8 Ways to Save Time in Your Strength Training Workouts
You’re a busy person who lifts weights and you’re wondering how you can save time in your sessions without sacrificing results.
By making small, strategic adjustments, you can save minutes here and there which really add up to get you through your session faster.
1. Warm Up Smarter with Mobility + Ramp-Up Sets
You’re a busy woman who lifts — and you don’t have time to waste on a warm-up that doesn’t actually help you train better.
Traditional advice often tells you to hop on the treadmill or elliptical for 20 minutes before your workout. Sure, that’ll warm up your legs, but what about the rest of your body? And is it really necessary?
Instead of spending all that time doing general cardio, make your warm-up specific to what you’re about to do: lift weights.
Start with some gentle mobility work to get your joints moving through their full range of motion - especially if you’ve been sitting most of the day. A few minutes of arm circles, hip rotations, or bodyweight squats are plenty to get your body ready to move.
Here’s my quick 4-minute full-body mobility warm-up:
Then, move into exercise-specific ramp-up sets for your first few lifts.
How to do a Ramp-up Set
Start with about half of your working weight and do 8–10 controlled reps.
Then, without a rest, increase to about 70–80% of your working weight and do 2-4 reps.
Then, do a final 1-2 reps with just under your working weight (maybe 1 peg down on the machine or 1–2 pounds lighter)
Rest for 1-2 minutes, and you’re ready to go full steam ahead in your first working set.
This approach warms up the exact muscles you’re about to use and helps your body adapt to heavier loads safely and efficiently.
You only need to do these ramp-up sets for your first few compound exercises like your main squat pattern on leg day, or your first push and pull movements on upper-body day.
Once you move on to smaller accessory exercises (eg. for biceps, triceps, adductors, abductors), those muscles will already be warm from the compound lifts, so you can skip the ramp-up set and dive straight into your working weights.
2. Skip Redundant Exercises to Avoid Diminishing Returns
When your time is limited, every exercise needs to count. That’s why following a well-designed program matters more than most people realize.
One of the biggest time-wasters I see is redundancy: doing multiple exercises that hit the same muscles in the same way.
For example, you might see a workout that includes a goblet squat, a split squat, and a leg press all in one session.
They might look different, but they’re all training the same movement pattern.
Here’s the problem:
When you hit the same muscle using the same movement pattern over and over in one session, you don’t get triple the results. You get diminishing returns. The first exercise gives the biggest stimulus for growth and strength. The second gives you less and so on.
And because every session has a limited amount of time and energy, repeating the same pattern means you’re missing the chance to train other important muscles or movement patterns that deserve attention.
Smart programming avoids this, helping you get the most bang for your buck in every workout.
So, if you’ve been stringing together random exercises or following online workouts that look fun but lack structure, it might be time to rethink your plan. A well-designed program saves time and delivers better results — no wasted effort, no redundancy, just progress.
3. Track Your Workouts to Save Time & Get Better Results
I see too many women go into their workouts without tracking what they’re doing - even when they’re following a program.
It might feel like you can remember what you lifted last time, but in reality, you’re probably spending extra time guessing or trying to remember which weights to grab and how many reps you did last time.
Tracking your workouts changes that completely.
When you’ve recorded your weights and reps from previous sessions, you know exactly what to weight to pick up next time and the number of reps you’re aiming for. That means less time thinking, more time training.
And beyond saving time, tracking is what allows you to apply progressive overload which is a key to increasing strength and muscle. Without tracking, you’re very likely just repeating workouts instead of progressing them.
If you don’t have a tracker, grab my free strength training tracker here:
4. Use Smart Programming: Balance Unilateral and Bilateral Work
It’s important to include some unilateral training (single-leg or single-arm work) in your program to keep your body balanced. Exercises like split squats, step-ups, or 1-arm rows help prevent strength imbalances.
But here’s the catch: unilateral work takes twice as long because you’re training each side separately.
If your session is packed with too many single-side exercises, it can easily double the time you spend in your session.
That’s why smart programming matters. You want enough unilateral work to keep your two sides balanced, but not so much that it drags out your session unnecessarily. This is one of those small details that can make a big difference — and it’s exactly the kind of balance built into my programs.
5. Choose Exercise Versions That Take Less Setup Time
If you already lift regularly, you’ve probably noticed how much time can disappear setting up certain exercises.
If your goal is to get stronger, build muscle, and stay functional as you age, you don’t need to spend half your session setting up complicated equipment.
A machine glute thrust can be just as effective as a barbell version - with a fraction of the setup time.
What matters is that you’re training the movement pattern effectively, with good form, and applying progressive overload over time.
When you simplify your setup, you spend more of your time on the things that move the needle: your sets.
6. Use Supersets to Cut Rest Time Without Sacrificing Results
Supersets are one of the simplest ways to make your workouts more time-efficient — without losing effectiveness.
A superset means performing two exercises back-to-back with little or no rest in between. You rest only after completing both. This saves time because you’re spending less of your session resting between sets, not because you’re turning your workout into cardio.
The key is in the pairing. You want to combine exercises that work different muscle groups so one can rest while the other works. So, pair an upper-body exercise with a lower-body exercise, or a pull exercise with a push exercise, or antagonist muscle pairs.
Here are a few examples of effective superset combinations:
Bulgarian Split Squat + Shoulder Press (lower + upper)
Chest Press + One-Arm Row (push + pull)
Bicep Curl + Tricep Extension (antagonist pair)
Supersets like these help you get the same amount of work done in less time without compromising in results.
And if you prefer to complete all your sets of one exercise before moving on to the next, that’s perfectly fine too. You don’t have to use supersets. But if you’re looking to save time, they can be a real game-changer.
7. Time Your Rest Periods (So You Don’t Get Stuck Scrolling)
One of the biggest hidden time-wasters in a workout isn’t the lifting itself, it’s what happens between sets.
We’ve all been there: you finish a set, grab your phone “just for a second,” and before you know it, three or four minutes have disappeared. Multiply that by 3 sets of four or six exercises, and suddenly your 45-minute workout has turned into 75.
But don’t skimp on your rest time either: that recovery between sets is important. Research shows that recovering for at least one minute between sets does improve results. So, do rest long enough that you can go hard again in your next set.
My general recommendations for rest times between sets:
Lower body exercises: rest 1–3 minutes
Upper body exercises: rest 1–2 minutes
Supersets: rest 1–3 minutes after completing both exercises
That’s why I love the built-in rest timer in my training app: just tap a little button after your set, and it automatically counts down for you.
Being mindful of your rest doesn’t mean rushing. It means training intentionally, saving time and getting better results.
8. Have Alternate Exercises Ready
Even with the best plan, sometimes things don’t go as expected — especially if you train in a gym. Your favorite machine might be taken, or the dumbbells you need are nowhere to be found. That’s why it’s smart to have alternate exercises ready before you start.
The key is knowing which movements train the same muscles in roughly the same way — and what equipment options you can use instead.
For example, a bicep curl can be done with dumbbells, a barbell, cables, or even a machine. It’s the same exercise pattern, just using different tools. When you understand those relationships, you’ll never have to skip an exercise or waste time waiting around.
This is also why my clients love my app — every exercise includes alternate versions. So if something’s not available, they can just tap and choose another option without missing a beat.
Being prepared for plan B keeps your workouts efficient, stress-free, and consistent.
Final Thoughts: Small Tweaks, Big Time Savings
You don’t need to overhaul your training to make it more efficient. Most of the time, it’s small, smart adjustments - a few minutes saved here and there - that add up to big results over time.
When you warm up with purpose, avoid redundancy, track your lifts, and plan ahead, you can get in and out of your workouts faster without sacrificing progress.
And if you’d rather not figure all of this out on your own, I’ve built all of these principles right into my programs.
Inside my app, every workout is structured for efficiency: warm-ups, rest timers, tracking, and alternate exercises are all built in. You just open it, train, and get back to your normal life.
Ready to make your strength training simpler and more effective?
Join my monthly Lift with Lynn Membership, where you’ll get ongoing programs designed to build strength, save time, and keep you progressing. No guesswork required.
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If you’re ready for smarter, more time-efficient strength training, join my monthly membership, Lift with Lynn, or start with Learn to Lift to master the fundamentals first.
