Online Workout Routines

One of the challenges of these theme weeks are that it becomes easy to just troll Google for some unsubstantiated links and pass them on to you on my way to fame and fortune. But that sucks, so thankfully quite a few of you have already made my job easier by suggesting a few workout programs that you’ve used personally, which is stamp of approval enough for me.

• Crossfit.com

Mark A. writes:

Check out crossfit, its run by mostly fitness nazis and ex-military types, but helped me shed 20 pounds and build crazy amounts of muscle in a matter of months. The work outs are intense, but never the same, and can be done by most people who are in at least something resembling shape. Perfect for the person who like me, was a pretty good athlete in H.S. but took a few years off from activity to play flip cup and do gravity bongs.

The main idea behind CrossFit seems to be the “WOD,” or “Workout of the Day,” a rotating set of exercises that keep things from getting stale while encouraging you to beat the times of your fellow CrossFitters. Of course, if you see “225-pound deadlift” and “handstand pushups” as a bit daunting, perhaps you should start with something a bit less “elite,” like the…

• Navy Seals Fitness Test

You won’t get very in the Navy SEALs unless you can complete the basic fitness test, which includes a 50-meter underwater swim, a one-and-a-half mile ocean swim (with fins), and a 32-minute 4-mile run (and that’s just part of it). I don’t know if you’ll have to do everything on the list to get into the SEALs, but at least you’ve got something to work towards.

Adventurer’s Option: Navy Aviators Fitness Test, including an inverted loop in an F-14 and sport bike ride set to the soothing sounds of Kenny Loggins.

• Hyperstrike

First things first: Hyperstrike costs money. (They have a 14-day free trial.) After signing up and selecting one of three workout tracks—”Lean,” “Fitness,” or “Performance”—you’ll receive a customized workout plan, access to training animations, and a online tracking system that will help you monitor your progress. Reader Steven L. says it’s “Very tough, but quick, but no equipment needed.”

• Fitness Ladder

Of course, you’re probably a sweating, quivering sack of self and even reading something like “handstand pushups” makes your pericardium go all to ice, you could do worse than The Hacker’s Diet’s Fitness Ladder, which starts you off with a laughably simple regimen of push-ups and jumping jacks before inching you towards something more impressively challenging. Like Hyperstrike, all the exercises in the Fitness Ladder can be done without any equipment; Unlike Hyperstrike, the Fitness Ladder is free.