t be.
Simply lie on your back with your arms above your head, resting on the floor. At the same time lift your legs and arms vertically to meet each other at the top so you are sort of folded up and then lower back down to the floor again.

To ensure you are doing this exercise properly, don’t jerk your body or use your momentum to lift yourself up. Use straight up muscle strength and work up to more reps.

Being as this exercise is a bit more advanced than the others, if you can only do 1 set of 12 to start with, that’s fine. Just make sure that each time you preform this exercise you strive to do another rep until you have reached the goal of 3 sets of 12 reps.

If you can push yourself to reach this goal you will be kicking your core muscles, abs, and hip flexors into better shapethan they have ever been in before.

Lower Body Bicycles

This exercise is a core move in Pilates but can also be adapted for any regular exercise routine. Once again, just make sure you are not letting your back arch while doing this exercise and you are keeping your abs engaged and strong.
To work your core muscles, your abs, and your legs, simply lie on the floor on your back and bend your knees to a 90 degree angle. Then extend and lower one of your legs forward so it is parallel to the floor while keeping your abs flat and engaged.

Hold your leg straight for 3 seconds, bring it back to it’s starting position and repeat the exercise using your other leg.
To get a good mental picture of the technique, think of how you do bicycles but don’t involve your upper body. If you can complete 3 sets of 20 on each leg, you will be shaking and sweating in no time.

Finally, no matter what exercises you choose to do, make sure you pair them with a healthy diet and active lifestyle and you will be one step closer to that beach-ready body in no time. Ω

AUTHOR BIO:
Vanessa is a lifestyle blogger whose work can be found on various websites around cyberland, including reviews on Naturaful, as well as many other lifestyle brands. The best part about her job? She gets to help her readers live their best lives.

Exercises To Include In Your Boot Camp Workouts

Using the right boot camp workouts will provide you with a quick and effective way of getting your body into shape as well as losing weight all in the comfort of your own home. The best types of workouts are those that incorporate elements of conditioning, strength and endurance exercises within them whilst of course making sure that the pace you work at is ideal for conditioning your cardiovascular system.
You will find that the majority of boot camp workouts available today incorporate exercised that are based around bodyweight. So of course you don’t need any specialist equipment such as that your gym has available in order to perform. Rather the exercises are designed to make sure that you use your own body to stabilize yourself as you perform the exercises so that you in turn use all the muscles more. Not only does this help to make them more toned, but you will find that these particular exercises will help you to burn off unwanted fat and calories much more easily.
So what kinds of exercises can one perform as part of a boot camp workout without the need of equipment? Below are two that are most commonly used as part of such workouts.
Exercise 1 – Push Ups
We all know what a push up is and this is a very effective exercise as part of your boot camp workouts to improve the muscle mass in your chest, shoulders, triceps and stomach. In order to perform this correctly you must makes sure that your entire body remains straight and that the hands with their palms on the floor are around shoulder width apart. You should lower yourself gradually to the floor and then put up fast as this will enhance power and develop strength in the muscles already mentioned more.
Exercise 2 – Y Squat
Of course you need exercises in your boot camp workouts that work on the muscles in the lower part of your body . This one is perfect for actually improving the condition of your hams, glutes and quads. However you stomach muscles will also be worked on as you perform this exercise as they are going to help stabilize your body as you performing this one. Stand with your feet shoulder width apart and your arms up in the air so you form a Y. Now you need to sit back into a deep squat position making sure that you don’t actually lean forward. To return back to the standing position you need to push from your glutes.

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Drills To Use For More Effective Boot Camp Workouts

Many people who already do regular boot camp workouts understand just how beneficial the exercises that are performed can be to their health. It is important that when performing such workouts you need to make sure that you use the most rigorous boot camp drills you possibly can. Of course if you have never performed such drills before where do you start.

Below we take a look at some extremely effective boot camp drills that you can incorporate into your workout that will provide you with the results you desire over the coming weeks and months.

Effective Boot Camp Workouts: 1. Triple Minute Warm Up
Warming up is all important before you actually exercising as part of your boot camp workouts. The exercises involved here are not only going to get your heart pumping but also make sure that your muscles are warmed up properly so that you won’t cause damage to them as you begin exercise. The first thing to do is carry out some jumping jacks for 1 minute then follow this with using a jump rope for a further minute. Then finally as part of your triple minute warm up you should do some burpees. Then you need to perform these exercises again for 1 minute each.

Effective Boot Camp Workouts 2. H I I T Sessions
For those of you who have never heard of H I I T (High Intensity Interval Training) you are missing out on what could prove to be the most effective way for you to burn off unwanted fat. Simply put you begin doing the exercise at love intensity for a short period of time before then switching it up a notch and performing it at your maximum intensity but for much less time. The most common form of High Intensity Interval Training that people use as part of their boot camp workouts is running or jogging. You should run or jog for around 75 to 100 yards and begin by jogging this distance up and back at a slow to moderate pace for around 2 minutes. Then you should sprint the same distance and repeat this exercise again 4 times.

Effective Boot Camp Workouts: 10 and 1’s
This particular drill for your boot camp workout is designed to help get your chest and shoulders burning and pumped. In order to perform this drill you also need some lightweight dumbbells, ideally ones that weigh between 5 and 10lbs should suffice. First off you need to do one push up then follow this up by doing 1 shoulder press whilst you have a dumbbell in each hand. Then next time you increase it up to doing 2 push ups followed by 2 shoulder presses and so on until you have reached doing 10 of each. Then you work your way back down so that you finish up with doing just one push up and one shoulder press.

You may find when performing this particular drill as part of your boot camp workouts that initially you won’t be able to use the weights. But eventually you will find yourself actually moving from using 5lb dumbbells to 10lb ones.

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Best Bootcamp Workouts – How To Challenge Yourself More

The best bootcamp workouts are designed to actually challenge you even though simple moves are used. According to the American Council of Exercise doing the exercises associated with this form of work out can burn as much as 600 calories in just one hour.
In terms of exercises boot camps require you to carry out a variety of different ones but will typically be a combination of athletic and military style drills. These you can perform indoors or out and may require you to use some forms of fitness equipment.
Generally if you need to use fitness equipment when carrying out your bootcamp workout then the items you will use include dumbbells, barbells, along with kettle bells, medicine balls and stability (exercise) balls. Also sometimes the best bootcamp workouts require you to use equipment such as cones or resistance bands or steps with risers. But you also need to be aware that certain boot camp workouts don’t require you to use any equipment at all. This is because you will use body weight exercises instead.
The main reason why such workouts are proving extremely popular today is that as you will be required to perform a variety of different exercises you won’t find yourself getting bored. Also the exercises you are required to perform are ones that will continue to challenge your body.
So what exercises do you perform where no equipment is required, or where you use some or a lot of equipment to perform them?
The kinds of exercises that you will perform without the need of equipment are squats, push ups, walking lunges as well as triceps dips or the plank. Also you would include cardio vascular exercises such as jumping jacks, plunging lunges and high knee jogs into your boot camp workout. These exercises you can perform just about anywhere including your own home or garden.
The types of exercises that will require you to use a minimal amount of fitness equipment as part of your best bootcamp workouts includes the likes of double or single leg jumps onto a platform. The use of dumbbells which you hold when you do walking lunges or bent rows for your back. Another exercise you can perform using minimal fitness equipment is to do bicep curls as you step up and down off a bench. It is important when performing these exercises in order to get the maximum benefit from them that you take no rest between each one.
Finally when it comes to creating the best bootcamp workouts possible using lots of fitness equipment you will find that these help to make the exercises you do extremely challenging. Why not use a medicine ball as you perform torso twists or wood chops. Then when it comes to doing the plank or crunches to make your exercise much more challenging use a stability ball that you place underneath your legs.