Quick question peeps,
I am 5' 10" Weighing 154Lbs - 70KG.
I have a program setup etc but am unsure how many calories to intake per day.
Normally I aim for around 2200. My Goal is to gain definition for the 15th May (6-7 week target). My body is already in average shape.
An average week would look like this: (on top of all this i would do a 15min Abs workout most days, split legs and ab workout over 2 GYM sessions as well)
Monday: 25 min cycle. Rest
Tuesday:25 min cycle. 1x 60min JuJitsu Session, 1x 60 min MMA session
Wednesday: 25 min cycle. Rest
Thursday: 25 min cycle, GYM (Chest/Shoulders/Tricep), 60 Mins casual football training.
Friday: GYM (Back/Bicep)
Saturday: Rest
Sunday: 90 Mins of Football (Poor standard, normally fairly casual)
So in a nutshell:
Potentially 6 hours of cardio, and 2x Max strength GYM sessions a week.
Suggestions & advice welcome!!
If you require more information please ask.
More info needed.
When you say your goal is definition, is this coming from being skinny or from carrying too much fat?
I don't understand your gym routine at all. When do you do your legs? Also, drop the ab exercises, they're almost totally pointless at this stage (they will not give you a six pack! Especially if you're just doing the standard ones). When you're in the gym doing your different body parts, what exactly are you doing? Which exercises, what weights, how many sets and reps? How long are you spending in the gym?
As with Morba, I am also having problems with building my chest.
I have been stuck around 20kg dumbells now forever. When I used to train 2 years ago this is where I plateaued and it seems to be the same now. I assume I am lifting with my shoulders as I have had prety good growth and strength increases there.
Whatever I do I just don't seem to get any stronger. My diet is prety much spot on I think and my routines not too bad either. Chest / Tricep day is something like this.
DB bench
Tricep extensions
Incline DB bench
Tricep Pulldown
Cable flies/DB flies.
Close grip bench BB.
Dips with whatever energy I have left.
After doing either the DB bench or incline bench I feel knackered and can hardly press anything for the next excercise. I am thinking of just lowering the weight right down and focussing on form at the end of other days. Would this help? Does anyone have any really good video guides, I have watched a few but can't really tell if I am doing it correctly.
Also I have never been able to do a single pull up properly. Thinking about getting a powerbar for home so can just jump on it a few times a day.
All of my other lifts seem to be progessing quite well. Will try and update my gym thread! I posted some pics and never got another reply, maybe I'm uglier than I thought.
I can assure you Morba isn't the member you're thinking of
First of all, I doubt your diet is spot on. If you've plateaued it's probably one of the factors. When this happens, it's basically because you aren't recovering in between workouts. This is a combination of the amount of damage you do to your muscles in the gym, the quality and quantity of rest you get, your diet, your hormone levels and general health, and for how many weeks this effects builds up.
You routine isn't terrible but you have too many exercises going on; more is not always more, especially if your progress has stalled. I would pick three exercises max for your chest and then 1 at the end to isolate your triceps. There is a temptation to work harder when things slow down, but this isn't always the answer. Also, I'm going to speculate that 20kg isn't arbitrary for you. I'm guessing that you rushed your progression back up to that weight and that you've continued to hammer away at it relentlessly. What do your sets and reps look like?
What do your back and shoulder workouts look like? (if you don't do your legs properly too Morba will eat you)
In terms of immediate advice, you probably aren't going to like it much. Drop the weight to 10kg and increase it by the smallest increment possible week-on-week. It WILL feel light, and you will probably feel like you're wasting your time, but you won't be. During these lighter workouts focus on nice smooth, steady form with controlled negatives and powerful positive portions of the lift.
If you do this, and your diet is good, I can almost guarantee that you'll both grow and get stronger.
To get better at pullups just do a couple of sets of negatives (jump up to the bar and lower yourself slowly). This should help. You could also try strict wide grip pulldowns.
Just wandering off onto a brief tangent, I think this touches on one of the most common problems guys have in the gym: the inability to separate ego from training and to view strength and growth as different entities. This is why people get stuck just under a 100kg bench or whatever number might be important to them personally. If you're goal is to add size, then for goodness sake train that way and stop caring about lifting massive weights every session. Likewise if your goal is to get stronger, train for that! The irony here is that no goal should have you training maximally at the same weight every week.
That isn't a dig at you soundb0y, I think it's a problem innate to the way blokes think about things. I still have the thought at the back of my mind that I want to be on heavier weights, but I trust the system and it works. But the sooner people realise this, the sooner their progress will reach their potential.
Should've done this a few weeks ago when I started on the 'diet' I'm on now!
Myprotein is good and cheap though so everyone wins.
