If you are looking for a new way in which to take your physique to a higher level, try incorporating active rest into your workouts.

This special technique can help you to improve upon your results and ignite them further, exploding your fitness into greater success.

Active Rest

In regular workouts, we often implement periods of rest in-between sets and exercises to allow us to “catch our breath” and to allow our bodies a chance to momentarily recover.

Active rest takes this principle and turns it upside-down.

Active rest refers to remaining active during times of rest, as its name implies. Rather than taking a few minutes between bursts of exercise to take a break, active rest workouts encourage you to continue exercising during times where you would typically be resting.

Workouts where active rest is implemented will push you and your body into overdrive, massively kickstarting your metabolism and your ability to burn the greatest amount of fat while building the greatest amount of muscle simultaneously. Plus, you will be able to complete your workout more quickly since you will be continuously moving in your exercise.

Active rest workouts work best when you exercise opposing muscle groups back-to-back. The muscles you are working in your first exercise set should be different from the muscles you are working during your active rest exercise. This allows for your individual muscle groups to have moments of rest while your entire overall body as a cohesive unit will be continuously exercising.

Example

Let’s say the main exercise you are completing is the pull-up.

In an active rest workout, you would perform one set of pull-ups to your desired repetition range.

Then, immediately after, you could go into a a set of an abdominal exercise or an exercise that works your entire core. This would be completed during the time in which you normally rest between sets.

Once completed with your set of abs, you would immediately return back to the pull-ups to perform your second set of pull-ups.

After this set is finished, you could perform two minutes of cardio before returning to your pull-ups for a third set.

Summary

Active rest workouts are a tremendous tool to have in your fitness library. As these workouts are intense, it is best to space the frequency of these workouts out, allowing two to three days between each workout of this type to allow your body to fully recover.

Give active rest workouts a try the next time you hit the gym. You never know the results you will see!