Talking Shop with Craig Ballantyne

Written on October 25, 2007 at 8:40 am, by Eric Cressey

EC: Let’s be honest: every Average Joe trainer under the sun has an e-book or 5-minute guide to sucker misinformed housewives into shelling out hundreds of dollars to learn the “hidden secret” of fat loss. Frankly, I’ve had hundreds of products along these lines cross my path in the past few years, and the only two that have withstood the test of time – and yielded outstanding results time-and-time again are yours and Cosgrove’s. I know about your programming, but let’s enlighten our readers a bit about what makes Turbulence Training so effective.

CB: I think there are a lot of other good ideas and programs out there; not a day goes by that I don’t get a good idea from another trainer. Maybe Alwyn and I just claimed the catchiest names – or maybe it’s the Scottish last name.

What I’ve done over the years is take my experience in research, and in training athletes, and in working with busy people with minimal equipment, and rolled that up into a program that meets the needs of my readers.

I’ve adapted the program quite a bit over the years because users have demanded changes. For example, in the past, it used to focus on barbell exercises, but now includes only dumbbell and bodyweight exercises (with the exception of my more advanced “Fusion and Synergy” fat loss programs)

The principles remain the same, though. We use more intense strength training than traditional programs (lower reps, not as low as a powerlifter, but lower than 99% of fat loss programs recommended in the past – although this is changing as the approach becomes more popular).

Each workout uses supersets. This gets the workout done faster. I also use what I call “non-competing” supersets, basically referring to supersetting two exercises that don’t use the same muscles – including grip strength.

So, a dumbbell split squat and a dumbbell chest press would be non-competing. A dumbbell reverse lunge and a dumbbell row would be competing, because they both demand intense grip work. So, I’d avoid the lunge-row combo.

And then we finish up each workout with interval training. This, too, has evolved over the years. I used to recommend basic 30-second intervals, with 60-second recovery, done on a bike or treadmill (or sprints outside). Now I’m using bodyweight circuits in place of intervals, or sometimes barbell complexes, or sometimes even high-rep dumbbell work.

These changes have all been based on feedback from users. For example, a lot of Turbulence Training readers work out at home with nothing but dumbbells and a bench; they don’t have a machine for cardio. So, we use bodyweight circuits instead. These are great and can be adapted for any fitness level.

For the interval type circuits, I like to use six total bodyweight exercises, three lower body and three upper body. Then just alternate between upper and lower in a 6-exercise circuit.

So bottom line, a Turbulence Training workout will run like this:

5-minute bodyweight warm-up
20-minutes superset strength training
18-minutes interval training
7-minutes stretching or mobility work

We do three hard workouts per week, yet I emphasize that everyday is an exercise day (that is, on the four days you don’t do a hard Turbulence Training workout, you must still get 30 minutes of activity – preferably something you enjoy and enables you to spend time with family or friends).