Train three days this first week, performing just one exercise per bodypart in each session. You’ll begin the program with a full-body training split, meaning you’ll train all major bodyparts in each workout (as opposed to “splitting up” your training). Week 3: Three-day split: Push/Pull/Legs.Week 2: Two-day split: Upper body/Lower body.How long has it been since you went to the gym regularly? Six months? A year? Five years? No worries: The following routines will get you back on track in-you guessed it-just four short weeks.

This program isn’t just for the true beginner who has never touched a weight before it’s also suitable for anyone who has taken an extended leave of absence from training. In other words, one month from now you’ll look significantly better with your shirt off than you look now. After four weeks you’ll not only be ready for the next challenge but you’ll have built a significant amount of quality muscle. In this plan, your first month of training will be demanding, but not so demanding as to cause injury (or worse yet, burnout), and progressive in the sense that each week you’ll graduate to different exercises, higher volume, more intensity or all of the above. Let’s just call this the accelerated beginner’s guide to bodybuilding. Not that you’ll be a seasoned vet after four weeks, but if you can just get that first month under your belt, you’ll get yourself over the proverbial hump, where so many fail and give up, and set the stage for a lifetime of muscle gains. But we’re going to let you in on an interesting secret: It doesn’t necessarily take 8 or 12 weeks to get your feet wet in the gym.

You’ve even seen plenty of them in our magazine over the years.

In the realm of fitness, three-month workout programs dominate the landscape.

Download fun workouts for beginners