The “Early Morning” Park Workout

Your local park could be the perfect workout gym in the early morning summer hours. Even if you love the gym – an occasional park workout is a refreshing change that keeps your workouts motivating and effective.

The best park workouts are with a crowd, or at least one workout partner – because you can cheer each other on, enjoy some conversation, and most importantly, have the willpower (and purpose) to get out of bed before a hot summer day sets in. So get a group of friends together and try this no-hassle, heart-pumping workout! It requires nothing other than your amazing body and a grassy area to make you sweat, burn calories and build lean, beautiful muscle.

There are seven exercises in this workout. Perform each exercise for one minute and repeat the circuit 3 times for 21 minutes of hard work (plus a few minutes on each end to warm up and cool down).

The Early Morning Park Workout

Warm-up: walk or jog around the park for 5 minutes.

Get Sweaty:

1. Burpee Hop: drop down to hands, pop the legs out to a plank, jump the legs back in and then come up and powerfully hop to the left. Then repeat the motion and powerfully hop back to the right side. You can make your burpee harder (and traditional) by dropping into a pushup from the plank.

2. Crab Walk: Yep, this is that one where you get down on all fours, reversed though, facing up. Than you walk backward, arm, arm, leg, leg. Go slow first, then speed it up to a fast, crazy crab walk. Squeeze the back of your arms.

3. Jab Tuck Jump: Do six fast, powerful kickboxing jabs, then do a tuck jump.

4. Walking Lunges: Step forward and push your weight through your front heel, come up and hinge forward from your hips to touch the grass, then bring the other leg forward to lunge and dip-touch the ground. This one is great to do uphill, as well.

5. Snowboarders: turn to the side and stand with your feet slightly wider than shoulder width apart, with your toes forward. Now powerfully jump up and turn 180 degrees to the other side. Try to touch the grass as you land each jump.

6. Plank Jacks: Get down into a plank position, from your hands and toes. Pop your legs out to a jumping jack and bend your elbows into a slight push-up. This one gets harder as you increase your speed, but stay in control.

7. V-Abs Hold: Lean back on your elbows and lift your legs up (one at a time) about 12″ – 24″ above the grass. Contract your abs hard, then hold the legs for 4 solid counts and then alternatively “scissor ” your legs downward for 4 counts. To make this harder, balance on your sit bones and hold your arms in the air, at shoulder level and out to the sides.

Cooldown: walk around the park for 2 minutes, then perform ~2 minutes of light stretching.

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