IRON Series 30 Min Upper Body Chest and Back Workout | 22

30 Min Upper  Body Chest and Back Workout is Day 22 in Caroline Girvan‘s Iron Series. Wow! Another intense and excellent upper body strength workout. I love this series so much! I don’t want it to end! I will definitely be returning to many of the workouts in this series. In fact, I almost hate to leave it. I do have some other workouts/programs I want to do, but these workouts are just what my body wants/needs. Though this workout focuses on the back and the chest, challenge yourself with the weights you use and you will work your entire upper body. I felt my biceps being worked with the rows and my shoulders and triceps being worked with the pullovers. I used Heather Robertson‘s 10 Min Standing Abs Workout as a finisher. The stretch at the end of this workout is another good one. I feel like, in addition to giving us some of the best workouts ever with this series, Caroline is also giving us better stretches at the end. At least, that’s what I have seemed to notice this week.

All of the exercises in this workout are done interval style: 60 seconds of work followed by 30 seconds of rest. There is a timer in the upper left hand side of the screen counting down your intervals and recoveries. During the recovery Caroline previews the next exercise. There is also a little bar at the bottom of the screen that counts down the entire workout time as a percentage.

30 Min Upper  Body Chest and Back Workout is 36:41 minutes; 2:28 minute intro, no warm up and 3:30 minute stretch. Equipment: dumbbells and fitness mat. Optional is a chair or bench for bent over rows. Caroline is using 20kg/44.1 pound and 10kg/22 pound dumbbells. The weights listed below are what I used.

1. Chest press (30# DBs)
2. Repeat #1
3. Chest flys (20# DBs)
4. Repeat #3
5. Single arm bent over row (one 45# DB)
6. Repeat #5 on other arm
7. Repeat #5 & 6 (one 45# DB)
8. Pullovers (one 40# DB)
9. Repeat #8 two more times
10. Momentum row (single arm bent over row, but use momentum to row DB up, lower slow and controlled) (one 45# DB)
11. Repeat #10 on other arm
12. Repeat #10 & 11 (one 45# DB)
13. Push ups
14. Supine double row (bent over double arm row with palms facing forward) (32.5# DBs)
15. Repeat #13 & 14

Finisher: Alternating renegade row to push up for 60 seconds (one renegade row each arm + one push up) (30# DBs)

For more info on Caroline Girvan’s workouts and other (free) streaming workouts I’ve sampled and reviewed, check out my Streaming page.