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30minutephysique

30 Minute Physique Full Body Program

Many of my clients over the last 9 years (wow...I still can't believe I've been training people flesh to flesh for 9 years! You'd think I'd be good at it by now...)...


Let's start over, because that was a big side quest that interrupted my thoughts.


Many of the clients I've trained over that last 9 years trained only 2-3 days per week – often just during paid sessions with me – for 30 minutes at a time.


Some of these clients were young teens or 20-somethings that had dreams of getting jacked, but not quite grand disillusions of becoming the next Phil Heath. 


Most of these clients were 30-65 year olds just looking to LOOK better (more muscle definition, more tone, less fat, better shape – aka – they were looking for the fit aesthetic). 


Many of these clients are paying me for just 30 minute sessions.


Whether a client is doing 30 minute or 60 minute sessions, I almost always put them on a full body program to start.


I believe full body plans are sensible.


If you're looking to train just 2-3 days per week, full body training will allow you to accumulate volume by getting 2-3 days per week of frequency for each muscle group – either directly or indirectly. This has the added benefit of allowing you to practice the main compound exercises frequently.


The principles of 30 minute full body training are the same as 30 minute PPL, 30 minute Gironda Split, 30 minute Arnold Split, and 30 minute Upper/Lower.


We will do 3-4 exercises per sessions, 2-3 sets per exercise, 2-3 minutes of rest between each set.


Full body workouts ARE going to be a LITTLE more time consuming and fatiguing during each session. We're talking just a smidge. But a smidge is enough of a measurement to be noted.


As you become relatively strong, you will likely need to drop any exercises from 3 sets to 2 sets. Most of my clients eventually get to the point on full body where we will do 1 warmup, or acclimating, set before going into 2 hard working sets.


Honestly, this pattern is pretty similar in the other 30 minute physique program options, too. But full body training takes a little more acclimating and setting up because you'll be warming up a different part of your body during each exercise.


Full body also takes longer because you'll often be doing 3 compound exercises, whereas in the other training splits, I recommend no more than 2 compound exercises followed by 1-2 isolation exercises.


But, structuring a brief full body routine is incredibly simple.


Here's how it goes:


Push exercise (chest or shoulder dominant)


Pull exercise (horizontal or vertical pulling – back)


Leg exercise (squat, hinge, or quad dominant, hamstring dominant)


Optional accessory (biceps, triceps, calves, or secondary quad/hamstring exercise)



It doesn't matter what order we put the first 3 exercises. Often, the gym traffic will determine whether my clients start with a push, pull, or leg exercise.


Usually we will alternate between an A & B session and, depending on the client's goals, weakness points, or likes – we will either rotate through 3-4 accessory exercises (1 per session) over the course of 3-4 sessions or, we will stick with 1 accessory exercise for session A and do 1 constant accessory exercise for session B.


You could use a shoulder isolation instead of a vertical press on one of your sessions.


You could also use quad or hamstring isolations as your leg exercises. Though, I don't recommend doing that on the regular.


Here's a quick sample full body routine that I like:



Session A


Ex 1: overhead press-2x6-12

Ex 2: pullup-2x5-8

Ex 3: Bulgarian split squat-2x6-12

Ex 4: incline DB curls-2x6-12



Session B


Ex 1: incline bench press-2x6-12

Ex 2: single arm DB row-2x6-12

Ex 3: single leg Romanian deadlift-2x8-15

Ex 4: tricep pushdowns-2x8-15



That's just one of MANY examples. You can swap any exercise variations as appropriate based on your preferences and the equipment you have available.


While I like the simplicity and the fact that full body training allows you to stay consistent even if you only have just 2-3 days per week to train – I personally don't use full body programs very much anymore. I start most of my clients on them, but eventually, those clients that are like me and want a little 'more' – more muscle, more exercise variations, more total frequency, more localized muscular stimulus with less systematic fatigue – will switch over to an upper/lower, PPL, Arnold, or Gironda Split.


But, if you like full body and you don't care to do "Frankenstein" exercises, this simple structure will take you a long way and help you get stronger, bigger, and – assuming you're in a calorie deficit from time to time – leaner.

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