Men's Fitness Online

Expert trainer Andy Speer reveals three surefire tips for getting fit and lean.

Getting fit and lean isn’t that hard.It just takes consistent effort and some knowledge. Try applying these 3 simple tips to your daily routine and watch your body change.

Use complexes

A complex is generally three to five moves strung together using one tool – a barbell, kettlebell, dumbbell, sandbag, etc –  that you don’t put down until you’ve completed the set. Complexes are ideal for combining strength or hypertrophy training with cardio or metabolic training when you’re short on time. One of my go-to complexes: grab a pair of dumbbells and perform six reps each of cleans, overhead presses, front squats and bentover rows. Do three to five sets, resting a minute between rounds.

Sprint

Sprinting is hands-down the best exercise for shredding fat and maintaining functional lean muscle mass. That said, take a month to work your way into being able to push yourself at a 90% effort sprint speed. You’ll get a ton of benefit out of the building phase. Ideally you should do this on a grass field or a track. Start with strides at 50% effort. Then build up to 70, 80 and then 90% effort for 10 to 15 seconds. Sample workout: five to eight 100m sprints with 60 to 90 seconds of rest between sprints.

Track macros

When you’re in a shredding cycle, there are two good rules of thumb for nutrition. The first: your daily calorie intake should equal your body weight times 20. (So if you weigh 75kg, you should consume 1500 calories per day.) The second: get 2g of protein per kilo of bodyweight each day. It’s not a groundbreaking formula, but it really works. Unless you do everything else wrong, you’ll lean out. That said, it’s pretty difficult to get that much protein just by eating food. So supplement with a performance whey protein twice a day.