“Circuit Training – Is it for you?” 

            A lot of people decided to enroll in exercise programs in hopes of achieving the desired weight in addition to muscle gain. Circuit training is a series of repetitive low resistance workouts designed to loose fat without losing the muscle in addition to other health benefits such as increased cardiovascular fitness, strength endurance, and mental toughness. Each workout is composed of six different circuits with two or more cardio/strength exercises that has to be performed one right after the other with minimal rest periods usually 30 – 90 seconds between intervals. The main point of this routine is to do more workouts in less time that’s why the use of fitness machines is highly recommended.

            Why do we do circuit training?

1.         Because we want to achieve maximum results in minimum time. This is perfect for people who wanted to acquire maximum results but has less time to spend on workouts. This workout allows you to fit in a lot of exercises within 15 minutes or an hour. You don’t have to waste your time waiting in line for a specific fitness machine because it is easy to swap from one station to another different exercise and still get the same amount of workout.

2.         We want to have a healthy heart and a strong body. This workout allows you to train your strength as well as caring for your cardio fitness by combining intervals of high-intensity cardio exercises and weight lifting.

3.         We want to lose weight and increase metabolism. Intense training and heavy weight lifting can program your body to burn calories in within 20 minutes of workout and you’ll have the afterburn effect of burning up more calories for up to 48 hours after your workout ends.

There are a lot of ways to circuit training. You can choose 10 to 12 varieties of exercises – it can be all cardio, all strength or a mix of the two types as long as it is of high intensity and have variety of moves. Start with a warm up followed by your choice of first exercise and keep doing it for 30 – 60 seconds before starting with the next exercise. Continue to go through all of the exercise with minimum intervals of rest. When you are done, you can repeat the whole circuit as long as your body can handle it.    

You could also choose to enroll at specific programs that are offered by fitness facilities. However, before you could enroll at a specific program, you will have to assess yourself and give thought to the following:

• Why do you want to do circuit training?
• Are you interested to improve all your body areas or on specific areas only?
• How much time will you commit for the workout?
• Does you facility offers a complete variation of fitness machines available?

Some fitness facilities offer workouts for beginners, intermediate, and advanced levels. It is up to you to know what the best program that works for you is.