Chest & Back Strength is Day 32 in Heather Robertson‘s 12 Week 4.0 program. A other great and effective upper body strength workout. Lots of nice back and chest work. Each circuit contains a more metabolic exercise as well to keep your heart rate elevated. This is a circuit based workout. There are three circuits and each circuit is done 2 times. The exercises are done interval style: 40 seconds of work followed by 20 seconds of recovery. There is a timer in the lower right hand corner of the screen counting down your intervals and recoveries. During the recoveries Heather previews the next exercise. At the bottom of the screen during the preview, there is a small graphic with a weight recommendation–light, medium or heavy.
Chest & Back Strength is 38:07 minutes; 20 second intro, 3 minute warm up and 3:30 minute stretch. Equipment: light, medium and heavy dumbbells and a fitness mat. The weights listed below are what I used. I also used a medium resistance band to increase the resistance of the Super V Squeezes.
Circuit 1:
- Chest press (barbell @ 75#)
- Dumbbell pullover (legs are raised and knees bent at 90 degrees, legs remain in this position while doing a pullover) (one 40# DB)
- Chest fly (hips are raised into bridge and held isometrically while doing chest flys) (25# DBs)
- Super V squeeze (lay on stomach with arms extended in front of you, raise arms and legs in superman, hold and pull elbows behind back, push arms in front of you again then lower hands/legs) (I used a medium resistance band)
- Lay down push up (alternate one push up with one superman)
- Repeat #1-5
30 second rest
Circuit 2:
- Single arm row (Heather is in kneeling lunge, torso is hinged forward and non-working hand rests on the end of another DB; I just placed one knee and one hand on a weight bench) (one 50# DB)
- Repeat #1 on other arm
- Scapular squeeze (hold DBs in front of thighs with palms facing in front of you, extend arms out to sides in a T then pull elbows behind ribs, push elbows back out to a T) (8# DBs)
- Upward chest fly (stand holding one DB in each hand, arms at sides and palms facing in front of you, lift one arm into straight arm front raise with palm facing ceiling, alternate arms) (10# DBs)
- Inchworm push & hop (stand at end of mat, hinge forward and walk hands out to plank, do one push up, walk hands back to feet, stand and jump)
- Repeat #1-5
30 second rest
Circuit 3:
- Single arm neutral press (single arm chest press, DB is held on a diagonal) (one 25# DB)
- Repeat #1 on other arm
- Negative chest fly (legs are raised and knees bent at 90 degrees, legs remain in this position while doing a chest fly, lower arms/DBs very slowly and raise at normal speed) (20# DBs)
- Alternating rear flys (bent over rear delt flys, alternate arms) (10# DBs)
- Renegade row combo (start in straight arm plank holding a DB in each hand, do one renegade row each arm, jump feet into DBs, lift DBs off mat while remaining hinged forward and do one double arm back row) (30# DBs)
- Repeat #1-5
For more info on Heather Robertson’s workouts and other (free) streaming workouts I’ve sampled and reviewed, check out my Streaming page.
