4 Post-Thanksgiving Workouts
Learn the top four post-Thanksgiving workouts, which can help you burn those calories fast.
I’ve already given you 4 Ways To Burn Thanksgiving Calories Fast, including my six-minute trick, shivering, the best workout for fat loss, and greasing the groove. Check out that episode to get those tips. And, although I don’t endorse gluttony or extremes of calorie consumption, I’ll hazard a guess that this Thanksgiving or over the holidays you may find yourself in a situation where you need to burn some serious calories.
So without further ado, I’m going to give you my top four post-Thanksgiving workouts:
Workout #1: “The Butt Burner”
All that’s required for this hip, thigh, and glute workout is a cardio mode of choice, then you and your body. And a love for lunging, of course. Here’s how it works:
- 20 walking lunges per leg or 20 reverse lunges per leg
- Run, bike, swim, or row max distance for 5 minutes
- 20 walking lunges per leg or 20 reverse lunges per leg
- Run, bike, swim, or row max distance for 4 minutes
- 20 walking lunges per leg or 20 reverse lunges per leg
- Run, bike, swim, or row max distance for 3 minutes
- 20 walking lunges per leg or 20 reverse lunges per leg
- Run, bike, swim, or row max distance for 2 minutes
- 20 walking lunges per leg or 20 reverse lunges per leg
- Run, bike, swim, or row max distance for 1 minutes
Workout #2: “Pyramid Down”
This workout is perfect when all you have is the one set of dumbbells that you found in the basement of your Aunt Matilda’s house after the family got together for the holidays, and you want a lung-sucking workout that includes some significant load lifting, muscle toning and fat burning.
Do 3-5 rounds of the following:
- 50 leg levers
- 40 mountain climbers
- 30 burpees
- 20 kettlebell or dumbbell swings
- 10 dumbbell manmakers (40 lb men/25 lb women)
Workout #3: 5×5’s
This workout requires a gym or access to some weights, but gives you a potent combination of strength, speed, muscular endurance, and, of course, to stay true to our them, extreme calorie burning.
With as heavy a weight as you can lift with good form, do five sets of five reps of:
- Benchpress
- Deadlift
- Backsquat
- Shoulder Press
- Power clean
And for bonus points? Here’s the finisher: 10×30 second sprint at your maximum running pace on an 8-10% treadmill incline. Rest 60 seconds between each sprint.
Workout #4: Hotel Stairs
Traveling over the holidays? Here’s a very good option for getting a killer workout, even when your hotel gym is crappy:
- Run one flight of stairs one step at a time. Stop on landing for 20 second isometric squat.
- Run next flight of stairs two steps at a time. Stop on landing for 20 push-ups.
- Run next flight of stairs by box jumping as many steps at a time. Stop on landing for 20 mountain climbers.
- Repeat for as many flights as possible.
- Ignore strange looks you get from the very, very few people who ever use the hotel stairs these days.
Last year I tweeted that “The Average American eats about 3,000 to 3,500 calories during Thanksgiving. That’s 14,500 jumping jacks!” Thankfully, there are faster and more fun ways to burn calories from the turkey extravaganza, and now you know a few of my favorites!
So what do you think? Do you have questions about these four post-thanksgiving workouts? Head over to Facebook.com/GetFitGuy and join the conversation there.
Image courtesy of Shutterstock.
About the Author
Ben Greenfield received bachelor’s and master’s degrees from University of Idaho in sports science and exercise physiology; personal training and strength and conditioning certifications from the National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA); a sports nutrition certification from the International Society of Sports Nutrition (ISSN), an advanced bicycle fitting certification from Serotta. He has over 11 years’ experience in coaching professional, collegiate, and recreational athletes from all sports, and as helped hundreds of clients achieve weight loss and fitness success.
