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The Mad Rapper

The Mad Rapper

The Mad Rapper

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18 Oct 2002
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I'm approaching the end of my 3rd full week of training and things are going well so far. I've switched to a 3 x 8 routine and upped the weight until I move to a proper gym at the start of August.

I'm quite pleased with myself because I've managed to double some of my lifts in that time, and although the weights still aren't heavy by any standard I'm a n00b and it's progress ;)

Tonight I did:

Flat BP - 3x8x40KG

DB Row - 1x8x20KG 2x8x22KG

DB Shoulder Press - 3x8x12KG

DB Curl - 2x8x14KG 1x8x12KG

SkullCrushers - 3x8x10KG

I can see some muscle developing which makes me feel great and is a good motivation to keep going. I'm having no problem sticking to my diet and am eating clean.

Just wish I was bigger now! ;)
 
danoliver1 said:
Your working chest,shoulders,biceps and triceps all in one go i thought that wasnt a good idea? Morba :confused:
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That's right, I'm on a double two day split. So upper body Mon, lower Tue, Wed off, upper body Thu, lower body Fri, off Sat and Sun.

Nothing wrong with that mate. I am not doing silly numbers of exercises each day so no real danger of doing anything other than making progress ;)

When I move gyms I will be training each bodypart only once a week on a 3 day split (Mon, Wed & Fri) but obviously it'll be far more taxing because there'll be additional exercises each training day.
 
The Mad Rapper said:
When I move gyms I will be training each bodypart only once a week on a 3 day split (Mon, Wed & Fri) but obviously it'll be far more taxing because there'll be additional exercises each training day.
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Thats what iam on at the min 8 weeks in and goin strong :D If your routines working then :D keep at it you will only get bigger and stronger. ;)
 
Phnom_Penh said:
Far better exercises than flat press, if anything incline and decline dumbell press is the way forward.
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Depends on the person/goals/training/everything. I've always done FBP and I've trained (albeit on and off) for a long time.

Saying you wouldn't bother with FBP is a very bold statement :) Other exercises may be better, but until you experiment you'll never know (I get nothing from Incline Bench to be honest, just doesn't hit me in the right places).
 
Phnom_Penh said:
Far better exercises than flat press, if anything incline and decline dumbell press is the way forward.
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That there are, DB press is a superior exercise but a mixture between the two is great. I believe flat BB bench is a great exercise for someone new to the lifting game and can have a place in many many routines for a more advanced lifter.
 
But not everyone has the facility to use a bench capable of decline. You cannot just discount flat bench like that, it's still a good exercise...just no where near as good as most people think. A lot of people see it as the holy grail of bodybuilding movements, when in reality (as you've pointed out) it's not.

But as I said before, I'll always have it in my routine but in a routine based around variety. So personally I switch between BB and DB and the 3 stages.
 
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I will just point out I'm a beginner, so from my perspective I will stick with it until I move gyms. It's a great compound exercise that's helping me to develop some initial strength and growth. I won't do it forever, but I will try and include it in every other cycle.

As others have mentioned, variety is good :)
 
I think we need to remember that Mad Rapper is in a pants gym atm and doing the best he can, while doing this he is looking good and feeling strong, which even in small doses is a good achievement.

Mad Rapper is showing that when he moves to a decent gym he will rework his routine to fit with the available equipment and extra exercises, from this there is no doubt he will continue to move towards his goal.

again, good work TMR :]
 
danoliver1 said:
Your working chest,shoulders,biceps and triceps all in one go i thought that wasnt a good idea? Morba :confused:
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Didnt notice this before, but have now :]

If we step away from this specific instance and look at the exercises that we done on there own, we will see that there was not really any mass working of any of the muscle groups that were trained.
Many people do push/pull/legs routines, where push and pull will work a whole range of muscle groups in one session, this works great for them.

I have no doubt that should you work all 4 of those muscle groups 'properly' in a single session, you would be overworking your body as a whole. You would also be in the gym for quite a period of time!

There is the group of people who like to do chest, shoulders and tris in one session, this would mean more work to those areas that TMR has done. Adding in the Bis wouldnt be too much of a killer as your bis would not have been worked very much at all.
So, you could do some tri+bi supersets, it would mean the same amount of time in the gym as not doing the bis, but giving your arms an added boost by working both the agonist and antagonist muscles in that area.

There is also some proof (cant find it now though!!! argh!) that working the opposite muscle to the main muscle group you are training, can have an added boost to the main group you are working. That sounds a bit weird (most probably the way i have worded it) so here is an example.

Chest day
During your bench sets, do some bent over rows. Not in the range of a normal back day row weight, but a good working range to get the back going. This has been shown to have a positive effect on the next set of chest press.
The same can be said for bis and tris also hams and quads.

I will try to find some more info on this for you so that you can see it in graph format. I am sure that a study was done with 2 groups of people. a base test was done, then some time after (while doing the above with sets of rows between chest sets) another test was done. It was noticed that those that did the rows were able to lift more weight (80% of 1RM) for a working set, than those that just took a rest.

There
 
Morba said:
There is also some proof (cant find it now though!!! argh!) that working the opposite muscle to the main muscle group you are training, can have an added boost to the main group you are working. That sounds a bit weird (most probably the way i have worded it) so here is an example.

Chest day
During your bench sets, do some bent over rows. Not in the range of a normal back day row weight, but a good working range to get the back going. This has been shown to have a positive effect on the next set of chest press.
The same can be said for bis and tris also hams and quads.

I will try to find some more info on this for you so that you can see it in graph format. I am sure that a study was done with 2 groups of people. a base test was done, then some time after (while doing the above with sets of rows between chest sets) another test was done. It was noticed that those that did the rows were able to lift more weight (80% of 1RM) for a working set, than those that just took a rest.

There
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I used to do this when I did a push/pull/legs split.

Example:
Monday - Chest / delts / triceps
Flat bench Press - (Bent Over Rows)
10x80 (10x40) 8x90 (8x45) 6x100 (6x50)
Inbetween each set I'd do a set of Bent Over Rows with 50% of the weight I'd just used on Bench Press. Nothing stressfull, just enough weight to work the muscle and get some blood in there.

Skullcrushers - (Barbell Curl)
12x20 (12x10) 10x30 (10x15) 8x40 (8x20)

Only did it with my main heavist lifts, not on every exercise. I found it actually helped me lift more weight!

I still do it now on HST. I superset bench press with BOR's, pulldowns with shoulder press, squats with SLDL's, etc. Though only on the first week of each cycle, when I'm going for max lifts I don't superset, it doesn't help lift more weight when lifting heavy on both lifts!
 
Well that saves me finding proof! Its a bonus when you have people who actually do these things on the forums :D

Good to hear that it works for you as well :]
 
Phnom_Penh said:
Far better exercises than flat press, if anything incline and decline dumbell press is the way forward.
Click to expand...

That may be true for you but not for everyone. I've done plenty of experimenting and found good old fashioned heavy flat BB benchpress (full range) works best for me :)

Keep up the good work, Mad Rapper :cool:
 
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Sounds good, glad you're making progress. There is a tendency in the bodybuilding world to over complicate things. Flat barbell bench pressing is a staple compound movement and has been for decades, yet people are quick to jump in and rubbish years of proven results from this exercise.

Yes, maybe decline DB pressing recruits slightly more fibres in the the sternal head, and perhaps it's something to consider if you've been slaving away at forging a great chest for years, yet are slightly lacking in that area.

You should fairly clued up for a beginner Mad Rapper, I'm sure with time and effort you'll achieve what you want.
 
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