Strength + Cardio Heavy Lower Body Workout

Greetings from California! I’m currently in San Francisco and will be heading down to Santa Barbara to attend CJU with Under Armour until Friday. I’ll have some free time tomorrow afternoon and would love any Santa Barbara suggestions you have! Eat? Workout? Things to see? I’ve never been!

I finally invested in some heavier dumbbells for my at-home gym collection (20-pounders woop woop) and we’re putting them to use in this heavy lower body workout. It’s divided into weighted strength sections and bodyweight cardio sections and will take you about 25 minutes to complete.

Strength + Cardio Heavy Lower Body Workout

EQUIPMENT I USED:

• Stepper – I used it with 3 out of the 4 risers. The more risers, the harder it’ll be. Pick the height that works for you!
• Set of 20-lb dumbbells (use weights that work for your fitness level!)

In this workout, you’ll alternate between heavy weighted sections and bodyweight cardio sections. You rest for 30 seconds after each 3-minute section and get a full 60 seconds to rest at the halfway point (after your first cardio section).

Here’s a breakdown of the structure:

Warm Up
Strength – Right
Strength – Left
Cardio
Strength – Right
Strength – Left
Cardio

All the exercises are done for 60 seconds. If the two weights get to be too heavy at any time, you can drop down to one weight.

As with all workouts, make sure you’re properly warmed up beforehand. Always listen to your body, modifying or stopping as needed. Take some time to cool down and stretch afterwards. This workout starts with 3 minutes of gentler work before getting to the body of the workout, but I still recommend warming up beforehand. I have a 5-minute warm up or you can do you own.

Exercise Breakdown

For a preview of all the exercises, fast-forward to 3:33 in the above video.

Warm Up – use just one dumbbell

• Good Mornings
• Good Morning Squats
• Alternating Reverse Lunges

Strength – Right leg 

• Bulgarian Lunge
• Squat to Step Up
• Back Lunge Pulses to Curtsy Lunge Pulses (can drop down to just one dumbbell)

Strength – Left leg

Cardio

• Up and Overs
• Sit to Squat Jump – if stepper is too low, just do regular squat jumps
• Hot Feet with Step Jump – if following along with the video, jump when you hear a beep; if doing on your own, just jump every 10ish seconds

xo Nicole