It’s day two at the gym and your milestone two in your gym routine for first week. You are ready with new energy and with new motivation to follow your gym routine. You woke up and thought, ‘Let’s do this, I’ll get those abs’. You have completed your Day 1 at the gym as a good warmup day. You have everything you need and you are headed out for the gym.
You might be wondering that you have done enough cardio yesterday and now you can train your body for weight lifting and general fitness from today. Well, I would like to break that myth. You are going to be a beginner for at least a year at the gym and as long as you are a beginner, you are not going to be able to get rid of daily cardio out of your gym routine.
Even after you have grown beyond the beginner stage, it is not advised to give up on cardio completely. Your body needs to feel free at times!
Day 2 – Gym Routine for Beginners
Let’s begin day two of the gym routine for beginners with a little something that you came in to do, weigh-lifting! Just keep in mind the gym routine for beginners is common irrespective of their body types and end goals.
Day 2 generally focuses on getting you affiliated with all gym weight-training equipment and learning about the body movements. If you are out there to lose weight or gain muscle, or if you are just working towards general fitness, your beginner gym workout is going to be almost the same. There can be a few changes in reps and weights, of course, but that would depend on your physique and body type.
So let’s begin Day 2
Exercises
- Cardio – Walking or Cycling
- Legs – Free-weight Squats
- Back – Seated Row
- Chest – Seated Chest Press
- Biceps – Bicep Curl
- Triceps – Bar Tricep Pushdown
- Stretching – Seated Chest Press
Exercise 1 – Cardio – Walking or Cycling
Starting-off your day, you need to get your body warmed up. 5 to 15 minutes of walking on a treadmill or cycling would be a good start. Alternatively, you can do a few burpees, jumping jacks, high-knees or butt-kicks or all of them to get your body warmed up in case you have given up on the idea of machine-assisted cardio.
If you are someone, who walks to the gym and has a good 5-10 minute walk, start working out as soon as you entire the gym door, then you probably can skip cardio or 5-minutes of cycling isn’t going to do any harm.
Exercise 2 – Legs – Free-weight Squats
Squats as the first weight-training exercises in beginner gym workout might sound a little off to you but let’s face it, you have been doing these or at least a version of these for a major part of your life. You sit down every day, but how many times have you lifted weights using your chest? Besides, legs are the strongest part of your body and are also home to the largest muscle of your body. So why not start training with something that important?
Squats have a specific movement structure for the right posture. Firstly, keep your feet parallel to your hip, not too wide not too close. Just stand like you normally would. Now, sit back and not down, your knee should not go beyond the tip of your foot when you do so, and both should be in line. If you find it difficult to keep a track of your knee, you can ask the help of any gym bro or broette and they will help you out. There is no shame in the gym! Everyone is building!
It’s the first week, you are doing squats without weights, it is a really good time to learn the correct posture. If you don’t learn it right now, it will probably be with you for a long time and might cause injuries or muscle-locks when you go to heavier weights.
3-4 sets with 15 reps each would be great for your first squats session. Don’t worry if you can’t get to 15 or 4 sets. Reduces the reps and the sets, it is just your second day!
Exercise 3 – Back – Seated Row
Seated Row is one of the most basic exercises for the back. Keep the weights less and it will make for a good entry-level exercise that you are looking in a beginner-level gym routine. The posture is as simple as it gets.
Sit down, hold the bar or the handle and pull it towards your abdomen without moving your back. Movement should be created only from your arms. Keeps the weights light and the arms moving. Breathe in as you release the weight and breath out as you pull the weights towards yourself.
3 sets with 15 reps each is what you are aiming for here.
Exercise 4 – Chest – Seated Chest Press
If you do not have the equipment for this exercise, I would recommend getting a trainer or a gym bro to stand by your side, or skip the exercise completely.
The seated chest press is a lighter and machine-assisted version of the chest press. At the start, for a lot of beginners, the experience of holding a weight which you cannot balance, right above your face is a little scary, so just rather settle for the machine-assisted version.
Just tuck yourself in, hold the bar close to your chest and push. You won’t be able to make it out at the start, but you are not pushing from your biceps, but your triceps and your chest. You won’t feel it today or until we get to chest day that you would realize your chest actually has muscles. Well if not on that day, then two days later when you ride over a pothole. You will know what I mean.
3 sets with 10-15 reps on low to medium weights is a good start. Remember push with your chest and not with shoulders or abdomen or your body. If you can’t feel it, try tightening your chest a bit just to feel the muscles working.
Exercise 5 – Biceps – Bicep Curl
If you had not done it on day one at the gym as said in the first-week gym routine for beginners, then here now is your turn to do it. If you did it already then you already know how to do it.
For those who don’t know how to go about bicep curl, here is what you have to do: Just hold the dumbbell in your hand, stand up perfectly straight and then pull the dumbbell to your chest. Bend your elbow when you pull it up and straighten it out when you release it. Do not move your elbow at all, just bend it. Get the postures correct!
3 set is what you have to do. Anywhere between 12-15 is a good range. Anything below it means the dumbbell is too heavy for you, anything more means it is too light. Try to get the balance.
Exercise 6 – Triceps – Bar Tricep Pushdown
The Bar Tricep Pushdown is next in the queue of exercises in the beginner gym workout.
It is exactly what the name says. Just connect the bar to the pulley rope, hold your elbow upright, lean just a little bit and then push the bar down. Do not move your elbows, do not lean too much and do not push the bar down with your shoulders or your core, just the arms move.
Since this is the last variation for the day, you might be tired or might have too much energy remaining in you, so I would let you chose the number of sets and reps all by yourself. Just remember, triceps bring in the size to your arms and not biceps. Now go!
In case you need guidance, then do 3 sets with 12-15 reps each.
Exercise 7 – Stretching – Full Body Floormat Stretching
You have completed your very first beginner’s gym routine and now it is time to stretch and relax your body. You can completely skip out on this step as long as you are okay with having a sore body for the next few days.
Stretch your arms, legs, chest, back and every muscle you worked out, even those that you didn’t. Another thing that works really good for stretching is Surya Namaskar. It improves your blood circulation and stretches each muscle of your body. I usually did 4-5 variations of stretching, holding each move for 15-30 seconds and then went on to 4-5 repetitions of Surya Namaskar in my gym routine as a beginner.
Okay, Bros and Broettes, that’s all for day two, enjoy a fit and healthy life and follow Cannot Cardio for more fitness posts! Remember to Stay Awesome!
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