Here’s how to simplify your training with just one workout per week that hits the entire body efficiently in minimal time. No gym required.

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I’ve been playing around with working out time per week.

One full body strength training session during my work week and then the other six days, I’ve committed to just being active:

• Some cardio
• Daily mobility
• And just playing and having fun

There’s a playground nearby where I take my Interns on the weekends and we play dodgeball, kickball and maybe even tag or hide-and-seek.

I’m having a lot of fun with this approach and even seeing positive results.

Let’s be honest, not many of us want to train all day, every day.

I get a kick out of my fellow fitness pros who tend to forget that normal people living normal lives don’t care about daily undulating periodization schemes and sarcoplasmic hypertrophy.

You care about feeling good and looking good nekkid.

And you want to do this with minimal effort.

The minimum effective dose.

I like to look at this way: Water boils at 212 degrees Fahrenheit. It doesn’t get “more boiling” at 234 degrees. The extra heat is basically unnecessary, it won’t make your pasta taste any better.

Bringing that home to working out, if you could shorten your workout time down to just one hour per week and still see desired results, that’s a win, right?

Of course it is.

Today, I’m going to share how to execute one workout per week so you can cut your training time down dramatically and still enjoy the benefits.

Save time and still get in shape? Amazing.

Let’s get into it.

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My one workout per week hits the entire full body

It takes just one hour.

I’m still training at home. In my Brooklyn apartment living room. With minimal equipment.

To me, there’s just no real need to spend time commuting to and from a gym.

I’m happy to train at home.

When I plan out my week on Sundays, I can look ahead and schedule around the obstacles, knowing that as long as I can block out one hour to train, I’ll be good.

This gives me so much more freedom to explore other ways of movement throughout the rest of my week.

I’m working on primal animal movement flows (like this one here) and might even start getting back into my pursuit of nailing the handstand.

There are a couple of ways to do minimalist training:

• I’ve explored doing 2-3 sessions per week
• Then there’s also short, daily sessions of like 15-20 minutes that have helped me lean down into incredible shape
• And now I’m experimenting with just one full body complete session per week and seeing some good things

As of writing this, I’m working on leaning down before a Spring Break trip with my family.

When you are in a negative energy balance (a.k.a., calorie deficit … otherwise known as: trying to lose fat) then it makes sense to actually reduce some of your volume to avoid burning yourself out.

Energy (calories, food) is low anyway, adding intense training on top of it (like most novices do) can lead to exhaustion and a huge drop in motivation and energy.

Reducing my load and applying the minimum effective dose seems to make sense here and I’m enjoying the process so much I might even stick with it for a while.

Here’s how to save time and get in great shape with one workout per week

First we need to set the rules. This is how you’ll ensure success with this minimalist approach.

Rule No. 1

Block it out in your calendar and commit to it every single week.

It’ll be easy to skip that one session if you’re not careful.

I highly advise that you schedule your training session right now.

Otherwise, you’ll start making bargains with yourself to skip “just this one time.”

Then it’ll be a month later and you still haven’t worked out that one time.

Rule No. 2

You must also stay active every other day of the week.

No exceptions.

At minimum, there should be lots of walking.

But you can also add in:

• Yoga
• Dancing
• Mobility
• Running or cycling
• Swimming
• Boxing
• Play a sport
• Practice a martial art
• Conditioning (but no more than 1-2 times per week)
• I’m working on animal movement flows
• Or skills like handstands or other advanced calisthenics of athletic goals

Get creative with it.

But get moving each and every day.

Rule No. 3

Set a goal of getting a little better with each strength training session.

You’re going to need to start tracking all of your workouts.

I use a simple pen and a notebook.

All of my sessions for the last 2-3 years are in one place so I can easily reference things.

It’s only one session per week. No excuses.

Start with light weights/resistance than you’d usually do, and just slowly work your way up.

The goal is to try and improve your numbers week over week. That’s how you ensure progressive overload is happening.

Give yourself a good month to adjust before making tweaks.

You can swap exercises or rest times or even set and rep schemes as you get more comfortable.

But understand that the magic is in being slow, steady and methodical.

It’s not about “muscle confusion” (which is bullshit anyway).

Resist the urge to turn this into some random “choose your own weekly workout adventure” and commit to one month of trying this out before you start tweaking or changing the whole thing.

Once you’ve got the rules down, let’s get started.

Here’s how I’m setting up my workouts

Because you’ll be hitting the full body, the volume of this one workout might be a tad higher than you’re used to, just remember this is your only resistance training of the week.

I like to start with a simple template to help you out:

Warm-up

Keep this as simple as you’d like or need.

If you’re jumping into this first thing in the morning or after sitting for long periods of time, you’ll want to do something to get the heart rate up a little bit: running, treadmill, jumping jacks.

I like to use some quick animal crawling like the cat crawl, crab crawl and frog to open things up a bit, too.

Then I’ll perform 1-2 warm-up sets of my first block at about 50-percent of the reps and resistance.

Then we get started.

First Block

1a) Upper Body Push

1b) Lower Body Push

Pick one upper body push movement:

• Push-ups
• Dips
• Pike push-ups
• Ring push-ups

Pick one lower body push movement:

• Bulgarian split squats
• Stationary lunges
• Squats
• Goblet squats
• Pistol squats

We’re supersetting our two working blocks to save more time. Each superset will be performed with minimal rest between exercises.

Then you’ll rest for 1-2 minutes before repeating that training block.

Perform this block for 3-5 sets at 8-12 reps in super set fashion.

Then break for 1-2 minutes before repeating.

Second Block

2a) Upper body pull

2b) Lower body pull

Pick one lower body pull movement:

• Pull-ups
• Chin-ups
• Bodyweight rows
• Dumbbell rows

Pick one lower body pull movement:

• Romanian deadlifts
• Hip thrusts
• Glute bridges
• Hamstring curls
• Nordic curls

Again, we’re supersetting our two working blocks. You’ll rest for 1-2 minutes before repeating this second training block.

Perform this block for 2-4 sets at 10-12 reps in super set fashion.

You honestly could cut the workout right here and be done in about 35-40 minutes.

I’ve recently added a little more volume. Since it’s only one workout per week, I figured there was some room in there for direct arm and shoulder work.

This is what brings my total time closer to the full 60 minutes.

Third Block (optional): Arms

3a) Bicep Curls

3b) Tricep overhead extensions

Perform 10-12 reps. And once again, rest for 1-2 minutes before repeating for 2-3 total sets.

Fourth Block (optional): Shoulders

4) Rear delt raises

Perform 1 rest-pause set:

Execute 12-15 reps … put the weight down and pause for 15 seconds then repeat for 8-10 reps … then pause and repeat before performing 5-6 more reps … keep repeating for 2-3 more rounds.

Cooldown: Dead hang

Find a pull-up bar and hang from it for about 60 seconds to decompress the spine and cooldown.

And there you have it.

One workout per week that hits my entire body in just one hour

That’s my entire workout that I’ve been doing for the past six weeks.

I’m performing five sets of each movement for some added volume and that’s what brings my total time up to about 60 minutes.

You might be done sooner if you go with a lower volume for your sets.

I’ve gotten strong enough to add a weighted vest to my workouts and now I’ve increased the resistance on that weighted vest, too.

Remember to track your workouts as you can see the gainzzzz happen in real time.

Try this out if you’d like and let me know what you think.

I hope you found this useful. If so, I’d appreciate it if you sent this newsletter to one person you think would benefit from my writing today.

And if you’re new here and enjoyed this newsletter, I’d be honored if you subscribed for more at this link.

And as always, if you have any questions, please feel free to reach out.

I answer all of my emails at pete [at] petecataldo [.] com … Hit me up with the subject line “one workout per week” and I’ll answer any questions you have to make this work for you.

Until next time,
Pete