It’s inevitable when you workout regularly for a long period of time. You hit a plateau with your results, you get bored, or you just want to push your limits and get a good sweat/muscle burn on. Never fear, I have just the tweak that your workouts need — finishers.
Finishers are short circuits of all-out effort tacked on at the end of a strength workout. They improve conditioning and work capacity (meaning you can work harder for longer periods of time). They also help boost mental toughness, fat loss, and hypertrophy (building muscle).
Finishers can include bodyweight exercises and just about any other modality — kettlebells, dumbbells, barbells, suspension trainers, ropes, sleds, and cardio equipment. I love the creativity of it — you can mix things up, from doing an AMRAP (as many rounds as possible), a drop set, work:rest intervals, ladders, complexes, EMOM (every minute on the minute), and single set burnouts.
As always, it’s important to not let form and technique break down at any point to help prevent injury and excess soreness and to get the most out of your training time. If you’re ready to give this method a shot, here are four short and intense finishers to boost your strength workouts and results when sprinkled in 1-3 times a week.
Kettlebell Finisher: x 3-5
2-Handed Swing x 60 seconds
Single Arm Dumbbell Snatch – Right x 30 seconds
Single Arm Dumbbell Snatch – Left x 30 seconds
Rest x 30-60 seconds
Dumbbell AMRAP (As Many Rounds As Possible) x 10 minutes:
Thruster x 10
Bent-Over Row x 10
Romanian Deadlift x 10
Dead Bug x 10 each
Rest as needed
Medicine Ball Circuit: x 2-3
Med Ball Slam x 10
Alternating Med Ball Push-up x 10
Overhead Med Ball Walking Lunges x 20 total
Russian Twist x 10
Rest x 60 seconds
Bodyweight 24s: x 2 rounds
Squat x 24
Jump Squat x 24
Reverse Lunge x 24
Jump Lunge x 24
Rest twice as long as it took to complete the first round