Please help me set up a rotation

[MarlaGaz]

Hi everyone,

I started reading the message board and realized that this is such a great motivator!!! (Not to mention the pics of Cathe & crew).

I need help on the basics of setting up a rotation. Is there a basic formula I should follow? I have many of Cathe's workout DVD's, but I mainly do whichever workout I'm in the "mood" for -- but I generally do wait 48 hours between heavy weight-training workouts.

I'd really, REALLY like to design a rotation for myself, though, and put it on paper and follow it.

Can you help?

Thank you all for your excellent motivation!!!

Marla:

 

[KathyH]

Hi Marla! Setting up a rotation depends on how many times you wish to do cardio, do you like weight training splits or total body workouts; do you do yoga & pilates. There are no "rules" to follow. If you like the results your now getting, then by all means stick to what your doing already but if not, then you might want to change things up a bit. I generally stick to a rotation for 6 weeks then do an active recovery week & then do just yoga, stretch or pilates before I enter into a different rotation.

My own rotation is working my upper body 2x a week & 2x a week lower & 2x cardio for 6 weeks, then my active recovery week consists of bootcamp, mic, mis or ph or me or from P90X Core Synergistics.

There are soooo many ways to work it its difficult for me to give you an answer. HTH, Kathy

 

[FiddleFit]

I agree with Kathy. There are people on these forums who are very good at creating rotations, but you need to tell them what your goals are, how much time you have in a day or a week to workout, and what workouts you actually have in your possession. There is also a "Rotations" forum here that has rotations made by Cathe, and where people post what they're doing. You might find something you like in that forum.

All the best,
Sandra

 

[catwoman]

I just set up my first Cathe rotation schedule.

First, one thing I like about having a rotation schedule is the motivating factor. I can't explain it, but it's like having it written down ahead of time motivates me to work out. I have set up a notebook with the left half of the page devoted to my "plan" and the right half devoted to my "actual". Maybe having to write down what I actually did is what is so motivating. I've also put in room to write notes about my progress. At any rate, I look forward to looking in my notebook to see "what's next". My goal is to have a well-worn notebook that I can look back on and see where I had success and where something didn't work quite as well as I'd hoped.

In my current rotation, I work upper body 2x a week, lower body 2x a week (never on successive days), core 2x a week, and cardio at least 4 times per week. 2 cardio workouts are for at least 20 minutes, and 2 of them are for at least 45 minutes (I don't want to kill myself since I'm just starting out, so I'm allowing myself to not complete entire workouts until I've gotten accustomed to them). I also have a 3 on, 3 off schedule: Work out for 3 days, take a day off, work out for 3 days, take a day off.

Later on, I think I will build a rotation where I am doing 1 higher intensity upper body workout and 1 lower intensity upper body workout per week...I'll do the lower body workouts the same way: 1 high intensity and 1 low intensity.

Whatever approach you use, I find rotations very motivating!