You are at the gym, ready to rock a nice “swoll”. Your favorite playlist is going, and your pumped to kill it in the gym. As your finishing up your warm up, you realize you never planned out what exercises you were going to do. This really is not that big of a deal to the common goer. However, to a new guy this can really throw them off their game.
The best way to avoid this rookie mistake is by looking up and trying new workouts. While you do this make sure the workouts you try pertain to what you are ultimately working to achieve.
The two workouts we are going to focus on today involve muscle confusion exercises and interval training. I first heard of muscle confusion exercises from P90X trainer Tony Horton. The idea behind this work out is to keep your muscles from getting used to the same exercise routine. This type of work out entails doing different exercises that still target the muscle groups being worked on. An example would be doing pull-ups on back day and the following back day doing inverted rows. Both exercises still target the back but they are different exercises.
Muscle confusion workouts also require working contradicting and complementing muscle groups. Contradicting are muscles that flex by different types of movements such as your triceps and biceps. When you extend your triceps flex, and when you pull your biceps flex. Conversely, complementing muscle groups flex in unison, such as in a bench press where your chest flexes and your triceps as well. The best way to incorporate this into your workouts is having alternating days between complementing and contradicting exercises.
Muscle confusion workouts can help put on some serious muscle if you are weight training. At the same time, muscle confusion workouts can also help you shred some serious fat if your focusing on bodyweight routines. If you want to maximize this exercise in your workouts consider combining muscle confusion workouts with interval training.
Interval training is a series of exercises being done in a specific amount of time, and or number of reps per workout. Interval training also requires repeating the routine of exercises two to three times. I first experienced interval training when I did insanity back in my freshman year of college. On a side note, I would recommend trying out the Insanity 
work out. In my experience I lost close to 30 pounds in 3 months. If interval training sounds more up to your speed try out Sean T’s Insanity tape workouts.
In one of my earlier posts, I recommended warming up with a form of cardio. With that being said, Interval training is a form of cardio and with the intensity it presents you afford to skip that run on the treadmill. Now with everything that has been said, I want to leave suggesting you try to incorporate muscle confusion workouts and interval training into your exercise routine. Anyway guys stay focused, stay determined, keep your goal in site, and always push for that one more rep. Also below I listed “The Gym Rat Challenge”, this challenge will provide you with an idea of how these types of workouts work together. Till next time stay strong.
The Gym Rat Challenge (Muscle confusion interval training routine)
Monday (Contradicting- Chest and legs) Repeat 4 times
-Body Squats (30 sec)
-Push ups (30 sec)
-Switch Lunges (30 sec)
-Triceps push up (30 sec)
Tuesday (Complementary- Back and Biceps) Repeat 4 times
-Pull ups (10 reps+)
-Dumbbell curls (12 reps +)
-Dumbbell Row ( 12 reps +)
-Wide grip pull ups (10 reps +)
Wednesday (Contradicting- Shoulders and abs) Repeat 3 times
-Shoulder pushups (30 sec)
-Russian twists (30 sec)
-Shoulder Lateral raise (12 reps +)
-Leg Raises (20 sec)
-Cable shoulder front raise (12 reps+)
-Legs crossed ab crunches (25 reps)
Thursday (Complementary- Chest and Triceps) repeat 3 times
-Push ups with Medicine ball (12 reps +)
-Triceps dips with plate (max reps possible)
-Dive-bomber pushups (10 reps +)
-Isolated triceps pull down (12 rep +)
-Chest cable flies (12 reps +)
-EZ bar Skull Crushers (12 reps+)
Friday
-Cardio 40 min
Saturday (Contradicting- Shoulders Biceps) repeat 4 times
– Shoulder Dumbbell press (12 reps+)
-Reverse grip bicep curls (12 reps+)
-Y T W shoulder workout (max amount possible)
-Barbell curl (12 reps +)
Sunday
– Off
The gym rat 