*** The 2010 Gym Rats Thread ***

PAz diet looks good to me. Roughly how many calories does that work out to be?

Seems a little high on whey and you're eating quite frequently? Perhaps too frequently?

You could try halving the amounts of whey & oats you're intaking. As 30-40 grams at breakfast followed by 3-5 eggs is a fair bit to be having in the morning. Do you know roughly how many grams of protein per day you're getting?

I found that my diet was quite low in fat and as soon as I started to eat good fats, olive oil, small amount of butter, nuts etc I began to drop fat a little quicker than I had been.

Olive oil & lemon juice makes scrambled eggs taste delicious!

Are you cutting/bulking at current mate?
 
Concorde Rules said:
Right now i've moved onto mainly weights and with help of an app called "iFitness" (very useful for a beginner for different exercises) and this is what i've come up with for my week.

My aims are: Toned arms, with additional strength, overall stamina and work on my back muscles as they are very weak and ache if i've done something strenuous on them.

Monday/Wends/Friday:
Cross-trainer: 15 mins warm up.
Rowing: 1km
Dumbell Biceps Curl: 2x15
French Press: 2x12
Standing Concentration Curl: 2x10
Hammer Curl: 2x10
Barbell Bench Press: 2x8
Machine Biceps Curl: 2x15
Machine Chest Press: 2x15
Cross-trainer: 15 mins cool down.


Tues/Thursday/Sat/Sun:
Cross-trainer: 20 mins
Cycling Machine: 20 mins
Treadmill: 20 mins
- Whats a good lower back exercise here?


Any opinions on the above?


I must sound like a right beginner but i'd like to get into a routine because when im all over the shop I just loose commitment!!!

Thanks!
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Some of those reps seem a little high. If you're doing more than 12 you're using too little weight. Remember, you gain muscle by lifting BIG and eating BIG. You gain tone by dropping your bodyfat %age. High reps and low weight will just be wasting your time. I usually aim for around 8 - 10 reps on whatever I do.

Another thing to mention. Don't be that guy who does Bicep curls every day. Your biceps are a very small part of your arm and only need to be worked once a week. Triceps are a larger muscle on your arm and you'll look incredibly weird with big biceps and small triceps.
You'll also be totally worn out if you do bench press 3 times a week as well and your shoulders might get injured.

You should really be sticking to the main compound exercises for now (see the wonderful sticky in this forum or check out Rippetoe's Starting Strength). Exercises such as Bench Press, Squats, Deadlifts, chin ups, pullups etc will all help add big muscle to your body. Then you can start working on more isolation exercises if you need be.

I think finally, make sure you understand that you don't gain muscle at the gym, you gain muscle from recovering from the gym. If you spend every day in the gym without any opportunities to let your body rest, you'll seriously hinder your gains and possibly even injure yourself.
 
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Got an arm day in tonight............

50 kilos per stack overhead cable curls 5x10
15 kilo one arm wrist curls 5x10
35 kilo dumbbell curls 5x10
50 kilo ez reverse curls 5x10
50 kilo skull crushers using ez curl bar 5x10
100 kilo cable push downs 5x10
25x4 exercise ball crunches
20 minutes high resistance on the crosstrainer
 
BennyC said:
PAz diet looks good to me. Roughly how many calories does that work out to be?

Seems a little high on whey and you're eating quite frequently? Perhaps too frequently?

You could try halving the amounts of whey & oats you're intaking. As 30-40 grams at breakfast followed by 3-5 eggs is a fair bit to be having in the morning. Do you know roughly how many grams of protein per day you're getting?

I found that my diet was quite low in fat and as soon as I started to eat good fats, olive oil, small amount of butter, nuts etc I began to drop fat a little quicker than I had been.

Olive oil & lemon juice makes scrambled eggs taste delicious!

Are you cutting/bulking at current mate?
Click to expand...

TY for the feedback. I think you are right about my frequency of eating - I'm often only going 1-2 hours without food which is probably a little too much on the high side. I think I might experiment as I said above and rather than just have whey on waking, I'll have oats, whey, fruit and then leave the eggs until 0900ish, then leave out the 1030ish food.

Its about 200g protein a day usually.

Aim is niether really cut or bulk. If anything lean bulk and lift heavy weights!
 
^TANK^ said:
Got an arm day in tonight............

50 kilos per stack overhead cable curls 5x10
15 kilo one arm wrist curls 5x10
35 kilo dumbbell curls 5x10
50 kilo ez reverse curls 5x10
50 kilo skull crushers using ez curl bar 5x10
100 kilo cable push downs 5x10
25x4 exercise ball crunches
20 minutes high resistance on the crosstrainer
Click to expand...

How much are you doing on the neck harness atm?
 
^TANK^ said:
Got an arm day in tonight............

50 kilos per stack overhead cable curls 5x10
15 kilo one arm wrist curls 5x10
35 kilo dumbbell curls 5x10
50 kilo ez reverse curls 5x10
50 kilo skull crushers using ez curl bar 5x10
100 kilo cable push downs 5x10
25x4 exercise ball crunches
20 minutes high resistance on the crosstrainer
Click to expand...

those are some impressive numbers!
 
exhashdotdot said:
Some of those reps seem a little high. If you're doing more than 12 you're using too little weight. Remember, you gain muscle by lifting BIG and eating BIG. You gain tone by dropping your bodyfat %age. High reps and low weight will just be wasting your time. I usually aim for around 8 - 10 reps on whatever I do.

Another thing to mention. Don't be that guy who does Bicep curls every day. Your biceps are a very small part of your arm and only need to be worked once a week. Triceps are a larger muscle on your arm and you'll look incredibly weird with big biceps and small triceps.
You'll also be totally worn out if you do bench press 3 times a week as well and your shoulders might get injured.

You should really be sticking to the main compound exercises for now (see the wonderful sticky in this forum or check out Rippetoe's Starting Strength). Exercises such as Bench Press, Squats, Deadlifts, chin ups, pullups etc will all help add big muscle to your body. Then you can start working on more isolation exercises if you need be.

I think finally, make sure you understand that you don't gain muscle at the gym, you gain muscle from recovering from the gym. If you spend every day in the gym without any opportunities to let your body rest, you'll seriously hinder your gains and possibly even injure yourself.
Click to expand...

Well i've read through Gordo's thing and put together a week based on his examples so we'll see how that goes!

Being a student and all the diet part of it will almost certainly go out of the window, I think the body will have to make do with what it gets. I eat better than most student and eat lots so I think i'll be fine there.

If i'm doing weights Mon/Wends/Fri can I do cardio on tues or thursday or is that still impeding muscle growth?

Thanks!
 
Concorde Rules said:
Well i've read through Gordo's thing and put together a week based on his examples so we'll see how that goes!

Being a student and all the diet part of it will almost certainly go out of the window, I think the body will have to make do with what it gets. I eat better than most student and eat lots so I think i'll be fine there.

If i'm doing weights Mon/Wends/Fri can I do cardio on tues or thursday or is that still impeding muscle growth?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

Just because you're a student doesn't give you an excuse to eat crap food. Drinking and pizza take up a lot of time, that's for sure, but the rest of your diet (at least 80% perhaps 70% if you drink a lot) can and should be beef and chicken and salmon and broccoli.

And listen to exhash; as much as Gordo's faq is useful I'm still very much a proponent of a simple 5x5 beginner routine, there are many around and all of them are better than the routine you're currently sodomising your body with. For reference: http://newbie-fitness.blogspot.com

Make sure you focus on deadlifting and squatting form too, they're something that 90% of everyone in the gym does wrong - you don't want to be one of those people. :)
 
What's the current unflavoured/unsweetened whey of choice? I have had the all-in-1 unflavoured before and it was nice, but it seems to have changed and they've added sweetener as a friend's came with it and it tastes disgusting..

edit: just checked and it's back to unsweetened, but has "lactospore" now so I'm unsure..
 
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PAz said:
TY for the feedback. I think you are right about my frequency of eating - I'm often only going 1-2 hours without food which is probably a little too much on the high side. I think I might experiment as I said above and rather than just have whey on waking, I'll have oats, whey, fruit and then leave the eggs until 0900ish, then leave out the 1030ish food.

Its about 200g protein a day usually.

Aim is niether really cut or bulk. If anything lean bulk and lift heavy weights!
Click to expand...

I had a phase where I ate every hour and a half :eek: but I was able to as I was at home working on dissertation & drawing so the fridge was only downstairs. When I'm in the workshops it's a different matter.

I find 3-4 eggs & an apple for breakfast (8 am) with a snack of carrots & humous (10:30) is good enough to see me through till 12/12:30. I'm low carbing too so some toast with the scrambled eggs will deffinatley fill me up.

I've brought some tea :D and will be having cups of this to help satisfy my hunger - well thats the plan we'll see how it goes.

Concorde Rules said:
Being a student and all the diet part of it will almost certainly go out of the window, I think the body will have to make do with what it gets. I eat better than most student and eat lots so I think i'll be fine there.
Click to expand...

I'm a student and eat ,almost very, well. It costs a lot on average about £60 a week. This is more important to me than getting smashed 3-4 nights a week so am happy to spend the money. Diet really is critical. You'll see gains providing you're eating enough of the right things but the cleaner and better macro'd your diet the less fat you'll be likely to gain and the better the results will be.
 
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georges said:
What's the current unflavoured/unsweetened whey of choice? I have had the all-in-1 unflavoured before and it was nice, but it seems to have changed and they've added sweetener as a friend's came with it and it tastes disgusting..
Click to expand...

Supplements thread sunshine! :mad::p;)

Depends what you mean by 'all in one'.
 
georges said:
lol oops I forgot about that.

I mean this one:
http://www.sports-nutrition.net/store.php?sub=3&id=66
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Whey protein concentrate (43% ß- Lactoglobulin, 18% Glycomacropeptide, 16% Lactoferrin & Others, 15% a- Lactalbumin, 5% Immunoglobulin, 3% Serum Albumin.), probiotics (lactobacillus sporogenes (Lactospore®)).
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To be honnest I have no idea what half that stuff is, or if other variants contain it. It's a 4.4KG tub for £29.99 so it's cheap by most standards.

MyProtein do a 10lb bag which is 4.5KG's for £39.99. Which is a blend of concentrate & isolate. It's a little more expensive but if it was my money that's what I would, and have brought. They usually have promotions quite regulary, if you're not already registered do so because you can save a tidy penny (sometimes free delivery & 20% off selected products)

Order some samples to get a feel for their flavourings. It can be a bit hit and miss sometimes but we don't drink it because it tastes nice!

Edit: They do standard unlfavoured Whey Concentrate (82%) for £32. See 'Unflavoured Bulk Supplies' on the left column.
 
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Concorde Rules said:
Well i've read through Gordo's thing and put together a week based on his examples so we'll see how that goes!

Being a student and all the diet part of it will almost certainly go out of the window, I think the body will have to make do with what it gets. I eat better than most student and eat lots so I think i'll be fine there.

If i'm doing weights Mon/Wends/Fri can I do cardio on tues or thursday or is that still impeding muscle growth?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

I eat pretty damn well and i'm a student. Just don't eat from those crappy takeaway places on a night out and watch how much you drink. Doesn't even cost that much to buy decent food from Tesco.
 
Had my 'Body M.O.T' today. Part of 'healthy campus week' run by my uni.

Basically an oppurtunity for a free bodyfat check I saw it as. Peak flow, blood pressure, height weight etc were all taken.

84KG (dead this morning). 5 foot 10" (exactly). 15.9% bodyfat. Waist 33.5" // Chest 45.25" // Arms 15.75"// Thighs 25"

Measurements I've taken just now. They are down a little but considering I've been cutting since January and training mostly for strength for the majority of this, though this is to be expected and I'm still happy with those measurements. My proportioning is still good, my arms had beenover powering my shoulders and now as a result my shoulders are more pronounced. (Dropped around half an inch off each arm) Vasularity has improved as have striations.

Not sure how accurate that reading is. It wasn't a caliper test, or one of those cold water tanks, or gripping handles. I had 2 sensors placed on my left hand and 2 on my left foot. A current is then passed through. Not sure how accurate but I can get it read every 2 weeks if I so wish.

I was expecting a reading of 16%, I know bodyfat always appears higher than you expect! 15% would have been nice! Hoping to get it read again on the 22nd of March.

Going by the mirror I would imagine I was closer to 17-19% just after Christmas.

At the end of March some before/after shots will go in the BB pics thread. People can guage what 16% bodyfat looks like roughly. On someone that isn't a direct decendant of Hercules! (Freefaller :p)
 
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exhashdotdot said:
I eat pretty damn well and i'm a student. Just don't eat from those crappy takeaway places on a night out and watch how much you drink. Doesn't even cost that much to buy decent food from Tesco.
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haha I don't do pizzas everyday.

Last week it was (all home made) cottage pie, stirfry, pasta/broccoli/cheese, goulash, bangers and mash, etc.

We don't eat **** and I only drink once a week.

I add salmon/tuna etc for lunch and actually I've made a tub of pasta/sweetcorn/tuna up for lunches in the last week. I also drink fresh juice, add banana to a bowl of yoghurt etc and usually (if I dont wake up too late and there is milk in the house) fruit and fibre for breakfast.

Is that good enough or do I need to buy some protein shakes or what not? (Is that REALLY worth it, I mean all im trying to do is look more in shape, be able to lift 10kg more than I can now, 30kg ish atm and generally be fitter.

It's all very confusing on what I should do and opinions and I really need to find a weeks routine that I can stick to otherwise I loose faith.

I shall look at that 5x5 routine tho.
 
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