Wife wants me to design a workout program for her. Need advice.

My wife is seeing the progress I am making. She wants me to design a workout and diet plan for her to lose weight and fat. She carries more muscle that a lot of women so at 5'3, she wont be able to go down to 120 I dont think. At this point, if she could see 140 to 150, she will be happy. I think shes around 180 to 190 so a 40 lb loss is what we will shoot for at this moment.
 
I can work with her on diet going very clean but balanced meals. Might even cycle carbs for about 3 to 4 weeks then go clean but balanced for 3 or 4. We will see on that.
 
I need some advice on getting the weight training program started. At the moment, a gym is out. She will need to work out at home. When she went to a gym, she always wanted to do the classes like body sculpting, step arobics, cycleing and such. I have the stuff I use to lift with in my shed. I can buy some more.
 
What kind of workout should I design for her? She is not one to enjoy lifting weights, but she will if she has to. She has not lifted in probably a year. I never saw her when she did lift so I have no idea how well she does or what. What kind of reps ranges should she work for? Would these be 100% effort, or say 70 to 80% effort?
 
I have some dumbells, a couple of bars and a cable pulley she could use.

everything you can do SHE can do better ; )

Smart ass way of saying she should lift like you do.

 For fat loss personally I favor... big compounds (even double compounds, like Romainian dead lifts with bent over row), short rest 60 secs or less, super sets even, 12-8 reps...

But if you are doing any quality routine, she can do exactly what you are doing.

Exactly ^^

There's no reason a woman should train any different than a man, if she says she doesn't want to get big - explain to her it doesn't happen accidentally. Getting big requires loads of effort and a calorie surplus.

ACE-CPT, NASM-CPT, AFPA-Nutrition Consultant 

Your quite right. She should lift as I do, but she wont. It will be hard for me to get her to do that. Its the reason she has not asked me to design a routine for her before now. Just thought maybe there is something that I should have her do different. 
 
When you do the double compound of romainien DL and Row, do you have both your hands already pronated on the bar so it works for the row part ?

Yes... 1st if you can row as much as you can Romanian... more power to you... short way of saying you would not need to split your grip.

this is a fat loss routine I gave to Bulking Up for his wife... It is a modified New rules of Lifting routine....

You can tell her 1 it was modified by a woman (myself, and I have used it as well, several times... probably should be doing it again, right now...), and was used with success by yet another woman (Bulking's wife).

So if she is scared of a "manly" routine... or your doing something low rep that scares her off... see if she'll do this.

Ok, I am giving her my modified NROL fat loss routines... She should stick to the prescribed rest times as much as possible... if she is not whipped by the end of the routine the weight was not high enough.

A, B work out 3 non consecutive days...
I know you two have a home gym, so modify for your equipment, although I would be surprised if you don't have everything you need...

Do each work out twice with 75 rest between each exercise all 3 x 15 (but still super set them, do one, rest do another, rest go back to first)
A
Squat (what ever varietation you guys can do )
bent over row (dumbbell or barbell, ladies choice)

Supine hip extension (google it), on swiss ball
Dumbbell  push press

Walking lunge
Swiss ball crunch

B
Deadlift
incline bench press

Bulgarian split squat
Pull ups (pull downs)

romainian deadlift
oblique crunches (crunches with a cross swiss ball)

the 3rd and 4th time through each work out reduce reps to 12 reduce rest to 60 sec add weight

the 5th and 6th time through reduce rest to 45 sec reduce rep to 10 add more weight

that is about 4 weeks she can go ahead and take the week off... she can continue to do cardio.

Cardio... I always did some form of HIIT, only because I hate running (but 12 - 20 minutes I can do) and it works well for me (although it has been a while since I have done any cardio besides Kung Fu).

next 4 weeks or so same format starts at 3 X 12 with 60 sec rest
A
Front squat (or your squat of choice)
dumbbell rows elbow out

supine hip extension w/ leg curl
Barbell push press

dynamic lunge
upper body russian twist (on swiss ball)

B
Snatch Grip Dealifts
t push ups

Bulgarian Split squat w/ ovr head press
CHin up

Romanian Deadlift with bent over row
lower body russian twist

Good routine, thehardway.

ACE-CPT, NASM-CPT, AFPA-Nutrition Consultant 

I was looking one for my gf too. Thanks to this thread, I think I will just get her on a 5X5 like myself.

Anbe Sivam. Period.

Thanks for the plan. I think it will be perfect. As several have said, there is not a difference between a man or woman with regards to training. The only issue is finding a program that my wife will do. It would do no good to design one that she simply will not follow due to the issues involved in where the equipment is, how it gets setup and loaded. If she belonged to a gym, or we had a good home gym it would be better, but with the primative setup I have, it just would not work.

I do think that this gives me enough leeway that the program can be followed without fuss and excuse.

Thanks all.

Yea the ability to do that routine in a makeshift home gym is one of it's strengths... like I said it is a New rules of Lifting Routine. The changes I made (i don't even remember what the changes were at this point), were focused on making that routine work in a "makeshift" home gym.

Hope it works out! honestly that second routine B day, is by far and away the hardest routine I have ever done. More difficult than any low rep Personal Record, strength geared routine, harder than any Hypertrophy specific routine, harder than any other "fat loss" routine... more difficult than any split... funny because it looks like nothing on paper.