Daily Strength Training Workout Routine | Improve Functional Strength

The best home exercises you can do everyday to improve your overall functional strength. This daily strength training workout consists of bodyweight exercises that will strengthen and tone every major muscle group in your body. This is a great daily routine for functional strength training at home. Keep reading for more!

As a doctor of physical therapy, the majority of patients I see fall into one of two categories - those who need to stretch and those who need to get stronger.

In my video last week, I presented 7 of my favorite stretches to help improve your flexibility and mobility; in my video this week I wanted to share 7 of my favorite body weight exercises to improve your strength and function right at home.

These exercises are actually ones that I recommend the most to my patients as “homework” or as part of their “home exercise program”. We’ll address every major muscle group in the body to make a great tote body strength training routine.

The caveat to this video is that we’re not going to show you anything to pack on muscle or build mass. We’re not going to be using any weights or equipment, so we don’t have the option to “progressively overload” the muscle to cause it to hypertrophy.

Similarly, because we’re not working the muscle to fatigue and even failure, we eliminate (if not significantly shorten) recovery time. Therefore, these should be safe for most of you to do this routine every day (at least 4-5 days/week).

Keep in mind that if any of these hurt or if over time you start to experience soreness you don’t recover from before performing these again, that’s an indicator that you may need to slow down to 2-3 days/week until you build up adequate strength.

I wanted to share at least one exercise for every major muscle group in the body. I’ll run you through a “top-down” approach where I’ll share exercises for your neck and upper back, chest and arms, core, hips, and quads and hamstrings.

Strength in each of these areas is crucial to proper function in performing many tasks that we undertake everyday. So let’s get started and see what we can do!

CLICK ON THE TIMESTAMP BELOW TO JUMP TO EACH SPECIFIC EXERCISE

SCAPULA PINCHES (2:29): Great for neck and upper back pain and posture problems. The focus is on squeezing your shoulder blades together and tuck them down into your back pockets.

PRONE SCAPULAR RETRACTION (3:23): Works your spinal extensors in addition to your rhomboids, traps, and external rotators. Great for neck and upper back pain and correcting your posture. I love this one because you’re pulling back against gravity - it works the muscles a little harder.

WALL ANGELS (4:31): Great for postural muscle activation and even muscle knots! Great postural cuing while activating these important muscles. Check out wall angels in action in some of these other T&T videos

PUSH UPS (5:45): My favorite bodyweight strength exercise of all time! Great for your chest, shoulders, and triceps, but works a lot of core muscles also. If full push ups are too difficult, perform them on your knees for a modified version.

PLANKS (7:02): My favorite core exercise because it effectively activates all four core muscles. Hold your plank static, keep your back flat and your pelvis “tucked under” yourself. Draw your navel in towards your spine to activate your deepest abdominal muscle layer.

SQUATS (8:38): My favorite lower body exercise of all time. There’s not an exercise that activates more lower body muscles as effectively as this weight bearing anti-gravity exercise. Focus on squeezing your glutes and your quads and you’re well on your way!

BRIDGES (10:03): One of my favorite recommendations for those of you who might be experiencing pain in your lower back. Oftentimes glute weakness can be a major contributor to lower back pain; this is a great exercise to tone and strength.

There you have them! Seven of my favorite bodyweight exercises in one convenient strength-training routine that you can do everyday. Performing these exercises daily will help improve your strength and function and can even help to decrease pain.

I hope you guys found this useful; if you did please leave the video a “thumbs up” above.

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR CHANNEL TO NEVER MISS A NEW T&T VIDEO!

QUESTIONS? COMMENTS? SUGGESTIONS? LEAVE THEM BELOW AND I’LL BE SURE TO ANSWER AS SOON AS I AM ABLE.

[toneandtighten]

This daily strength training routine is simple, yet incredibly effective. Performing these everyday will help strengthen key muscle groups to help you become stronger and more functional. Thanks for watching!

[sweetvuvuzela]

Thanks i was watching this and my neighbour came in and we watched this together now our whole village has watched this video and they all appreciate the exercises now 🏋🏽‍♀️🏋🏽‍♀️

[julianastiles]

Thanks, it's hard to start building muscle when you don't have much. This helped a lot!!

[frogprincessss]

Your videos are amazing :) Can I request for a follow along routine set of videos for beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels?

[itsjanetruth]

love your tips and health info you include in your videos. thank-you for all the variety.

[yvonnecantlie]

Excellent exercises and very easy to follow step by step! Love it 😃

[MuhammadIrshad-gojy]

It’s excellent I liked it very much and will try to follow it from tomorrow

[leanneworwood]

I love having an easy to follow daily routine. Thank you and I also appreciate the replies you've posted that help clarify the exercises.

[hansanadavinda]

What an marvelous 5 voice.All the best for future

[astrikstar]

Practical! Love it. Do you have a video on the stretches, maybe props for good posture while driving? I find the seats are too rounded and force you to curl in the shoulders...

[shyrlmatias]

I have difficulty getting up from floor. Are there modifications for some of the floor exercises? Thanks! You are doing a great job!

[barrybross]

Super great for every day movements, loved it!

[DukeH]

Loved this! I'm definitely going to try these daily.

[Fierauntamed]

Omg the scapula and wall yeasss!! Thank you I’m getting back to ROM after a back injury and this is amazing thank you so much it felt like a good stretch I’ll most likely do those wall angels as breaks in between my homeworks when sitting and typing on a laptop thank you so much!

[mishong]

These exercises are great - I do these all the time at the gym during my workout. Thanks for posting.

[laurieyoung]

Thank you for sharing; you are a gift to many people.

[Music-Man]

New video idea! You should create a video showing and fixing old gym class stretches and how to do them more effectively. I think new people who don't know anything about stretching refer back to their gym class days. You can help and show how to really do them effectively and show what stretches or not good or ineffective.

[Ramyapad]

Will do this for me as my body is paining much will follow this next week after office Thanks Ramya

[edwarcastil]

Good strength functional exercises, thank you!

[plantarianchic]

Do you have any suggestions for modifications for push ups (and other exercises using the hands and wrists) with a sprained wrist?