I Tried GymBird’s 6-Week Beginner Fitness Program: Here’s My Review

The Premise and Promise of Gymbird’s Fitness Program

GymBird's 6-Week Beginner program is ideal for those new to exercise or for folks getting back into working out after taking some time off. This plan helps users establish a fitness baseline by focusing on foundational movements they can do anywhere with little to no equipment. After completing this program, you'll be ready to level up your exercise routine by adding weights or increasing intensity.

Setting Personal Goals

A mistake I see many exercisers make is relying on motivation alone to help them stick to their fitness routine. Motivation is a finite resource. It's easy to stay motivated when you're having a good day, but your motivation will likely wane when you're stressed or have low energy.

Setting fitness goals can help improve your motivation and increase your workout consistency. The key is choosing a challenging but realistic goal. Research indicates that these goals are more motivating than unrealistic ones.

My personal goal for this challenge was to move five days a week for at least 30 minutes. The purpose of this goal was to help me re-establish a fitness routine, reducing the negative impacts of sitting around all day. This goal was challenging since I hadn't been moving regularly, but it was attainable because it didn't require an excessive amount of time.

When setting your own fitness goals, start by assessing your fitness level. Identify areas for improvement and set specific, measurable, and achievable goals.

Understanding the GymBird Fitness Program

This six-week program is designed to help you go from couch to gym comfortably. Do each workout twice, going through the exercises for each of the seven days once, and then repeat the following week. The goal is to get you moving and ready for the next step of your fitness journey. Users are encouraged to repeat the program as many times as needed.

Program Breakdown

Full Body Workouts

GymBird's program includes three 30-minute full-body workouts per week. These workouts include exercise circuits that keep your heart rate up while engaging your muscles. Most exercises you'll perform throughout this program are body-weight movements, but you'll need a long resistance band and an elevated surface like a chair for some exercises.

Science-Backed Benefits

While bodyweight exercises don't require Schwarzenegger-like strength, they're incredibly effective at improving your fitness.

AKT Master Trainer, Alissa Tucker, is a huge fan of body-weight workouts, saying, "Body-weight training helps build muscle, improve aerobic capacity, improve muscle endurance, and even improve flexibility. Most body-weight exercises also use multiple muscle groups at once, making it a more functional choice than weight machines at the gym, which typically target just one muscle group."

Research backs Tucker's positive opinions on body-weight exercise. One study published in the International Journal of Exercise Science found that body-weight training for just 11 minutes three times per week positively impacted participants' cardiorespiratory health. Another study explored the impact of body-weight training in young women and found improvements in aerobic capacity, muscle endurance, lower body power, and flexibility.

Active Recovery

GymBird’s beginner fitness program doesn’t just focus on heart-pounding body-weight workouts. It also encourages participants to slow down and take two active recovery days weekly. Active recovery, also called active rest, focuses on low-intensity movement like walking, yoga, or simply playing with your kids.

Science-Backed Benefits

Exercise causes damage to muscles and ligaments, leading to muscle soreness after a workout. This is normal and essential for muscle growth. But that doesn't mean you have to settle for an achy body after every workout. Active recovery days can help ease soreness by increasing blood flow to your muscles and reducing inflammation.

According to AKT master trainer Tucker, active rest is also an excellent tool for helping you build an exercise habit.

"Active rest days can be extremely beneficial for those who are beginning a workout program or who have a history of ‘falling off the exercise wagon’ by keeping them in the habit of carving out time for themselves and for movement each day,” said Tucker.

“Oftentimes, those new to an exercise routine need to keep the momentum going,” said Tucker. “When we exercise, our body produces feel-good hormones. This feeling of wellbeing can often keep people motivated to do it again the next day. When we take too many days off, we tend to fall back into old patterns and routines - which is totally normal! Our limbic brains are wired to crave what we know. Anything new can be seen as a threat. Rewiring the brain to create behavioral change takes consistent effort. When it comes to exercise, active rest days can keep the momentum going, without overdoing it."

Rest Days

While other programs (I'm looking at you, 75Hard) view rest days as a setback, GymBird sees them as a necessary component for any well-balanced exercise routine. This program encourages you to take two rest days per week.

Science-Backed Benefits

"Recovery is a crucial part of any exercise program," said master trainer Tucker. "Exercise without proper recovery time can lead to overuse injuries, increased soreness, dysregulated nervous systems and can even negatively impact our results."

On top of the negative outcomes highlighted by Tucker, one recent study found that individuals who exercised too much experienced more stress and mental health challenges than light exercisers. When it comes to exercise, more isn't always better. Use your rest days to focus on other activities you enjoy, like spending time with your family or reading a good book.

GymBird App Interface

After signing up for this program, I was granted instant access to six weeks of workouts through the GymBird app powered by Superset. The app has a clean, user-friendly interface that simplifies navigation. It's especially convenient for someone like me who's not particularly tech-savvy, making accessing workouts a breeze.

Each workout provides video demonstrations and descriptions for every movement, ensuring you have proper form. After completing an exercise, you simply press the arrow at the bottom of the screen to move on to the next movement.

What I Loved About GymBird’s Program

Expertise

As a certified yoga instructor and professional wellness writer, I understand the importance of following workouts led by an expert. All too often, I come across folks with no credentials selling programs on social media. Following advice from individuals with no fitness expertise can hinder your results and be downright harmful.

Experts, like certified personal trainers, understand anatomy, physiology, and exercise science. This expertise helps ensure that the programs they create are safe and effective.

Before beginning this program, I researched who would lead the workouts. I was delighted that the NASM-certified personal trainer, Caitlin Hansen, would guide me through the sessions. With over ten years of experience, Caitlin has guided countless people, from beginners to regular gym-goers, through their fitness journey.

Convenience

It's tough to squeeze in a gym session with my busy schedule, especially when faced with a discouraging 40-minute round-trip drive to the gym. This commute alone discouraged me from exercising in the past. To build a consistent exercise habit, I needed to make fitness as convenient as possible.

GymBird's program required minimal equipment, allowing me to skip the commute and comfortably exercise from home. Additionally, each workout was only 30 minutes, making it easier to fit into my day than longer workouts found in other programs. I completed most of my workouts during lunch breaks or when dinner was cooking in the oven.

Intensity

One of my favorite features of GymBird's program is the workout intensity. The workouts include a combination of cardio moves like jumping jacks and strengthening moves like glute bridges. This variety of exercises helped elevate my heart rate without making me feel exhausted.

As the program progressed, so did the intensity of the movements. Since the first few weeks focused on building a solid fitness base, I felt prepared for the challenge as the exercises became more difficult.