Build Your Best Circuit Training Plan with Felix Grewe and Mike Diehl
Felix Grewe and Mike Diehl have put together a book that includes many ways to build a circuit training plan and adapt it as your training changes or you become more fit. Fit Strong Lean: Build Your Best Circuit Training Plan includes helpful photos and a variety of exercises for those of us who want to do our circuits at home or in front of a mirror at the gym, but not with a paid trainer. This book provides top notch, professional assistance at a fraction of the cost.
In this episode, we learn a bit more about what each of them has to offer us to “build your best circuit training plan”.
Mike Diehl is a certified fitness coach for sports performance as well as health, fitness and sports rehabilitation. He has worked for the German Women’s National Tennis Cup Team for more than 10 years as their fitness coach and has worked with Wimbledon Champions as well as top soccer and ice hockey teams in Germany.
Mike starts each day with an intensive workout that varies each day
Mike likes to start his day early with an intensive workout. His philosophy is: “Everybody is able to become fitter, stronger and leaner! Pain doesn’t stand a chance against passion. It’s all about finding a goal for which you are willing to accept pain and hard work.”
Felix works out according to how he feels
Felix Grewe is a professional journalist, author, and fitness and tennis aficionado. He worked for many years as a full-time reporter for a German tennis magazine and went on to head up the media department of the German Tennis Federation. He now works as a freelance journalist, author and social media manager.
It all started with a fitness experiment
Felix and Mike met for the first time about 7 years ago when Felix tried an experiment with Mike for a tennis magazine article. This was the spark for bringing together a workout book of Mike’s exercises and philosophy. Felix, as the writer/journalist and both as tennis and fitness experts put Mike’s methods into words. And, of course, Felix trains regularly using Mike’s workouts.
Questions Felix and Mike are asked:
4:05 What was the self-experiment you two did together?
6:45 Were your prior books only available in German?
8:15 First Four:
- Are you a runner? If so, How long have you been running?
- Where were you born?
- Where you are living now?
- What has been, one, single, outstanding success for you as an athlete?
15:44 How do you define ‘Circuit Training’?
16:58 What makes your book so easy to use?
17:36 Is circuit training also an attitude?
18:54 Why do you suggest using a stability ball, resistance bands, free weights, and / or body weight for these exercises?
20:14 How hard was it to get such great photographs of the exercises for the book?
21:38 Why did you break down the exercises into, strength and endurance, upper body, belly and back, and legs and what variety of exercises within those categories can people do?
23:07 What are some examples of the multiple workouts you included: basic through Tabata, mixed to strong, to hardcore, and a few more?
24:04 (To Mike) What Tabata workout will you do tomorrow?
25:19 Felix, how do you use the exercises in your book?
26:30 (To Felix) Are you still active in tennis and do your workouts focus on what is helpful for tennis?
27:43 (To Mike) What would be a basic, but explosive, exercise routine?
29:11 Could just jumping in place be a good start for beginners?
29:36 How often should runners do alternative training?
31:35 How long did it take you to write the book?
32:58 Is there a version of the book available for a small screen, like a phone?
34:15 What are your thoughts on supplements?
36:21 What final take-aways would you like to share?
38:55 Final Kick Round:
- What is your favorite local training run or outing (location, starting point, parking, distance, terrain and safety issues)?
- Favorite book(s), video or resource?
- Who or what would you like to have featured on the Run To The Top podcast?
Quotes:
“Our idea was to keep it as easy as possible and to provide a fitness method with highly effective exercises for everybody for men, women, professionals, beginners, young people, older people, to let everybody work at their own pace on their own level.”
“I love resistance bands. For me, it’s the smallest gym in the world. You can use it everywhere.”
“With this book and with these exercises, you can change (it up) everyday and that’s the way that works for me.”
“The point of our book is that you can do these everywhere, you can do it in front of your TV.”
“Eat healthy stuff. Eat Omega-3, Vitamin B, and eat some apples each day, and you will have everything you want and everything you need.”
Take a Listen on Your Next Run
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Mentioned in this podcast:
Run To The Top Winners Circle Facebook Community
Book: Fit Strong Lean: Build Your Best Circuit Training Plan – by Mike Diehl and Felix Grewe
Alster Lake running path in Hamburg, Germany
Robert Crais’s Amazon Author Page
Follow Felix and Mike on:
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