No One Likes Burpees, so Here's Exactly How Many You Have To Do per Week To See Results
Just as we eat certain healthy foods even when they’re not our favorites, the same applies to workouts—we do them because we know they're good for us. And when we think of not-so-enjoyable exercises, burpees are likely at the top of the list.
The good news is that you don’t have to do burpees that often to reap the health benefits. Here’s everything you need to know, according to trainers.
The Benefits of Burpees
Not only are burpees an excellent way to get your heart rate up, but they can also boost your strength and endurance. Burpees are a complete full-body workout.
“Burpees are a great move to warm you up and get your cardio pumping. Burpees work your whole body and improve strength and endurance,” says Emily Skye, trainer and creator of the fitness program, Emily Skye FIT. “This move has a cardio element to it—getting your heart rate up and your muscles working explosively, including your legs, glutes, upper body, core and back.”
Related: 19 Workouts That Are Great for Your Heart, From Walking and Water Aerobics to Boxing and Burpees
Along with activating numerous muscle groups, you’ll also burn more calories per minute compared to other workouts.
Burpees activate the entire anterior chain (front) of the body. This includes pecs, anterior deltoids/shoulders, abdominals, glutes, quads and hamstrings, as well as obliques and multifidus to stabilize the spine. Since it is a level-changing exercise, burpees will elevate your heart rate quickly, allowing you to burn more calories per minute. This all can be tracked while wearing a heart rate monitor, Brooke Taylor an NYC-based personal trainer, owner of Taylored Fitness and creator of the Brooke Taylor Fit App, says.
How Many Burpees You Need To Do per Week To See Results
This is a great functional training exercise that you can add to any program designed to maximize your time in the gym and energy expenditure, Taylor explains. Try to cycle in different variations of the exercise for the greatest benefits. Too much impact for an extended period of time can cause injury or burnout.
This is why Taylor suggests adding a variation of two to three sets of 12-15 reps into a workout regimen over time every other month. This way your body has an adequate amount of time to recover, reset and go—and you'll see results.
In some cases, it may be a good idea to implement high-rep burpees. For example, 50-60 burpees with as few breaks as you can manage, Thoren Bradley, MA in Exercise Science, Former D1 NCAA Strength Coach and C4 Energy Brand Ambassador, suggests.
However, to get the most out of the burpee, we may use it as a “garnish” with our exercise selection. Say you're going to be performing some leg extensions for four sets of eight reps. You could include eight burpees in between each set.
"Now what you're doing is increasing the oxygen consumption and energy demand of your workout, while simultaneously overloading your quads," Bradley adds. So with methods like this, you aren’t constantly just chasing more and more reps, but instead making your workouts harder by asking more of yourself in between traditional movements. Using this method, doing only 80-100 burpees in a week would allow you to still get the most out of the movement.
Burpee Workouts
Here are a few trainer-approved exercises to help you get started:
Classic Burpee
From Skye
How to do it:
Beginning in a standing position with feet hip-width apart, lower your body to a crouch position and place hands on the floor in front of you.
Jump back so your feet land together behind you to form a push-up position.
Perform a pushup, and then hop back so your feet come under you so you’re in a crouch position again, and jump back up to the starting position.
Sliding Plate Burpee
“When you power through the full range of motion, the burpee is a big muscle mover and a massive calorie burner. The more reps you can fit into the 50 seconds, the higher the calorie expenditure,” Skye states.
How to do it:
With your sliding plates under both feet and shoulder-width apart, squat down to place your hands on the ground in front of you and slide your feet back (at the same time as each other) until your body is in a plank position.
Bend your knees and slide your feet back towards your hands, release your hands from the ground and squat back up to standing, putting the weight on your heels rather than the balls of your feet.
Keep repeating the move.
Burpee Push Ups
From Taylor
How to do it:
Start standing with your legs wider than hip distance apart.
As you inhale, send your sitz bones back into a nice deep squat position, place your hands directly underneath your shoulders and jump the legs back, forming a nice long dart position from head to toe.
Inhale to lower the body down forming a 90-degree angle at the shoulder to elbow joint.
Exhale extend the arms, while you jump the legs back into standing.
Repeat 10-12x
Burpee Push-Ups to Deadlifts
From Taylor
How to do it:
Start standing with your legs wider than hip distance apart holding one dumbbell in each hand.
Inhale to hinge at the hip placing the hands down directly underneath your shoulders.
Exhale, jump the legs back forming a nice long dart position from head to toe.
Inhale, lower the body down forming the 90-degree angle.
Exhale to extend the arms, jump the legs back in finding a neutral spine and extend your legs straight to standing.
Repeat 10-12x.
Burpee to Deadlift Front Squat
From Taylor
How to do it:
Start standing with your legs wider than hip distance apart holding one dumbbell in each hand.
Inhale to hinge at the hip placing the hands down directly underneath your shoulders.
Exhale, jump the legs back forming a nice long dart position from head to toe.
Inhale, lower the body down forming the 90-degree angle.
Exhale to extend the arms, jump the legs back in finding a neutral spine and extend your legs straight.
Inhale, scoop in your abdominals, swing your arms up into a bicep curl so they line up with the shoulders.
Then hinge at your hip, send your sitz bones back into a front squat.
Inhale and extend the legs.
Repeat 10-12x.
Burpee Push Up to Renegade Row
From Taylor
How to do it:
Start standing with your legs wider than hip distance apart.
As you inhale, send your sitz bones back into a nice deep squat position and place your hands directly underneath your shoulders and jump the legs back forming a nice long dart position from head to toe.
Inhale to lower the body down forming a 90-degree angle at the shoulder to elbow joint.
Exhale, extend the arms, keep your core nice and tight with the focus being to keep the hips square as you exhale, pull one elbow back in line with the ribs, then place it down and then pull the opposite arm back.
Exhale, jump the legs back into standing.
Repeat 10-12x
How to Modify a Burpee
Bradley provides an easy, slightly hard and more advanced version of burpees.
To make it easier: If you aren’t quite ready for the full push-up, drop to your knees right before the push-up and perform a modified version of the traditional push-up burpee.
Slightly Harder: Instead of just jumping, add a high knee tuck at the top of your jump.
Harder Still: Instead of just going up in reps, we can also add dumbbells to the movement. This opens up an entirely new avenue for progressive overload. Remember, it is increasingly important to have a robotic form while doing a dumbbell burpee. We don’t want to see any dumbbell swinging before the jump, and the dumbbells should remain at your sides while performing the jump. Start with 2.5 or 5 lb dumbbells until your fitness warrants more weight.
Next up: Here's Exactly How Many Squats You Need to Do Per Week to See Results, According to Trainers
Sources
Emily Skye, trainer and creator of the fitness program, Emily Skye FIT
Brooke Taylor an NYC-based personal trainer, owner of Taylored Fitness and creator of the Brooke Taylor Fit App
Thoren Bradley, MA in Exercise Science, Former D1 NCAA Strength Coach and C4 Energy Brand Ambassador
