My First Post - Go Easy ;-)

Bodyworks

dude, enough with the photos already. what do you want us to tell ya ? stick with the diet, stay focused on the training and get those weights up. simple.

Tall

lmao bodyworks - I said go easy!

fair play.

I'll post some in a month to get comments on how im doing.

Glutes are killing from yesterday! Some ache all over, but still feeling quite pumped.

Just cooked up a huge batch of Sweet Potato and Lean Mince for work next week (cottage pie??)

I am seriously feeling the need to eat all the time at the moment.

Just hope I dont get too fat - got a holiday coming up in may

Tall

Just back from a great session at the gym, her of the indoors has commented that my chest is getting bigger, and having weighed myself...

I now weigh in at 17stone!

Thats my heaviest ever. Sadly I still luck skinny, but were making progress!

Tall

Yesterdays Food:

Breakfast:

1x Mass Gain Shake (100g Carbs, 44g Protein)
1x Bacon Cob

Lunch Time Meals
2x 250g Lean Mince with 250g Sweet Potato

Evening Meal
Baked Potatos with Cheese and Salad

Pre Workout:
1x Mass Gain Shake

Post Workout:
1x Mass Gain Shake

Early night.


Last nights workout:

Gym was packed and I only had an hour so I had to modify the routine:

3x 6 Dips
5x 8 Cable Curls @ 40kg
3x 8 Bench Press @50kg
3x 6 Bench Press @ 40Kg
5x 10 Deadlifts @ 60Kg
3x 10 BB Shoulder Press @ 30kg
3x 10 Back Hyper Extension @ 105kg
5x 10 Chest Pulldown @ 60kg
5x 10 Tricep Press @ 50kg
5x 10 Weighted Situps @ 80kg

Ruggerbugger

My God man, ONLY an hour and 40 sets, are you kidding! Have you heard of the concept of OVERtraining?!

In one of you earlier posts you said that you felt great after squats and deads, as if they released something in you. Well they did, its called Testosterone. When you load your musculoskeletal system with heavy loads one of your body's reactions is to dump testosterone inot your bloodstream. This is good because Testosterone makes you bigger and stronger. That is why we weight train. Its also why exercises like squats and deads are better than bicep curls and fly for building mass, the more muslce you load up and the heavier the load the more testosterone your body dumps into your blood.

However.... if your body gets stressed for an elongated period of time it starts to release another hormone, Cortisol. Cortisol is like the anti testosterone, it makes your body use your muscles as a source of energy so it actually breaks down muscle tissue (it also promotes the growth of fat cells among other things). When a man lifts weights his body will typically start releasing cortisol after about 40-45 minutes. This is why we take protein shakes and carbs at the end of our workout, it helps to minimise cortisol production and allow your body to exploit the high testosterone levels in your blood. So... bottom line, spending too long in the gym and working too hard can actually be very counter productive. If I were you I would cut down on the number of exercises you do in a session. Give yourself 60-90secs between sets. Don't spend more than an hour lifting and make sure you get that protein shake and carbs in you as soon as your done.

Tall

Much lighter session last night.

Diet is still pretty much the same - having about 500g of lean mince and sweet potato across the course of the day. Still on the mass building shakes.

Still tipping the scales at 17stone.

I'll watch the overtraining though.

3x 8 Cable Curls @ 60kg
2x 8 Cable Curls @ 55Kg
1 Max Rep Cable Curl @ 80kg.
5x 10 Cable Tricep Pulldowns @ 50kg
5x 10 Leg Presses @ 100kg
5x 10 Calf Lifts @ 100kg
3x 10 Leg Extensions @ 55kg
3x 10 Whatever-The-Opposite-Of-Leg-Extensions-Is @ 55kg
3x 10 Weighted Situps @ 80kg
5 Unassisted Pullups
5 Pullups assisted by 30kg counterbalance
3x 10 Barbell Squats @ 40kg - Really not keen on doing these with a barbell!

I'm now going Monday and Wednesday evenings and Saturday lunchtime - this should give me enough recovery period for the muscles to grow.

Shoulders are getting bigger - to the point I now dont fit properly into my fave Paul Smith shirt. No Pain No Gain I guess.

One thing I am stuggling with is getting to sleep on workout days, my body is physically tired but my mind is racing - any ideas guys?

Bodyworks

i know you're still a beginner, and you're obviously enthusiastic. however, personally i don't see why 5 sets of ten with the same weight on each set is the way to go. you are obviously capable or more weight or more reps, as none of those sets achieve failure with the possible exception of the last one. next time, try this;

example:

1st set 12 reps
2nd set 10 reps with more weight
3rd set around ten reps with as much weight as you can STRICTLY use for aound ten reps
4th set again around 10 reps with as much weight STRICT form again. set four will probably necessitate less weight on the bar than set 3 as you'll have begun to tire.

first 2 sets are almost warm up sets, set 3 and 4 are the ones that do the damage.

if you don't ache after this, you're not training hard enough.

good luck

Tall

Hi Bodyworks,

Cool I'll give that a try for a week starting Saturday and see how I get on.

If I'm taking your approach will I need to limit the number of exercises I do per session?

Cheers for everyones help thus far.

crazycal1

wow just seen this thread.
mate 2 words
over training.

are you really doing all that in one workout!!!!!!!!!!
tho like BW`s says you could do far more weight.

i reckon you should be doing squats first for a start off rather than biceps.
youre basically exhausting your body prior to the biggest exercise when it needs to be strong and very stable(watch out for back probs).
like ali said focus on the big exercises-
deads,squats,bench and military press and a back exercise-build up your poundages and for now FORGET about shaping /isolations exercises

einsteins mind was the key to all things...to understand more than to know.

www.extremenutrition.co.uk

Tall

I'm guessing Ali's suggested workout was meant to be split across a few days then ...

Don't I feel like an idiot lmao!

I was under the impression that overtraining was where you worked an individual body part too many times - e.g.

Barbell Curls
Preacher Curls
Hammer Curls
Seated Rows
etc etc etc

So I need to move away from top day, bottom day and then a full body day...?