There are a lot of different ways you can go about getting stronger, but my go-to option when I’m short on time is always a full-body dumbbell workout.
That’s because I find dumbbell workouts the most time-effective way to train. I have a set of dumbbells at home so I just need to load up a session to follow and get into it, and I can train the whole body pretty well in under 30 minutes.
You do need to find a good workout to follow though, which can sometimes take a bit of time, but I’ve the work for you on that front, and this 25-minute from Dan, one half of fitness duo TIFF x DAN, is well worth adding to your routine.
Ideally, you need a few different sets of dumbbells for the workout, or a set of the best adjustable dumbbells so you can change the weight you’re lifting quickly to suit different moves. It’s also helpful to have access to a bench.
However, I was able to do the workout with just one set of dumbbells and no bench, so while it’s not ideal, you can get a great session done without needing too much kit if it’s easier for you.
Watch TIFF x DAN’s 25-minute full-body workout
After a quick warm up the main workout is broken down into five rounds, with each targeting a different area of the body. Round one is legs, round two is upper body, round three is abs and core, round four is biceps and triceps, and round five is full body moves.
In each round, you do five exercises, and there are no repeats throughout the whole workout, so you’ll be doing 25 different moves. In each round aside from round three, you work for 40 seconds and then rest for 20 seconds. In the core-focused round three, you work for 50 seconds and rest for 10.
Here are my main takeaways from the workout after doing it.
The warm up is worth using with other workouts too
I was impressed by the video before we even reached the workout because the three-minute warm-up is effective in waking up almost your entire body.
I’m often guilty of skipping my warm-up for strength sessions because I don’t want to take the time and don’t really know what to do, but this quick routine is one that I’ll use for other sessions as a good general warm-up for the gym.
Move with control to maximize the benefits
Most of the moves in the workout are best done at a slow tempo so you can focus on getting your form right and engaging the right muscles. This isn’t a HIIT-style session where you’re trying to do as many reps as you can during each work period.
Instead, I found that moving with control was the most effective way to exhaust the target muscles in each move, keeping an eye on the screen to make sure my foam was mimicking Dan’s for the exercise.
A range of weights definitely helpful
I only have one set of dumbbells at home so I used those, and while I could do each move, they were a little too light for some of the big leg lifts like the deadlift, and a little too heavy to comfortably do some arms exercises like lateral raises.
Dan is using a range of weights between 20lbs and 40lbs, and it shows what he uses for each move on screen, but if you at least have one heavy and one light set of weights you’ll be well set for the workout.
You can do the bench exercises on the floor
There are some moves in the workout that call for a bench, including the bench press and the dumbbell pullover. I don’t have a bench so I did these on the floor, and while you get a smaller range of motion by not lowering your arms past your chest or head, you can still work the right muscles.
The workout showed off the weak areas of my body
A full-body workout like this quickly exposes which parts of the body you’ve trained more than others, even for me demonstrating that I do more work on my triceps than my biceps.
As a keen runner, my upper body is certainly weaker than my lower body, and I need to work more on my hamstrings than my quads to even up an imbalance there too. This is handy to know to help me decide what to do in future workouts.
I ditched my weights for some of the abs moves
The core circuit in the middle of the workout is tough, not just because you get less rest with 50 seconds of work in each minute, but also because I was doing most of the moves with weights for the first time.
Generally, I do core exercises like crunches and dead bugs without weights, and for most of the moves in the circuit I had to put my dumbbells down to get through the set.
Lighter weights would have helped, but for the workout in general you can complete most of the moves without dumbbells and still work the muscles well.
The last section gets your heart pumping
I mentioned above that the workout is mostly done at a controlled pace, which means my heart rate wasn’t spiking that much. That was until the final round where you do full-body exercises like dumbbell thrusters and swings, which certainly got my heart pumping.
It’s a great final round for the workout because you can push hard knowing you’re nearly done, and it boosts your cardio fitness as well as your functional strength.
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