ok to be random in my routine?

Ok to be random with my routine?

I've tried sticking to programmes and set routines in the past and find it difficult.

Firslty, I'm not trying to be a gymnast here, I just enjoy this style of workout and do it for fitness and keeping in shape.

Lately, I've been going to no set plan or routine, just doing a mixture of moves and basic exercises. I'm only a beginner so what I can do is limited

Mostly it revolves around the rings

skin the cat, back and front tucks, chins and dips as best as I can do them, l-sit tuck

I then do some pushups, a bit of ab-wheel crunching (just because I like it) and maybe some rows or pullups on a bar and attempts at the planche tuck and handstand.

I might not do all of that in one session but that's the rough scope of my workouts, 3x a week. And I surf one day a week two.

Is this acceptable? I'll still progress won't I, just at a slower rate perhaps..

I see nothing wrong with that as long as you enjoy it. I probably went on like that for a year before I found a good routine to stick to for more than a week, and I made huge gains. I still mix it up a lot, though with more structure than before.

random training = random results

If you want specific results then do specific training, but since you havent one goal in mind, try to do at least 1 exercise for pulling, pressing, core and legs, or concentrate on duration of the exercise or something else but dont do total random things!

It's as meaningful as playing, it's mainly fun and has minor effects compared to a proper designed training routine.

Crossfit might be what you would really enjoy based on what you said. I sometimes substitute a few movements for more gymnastic oriented ones.

So, the "random workouts" are great when they are planned, not random. For example, if you decide to work on front lever pulls one week, TOPS pulls the next, and front pulls the week after that, and then repeat, you will be kicking butt in no time. What you don't want to do is do the exact same thing all the time for your dynamic work. Work the same muscles, but work them differently each time. They never get used to it, so they keep growing and getting stronger more quickly. If you apply this to all of your movements you'll find that you can have "random" workouts that are pre-planned, and you will see results very quickly.

With the statics, you'll probably be best served with steady state work. If you don't care about them, then I guess that's not something you need to worry about!

TRULY random workouts will never produce results as good as a pre-planned approach. Without planning for progressive resistance and regular training, even when every training session is different, you will not get the optimum results. If you don't really care about being "all that you can be" then just get out there and have fun man!

quad6 said:

Ok to be random with my routine?

Firslty, I'm not trying to be a gymnast here, I just enjoy this style of workout and do it for fitness and keeping in shape. . .I'm only a beginner

You're in luck, you can reap the benefit of beginner status and you'll probably progress with any style of workout and since progress isn't your main objective, a random workout could work for you.

For a good few months I'd go into the gym with only a general idea of what i wanted to accomplish that day and go about it intuitively, and some sort of intuitive structure would arise. There's more than one way to go about it, especially if progress isn't your main objective.

Your progress will be slower than with a structured routine.. so yes.

But doing something is always better than doing nothing. Take the time to figure out what you want to do like ts00nami is saying. You can always use your basic work to build up from there if you have more concrete goals int he future.

Thanks for the feedback.

this is my attempt to introduce a little more strucutre while keeping things flexible. Basically, I'd follow this planner but sometimes I might do the exercises differently, i.e. dips on rings, on bars the next week.

I tried it yesterday, seemed ok. Feels like less volume than what I do when I'm completely random.

I'm going to parrot that I got poor results with an unstructured routine compared to structured. Perhaps you'd enjoy scaled WOD's? They're unpredictable, but you can't go far wrong when your workout is hand crafted by Coach Sommer.