Effective 12 min CrossFit Dumbbell Workout (Complete Guide)

Welcome to the 12 min CrossFit Dumbbell Workout.

For this training session, you will need ideally two pairs of dumbbells, nothing more.

If you wondering why I am so fond of dumbbells as a training tool, make sure to give the following article a read which goes in-depth on the benefits of dumbbell training and gives you some guidance on what type of dumbbells to use.

What can you expect from this workout:

• The whole duration of this workout is between 25 to 30 minutes including a full warm-up and cool-down. (the duration of your warm-up & cool-down plays a role here).
• You will be performing two dumbbell exercises, one for the lower and one for the upper body.
• A guide on how to approach this workout and if you need some scaling options will be provided further below.

Let’s get to the workout.

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Warm-Up

Before we start, I want to remind you to never skip your warm-up!

It’s just as important as your actual workout.

Just to give you a few important facts on why you should warm up:

• Increases blood flow
• Reduces the chance of injury
• Increases range of motion
• Improves performance

I could go on and keep rambling about the importance of warming up but I already did that in a different article. (click below to learn more)

If you feel a little more stiffness in your body after a long day of work, use this warm-up routine:

Full-body warm-up for home workouts

12 min CrossFit Dumbbell Workout

For time:
21-18-15-12-9-6-3 reps of

Dumbbell Deadlift
Dumbell Push Press

(Click on the link to see a movement demonstration)

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How to approach it?

A tricky workout with a lot of repetition volume that will increase your heart rate in no time.

If you are not careful, this could turn into a very long and painful workout.

There are two approaches I would suggest to you.

Beginner Athlete:

• Don’t try to go unbroken on the first few sets.
• Break them up from the beginning and go with a rep scheme like 7/7/7, then 6/6/6, and so on.
• Use this strategy for both exercises.
• When you reach the set of 9 reps, you probably can go and try to finish the rest unbroken.
• Take short breaks in between your sets and make sure to keep moving.

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Advanced Athlete:

• The goal for the advanced athlete is to go unbroken on each set.
• The first two to three sets will be the hardest but after that, you are over the “hump” and things will feel much easier.
• Use your breaks wisely & ideally you take a few seconds to catch your breath in between the exercises.
• Push the pace on the last few sets, there is no reason to lose important time on them.

How to scale?

Before you scale any of the prescribed movements, try reducing the number of reps first.

In case you need to adjust the movement because of for example an injury, this is what I would suggest to you:

• Dumbbell Deadlift: a good alternative = is you can either perform a kettlebell good morning, a banded good morning, or a bodyweight good morning to get a similar stimulus but with more control
• Dumbbell Push-Press: a good alternative is either the strict dumbbell Arnold press or if the weight is too high, opt for a banded strict press

(Click on the links for movement demonstration)

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Cooldown

After a long workout like that make sure to have a proper cool-down to avoid injuries and give your body time to recover:

8 must-do cooldown mobility exercises