If you find that your groups are a little less cohesive than you’d like, then you may need to spend some time on team building. This will help take your groups from just a bunch of people that get together for a workout, to a team of people that look out for each other and push each other to work hard in your sessions.
Team building certainly starts with helping group members get to know each other. You can find some great ice breaker warm up ideas here, but most importantly, they really just need to get to know each other’s names. Then, you can start getting them working with each other in teams.
You want your campers to feel like they belong, to give them a reason (other than your amazing workouts) to keep coming back time and time again.
One To Create A Crew
Warm Up
What’s In A Name?
Drill Length: 5 minutes
Environment: Anywhere
Equipment: Nil
Designer: Theresa Prior
Have participants form a circle and jog on the spot.
Each participant in turn states their first name and how many letters are in their first name. They (or the instructor) suggest a bodyweight exercise to perform using the amount of letters in their name as the count.
Eg: ‘Hi, my name is Theresa! Let’s do 7 star-jumps!’ ‘Hi, my name is Jack! Let’s do 4 push-ups!’
Challenge: Have participants, one at a time, go around the circle and say each name. If they stuff up, or forget entirely, have the whole group do some (your choice) burpees!
Team Building Game
Leg Press Volleyball
Drill Length: 5-10 minutes
Environment: Anywhere
Equipment: 2 x beach balls
Designer: Jo Sharp
Set up: Divide clients into 2 groups in a seated circle. Each group has a beach ball and is seated with their feet on the ground and their knees up. At the start of go the groups lift their feet and go into a leg press position.
Rules: The aim is to leg press the beach ball to another team member. The first team to successfully do 4 leg presses throws without the ball hitting the floor gets 1 point. When a point is scored the opposing team have to do 10 burpees. The game then restarts until a team gets 4 points. The winning team then decide what exercise the losing team have to do. Feel your abs talking to you after this one.
Main Drill
Park Adventure
Drill Length: 30-40 minutes
Environment: A large, outdoor space (park)
Equipment: Optional resistance bands
Designer: Kyle Wood
The way this workout works is really simple: Your group will move around the park, stopping at various landmarks to complete exercises and drills.
How often you stop is up to you. As a guide, 3 to 4 minutes of running between ‘stations’ is a good amount. Try to get creative with some of the different drills you can do.
To inspire you, below are the techniques I used for my group’s workout.
Running
Between stations don’t just run as a mob from place to place. Get your campers in order by lining them up in pairs or single file.
Periodically yell ‘Jumps’ which will mean that the person or pair at the front will need to step off the path and do Jumping Jacks on the spot while the group runs past them, joining on again at the back of the group.
Hills
Squaterrific Hill Runs:
Run to the top of the hill, do 10 squats. Run back down, do 9 squats. Run to the top and do 8 Squats and so on until you reach 1 Squat.
Picnic Tables
Pushing 30s:
3 rounds of:
- Bench Dips
- Left Leg Step Ups
- Push Ups/Bench Push Ups
- Right Leg Step Ups
Spend 30 seconds on each exercise.
Railings
Rows All Round
Have clients quickly pair up. Partner A does 12 Inverted Rows, then Partner B does 12 Inverted Rows, then Partner A does 10 Inverted Rows and so on until the last round of 2 Rows each. (Pairs who finish continue but start adding 2 more reps each round)
Benches/Steps
Abs and Up
Break groups into teams of 3.
3–4 rounds of this circuit:
- Plank Clocks
- 1-leg Bench Dips
- 1 lap up and down the stairs (time keeper)
Clearings
Climb and Climb
Round 1: 40s each exercise. Round 2: 30s. Round 3: 20s.
- Reverse Lunges
- Mountain Climbers
- Seal Inverted Rows
- High Knees
Finisher
Team Rock, Paper, Scissors
Drill Length: 10 minutes
Environment: Large space
Equipment: Nil
Designer: Brittney St. Germain
Split the group into two teams. Each team stands at either end of your space, in their home base – they huddle and decide what they’re going to throw as a team (either Rock, Paper, Scissors), making sure other team does not hear.
Both teams meet in the center of the space and throw their choice out on the count of 3. The winning team chases down losing team.
Losing team turns and runs as FAST as they can back to their home base. If they reach home base, they are SAFE. Any ‘campers tagged by any member of the winning team are now part of the winning team.
Repeat. Play continues for 5-10 minutes, team with most players wins, or until everyone ends up on one team.
This workout was created with BootCraft. Create your own.
Theresa Prior has a mission to bring Mums and women together in a safe and supportive environment that just so happens to have fun fitness sessions at it’s core. She has been running her own personal training business since 2013. Theresa helps her clients understand that all aspects of their health are equally important.
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