Pros and Cons of Splitting Your Workout Throughout the Day
I know I’m not the only person who has exercise equipment within arm’s reach (or within walking distance) of where he spends most of his day. And you can hit the home gym a couple times a day, is that better than doing the whole workout at once? Or, if not better, then just as good? Sometimes it does! Let’s discuss the nuances.
For the sake of argument, I’ll assume that you are trying to decide between two schedules:
-
Traditional strength training in which you warm up and then perform four or five different exercises for several sets of each. All this can take you from 45 minutes to an hour and a half, depending on what you do and how long.
-
The same exercises, but split them up – spending, say, 15 minutes on each part of the workout, and then returning to a regular work day.
Benefits of spreading your workout throughout the day
Working out for 15 minutes probably sounds a lot less daunting than an entire workout, and that’s probably the most obvious benefit of interrupting your workout. People with busy or unpredictable schedules (say, those with a demanding job or parents of a new baby) may find it easier to find a few small blocks of time to exercise than to schedule a full workout.
Here are four reasons to consider splitting your workout:
-
Each mini-workout is less intimidating because it’s over in a few minutes.
-
It may be easier to fit in short sessions between other responsibilities and activities.
-
You’ll have several mental and physical breaks throughout the workday (which is helpful if you typically spend your day sitting at a desk).
-
You may feel less fatigued at the start of each exercise because you’ve had an hour or two of rest rather than just a few minutes.
Disadvantages of spreading your workout throughout the day
These benefits sound great, but there are some pretty significant downsides to splitting your workout, depending on what type of workout you’re doing. Most people will probably conclude that it’s not worth it for these five reasons:
-
Instead of deciding once that it’s time to go work out, you’ll have four or five opportunities throughout the day to tell yourself yes or no. Skip even one of these and you’ll only get, say, 75% of your workout done.
-
You’ll approach each exercise cold instead of warming up from the previous one. Warming up isn’t always necessary, but it can greatly help you prepare, especially for a good strength workout .
-
You probably won’t have to shower after every mini-workout, which means you can sit around in sweaty clothes. It can be nice to work out, get organized, and know you’re ready.
-
You’ll spend most of your day knowing you have another workout to do instead of ending it early.
-
Some workouts are designed in such a way that each part follows the previous one – for example, activating or pre-exhausting the muscles in the first exercise of the day, and then moving on to the second exercise before you have fully recovered. Breaking up your workout can make it less effective or, ironically, encourage you to use more weight or work harder than if you were doing everything in one block.
Aside from this last point, which only applies to workouts that are designed to be done consistently, most reasons for choosing one option over another come down to time management. Do you think you’re more or less likely to do four mini-workouts than one big workout? Are you okay with making compromises (perhaps spending more time stretching or cleaning) if they mean you never have to devote your entire lunch break to exercise? This decision can only be made by you.
‘Workout Snacks’ Can Be an Effective Alternative
If you can’t or don’t want to do a specific workout, perhaps you can have a “snack” every few hours.
Many recent studies have looked at ways to get people to exercise more to improve their health. In one study, older adults performed a 10-minute workout without equipment twice a day. Exercises included standing up from a chair repeatedly, marching in place, and doing calf raises.
After four weeks, subjects improved their performance on the sit-stand test by an average of 31%. Short workouts definitely do something , and it’s much better than nothing.
Whether the same strategy will work for more athletic people lifting weights requires more specific research, but there is plenty of anecdotal evidence that it works.
Mini workouts such as “greasing the groove” can improve strength.
There is another type of mini-workout that is very popular in the exercise world. Something called “groove lubrication” can help you improve your performance of a specific exercise, such as a pull-up. The name reportedly comes from kettlebell lifting coach Pavel Tsatsouline, and the idea is that you choose an exercise to perform several times a day, but never to failure. So if you can’t do five pull-ups in a row, you can do one or two pull-ups every hour or so throughout the day.
Many people have found that it has helped them perform better, probably for two main reasons. The first is volume: two pull-ups per hour for six hours is 12 reps of pull-ups. Do this every day and you’ll get 60 reps in a workweek, more than if you simply did three sets of five pull-ups over two or three training days. Each set may be lightweight, but they add up.
Another benefit of lubricating the groove is that it gives you a lot of practice in the movement you are working on. Strength training isn’t just about the size of your muscles; they also include a skills component. Just as you can get better at playing the piano by practicing, you can also improve your skill at exercises by continuing to practice.
What Happened When I Tried to Split My Workouts
This is a lot of theory. How does this work in practice? I tried it myself and have two stories to share.
First, I’ve been doing kettlebell exercises using the “lubricate the grooves” protocol for several months now. Every time I’m sitting at my desk and one of my wearables tells me I’ve been sitting too long, I stand up and do a flex press (or two, or three) with an adjustable kettlebell . I add weight when it starts to feel too light, but stick to a weight that feels nice and light—it feels more like a workout than a workout.
I swear my shoulders are healthier and I know I’m getting better at this particular exercise. A few months ago, 50 pounds was too much for me to bench press, so my daily incline presses were 20 pounds, one rep at a time. Now I do 24 repetitions of easy doubles three times a day, without warming up.
But while writing this article, I also decided to break down my workout routine to see what I thought of this approach. (My day’s workout had four main components that seemed like they could be separated without defeating the purpose of the workout.)
The first exercise, five sets of heavy barbell quarter squats, I did while helping my son with his own workout at the gym in our garage. I did a set, changed weights, talked to him a little, did another set, and so on. I finished my mini-workout long before he finished his.
A little later I did the following exercise: three sets of squats. I didn’t even bother going to the garage for these, I just made them on the floor in my office. Later I did supersets of pull-ups and push-ups.
This workout usually scares me because it can take a while. (That includes eight sets of pull-ups and push-ups. I mean, come on.) But if I did it one piece at a time, it didn’t seem so bad—I can handle eight sets of pull-ups and push-ups if I don’t I do another heavy exercise right before and right after.
However, I ran into one of the problems noted above: I had to say yes to the workout four times. And at the end of the day, I said no to the last part: a 15-minute circuit of core exercises. I’ve already split everything up, so what’s the harm in doing a lap the next morning? But it’s “next morning” and I haven’t done it yet. I’ll deal with this later. May be. Likely. After today’s training.