Entries Tagged 'Fitness' ↓

Losing fat is an all-out war. Problem is, most people don’t attack it from all sides. It’s all well and good to eat less and move more, but if you change the many things in our lives that are taken for granted, the results will be far greater! For instance, let’s assume that today is a shopping day. What changes can be made today so that you may slough off that stubborn fat?

Here’s a few things you can do that will really add up over the course of a day:

• At the mall, park on the opposite side of where you want to go. It may not seem practical, but if you really think about it, you’ll be giving yourself a good half-hour of cardio or more, depending upon the size of your mall. And there’s no way you are going to miss that super sale for Coach purses or the latest and greatest Nike kicks.
• Take the stairs instead of the escalator or elevator. If the former is not available, at least walk up the escalator and make something of it!
• Tote around a water bottle and an apple or something small so you’ll be less likely to nibble on typical food court junk and cookie stands.
• Though all that walking may leave you tempted to sit and rest, keep standing and walking, or lean on something instead. You burn almost double the calories that you would just sitting around.

It’s the little things you do that make the biggest difference in your physique and your health, so if you find weight loss is becoming increasingly more difficult, it may be time to completely overhaul those lazy tendencies!

“More is better,” says America. In fact, with weight training, it’s the exact opposite- more can be worse.

Johnny Boy is a hard gainer. He’s was making great progress in the gym the past few months since he started working out, but now his progress has come to a screeching halt. Out of confusion and desperation, Johhny decides he will ramp up the time he spends in the gym and the number of days a week that he coasts the gym floor. Week by week, he grows smaller (yes, he grows smaller!) and finds himself in a world of hurt.

As if his newly shrunken muscles weren’t enough, Johnny begins to feel overly fatigued and very lethargic. He experiences delayed soreness- it’s not that immediate soreness he is used to feeling. He begins to lose motivation. Johnny feels so irritable. He begins losing sleep. A look in the mirror shows he’s developing a spare tire around the waist- he’s getting fatter. Frightened at the lack of progress, he hits it harder in the weight room. Come Monday, while on the bench press, his ego takes over and he slaps on more weight than he can handle. On the way down, *snap*! He’s just torn his right pectoral muscle! He’s now a victim of injury.

Now, while the story above is entirely fictional, it entails the process of overtraining. But what causes overtraining?

• Lack of sufficient rest and recovery
• Malnutrition
• Workouts with too great a volume (too many sets)
• Workouts with too great an intensity for too long in duration.

The best thing to do is avoid overtraining altogether. Here’s how it’s done:

• Make sure you give the body part worked 48-72 hours of rest.
• After 6-8 weeks of training, take a week off from the weights.
• Sleep for 8-9 hours every night or get in at least a few “power-naps” to recoup lost sleep.
• Eat at or above maintenance if your workouts are demanding.
• If you intend on training with a higher volume, keep the intensity low.
• If you intend on training with higher intensity, keep the volume low.

1. Motivation. With an expert in your grille, you’re guaranteed to hop off your butt and hit the weights.
2. Consistency. A good trainer will hold you accountable and keep you regular.
3. Individualization. Having a personalized program based upon your goals is a sure-fire way to success.
4. Time Management. You’ll get everything going in less time with more results than you would on your own.
5. Accessible Knowledgebase. Hey, you’ve got a anatomical dictionary, a corrective, strength, and cardiovascular exercise database, and a nutrition plan, all in the form of a living, breathing human being.
6. A Great Jumpstart. For a novice to the fitness world, it’s a great way to ensure you get off the blocks as quickly as possible.
7. Safety. With a good trainer, you won’t be deep squatting atop a stability ball, all while balanced on one foot.
8. Plateau Buster. Advanced trainees that hit the wall full speed will benefit with a second opinion and a different point of view.
9. Privacy. The best personal trainers don’t work in a gym- they have their own facilities. Many trainers will actually come out to your house too.
10. A Wise Investment. Think about it. If you could add ten extra years of life to spend with family, friends, and things you enjoy doing, wouldn’t you invest a small fee? Life is priceless!

The Rest-Pause Technique:

I’ve outlined an entire routine for rest-pausing for strength and size gains in a previous post. Here’s the general consensus of the rest-pause technique: Lift a weight at 70-80% of your 1 RM for 1 or 2 reps at a time and then rack it. Assume a very short rest (enough to catch your head and your breath) and get back to the weight. Continue single reps and racking the weight until you can’t get 1 rep yourself.

Most Beneficial for: Strength gains (but strength can also precede size, so hypertrophy is definitely possible).

Best Performed During: The beginning of your workout (or your entire workout).

X-Reps:

X-Reps are intense in nature and may be difficult for beginning lifters. Much neuromuscular connection is needed to successfully perform this technique. X-Reps are used as a finisher for a work set. Basically, the x-rep is a partial rep performed in a pulsating manner - it’s very rapid in tempo. For instance, when you are on bench press, you would perform full range reps (full extension in lifting and full contraction in the lowering phase), followed by partial reps (performed at the bottom position of the bench press up to the mid-range) - just shy of half a rep. This is supposed to activate additional motor units, thereby stimulating more than the typical Type-II fibers. For more information on x-reps and the physiological descriptions behind it, visit the official X-Reps website.

Most Beneficial for: Hypertrophy.

Best Performed During: The end of a work set.

Static Holds

This one is easier said than done. While it is really only a static (non-moving) contraction, it will really fatigue the muscle and induce micro-tears (great for additional muscle growth). Perform a typical work set on the exercise of your choice and when you finish the last rep, hold the weight for 10-20 seconds in full extension or near full extension. Get ready to scream!

Most Beneficial for: Strength and Hypertrophy.

Best Performed During: The end of a work set.

One and a Half Reps

I wrote a guest article for Israel at Fat Man Unleashed for One and a Half Squats. This deals with one and a half reps, the basis behind the squatting technique, except you can apply it to additional muscle groups and exercises. Here’s how it works: You’ll take the weight through the eccentric (lowering) phase, fire the weight up mid-way, lower it through the eccentric again, and the fire it up through the concentric (lifting) phase. That’s rep number one. This is best done in a smith machine so you don’t end up looking like the pancake you ate this morning.

Most Beneficial for: Hypertrophy

Best Performed During: your first full set. It’s too hard to perform this in a pre-exhausted state! Start this one fresh!

Super Sets

You’ve probably heard of a super set before. In case you haven’t, you’re really missing out! A super set is a super way to induce size gains and a great way to break a plateau. Pick two exercises for the target muscle and as soon as you finish one set on the first exercise, bounce to the next without rest. Continue for two or three total sets.

Most Beneficial for: Hypertrophy and Fat Loss! (due to natural stimulation of growth hormone and the induction of lactic acid, which will positively affect body composition).

Best Performed During: The entire workout or the end of the workout.

After some time following standard body splits and run-of-the-mill routines, you’ll eventually hit a wall with your gains in muscle mass and strength. Now, for those of you who are used to workouts with greater volume, this might feel awkward. Don’t give it too much thought and just do it!

With this technique, you will be reducing the volume (number of sets and exercises) of your workout to one total set and turning up the intensity dial. It’s essentially the opposite approach. You will also have a hard time grasping how one true “work set” can promote progressive strength and size gains at first, but you’ll soon discover its’ worth when you move around like a zombie in the days following your workout.

Here’s the basis of this workout:

• The routine lasts three days a week. M-W-F or T-TH-SAT, your choice.
• Body part splits are as follows:
  • A - Chest, Shoulders, Triceps
  • B - Back, Legs, Biceps
• You alternate between A and B on workout days (i.e. Monday is Group A, Wednesday is Group B, Friday is Group A, the following Monday is Group B, etc)
• One work set at a weight that is between 70-80% of your 1 RM (single rep max)
• Only one exercise per body part
• Compound, multi-joint exercises only (Bench Press, Shoulder Press, Squats, Deadlifts, Barbell Curls, etc)
• Perform abs twice a week on days of your choice. Be sure to spread them apart to ensure sufficient recovery.

By using a tri-split (three muscle groups), we are able to use pre-exhaustion as a technique to slightly increase volume and overload. When you are working bench press, you exhaust your shoulders and triceps secondarily. The same with back and biceps - you inadvertently work your biceps when you perform back exercises, thus eliminating the need for more than one set per body part. And because we only have two groups, we are able to attack the muscles with more intensity and frequency. You’ll be able to recover quickly and hit the muscles more times per week, and that means more strength and greater muscle mass!

Here’s a standard template that I follow :

Group A

• Chest - Incline Bench Press - 1 Rest-Pause Set
• Shoulders - Barbell Shoulder Press - 1 Rest-Pause Set
• Triceps - Close-Grip Bench Press - 1 Rest-Pause Set

Group B

• Back - Deadlift - 1 Rest-Pause Set (perform a set of pull-ups to failure following this for lats)
• Legs - Back Squat and Front Squat* (2 x 10, 8 for Back Squat, 2 x 10, 8 Front Squat)
• Biceps - Barbell Curls - 1 Rest-Pause Set

* Legs are the only exception to the rule - rest-pausing with legs can be dangerous, so more exercises are performed with slightly less weight.

How Rest-Pausing Works:

Rest-Pausing is quite simple. You choose a weight that is 70-80% of your 1 RM and you try to lift it until personal failure - if you can’t get the next rep alone, rack the weight. Rest 20-25 seconds. Again, lift for as many reps as you can before failure - don’t go beyond it. Rest another 20-25 seconds. Once again, lift for as many reps as you can on your own. The trick here is lifting it without assistance, but keep a spotter handy so you don’t kill yourself (in the absence of a spotter, perform those lifts on a smith machine with hooks and guide rails). The rep progression is usually 6-8 reps on round one, 3-4 on round two, and 1-3 on round three. If you go beyond 15 reps, add 5 pounds to your next workout. Also, remember that this was your “work set” so you are done with this exercise and body part. Time to move on to the next muscle group!

I’d perform this routine for at least four to six weeks, and when you feel like you are nearing a plateau in particular exercises, change that exercise to another multi-joint exercise. Bring a log book too so you can remember your weight and reps performed.

Have fun!

As you progress in your lifting career, you probably notice it becomes increasingly harder to add more muscle to your frame. By adding a stretching routine upon completion of each exercise, you can break that forever-long plateau you’ve been stuck in.

How exactly will stretching allow for additional muscle growth? Well, let’s dive deeper into muscular physiology to see just how stretching will induce greater gains in the future. You see, we have a fascial tissue that surrounds the spindles of fibers that make up the skeletal muscles in our body. Over time, this tissue gets more and more tense, especially if you have added an appreciable amount of mass over the past few years. This is where stretching comes into play. When you stretch following a workout, you allow for the fascial tissue encasements to expand beyond the norm (which is a good thing I might add), leaving room for additional muscle growth to fill in the extra space. This is very beneficial for hypertrophy (when the muscle cells enlarge) and newer studies are revealing that stretching may induce hyperplasia too (an increase in the number of muscle cells).

To get the most out of stretching, I’d recommended stretching immediately following the exercise of the target muscle group you are working. For instance, if you’ve just completed an exercise that worked your hamstrings, you’d want to straddle your leg over something and perform a hurdle stretch or something of that sort. If you are working chest, you would perform a chest flye on a flat bench with dumbbells, only this time you would be holding the dumbbells at the bottom position of the flye. Lats- hang from a pullup bar. So on and so forth. Hold each stretch maximally for 60-90 seconds and that’s all you’ll need. Just make sure you aren’t bouncing and that you ease into maximum stretch, so as to not pull or tear any muscle.

I found that despite my huge gains in leg strength and size, I am still able to kick my foot all the way up to my forehead or touch my nose to my knee. I can also touch my hand to my mid-back without problems, so there’s no doubt in my mind that fascial stretching works. You won’t just benefit from additional room for muscle growth, you’ll also be much more limber and flexible with less joint problems, aches, and pains.

Have you heard the story of Milo of Crotona? This ancient Olympic wrestler (532-516 BC) exhibited qualities similar to Hercules in that he was of massive size and stature, he possessed great strength, and he was an extraordinary athlete. He was also five times victorious from the 60th and the 62nd to the 66th Olympiad. And here’s an interesting little tidbit: Earlier in his life, upon rising each day, this old chap would hoist a young calf above his shoulders. As months passed, the calf grew larger, and Milo found himself lifting increasingly heavier loads. Even as the calf developed into a full-grown steer, Milo continued to haul it atop his shoulders. The end result of his heifer hoisting: An impressive physique  and the brute strength of a god in those primeval times.

Milo’s story presents an important lesson to be learned in human physiology. In order to obtain the muscularity and strength you desire, you must continually stress your muscles with progressively heavier loads. This is a problem I see many times in the gym when I’m not training someone. It’s surprising how many I’ve seen that lift the same weight day in and day out, and then they ask why the can’t seem to get bigger. Progression is key, and without overload, there will be no progression.

An easy solution to this problem: track your weights. Write them down in a training log and assess your performance at the conclusion of each workout. The moment you do this, you will start to recognize when the time has come to increase the weight. Strength precedes size, so as you grow stronger, you will experience gradual gains is muscle size.