Hey guys. Im a 16 yr old in high school. I had a question what kind of lifting i should do, size or strength, or if i could do both. Heres the skinny- im pretty weak, so i wanna get strong, on the other hand im kinda thin, so size would be good. Help me out guys.
Do you play any sports? If you do, I’d say strength all the way. Even if you don’t I would lean toward strength training because you should see significant increases in size anyway if you’re just starting out. In either case, go to the previous issues section of this site and check out Chris Shugart’s “Dawg School-basic training for beginners” articles. Those will be a great help in getting you started. Another great way to choose would be to just read all of the bodybuilding type articles and all of the strength training type articles, and see which type of program you would prefer to do. Hope this helps.
Are you just starting out? If you are I would go with higher reps, not necessarily going to failure, but getting down form and such. 5 x 5 is good, but you are pushing a lot of weight and close to your max. Bad idea if you don’t have good form.
Squat, Deadlift, chin, and bench. Good form, keep adding weight to the bar, and eat as closely to the massive eating article as you can. You will grow strong, and big. THEN, you have an excuse to do tricep kickbacks.
It depends on the person and the specific exercise, but for many,
the weight that allows five sets of five
is only about 80% 1RM, which is by no means
dangerously high and is generally a very
good value for both mass and strength gains.
Forget training for size. Use the 5 x5 and follow you training progress and sit back and be amazed. At 16, flowing through your bllodstream, you are getting naturally what some of us would be willing to pay for. get stronger.
Make sure your diet is good also. All the training in the world won’t matter unless you get your diet right. At home, eat foods like steak, chicken, potatoes, turkey, fish, rice, oatmeal, and other foods that will help your muscles grow. At school, snack on some protein bars (hmmmm, Mesotech bars), tuna sandwiches, turkey sandwiches, beef jerkey, fruit, etc. Can you say by senior year, you’ll not only be banging the prom queen, but you’ll also get the entire cheerleaders in the shower in the women’s locker room!