*** The 2011 Gym Rats Thread ***

Status
Not open for further replies.
Loving how much qiueter the gym is compared to the first couple of weeks of Jan :)

My diet still ain't great, but I think its getting there and certianly better than before crimbo. Saw 80kg on the bench last night, doubled my weights in ~4 months.
 
Morba said:
At that weight im guessing you are female?

Anyway, some exercises for you:
Squats
Pullups/chins
Power clean and push press
Dumbells bench press/ dips

That should cover the majority of muscle groups :)
Click to expand...

I'm male :p But I'm only about 5' 3". I'm 22 but small. Stopped growing :p Cool, thanks for that list mate :)

65-70 kilos is the aim. Thank you for the list of exercises. While crack on with those once I get to the gym.
 
Last edited:
madindehead said:
I'm male :p But I'm only about 5' 3". I'm 22 but small. Stopped growing :p
Click to expand...

To be fair, I'm about 80 - 82 Kilos and I'm 6 foot, so I find that more insulting than you :p I think it's because Morba weighs 400 kilos and is the size of a brown bear............. ;D

Benny/Dark Shadow cheers for your input. I'll work on building a new shoulder workout and post it on here before I commit to it. I actually did the same workout last night and found that I did more weight as well, so I think I've definitely improved on it. But would be nice to mix things up a tad even if I'm still improving!

Back and Tris today. Hoping I MIGHT be able to do 3 sets of BW Dips (3x8) without failing on the last set tonight! Got to 6 reps last week......... Going to wear some gloves and see if that improves my deadlifts; bar just got too sweaty last week so I didn't dare try for 110kg :)
 
Begbie said:
Loving how much qiueter the gym is compared to the first couple of weeks of Jan :)

My diet still ain't great, but I think its getting there and certianly better than before crimbo. Saw 80kg on the bench last night, doubled my weights in ~4 months.
Click to expand...

Excvellant progress :)

@MoNkeE

What are you using for BW dips? Doing them in the gym or at home?
 
At the gym mate, the rack they have has detachable dip attachments, and they've got an assisted machine if it tickles your fancy.

I have however done dips at home. Grab a normal chair, position it infront of your sofa. Place chair behind you and grab hold of each side for your dips. Put your feet up on your sofa (thus requiring your arms to lift more weight) and whap out a few sets. I think when I did this I was doing 12 reps per set, and the last set was definitely challenging, so if you're wanting to do SOMETHING but lack the gear, it's a pretty decent way of starting :)

Also doing press ups with your feet on the sofa has the same effect of making your arms lift more weight :)
 
Forgot to post this yesterday. We were having a chat in the gym about the fact that it is unlikely that I'll get into uni this year (did poo last year :() and I was joking that I would stay at the club and smash all of the records (just FYI they are Squat: 232.5kg, Bench: I think 160kg, and Deadlift: 292.5kg) :p. Then we were looking through the qualification criteria for national level for several different federations and guess what...

... I qualify!! It's nothing that special cause it's not a big total but for juniors (18-23) in the BDPF the entry criteria is a total 0f 412.5kg :). I just think its kinda cool :p. I got a total of 417.5 in my first comp with 2 months of training :). I might go for it, I'm not sure though, I can't make my mind up :confused:
 
MoNkeE said:
At the gym mate, the rack they have has detachable dip attachments, and they've got an assisted machine if it tickles your fancy.

I have however done dips at home. Grab a normal chair, position it infront of your sofa. Place chair behind you and grab hold of each side for your dips. Put your feet up on your sofa (thus requiring your arms to lift more weight) and whap out a few sets. I think when I did this I was doing 12 reps per set, and the last set was definitely challenging, so if you're wanting to do SOMETHING but lack the gear, it's a pretty decent way of starting :)

Also doing press ups with your feet on the sofa has the same effect of making your arms lift more weight :)
Click to expand...

Chucking a weight on your legs also helps.
 
Am thinking of going a push/pull/leg split a go for a few months while I have less time available due to exams and lots of ongoing research work and came across this program:
here

The 3 day structure is:
DAY 1 – PULL

Deadlifts or Power Cleans
Barbell Rows, Dumbbell Rows, or Wide Grip Chins
Barbell Curls, Close Grip Underhand Chins, or Hammer Curls

DAY 2 – PUSH

Incline or Flat Barbell or Dumbbell Bench Press
Barbell or Dumbbell Shoulder Presses
Tricep Dips or Close Grip Bench Press

DAY 3 – LEGS

Front or Back Squats
Barbell or Dumbbell Stiff Leg Deadlifts
Calf Raises (3x12) - only if a seriously lagging bodypart
Weighted Crunches or Weighted Hanging Leg Raises (3x12)

On the compound movements I would stick to the 3x5. Just wondered how it would look to the educated eyes on this thread. Previous to this I have done stronglifts which has similar exercises but this has a few isolated ones thrown in.
 
drdimmer, that looks alright. You can up the volume as you go depending on how you're finding it or lower the volume and increase load.

You could include your leg day on the push/pull, adding your squats to your push day and SLDL's to your pull day and then adding calf raises and your crunches/leg raises to which ever day you want. This would give you a slightly higher frequency for legs which might be useful if you're doing a lower volume workout.
 
BennyC said:
drdimmer, that looks alright. You can up the volume as you go depending on how you're finding it or lower the volume and increase load.

You could include your leg day on the push/pull, adding your squats to your push day and SLDL's to your pull day and then adding calf raises and your crunches/leg raises to which ever day you want. This would give you a slightly higher frequency for legs which might be useful if you're doing a lower volume workout.
Click to expand...

Cheers for the advice, I'll definitely give that a go.
 
drdimmer that's pretty much the workout I am doing although I do four exercises per session.

Anyway, I am wanting to enter a local beginners duathlon. 4k run, 20k bike, 4k run. I should be able to train for this and hit my goals in the gym right? I mean it's not like I'm training for a marathon - I would only be training in my off days. Someone say it's ok...(btw I am pretty fit anyway so I won't need to train too hard - it's just that I like to set myself a little challenge like this on a yearly basis)
 
I tried a push/pull workout last year for a few months and it didn't work for me. For example: doing deadlifts on the same days as bent over rows means you can't max out either lift. The same goes for bench press/overhead press. I found that my muscles were fatigued from the first excercise and I couldn't concentrate on what mattered to me: adding more weight to the bar each session.

I guess it depends what you're aiming at, if you want to hit one muscle with a very large volume for one session, then not use it again for a while then push/pull is good. Can anyone explain the advantage of this?
 
$loth said:
When is it?
I would say its achievable in a gym but what else do you do for training? id get in a few 5k runs outside or 10k cycling because of the difference in surface.
Click to expand...

No sorry, what I mean is would it hamper my weight lifting goals in the gym ie to get stronger. As distances involved are short surely it's not enough to be detrimental to this? (Assuming my diet is OK)

@p4radox - you are right it is hard to do bench and ohp on the same day, for example. I am swapping the exercises around on a weekly basis so I 'start fresh' on a particular lift for that week. I am also cycling the rep/weights light/med/heavy. If you want a pure progression routine then this is probably not the one to use.
 
p4radox said:
I tried a push/pull workout last year for a few months and it didn't work for me. For example: doing deadlifts on the same days as bent over rows means you can't max out either lift. The same goes for bench press/overhead press. I found that my muscles were fatigued from the first excercise and I couldn't concentrate on what mattered to me: adding more weight to the bar each session.

I guess it depends what you're aiming at, if you want to hit one muscle with a very large volume for one session, then not use it again for a while then push/pull is good. Can anyone explain the advantage of this?
Click to expand...

It'll depend on the intensity, load and volume your using as to how effective they can be. Obviously you're going to be increasing your frequency and as such you'll need to decrease load to compensate for recovery and optimal growth. If you keep picking at scabs they never heal, the same applies to constantly breaking down muscle.

I've used push/pull split when cutting last year and gone on with it alright, yes to a degree fatigue will eventually set in but I was having quite high volume workouts. Picking 3/4 exercises one per major group should eliminate this. One shoulder specific, one chest, one quads and one tricep.

You can still max the lifts just you'll need to alternate the exercises you use on each push/pull workout. For example one week for pull do SLDL & B.O.R, then the next Deadlifts and say chins/pulls/seated row, for example.

Edit: Right now for my HST I squat, OHP, SLDL, Bench, Pull up, Lateral Raise, Seated Row, Weighted Dips, Calf Raise, BB Curl, Shrug. In that order. 2 sets working at about 90/95% of my 10rm at the moment. 3 times per week. When doing this with my 15rm fatigue became an issue as that is an endurance rep range, though right now on the 10's fatigue isn't an issue providing the volume and load are suitable.

Trying to do everything at once is a trap I fell into for quite a while and was a hard one for me to get out of. If you feel that you have to hit each part with high volume and then give it 4/5 rest and that this method works for you, which it may well, then something like a push/pull split probably isn't the best choice of program :)
 
Last edited:
Got some Jack3d today and did a chest/tri session, gym was absolutely mobbed. Managed 5x5 of BW dips +20 which is what I was wanting though :).

Also managed to avoid eating the crap on my kitchen table when I came home late :p, I'll post up impressions of jack3d in supplements thread.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom