On July 11 2012 13:20 ThunderGod wrote: Hi, first time poster in this forum.
My history: I've been training for quite a while (over 1 year) on no real programme (just beginner advices from gym staff) and have some difficulty with maintaining my weight and strength. I aim to train at the gym 1hr, 3 times per week (Mon, Thurs, Sat), this averages about twice per week due to going away for work fairly frequently or just random other commitments that come up. I also do Power Vinyasa Yoga once a week (Sat) to help with stretching and flexibility (I have very poor flexibility) I get chronic lower back pain (not too painful, just chronic) which I would like to improve, has not improved with repeated physio.
My stats: Height: 5'10" Beginning weight: 62kg Peak weight: 71kg Current Weight: 65kg
My goals: Goal weight: 75kg Primary goal is to gain strength/"normal flexibility" and secondary is to look good with my shirt off. I have made some gains in all three already.
4. standing military barbell press/bicep barbell curls/rest 8x18kg/7-7-7 low-high-full @15kg/rest -> 8x23kg/7-7-7 low-high-full @18kg/rest -> 8x28kg/7-7-7 low-high-full @18kg/rest OR seated dumbbell shoulder press with a how to explain.. like press upwards then down then bring elbows together in a fly motion then out to sides and up again/lateral arm raises/rest 8x12.5kg/6x6kg/rest -> 8x12.5kg/6x6kg/rest -> failure@12.5kg/6x6kg/rest
5. chest flys with machine 8x47/54/61kg
6. usually throw in one of 3x8 of cable seated row/dips/seated one-arm triceps extension/triceps kickback/leg press
7. standing cable wood chop 3x8 (recommended by physio for my back)
8. leg raises 3x8 straight leg front/bent leg alternating sides/bent leg front/rest
9. 15mins abwork on mats and stretching.
My nutrition: I have ~40g protein in a large glass of milk after training. also add a bit of protein (~20g) to my morning smoothie. I possibly don't eat enough but find it hard to eat more, especially with the protein as this really fills me up. meals: breakfast: smoothie (2xweetbix, milk, banana, frozen berries) morning tea: muesli bar lunch: typically 3 ham sandwiches with wholegrain bread OR subway footlong OR bakery goodness (e.g. buns/pastries) OR leftover dinner dinner: shared cooking arrangement but usually some kind of chicken and fresh veg with rice/potato/pasta + sauce type dish. Or ethnic stuff (mexican/indian/thai) weekends: dinner is usually takeaways or restaurant. snack on fruit throughout the day (e.g. banana and a few mandarins) and like my sugary stuff too with plenty of chocolate and icecream. beverages coffee/tea: none alcohol: friday 2-3 beers and additionally ~once a fortnight (6-8 beers or bottle of wine). juice/softdrink: none Don't know if this is relevant but I seem to drink very little water compared to most other people (~1-2 glasses a day, plus ~1 glass when at gym). Have been trying to up my water when i remember.
Can someone let me know my strengths/weaknesses and suggest modifications I can make to my routine/nutrition to achieve my goals. Also looking for stuff I can do at home with no equipment (already do 50xpushups whenever I remember). Thanks in advance!
Welcome to the forum!
Before you do anything else, I'd seriously suggest you read through the stickies in this forum, specifically the General Nutrition Thread and the General Training Thread. They'll tell you everything you need to do about building muscle and picking up weight. You might also be interested in the Bodyweight Training Thread as it will give you good information on training at home.
Personally, I'd suggest changing to a proper weightlifting plan like Starting Strength. No offense, but your program at the moment looks like something you threw together based on advice at the gym :p It's missing a few key ingredients which every successful program includes: For one, weightlifting programs must increase the weight you are training at regularly, and with regularly I mean at least once a week. For another, you program focuses on too many isolation exercises (exercises which only exercise one muscle rather than most of your body) and you are, to a large extent, ignoring your core and legs. That said, your exercise program also got a few things right. Importantly, you're only exercising three times a week which means you rest enough for your muscles to grow. You also rest regularly between sets which allows you to perform every set at your best. Finally, you're doing three very good compound exercises: Chin/Pull-ups, Bench, and Military Press. Honestly, much of what you do is correct but you're doing way too many inefficient exercises and not forcing your body to improve quickly enough. Starting Strength will fix that.
People who struggle to gain weight all find it difficult to eat a lot, but if you're really serious about gaining weight you'll just have to man-up and eat more :p Rather than working out a specific diet, keep things simple. Eat 3000 calories a day and make sure you get 150g of protein in on a day. That should be more than enough to ensure that you pick up weight. However, if you've followed this strictly and not gained any weight after two weeks, increase it to 3500 calories a day and see how that goes. Honestly, if you do that while following a program like Starting Strength your strength will improve insanely quickly.
Hope that helps, but like I said, read the stickies.
Thanks a lot Daigomi! I will check out Starting Strength, didn't know you have to increase weight that quickly. I know food labels have kilojoule readings but is there a quick way I can sort of approximate how many kilojoules I'm eating. 12,500kj seems like a hell of a lot.
The best and easiest way to track your calories is to log all your food online. Two popular calorie trackers are fitday and livestrong. Logging your food really makes a massive difference. When I was trying to pick up weight I would often find that I was 500 calories under my goal at the end of the day. Knowing this, I could quickly drink 500ml of milk with some protein powder before I went to sleep and thus make sure that I got reasonably close to my goals every day. Logging your food is a bit frustrating in the beginning, but it only takes around 10 minutes a day and it's the most effective way to manage your weight by far.
Regarding the calories, 3000 calories a day is a lot. There's no way in hell I could have maintained that by "trying to eat a bit more" every day. When I simply tried to eat more, I would end up on 2400 calories a day instead of the 1800 I would naturally try to eat which wouldn't be enough for proper weight gain. That's why tracking my calories helped me as it forced me to eat considerably more than I was comfortable with. It also taught me which foods are calorie dense and which foods aren't. If you do maintain 3000 calories a day you'll pick up weight in no time. I gained about 8kg in 4 months, which is a lot considering that I wasn't really trying to gain weight (I just wanted to ensure that I ate enought to continue gaining strength). Since you're considerably smaller, you'll probably pick up the weight even more quickly, and if you follow a proper training regimen you'll find that most of that weight is muscle.
im a complete newbie at working out but i decided i would be active this summer and for the next school year since im going to be cutting on my gaming
I signed up for YMCA about a week and a half ago, got it cheap since im still 16 and i mainly am working out my upper body and also play basketball there I go with my cousin whos actually a year younger than me but he worked out in YMCA for 1 year and got pretty neat results so im aiming to have bigger and stronger arms too Atm hes 2x stronger than i am and i remember i was definitely a lot stronger than him prior to his work out, but i was just big. ive gotten more lean So im just simply working to a goal of getting stronger and bigger arms and upperbody. im fairly confident with my legs but i still plan on running on the treads for about 10-15 minutes at 6.5mph. Am i trying to lose weight? no im trying to gain some muscle mass. Oh ya my friend and my cousin recommended me to drink muscle milk after every work out but its expensive as fuck lol. Regardless, a lot of protein should be consumed i think
Anyways on to the point i have some general questions: Since my cousin worked with the machines, i figured they should work for me too. ive looked around but machines arent really mentioned much around here on TL. Are regular weight exercises more efficient? I know i should stay away from shit like French Fries, Soda, chips (fast food, instant food and junk) but are there other foods i should stay away from? I think the question of "how much" i should work out a day is too vague and unanswerable in terms of time but im at the gym for 1-3 hours of basketball (depending on what time i get there) and about 30 on the machines but i plan on maybe ramping that up to about an hour. In addition, should i work out every day? My friend told me i should give my muscles a day to develop.
On July 12 2012 08:57 Kenpachi wrote: im a complete newbie at working out but i decided i would be active this summer and for the next school year since im going to be cutting on my gaming
I signed up for YMCA about a week and a half ago, got it cheap since im still 16 and i mainly am working out my upper body and also play basketball there I go with my cousin whos actually a year younger than me but he worked out in YMCA for 1 year and got pretty neat results so im aiming to have bigger and stronger arms too Atm hes 2x stronger than i am and i remember i was definitely a lot stronger than him prior to his work out, but i was just big. ive gotten more lean So im just simply working to a goal of getting stronger and bigger arms and upperbody. im fairly confident with my legs but i still plan on running on the treads for about 10-15 minutes at 6.5mph. Am i trying to lose weight? no im trying to gain some muscle mass. Oh ya my friend and my cousin recommended me to drink muscle milk after every work out but its expensive as fuck lol. Regardless, a lot of protein should be consumed i think
Anyways on to the point i have some general questions: Since my cousin worked with the machines, i figured they should work for me too. ive looked around but machines arent really mentioned much around here on TL. Are regular weight exercises more efficient? I know i should stay away from shit like French Fries, Soda, chips (fast food, instant food and junk) but are there other foods i should stay away from? I think the question of "how much" i should work out a day is too vague and unanswerable in terms of time but im at the gym for 1-3 hours of basketball (depending on what time i get there) and about 30 on the machines but i plan on maybe ramping that up to about an hour. In addition, should i work out every day? My friend told me i should give my muscles a day to develop.
welcome
you should read the the general training recommendations thread first and foremost. i'd highly suggest training with a program instead of doing your own thing.
running on a treadmill won't do jack for leg strength, unfortunately. if you wanna get leg strength go squat and deadlift. running is mostly endurance.
free weights are more efficient than machines because it's much more applicable to real life situations(stabilizer muscles etc). if you can, use free weights.
you should not work out everyday, for beginners a program like starting strength with full body lifts and lots of rest is much more efficient. cardio might hamper your lifting progress a moderate amount, but i'm not gonna tell you to stop playing ball.
anyways read the training, nutrition stickies before doing your own thing. also http://www.reddit.com/help/faqs/Fitness is actually a really nice faq for weightlifting.
On July 11 2012 13:20 ThunderGod wrote: Hi, first time poster in this forum.
My history: I've been training for quite a while (over 1 year) on no real programme (just beginner advices from gym staff) and have some difficulty with maintaining my weight and strength. I aim to train at the gym 1hr, 3 times per week (Mon, Thurs, Sat), this averages about twice per week due to going away for work fairly frequently or just random other commitments that come up. I also do Power Vinyasa Yoga once a week (Sat) to help with stretching and flexibility (I have very poor flexibility) I get chronic lower back pain (not too painful, just chronic) which I would like to improve, has not improved with repeated physio.
My stats: Height: 5'10" Beginning weight: 62kg Peak weight: 71kg Current Weight: 65kg
My goals: Goal weight: 75kg Primary goal is to gain strength/"normal flexibility" and secondary is to look good with my shirt off. I have made some gains in all three already.
4. standing military barbell press/bicep barbell curls/rest 8x18kg/7-7-7 low-high-full @15kg/rest -> 8x23kg/7-7-7 low-high-full @18kg/rest -> 8x28kg/7-7-7 low-high-full @18kg/rest OR seated dumbbell shoulder press with a how to explain.. like press upwards then down then bring elbows together in a fly motion then out to sides and up again/lateral arm raises/rest 8x12.5kg/6x6kg/rest -> 8x12.5kg/6x6kg/rest -> failure@12.5kg/6x6kg/rest
5. chest flys with machine 8x47/54/61kg
6. usually throw in one of 3x8 of cable seated row/dips/seated one-arm triceps extension/triceps kickback/leg press
7. standing cable wood chop 3x8 (recommended by physio for my back)
8. leg raises 3x8 straight leg front/bent leg alternating sides/bent leg front/rest
9. 15mins abwork on mats and stretching.
My nutrition: I have ~40g protein in a large glass of milk after training. also add a bit of protein (~20g) to my morning smoothie. I possibly don't eat enough but find it hard to eat more, especially with the protein as this really fills me up. meals: breakfast: smoothie (2xweetbix, milk, banana, frozen berries) morning tea: muesli bar lunch: typically 3 ham sandwiches with wholegrain bread OR subway footlong OR bakery goodness (e.g. buns/pastries) OR leftover dinner dinner: shared cooking arrangement but usually some kind of chicken and fresh veg with rice/potato/pasta + sauce type dish. Or ethnic stuff (mexican/indian/thai) weekends: dinner is usually takeaways or restaurant. snack on fruit throughout the day (e.g. banana and a few mandarins) and like my sugary stuff too with plenty of chocolate and icecream. beverages coffee/tea: none alcohol: friday 2-3 beers and additionally ~once a fortnight (6-8 beers or bottle of wine). juice/softdrink: none Don't know if this is relevant but I seem to drink very little water compared to most other people (~1-2 glasses a day, plus ~1 glass when at gym). Have been trying to up my water when i remember.
Can someone let me know my strengths/weaknesses and suggest modifications I can make to my routine/nutrition to achieve my goals. Also looking for stuff I can do at home with no equipment (already do 50xpushups whenever I remember). Thanks in advance!
Welcome to the forum!
Before you do anything else, I'd seriously suggest you read through the stickies in this forum, specifically the General Nutrition Thread and the General Training Thread. They'll tell you everything you need to do about building muscle and picking up weight. You might also be interested in the Bodyweight Training Thread as it will give you good information on training at home.
Personally, I'd suggest changing to a proper weightlifting plan like Starting Strength. No offense, but your program at the moment looks like something you threw together based on advice at the gym :p It's missing a few key ingredients which every successful program includes: For one, weightlifting programs must increase the weight you are training at regularly, and with regularly I mean at least once a week. For another, you program focuses on too many isolation exercises (exercises which only exercise one muscle rather than most of your body) and you are, to a large extent, ignoring your core and legs. That said, your exercise program also got a few things right. Importantly, you're only exercising three times a week which means you rest enough for your muscles to grow. You also rest regularly between sets which allows you to perform every set at your best. Finally, you're doing three very good compound exercises: Chin/Pull-ups, Bench, and Military Press. Honestly, much of what you do is correct but you're doing way too many inefficient exercises and not forcing your body to improve quickly enough. Starting Strength will fix that.
People who struggle to gain weight all find it difficult to eat a lot, but if you're really serious about gaining weight you'll just have to man-up and eat more :p Rather than working out a specific diet, keep things simple. Eat 3000 calories a day and make sure you get 150g of protein in on a day. That should be more than enough to ensure that you pick up weight. However, if you've followed this strictly and not gained any weight after two weeks, increase it to 3500 calories a day and see how that goes. Honestly, if you do that while following a program like Starting Strength your strength will improve insanely quickly.
Hope that helps, but like I said, read the stickies.
Listen to this man. Ditch the machines and isolation exercises. Your time is better spent under a bar. Get on a serious program that includes squats and deadlifts and plans for progress. Starting Strength is perfect for you. Or Stronglifts.
As for the nutrition- chronically skinny guys usually just don't eat enough. That why Mark Rippetoe (author of SS) recommends drinking a gallon of whole milk a day. It's about 3000 calories with a perfect proportion of protein, carbs, and fat to encourage growth. Plus, liquid calories tend to not make you feel like you are about to explode like eating that much solid food can. Good luck!
I finally got around to filming it today. Here are my three sets @ 86kg. Two showing the knees and one overall view (camera ran out of memory for last two reps of that set). I was trying to focus on pushing out the knees, and I think it helped a little, but I'm still getting some 'wobble'. You can see this mostly in the left knee. Thoughts?
The squats themselves felt easy enough, but I'm wary up putting more weight on if this is a problem.
It looks perfect to me, I don't really see any problem. Only thing I would suggest is not walking so far back before you start squatting. The purpose of those steps on the squat rack is to catch the bar should you get stuck under it but where you were standing there's no way it could possibly catch the bar. You should probably stand in line with the fourth step, if I had to guess.
Hey guys! First timer here at the fitness section as well!
I have a rather peculiar situation:
I have been skinny all my life, borderline underweight that is (Genes, metabolism and all that jazz, no eating disorders etc). Recently I think I've been gaining a bit of weight but nothing too noticeable. I'm 21 years old now.
At any rate, it just happens that I will be leaving for Japan at the end of July in order to bike through Japan. (Tokyo - Fukuoka if you were wondering.)
I will also be doing some (possibly quite heavy) physical work at some random farms during my time there.
So! Basically I will be biking around 2000 kilometers in the span of 5 months while doing some good old fashioned physical labour. Considering I will be more physical active then I have ever been in my life, I thought I should turn it up even more and ask for some advice here:
If I wanted to get some muscles and increase my endurance, what simple excercises would you recommend for me that I could do at my host families / motels everyday or a few times a week?
I'm not looking to build massive muscles, but I'd like to look fit. Now I just look skinny. And since I will be on the road / at some random farm in Kansai, access to heavy equipment isn't possible.
Also, any general advice or pointers? I'm new to this apart from googling some random information. So anything is appreciated.
On July 13 2012 01:01 Daigomi wrote: It looks perfect to me, I don't really see any problem. Only thing I would suggest is not walking so far back before you start squatting. The purpose of those steps on the squat rack is to catch the bar should you get stuck under it but where you were standing there's no way it could possibly catch the bar. You should probably stand in line with the fourth step, if I had to guess.
Same here, there is absolutely nothing wrong with your squat, besides the excessive walk-out. Actually it looks amazingly good and your mobility even with flat shoes is remarkable in my eyes. The only thing I can come up with is that the problem does not occur at light weights... given the manner you are walking like 5 steps back with this weight tells me that this was pretty light for you.
I'm finding myself having few things to do during the day, so I'm mostly just spending time on the computer all day, then go to the gym at night. Does anyone have any suggestions to keep me busy during the day? I don't really have money to spare and don't live near any friends. I feel like my brain isn't being very active, and I'd like a bit more stimulation.
On July 13 2012 01:01 Daigomi wrote: It looks perfect to me, I don't really see any problem. Only thing I would suggest is not walking so far back before you start squatting. The purpose of those steps on the squat rack is to catch the bar should you get stuck under it but where you were standing there's no way it could possibly catch the bar. You should probably stand in line with the fourth step, if I had to guess.
Same here, there is absolutely nothing wrong with your squat, besides the excessive walk-out. Actually it looks amazingly good and your mobility even with flat shoes is remarkable in my eyes. The only thing I can come up with is that the problem does not occur at light weights... given the manner you are walking like 5 steps back with this weight tells me that this was pretty light for you.
Thanks guys for taking the time to check it out. Good to know my form is sound, though that leaves the question of why my knees are sore.
I'll fix the excessive walk out. Honestly that never occurred to me. Was too worried about not hitting the supports to wonder if I actually would.
On July 13 2012 16:07 Zenbrez wrote: I'm finding myself having few things to do during the day, so I'm mostly just spending time on the computer all day, then go to the gym at night. Does anyone have any suggestions to keep me busy during the day? I don't really have money to spare and don't live near any friends. I feel like my brain isn't being very active, and I'd like a bit more stimulation.
Well you could make work and like clean up around the house or something like that. Also just going outside for walks can be fun Or read some books
On July 13 2012 03:15 NonFactor wrote: Hey guys! First timer here at the fitness section as well!
I have a rather peculiar situation:
I have been skinny all my life, borderline underweight that is (Genes, metabolism and all that jazz, no eating disorders etc). Recently I think I've been gaining a bit of weight but nothing too noticeable. I'm 21 years old now.
At any rate, it just happens that I will be leaving for Japan at the end of July in order to bike through Japan. (Tokyo - Fukuoka if you were wondering.)
I will also be doing some (possibly quite heavy) physical work at some random farms during my time there.
So! Basically I will be biking around 2000 kilometers in the span of 5 months while doing some good old fashioned physical labour. Considering I will be more physical active then I have ever been in my life, I thought I should turn it up even more and ask for some advice here:
If I wanted to get some muscles and increase my endurance, what simple excercises would you recommend for me that I could do at my host families / motels everyday or a few times a week?
I'm not looking to build massive muscles, but I'd like to look fit. Now I just look skinny. And since I will be on the road / at some random farm in Kansai, access to heavy equipment isn't possible.
Also, any general advice or pointers? I'm new to this apart from googling some random information. So anything is appreciated.
On July 13 2012 01:01 Daigomi wrote: It looks perfect to me, I don't really see any problem. Only thing I would suggest is not walking so far back before you start squatting. The purpose of those steps on the squat rack is to catch the bar should you get stuck under it but where you were standing there's no way it could possibly catch the bar. You should probably stand in line with the fourth step, if I had to guess.
Same here, there is absolutely nothing wrong with your squat, besides the excessive walk-out. Actually it looks amazingly good and your mobility even with flat shoes is remarkable in my eyes. The only thing I can come up with is that the problem does not occur at light weights... given the manner you are walking like 5 steps back with this weight tells me that this was pretty light for you.
Thanks guys for taking the time to check it out. Good to know my form is sound, though that leaves the question of why my knees are sore.
I'll fix the excessive walk out. Honestly that never occurred to me. Was too worried about not hitting the supports to wonder if I actually would.
A lot of times knee pain results from tight muscles which leads to tendons getting irritated -> pain. Stretching, icing, and foam rolling can all help. Foam rolling made a big difference for me. Had knee pain and IT band issues for the longest time until I got a roller.
I have a question about incorporating powercleans, squats, deadlifts etcc.. into my workout. Since those work so many different muscle groups, what would be a good split that still allows me to do bicept,tricept,shoulder,chest, back isolation workouts? Currently I do something like:
chest / bi's possible rest day back / shoulders tri's / legs rest
I've never done any of those excersizes that incorporate lots of muscle groups but I need to start doing them.
I think a lot of what you'll get here is gonna say that you should do a whole body compound based program like Starting Strength, and I'd be inclined to agree. However, if you're attached to the split routine, Squats, Deadlifts and Power cleans all would probably go under "legs" in the split you listed (they also work the back quite a bit too though)
If you insist on doing some kind of split I'd probably swap some stuff around and have a back/legs day with deadlifts, squats, powercleans and maybe some kind of rowing/pull up movement. Either that or I'd put squats and deadlifts/powercleans on leg day, alternating between deadlifts and powercleans every workout.
EPT
