The Top 6 Exercises This Strength Coach Thinks Everyone Should Do To Stay Fit

While everyone’s fitness journey will vary, strength training, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans, should be a central part of your exercise routine if you want to get fit and feel your best as you age—no matter your age. A strong body of research shows that strength training can improve your movement control, functional independence, cognitive abilities, and bone density, while also reducing your risk of Type 2 diabetes, decreasing visceral fat, and increasing lean muscle mass. And those benefits can be translated into daily life tasks, from carrying groceries to picking up your kid.

Strength training—which involves working with weights, machines, or body weight to create muscle mass, as opposed to cardio training—can be intimidating, though, especially if you don’t know where to start. It’s why physical therapist and certified strength trainer Andy Fata-Chan of Moment Physical Therapy and Performance has compiled a list of six foundational exercises to get Fortune readers started. 

He recommends doing each of the suggested movements for three sets of six to 10 reps (repetitions) each, making sure you have two more reps left in you in each set. 

“You don’t need to train to failure in order to reap the benefits—which is why leaving two reps left in the tank can help reduce risk of injury while getting all the benefits of training,” he explains. Even if you only have time for 20 to 30 minutes of strength training a couple days a week, he says—while keeping active with walking or other cardio the rest of the week—those sessions are crucial to help you feel your best.

Here, Fata-Chan explains how to do each suggested exercise and why it’s important.

1. Goblet squat

Fata-Chan says this is the easiest of the moves to start with. It strengthens your lower body and anterior chain—the group of muscles on the front of the body that help with movement and posture—and is especially helpful for older adults who struggle to get up and down from a seated position. To do the move:

• Stand with your feet slightly wider than hip distance and angled outward. 
• Hold a kettlebell or dumbbell directly in front of your chest, similar to how you’d hold a goblet, and squat, going as low as you’re comfortable without compromising form.

2. Single-leg or kickstand deadlift

This exercise offers two variations on a hinge motion that targets the muscles in your posterior chain, which includes glutes, hamstrings, lats, and lower back muscles. Whether walking, jogging, or running, we use those posterior chain muscles to accelerate and decelerate ourselves, Fata-Chan says, noting that weak posterior chain muscles can lead to “overstressing your back.”

Both exercise options will help you build posterior chain strength, stability, and balance, he says.

To do the single-leg deadlift, which requires substantial balance and stability:

• Stand on your right leg and hold a dumbbell or kettlebell in your left hand. 
• Keeping a flat back, slowly lower the weight in a hinging motion towards your standing ankle, while the other leg hovers behind you.

If you need more stability, hold a dumbbell the same way and opt for the kickstand variation:

• Stand with your feet hip-distance apart, then stagger your feet with your right leg forward and the left slightly back.
• Raise the heel of the left leg like a kickstand; the toes of your left foot should be lined up with the heel of your right. 
• Hinge forward with a flat back. You should feel the movement in the hamstrings and glutes of your right leg.

3. Push-ups

Fata-Chan says that push-ups are a great exercise to engage your entire body: your arms, chest, core, hips, and legs—and can be a strong indicator of your overall muscular strength and endurance. A 2019 study found that men able to complete more than 40 push-ups had a significant reduction in cardiovascular disease event risk compared with those who could do fewer than 10 push-ups. 

To do push-ups:

• Begin in a plank position, either with knees elevated or on the ground for extra support.
• Move your chest downward towards the ground until your arms are at a 90-degree angle, then push back up to your starting position, maintaining a flat back and rear.

To make it more challenging, Fata-Chan adds, you can prop your legs up on a couch for a decline push-up—or if you’re much more advanced in their push-up skills, you can wear a weighted vest, backpack, or add a small weight plate to your lower back.

“It’s an easily scalable exercise,” he says.

4. Pull-ups or chin-ups

Fata-Chan says you can install a pull-up bar in a door frame in order to practice this move at home. As you build neck, shoulder, and back strength the move, chronic neck or shoulder pain may even diminish over time.

To do the move:

• For pull-ups: stand with your arms extended and grip the bar with your palms facing away from you (an overhand grip). Pull your body upward, using your core to help. Repeat.
• For chin-ups: stand with your arms extended but your palms facing toward you (an underhand grip). Pull your body upward, using your core to help. Repeat.

“It’s a full body workout,” he says of each exercise, which works your core, upper back, and arms. 

5. Farmer’s carry

Fata-Chan says that this move works both grip strength and single-leg balance—which are both indicators of longevity. A study from 2023 found that participants with weaker grip strength were considered “more than twice as likely to have a late-life dementia event than the strongest individuals,” while a separate study from 2024 found that balance was one of the best indicators of how well someone is aging.

To do a farmer’s carry:

• Hold one heavy weight in each hand on either side of your body with your feet hips-distance apart.
• Slowly march forward in a controlled motion, focusing on having one leg on the ground at a time.
• Pause and stabilize on two feet in between raising a leg to march.

“The key is to really be able to stabilize on one leg and let the other leg swing through,” Fata-Chan explains.

6. Bulgarian split squats

Fata-Chan says lunge patterns are another crucial foundational movement, and that the best lunge variation is the rear-foot elevated squat, also known as the Bulgarian split squat. This exercise places 70% to 80% of your body weight on one leg, he explains, which can really help strengthen your legs and glutes while challenging your core and stability in the process.

“If you develop lower body strength it’s going to reduce your risk of injuries,” says Fata-Chain. And that’s true at any age—and in many situations, including during games of pickleball or tennis, where the movements on the court can mimic a lunge motion. For that, these foundational exercises provide training.

To do a Bulgarian split squat:

• Stand on your right leg with a chair, bench, or couch far enough behind you to extend your left leg back and rest your foot on top. 
• With or without a dumbbell or kettlebell in your right hand, or one weight in each hand, squat down on your right (standing) leg. Then return to the starting position. Repeat.

“A little bit goes a long way,” Fata-Chan says. And while many people will be challenged doing the move without holding a weight, he says, “You can get a great workout holding dumbbells during that kind of exercise.”

Consistency and progression are key

Finally, know that engaging for just 20 to 30 minutes with these exercises a couple of days a week can make a big difference—and you don’t need to go all-out every time.

What’s vital, though, is that you progress the exercises to build strength, he says, going up in weights as you feel ready—while also remembering why you’re doing the exercises in the first place. It may be to get stronger, prevent injuries and falls, or to remain functionally independent as you age. It could also be because you simply feel better after a good strength workout.