*** The 2017 Gym Rats Thread ***

[Kris_90]

Boxing. Google bas rutten boxing.

He has free 2min rounds on soundcloud. He calls the combo, you do the combo, he keeps calling them, you die of heart failure it's that simple

That looks awesome, thanks mate I'll be adding that to the weekly cardio sessions

Skipping. I was trail running for years previously - about 20 miles a week - but just got fed up of the pain, mud, cold and rain! Anything in the gym machine wise bores me to tears and is even more soul destroying. Each to their own of course. But I love skipping - just the right amount of learning curve/practise required to keep things interesting and as an added bonus it hits my calves, which often get neglected. Other than a sport you enjoy, this gets my recommendation. If you give it a go - get a semi decent steel cable rope that's nice and fast.

I like the thought of skipping but I'm not very good at it. I'll do it once a week and see how it goes - thanks.

It's best not to think of cardio in terms of calorie burn, mainly as most estimates tend to be overly optimistic and also it encourages people to get into that line of thinking where you're thinking 'ran x amount so I can eat y amount'. I just tend to try and have an active lifestyle - a lot of brisk walking (and sprinting for the train!), cycle now and again, go swimming now and again and have a yoga teacher that always wants us to be at the edge of what we're capable of* - rather than doing dedicated cardio which I tend to find boring. If I felt like I needed to some proper conditioning work for a reason then I'd probably pick some low impact HIIT that was fairly easy to maintain technique with (not while dieting though as it's hard on recovery) since stuff like sprinting even at a pro level has a higher injury rate than running. Ultimately it's a sort of 'am I fit enough to do the things I want to do' sort of thing, to which currently it seems like I am.



Oh and mrthingyx's favourite - DBSS - impossible not to be a sweaty wreck after some high rep sets of that. Horrid exercise.

Yeah I agree, I need to change how I view cardio. Mixing it up with the above suggestions and swimming should help.

I can't do DBSS while cutting as I can't recover but the though of doing them as cardio

 

[GiraffePencils]

From this morning:

Squat's still bad. I'm not sure if I might have my feet too turned out?
also I'm drifting the bar forwards, rather than the bar going straight up and down.
Needs work.....lots of work.....

It's embarrassing haha

 

[neoboy]

If it makes you feel any better, I don't think mine is much better still

 

[GiraffePencils]

Haha, well, video yourself to help improve

Another thing I thought I'd ask:
I started stronglifts, and I started with all the starting weights.
But I can bench more than that, and it'll take a while for it to get to where I used to bench.
Should I increase that weight? or just let it creep up?

 

[tom_e]

Haha, well, video yourself to help improve

Another thing I thought I'd ask:
I started stronglifts, and I started with all the starting weights.
But I can bench more than that, and it'll take a while for it to get to where I used to bench.
Should I increase that weight? or just let it creep up?

How much difference are we talking?

 

[GiraffePencils]

How much difference are we talking?

I used to do 3x5 70kg
and pushed 80kg for 4 reps
Old gym had terrible increments, and that was with dumbells.
I was thinking of going to ~45-50 and continuing the stronglifts increment.

But thought i'd ask encase I was going to screw up the system

 

[PermaChanged]

You were bench pressing 40kg dumbbells? What did Stronglifts start you at on the barbell bench press?

 

[GiraffePencils]

You were bench pressing 40kg dumbbells? What did Stronglifts start you at on the barbell bench press?

Only 4 times though I was working up to a set of 5, then i'd step back to 35's and do 2 sets of 5.
trying to keep increasing it till I ran out.......well, that was the plan I made up for myself haha.

I'd never used a bar for benching before, so just though it best to start from scratch, but now I've done it a few times I'm finding it a bit easy.
Stronglifts starts with the empty bar, so today's bench was 25kg......it was a nice rest before rows haha

 

[tom_e]

I think it's safe to say that starting with an empty bar was far too low if you can rep 40kg dbs. I'd move it up to around 50kg like you said, it's still low enough that you shouldn't stall but it's high enough to actually give you some form of workout.

 

[ChrisD.]

Stronglifts worth doing?

 

[tom_e]

Stronglifts worth doing?

Yes. It's a good straightforward program with good progression built into it.

 

[ChrisD.]

Yes. It's a good straightforward program with good progression built into it.

Cheers, I'll look into it.

 

[GiraffePencils]

I think it's safe to say that starting with an empty bar was far too low if you can rep 40kg dbs. I'd move it up to around 50kg like you said, it's still low enough that you shouldn't stall but it's high enough to actually give you some form of workout.

Thanks for the advice,
I'll crank that up, And try your band thing with the squat.
I really want to get this form!

 

[exhashdotdot]

From this morning:

Squat's still bad. I'm not sure if I might have my feet too turned out?
also I'm drifting the bar forwards, rather than the bar going straight up and down.
Needs work.....lots of work.....

*snip*

It's embarrassing haha

Honestly, your biggest problem is your feet position. They're too flared out and your heels are rising off the ground. Your knee position is actually very good so you just need to point your feet in the direction of your knees. You have a very deep squat (which is good) but you're getting a bit of lower back rounding - almost certainly because you're a rookie.

If you still find your feet rising / caving in, it's almost certainly due to poor ankle mobility which will be remedied with practice. Or you could just buy some weightlifting shoes.

 

[mrthingyx]

From this morning:

Squat's still bad. I'm not sure if I might have my feet too turned out?
also I'm drifting the bar forwards, rather than the bar going straight up and down.
Needs work.....lots of work.....

It's embarrassing haha

Any excuse to get my kit off in a thread where tom_e is posting...

 

[neoboy]

Hey man, do you want me to donate a webcam from 2010 so you can record at higher than 240p

 

[GiraffePencils]

Any excuse to get my kit off in a thread where tom_e is posting...

Thanks for that.
I'm gonna keep going over the bracing process.
I've been doing it at my desk, holding for a couple of seconds etc, getting some strange looks from those around me haha

I'm sure I'll get this with practice.
I'm still badgering my mate to get out with me, I feel it'd help having someone who could give me more live feedback

 

[UltimateBadger]

Sweet bejesus.

Two weeks into my new lifting routine and I'm 99% sure I have a sports hernia. I can feel discomfort when I brace for deadlifting, and I had quite bad groin pain after football last week. Will check in with GP to be sure. Anyone else had one? Did you have surgery? What was the recovery like?

 

[Somnambulist]

From this morning:

Squat's still bad. I'm not sure if I might have my feet too turned out?
also I'm drifting the bar forwards, rather than the bar going straight up and down.
Needs work.....lots of work.....

It's embarrassing haha

Watch this to help find your ideal stance:

Squatting ATG is okay if you can get down there without compromising your position... which you're not quite able to do yet whilst still keeping your feet planted. Focus on squatting as deep as you can can well (weight distributed over the feet evenly, keeping the weight balanced over the middle of the foot, keeping the legs activated using them rather than your back etc etc.

 

[mrthingyx]

Hi Guys I'm new to this thread and have been following the gym rats for a while I just wanted to share my story. I'm a 44 year old male and last summer my doctor told me I was heading for diabetes I was prescribed statins & blood pressure tables. The statins did not agree with me and quite soon after i started to feel very fatigued, I tried to loose weight but every thing I tried failed.

I joined a gym September 2016 & hired a PT I weighed in at 15st.4lb /97kg or 215lbs.
My stats: 5ft.8
Waist: 44in
Hips: 41in
Chest: 44in
BF: 39%

My personal trainer takes me 2 sessions per week and it totally transformed my mind, body & my outlook on life. Refocusing my goals & increasing my gains month by month. Long story short and after a few setbacks "rotator cuff & intercostal muscle" I achieved my goal
My new stats:
Waist: 31in
Hips: 33in
Chest: 38in
BF: 25.4%

I would say the hardest part of achieving these goals was not the training blood.. sweat.. tears or even the injuries... It was the food once I got my head round the food and the quality of the food coupled with the training the weight just fell off.

My new goal is to put on around 7lbs of lean muscle and I'm finding this quite hard as I'm new to strength training and I'm very addicted to cardio having done it for the last 6 months Grit cardio + plyo & HIIT + a few spin classes per week.

Totally addicted to the gym now as it gives me "my own time" if you know what I mean away from the stresses of life in general.

Weeks Training plan:
Mon: Strength upper body + chest followed by spin
Tue: PT session Strength - focusing on technique "olympic bars" + Core followed by spin
Wed: Strength Back + lower body
Thur: rest day
Friday: Strength more calisthenics based workout + core
Sat: PT session with a beastly finisher followed spin
Sun: rest day

Need advice guys... the physio I attend every 6 or so weeks to get a rub down is an ex-crossfit champion and she is talking me into trying it out. After a physio sessions at her crossfit gym she will teach me something new. Now I know nothing about crossfit apart from the fact it looks totally brutal on the body. I'm getting on in years a bit now! "I think I would definitely pick up an injury more easy doing CF"... But I kinda wanna try it. But thing is I love the gym I'm at so much it makes me feel like I'm cheating lol. What should I do?

Congratulations on turning it all around.

Crossfit is not great for getting jacked unless you are eating truly huge amounts of food... and even then it is dependent on a lot of things. As it stands, your heavy routine is not conducive to swolification, either, because of its frequency and intensity. We had a guy on here a while ago (who might still be lurking) who shrunk down massively and then wanted to get stacked... all whilst doing outdoor swimming. I think he had to load up with around 5000 calories a day to put on weight VERY slowly, but it worked.

Better to start off on Stronglifts (or use your OTroutine... which might not be great) and use the Crossfit gym to learn how to perform the Olympic lifts (and not do Crossfit).