How I Modified My Pregnancy Workouts By The Week

Navigating the gym during pregnancy is hard.

Especially when going through it all for the first time. We know our body will change and that we’ll have to make the proper workout modifications, but actually navigating how and when to do that can feel super vague and confusing.

How long can you do ab exercises for?
When do you have to make structural adjustments?
How do you make appropriate modifications that are still effective?

That is why each day I kept a record of how I was feeling, what felt wrong/right and which moves I removed so I could help others navigate the ambiguity of it all!

Below is the timeline of when I changed workout structures, removed certain exercises, and made adjustments overall.

Every pregnancy is different so this is not a black and white timeline by any means, but I hope this could give some better insight as you go through pregnancy yourself!

My week by week workout adjustments:

Weeks 6-7: no specific movements removed, but kept rep range at 5 of above (no PR attempts) and stopped sprint intervals.

Week 8: decreased high impact movements because of how sore my boobs felt, but physically could still do high impact if I wanted to.

Week 11: slightly decreased weight used for back loaded/focused movements because I could feel my core slowly getting weaker. Can still do (and should do!) back movements though!

Week 14: removed long runs. I could physically run far, but it put so much pressure on my bladder that after 5 minutes I’d have to run to the bathroom!

Week 15: removed sit ups, v-ups, and any core flexion movements, as well as pull-ups.

Week 16: removed planks. Some women feel good keeping planks or inclined planks in their routines, but I personally didn’t feel strong in these holds. Overall core strength started to weaken here too.

Week 17: decreased front loaded weight used because of declining core strength. Things started to feel heavier overall. I started feeling round ligament pain around week 17 as well.

Week 18: removed push-ups and the rower machine. Some women feel fine rowing for much longer, but it didn’t feel right for me personally so I just ditched it altogether! This is the week I got SPD, so I removed runs and all jumping / high impact movements for the remainder of my pregnancy.

Week 19: removed lat pushdowns on the cable machine and the ski erg.

Week 23: belly started getting in the way of movements like squats, DB vipers and DB snatches, so I widened my stance and reduced range of motion to knee height instead of the ground for some movements.

Week 28: decreased weight and added in more bands to maintain tension.

Week 31: RDL’s (straight leg deadlifts) felt a little useless at times, so I opted for other movements instead.

Week 34: harder to move around in general, so programmed workouts to be all standing or all laying instead of having to transition from the ground often.

Week 36: feet pain/swelling so did majority of my workouts in a seated position to take pressure off.

Week 38: felt unbalanced with lunges, so removed those here.

All of these changes and modifications are reflected in the FIGR:Pregnancy program so you won’t have to worry about figuring any of this out on your own. Every week will be already programmed for you, tested by me!

I got you,

Katelyn