A couple of Tuesdays ago I taught a workout that everyone LOVED, self included. The moves were fun, it was the first Tuesday night back after a three-week holiday hiatus, and the energy in class was awesome. One guy in my class said it was his favorite class ever with me, and Liz told me I was on fire and never allowed to go on vacation again. Whoops.

It’s funny because I threw this one together based off of a couple of mini circuit combinations I saw in the January 2014 issue of Fitness magazine. Since the mini circuits primarily focused on cardio and lower body (well, not the last one), I added a few upper body blasts to the workout so it would take the full hour class. Boom. What I thought was a somewhat hastily put together routine became everyone’s favorite. It just goes to show that you never know what people are going to like or not!

For those of you who keep asking “where’s that workout from after New Year’s?,” here you go.

I won’t lie, I think on the first round of each circuit I changed the 30 seconds to 45 second blasts. I was getting excited. Either way works though.

Here are links to the Fitness magazine videos of the mini-circuit exercises:
I also included some notes where I changed things up because I know someone from class will say “we didn’t do that!”

• Hammer kicks
• Hop hop squat combo
• Crossover abs — we did the advanced version by taking hands off ground
• The pyramid — I changed this one to be plank walk right, plank walk left, squat, burpee back down
• Kick and lunge combo — in class we did front kick > back lunge > side lunge instead of just front kick and side lunges
• Hip-up v-hold
• Pushup plank jacks — the video includes a burpee, but in class we just did the plank jacks and pushups as two separate exercises
• Alternating speed knees
• Walking ski planks — in class we just took one step up to each side, but I think I like the video version better

And here’s what I did for the upper body blasts:
Note – since higher rep, use lighter weight.

Triceps & Back

• 3 sets of 10 single arm rows
• 3 sets of 10 single arm kickbacks (stay on the same arm)
• 1 set of 10 row and kickback combo
• 10 tricep pulses
• repeat on other side

Biceps & Shoulders

• Front curls — 8 two count, 8 four count, 8 single count, 8 pulses
• Side curls — 8 two count, 8 four count, 8 single count, 8 pulses
• W curls — 2 sets of 8 single count, 8 pulse lifts

If you are short on time, you could do this workout without the extra upper body blasts. Trust me, you’ll still feel it. For questions or further explanations on anything, email me at fitnessandfeta@gmail.com or leave a comment on this post.

–Let’s chat–
What makes a workout “on fire” to you? Is it the moves? The energy? The instructor? How you feel during it? What fitness magazines do you get workout inspiration from? Instructors, have you ever hastily thrown together a workout and come to find out everyone loves it ten times more than the workout that took you over an hour to plan?

Enjoy the day!