almostthere
New member
Alright thanks a lot, I guess I'll spread my protein out a bit more and put some more carbs in my pre workout meal.
Workout
- Thread starter Steve
- Start date
Alright thanks a lot, I guess I'll spread my protein out a bit more and put some more carbs in my pre workout meal.
Anytime! And that's great! Are you keeping up with it still?
Im trying. I have slacked a bit on diet(not eating enough, or having what i should eat), and this past week i didnt work out as much. Im going to the gym later today and now that the court is open i also play ball again.
Good to hear. Just keep up with it. If you trip up for a few days, so what! That's doesn't matter anymore. What matters is what you do today.
Bigreen
New member
Hey Steve, great advice on this thread. We are so fortunate to have you around here. Anyway, I have a bowflex at home and some dumbells. 10, 20, 35, 50lbs and an adjustable set that does anything from 0-30 lbs.
I'll give you my routine really quick. I don't know the name of most excercises so ill try to explain.
Bench Press 6-8 reps 4x
Lift dumbells over my head when im sitting 6-8 reps 4x
flys 6-8 reps 4x
cross pulls (standing and pulling the handels in a cross pattern)6-8 4x
tricep workout, lean forward on a chair and have my elbow parallel with my body and extend my arm. 6-8 reps 4x
sitting on the machine i pull down from the top behind my head 6-8 4x
sitting again, pull up motion, 6-8 4x
hammer curls 6-8 2x
regular curls 6-8 2x
another curl where i curl 3x half way from bottom to middle and 3x halfway from middle to top and 3x full curls... i do this 2x.
i do a neck workout where i grab the heavy dumbells and raise my shoulders, 6-8 reps 4x
and i finish with a variation of the bench press (you can do so many with the bowflex) 6-8reps 4x.
I do this workout 3-4 times a week.... I want to do a workout 6 days a week and I guess im looking to specialise spacific muscle groups every day of the week instead of full body workouts. Do you have any advice?
Also i dont work my legs much because they get a crazy workout with my cardio, i do cardio 6 days a week plus i play ice hockey twice a week.
thanks in advance... ohh and the pounds are comming off like crazy right now
I'll give you my routine really quick. I don't know the name of most excercises so ill try to explain.
Bench Press 6-8 reps 4x
Lift dumbells over my head when im sitting 6-8 reps 4x
flys 6-8 reps 4x
cross pulls (standing and pulling the handels in a cross pattern)6-8 4x
tricep workout, lean forward on a chair and have my elbow parallel with my body and extend my arm. 6-8 reps 4x
sitting on the machine i pull down from the top behind my head 6-8 4x
sitting again, pull up motion, 6-8 4x
hammer curls 6-8 2x
regular curls 6-8 2x
another curl where i curl 3x half way from bottom to middle and 3x halfway from middle to top and 3x full curls... i do this 2x.
i do a neck workout where i grab the heavy dumbells and raise my shoulders, 6-8 reps 4x
and i finish with a variation of the bench press (you can do so many with the bowflex) 6-8reps 4x.
I do this workout 3-4 times a week.... I want to do a workout 6 days a week and I guess im looking to specialise spacific muscle groups every day of the week instead of full body workouts. Do you have any advice?
Also i dont work my legs much because they get a crazy workout with my cardio, i do cardio 6 days a week plus i play ice hockey twice a week.
thanks in advance... ohh and the pounds are comming off like crazy right now
Bigreen
New member
Fat loss first, then once I'm 180 ish, maybe 170 i want to add muscle mass.
Far too much volume and isolation work. Not enough pulling exercises.
Why?
Why?
I'd still train legs.
Bigreen
New member
6 days a week because I absolutely love working out. I didn't at first but i really love it now.
Specific muscle groups each day so that i can rest some groups for a day or two after i work out with them. As you can see i have a very generic workout that can probably be put to better use. Basically I'm looking for advice on a better routine. I know it's not the best.
About the legs, my legs are huge (all muscle) and they are not propotionate to my body. I really don't want them any bigger. I guess carying all that weight all those years has really built them up. My calves are the biggest I've seen.
Specific muscle groups each day so that i can rest some groups for a day or two after i work out with them. As you can see i have a very generic workout that can probably be put to better use. Basically I'm looking for advice on a better routine. I know it's not the best.
About the legs, my legs are huge (all muscle) and they are not propotionate to my body. I really don't want them any bigger. I guess carying all that weight all those years has really built them up. My calves are the biggest I've seen.
Yea, but you can do too much ya know. The more is not always the better. An important part of training is recovery.
Also, breaking your body up into specific body parts to train each day is a very inefficient way of training. We don't isolate our bodies in the real world. We shouldn't train that way in the gym either. Following your basic body part split takes the functionality out of your training.
Also, tons of volume and worrying about your arms and neck is stupid at this point. You are dieting. That means you're in an energy deficit. Adding any new muscle isn't going to happen, so why focus on such ineffective exercises. Rather, you should be focusing on compound exercises. Something like "the basic lifts" stickie would serve you well.
That's the entire premise of full body training. Train 3 days per week to give your muslces a break.
My suggestion to you is to erase all the stuff from your mind and break it down into why you do what you do in the gym.
What is all that volume and blasting each and every body part with isolation movements going to do for you?
That's not what creates muscle growth and/or maintenance.
What does?
Progressive overload of the compound lifts.
That means, get stronger in each of the basic lifts.
Most people don't need more than 3 full body sessions with a handful of compounds, low reps, and a focus on adding weight to the bar. This is what generates the majority of your gains until you reach a point where that doesn't work. Don't muddy the waters until you have to.
Again, if you are dieting, you aren't going to add any appreciable amounts of muscle.
Your legs are genetically big. That doesn't mean you shouldn't train them. Think of your body as a unit. Leaving out one particular section of the unit leads to inefficiencies across the board.
A couple of compound exercises for a handful of sets isn't going to cause you any hare, each week. You could simply do squats and deads and be done.
Yea, that was a fantastic website that went down unfortunately. You can see many of these exercises if you just type them into youtube.
Here are a few more sites that have vids:
Workout Routines & Exercises - New iPod Videos! (last i checked this site was temporarily down)
Web Page Under Construction
Video Index
Strength Training
Olympic Full Body
CrossFit Exercises
Overall Body
Exercise Directory
Exercise Demos
Strength Exercises, Weight Training exercises, types of exercise, weight training technique, types of weight training
Last edited:
leshric
New member
What about this?
Steve,
Been reading over this thread and the one about myths and I've seen the light in a few areas. But I do have a couple of questions...
First off, what do you think about so-called advanced workout techniques such as pyramiding, drop sets, or super sets? I know you wouldn't recommend these for beginners, but I've been lifting for a long time (admittedly though with a split routine of training a body part only once/week, and too much work on smaller muscle groups)
I've always done a pyramid with my sets, either 12-10-8-6 or 10-8-6-4 with progressively heavier weight, and occasionally would incorporate drop sets.
Second, I just wanted an opinion on my proposed schedule
Monday - Active rest
Tuesday - Upper body workout, HIIT
Wednesday - Lower body workout
Thursday - Steady-state cardio
Friday - Off
Saturday - Upper body workout, steady-state cardio
Sunday - Lower body workout, HIIT
I know it's kinda irregular, but it works with my schedule
In case you need it, I'm male, 5'11", started at 290lbs and now I'm 232lbs. My goal is to maintain muscle while losing the last 40 lbs to reach my goal.
Thanks!
Steve,
Been reading over this thread and the one about myths and I've seen the light in a few areas. But I do have a couple of questions...
First off, what do you think about so-called advanced workout techniques such as pyramiding, drop sets, or super sets? I know you wouldn't recommend these for beginners, but I've been lifting for a long time (admittedly though with a split routine of training a body part only once/week, and too much work on smaller muscle groups)
I've always done a pyramid with my sets, either 12-10-8-6 or 10-8-6-4 with progressively heavier weight, and occasionally would incorporate drop sets.
Second, I just wanted an opinion on my proposed schedule
Monday - Active rest
Tuesday - Upper body workout, HIIT
Wednesday - Lower body workout
Thursday - Steady-state cardio
Friday - Off
Saturday - Upper body workout, steady-state cardio
Sunday - Lower body workout, HIIT
I know it's kinda irregular, but it works with my schedule
In case you need it, I'm male, 5'11", started at 290lbs and now I'm 232lbs. My goal is to maintain muscle while losing the last 40 lbs to reach my goal.
Thanks!
Depends on goals and the individual.
But all training parameters have a place.... they just need to be used in context.
If you haven't trained using an optimal split such as full body or upper/lower splits yet, I'd put money on the fact that you're not ready to be doing things like drop sets.
Again, it's all dependent on your goals.
Give me context to work with.
I don't have a real problem with pyramid sets.
Define active rest.
If you're doing true HIIT, move it to your lower body workout day.
Upper/lower splits are my favorite, so there's nothing wrong here. But that's dependent on what you're doing each of these days.
Hahaha, obviously I'm replying as I read the thread. If I had read the entire thing first I would have known your goal.
I can tell you that you don't need to be doing any advanced techniques at this stage in the game. There's no reason to train as if you were putting on muscle when you're in a caloric deficit..... tends to cause more 'harm' than good.
leshric
New member
Sorry, when I said active rest, I mean 30-60 mins of light cardio, elliptical, treadmill, bike, stairs, whatever strikes my fancy. But just to get the blood flowing and the joints warm.
Ok, I'm planning to keep the pyramid because I like doing it that way. As long as it's not counter-productive. I'll drop the drop sets. (See how I did that?)
As far as moving the HIIT, that's a scheduling issue. And with the upper/lower splits, I'm going to use the basic compound movements. I'll probably throw a little work on the smaller muscles but probably only like 20% of my workout.
Ok, I'm planning to keep the pyramid because I like doing it that way. As long as it's not counter-productive. I'll drop the drop sets. (See how I did that?)
As far as moving the HIIT, that's a scheduling issue. And with the upper/lower splits, I'm going to use the basic compound movements. I'll probably throw a little work on the smaller muscles but probably only like 20% of my workout.
That sounds good to me.
As a general rule of thumb, it's best to consolidate high intensity bouts together to allow more time for recovery, which is why I suggested doing HIIT on your leg day.
fixedededed