I just finished Jess Allen’s Train Like an Athlete 6 Week Training Plan, and I promised to put together this Train Like an Athlete 6 Week Training Plan Review post for y’all.

First, upon completing the program, you’d think that maybe I took “before and after” photos to share. Spoiler alert: I didn’t. My goal had nothing to do with aesthetics, though I do feel that some of my muscles got more defined (shoulders, quads, and upper back namely). However, all I wanted was to feel stronger (and be able to run trails/hills better). Overall, I accomplished that. If you follow my Instagram Stories, you can see any “progress” you’d be looking for, since I share a lot of these workouts daily there. 

Train Like an Athlete 6 Week Training Plan Review

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The program breaks down as such:

• 6 weeks
• nothing but bodyweight and dumbbells required
• 5 workouts a week with no repeats
• 20-30 minute workouts, max

Jess says, 

Train Like an Athlete uses functional movements with minimal equipment to help you create an athletic physique and perform to your potential. You will complete 6 weeks of constantly varied programming using only a set of dumbbells. One of the best features of this plan is that you can repeat it and continue to challenge yourself by increasing the weights or the speed that you complete the workouts.

Although workouts are only 20-30 minutes in length, they require focus and intensity. While the workouts are intense, be sure to scale to your ability. Remember, there is so much variety in the program that you will be able to repeat workouts later to measure progress. Workouts will target different training goals like metabolic conditioning, HIIT (high intensity interval training), strength/balance, and overall conditioning to maximize your time.

You are prescribed 5 workouts per week. This allows you to insert rest days or optional training when it works best for you. Work hard, but listen to your body!

What I Liked

• Variety. You know the feeling. You start a new 6-12-week workout program, but by the 3rd week, you’re bored to death because it’s the same workout week after week. For some goals, you might need a program like that, but not for my current goals. There is never a workout during the 6 weeks that is repeated, which meant that I looked forward to every single one.
• Minimal Equipment. I used 3 things the entire time: these dumbbells, my own body weight, and our treadmill. That said, you could get by with even less. Review the program to see the size dumbbells you’d mostly use. For me, I typically always used 20, 22.5, 25, and 30 pounds (I could have stuck with just 2 of those weights, though, if needed). You could also run outside for the days she has the 400m sprints included in the workouts. Or if that wouldn’t even work, then maybe just swap it for something else like jump roping or another high intensity (short duration) activity.
• Minimal Space. The only thing that took up any kind of space for this program was the treadmill, which, again wouldn’t be critical to have. I did these workouts in small spaces sometimes, and it didn’t affect the quality at all. 
• Minimal Time Requirement. I think the shortest workout I did was around 10 minutes, and the longest was about 35 minutes. Barely any are 35 minutes, and on average, I spent 20’ish minutes per workout.
• Plenty of workouts. Do the math. 6 weeks of 5-per-week workouts. That’s 30 different workouts for $67, which means that each workout cost me $2.23 (but that doesn’t include doing multiple rounds of it). I don’t have a gym membership (we spent our time, energy, and money building a home gym). I work out, currently, 100% at home, so $2.23 is nothing.
• Full Explanations. Each move has a direct clickable link to Jess showing how to do it on YouTube. Once you click the link there are no long, drawn-out demonstrations. She just gets right to it so you can understand the exercise in 10 seconds or less.

Here is an example of a workout. You can save this workout for later by clicking HERE. 

What I Didn’t Like

Nothing. Honestly, there was nothing about the program I did not like. I wanted to find something I didn’t like, but I couldn’t come up with anything so I won’t even pretend there is something I didn’t like.

Would I recommend it?

100% YES! How can you be certain that I’m legit on that? Actions speak louder than words. I have already started the program over, ready for round 2! (Math again, friends. This means that each workout has now been reduced to about $1.12 per workout.)

I kept track of what weight I used for each workout and how long each took me to complete during round one.

This time, the goal is to see if I’ve improved. My plan is to (mostly) keep the weights the same, but see if the reps in prescribed time or time on the whole improves.

After just the first 3 workouts, I will say that everything has improved from round one. I have shaved minutes off from the first round, and no before/after picture could be more proof in the pudding. Stonger, friends, stronger.

Questions? Let me know! Happy to answer. 

p.s. Jess did not pay me to write this. She did not gift me the program – I bought it on my own, and I would recommend it over-and-over again. And here she is – meet Jess!

Xox,
SKH