Dumb Bell Routine to Build Muscle

Question

Hi I'm looking for an exercise routine I can implement with the equipment I have:

• Adjustable Dumb Bells 5-45 lbs.
• (non-adjustable) Workout bench.

I'm also open to Calisthenics and cardio.

My goals are to build muscle and generally achieve what is called a "swimmer's body" (no access to a swimming pool :( ). I can dedicate 45 minutes per day to this outside of the 3-4 times a week I play tennis (getting fair cardio).

Can someone with knowledge about this recommend a weekly routine to follow?

I found this Men's Health article 15 Minutes to a Swimmer's Body. Would that provide any real results or would I have to do more exercises? Never really tried to build muscle before so I'm not sure what routine is necessary to achieve results.

Answer 1

If you want the aesthetics of an athlete you need to train like one, and also eat like one. One thing that works for me is explosive training like sprints, cleans (dumbbell or barbell), box jumps, and so on. These are typically more dangerous movements than the slow safe stuff as they assume you are athletic when you do them. Therefore I would warn against doing these if you are training from Men's Health articles.

Bodybuilding.com is a good website to find beginner programs that you can execute in a safe manner and the site includes enough info to be informed about the exercise and routine/program.

My opinion is swimming is one of the best forms of cardio as it is low impact on the joints, improves testosterone (my personal experience, not sure about what studies say) and is just a fun way of staying in shape. I suggest you try as many forms of exercise as you want and do whats fun, the body comes naturally.