[quote]HoratioSandoval wrote:
OP - keep track of your carbs and increase them until you feel better. Instead of a week off, I’d first try a pigout weekend - go to a buffet, and eat tons of meat and potatoes. Eat a whole pizza. Eat pancakes and bacon. Drink a session beer like Guinness.
If that makes you feel better, try incorporating one “refeed” day per week.[/quote]
Thanks, I’ll try that.
That’s probably the best short term approach. Everyone is different and has different recovery needs. The added stress will have a big effect on what you can do in the gym and will put you into overtraining situations faster than anything. Try looking at the sources of your stress, get your financial house in order, pay closer attention to your school work, less on other distractions. Maybe take some time management and/or stress reduction training. The big thing is don’t worry, and just focus on priorities without a whole lot of analysis. Trust your instincts.
Stu.
so what do you think of my workout.
It’s not bad. I’m concerned about “All done with 3 x 5-10. Maybe 3 x 5-8. I don’t think it matters. I think I should just add weight when I feel like I should, and add reps when I feel it would be better.”
It matters.
Cycling your reps is fine but in order to gauge your progress you have to be able to measure it. Pick a rep goal for a given weight. You can do double progression, i.e. reps = 5 to 8. When you hit 8 add 5#. Every workout try to increase your reps or the weight. You might do that until progress slows and switch to 8-12 for a while.
"I know I am probably getting on a lot of people’s nerves with these posts. I am sorry. I feel like I am so close to finding a way to progress but I just can’t nail down a proper balance of frequency and recovery. "
What gets on people’s nerves is when good advice is given and then obviously ignored. The whole purpose is to help people learn so keep asking questions.
The proper balance is key to progress. Read “Practical Programming”. This is very well explained in that book. It all comes down to periodization.
Also, be carful about statements like “Man there is no overtraining just under eating.” That’s bullshit. That’s only true for skinny beginners.
Stu
Ok. Thanks, I will look into that book.
[quote]Der Candy wrote:
I follow an A/B split.
Workout A:
Back Squat 3 x 5-8
Flat Bench 3 x 6-10
Barbell Row 3 x 6-10
Workout B:
Deadlift 1 x 6-10
Military Press 3 x 6-10
Pullups 3 x 6-10
Weekly breakdown:
Week 1:
Tuesday - A
Friday - B
Sunday - A
Week 2:
Tuesday - B
Friday - A
Sunday - B
Diet varies. I try to east as clean as possible. It looks something like this:
Breakfast: Protein shake, oatmeal with some berries, cottage cheese, maybe some dark bread.
School Lunch: Usually some protein with potatoes. I try to limit my starchy carbs so I pile on the salad (with some mayo… so sue me) and take alot of meats and some milk too.
When I Get Home: Meat, vegetables and perhaps some rye bread or a cracker (no butter). A glass of milk or two on the side.
[Post-workout drink at this point]
After workout Meal: More Meat, some cottage cheese, veggies and some carbs (sweet potatoes or dark bread).
Evening meal (hour or two before bed): Cottage cheese and a glass of milk.
It may look small on paper but the portions are large. I may sneak in a small date cake because they are tasty.[/quote]
If the above is true, and this is what you have been doing, I am about to give you THE BEST advice you can possibly be given in order for you to progress. Are you ready?
Here it is:
split training:
monday - back
tuesday - chest
wednesday - legs
thursday - arms
friday - shoulders
saturday - abs/calves
sunday - rest
do loads of volume and destroy each bodypart.
And on top of that… eat whatever the fuck you want (and a lot of it) for 2 weeks.
Best advice you will get for a while, ideas taken from Chris Shugart.
[quote]Goodfellow wrote:
Der Candy wrote:
I follow an A/B split.
Workout A:
Back Squat 3 x 5-8
Flat Bench 3 x 6-10
Barbell Row 3 x 6-10
Workout B:
Deadlift 1 x 6-10
Military Press 3 x 6-10
Pullups 3 x 6-10
Weekly breakdown:
Week 1:
Tuesday - A
Friday - B
Sunday - A
Week 2:
Tuesday - B
Friday - A
Sunday - B
Diet varies. I try to east as clean as possible. It looks something like this:
Breakfast: Protein shake, oatmeal with some berries, cottage cheese, maybe some dark bread.
School Lunch: Usually some protein with potatoes. I try to limit my starchy carbs so I pile on the salad (with some mayo… so sue me) and take alot of meats and some milk too.
When I Get Home: Meat, vegetables and perhaps some rye bread or a cracker (no butter). A glass of milk or two on the side.
[Post-workout drink at this point]
After workout Meal: More Meat, some cottage cheese, veggies and some carbs (sweet potatoes or dark bread).
Evening meal (hour or two before bed): Cottage cheese and a glass of milk.
It may look small on paper but the portions are large. I may sneak in a small date cake because they are tasty.
If the above is true, and this is what you have been doing, I am about to give you THE BEST advice you can possibly be given in order for you to progress. Are you ready?
Here it is:
split training:
monday - back
tuesday - chest
wednesday - legs
thursday - arms
friday - shoulders
saturday - abs/calves
sunday - rest
do loads of volume and destroy each bodypart.
And on top of that… eat whatever the fuck you want (and a lot of it) for 2 weeks.
Best advice you will get for a while, ideas taken from Chris Shugart.
[/quote]
You know, I really appreciate the advice. But the reason I’m not doing that is because I have only been training for a year. I just don’t have the strength to do a successful split routine. When I am an intermediate/advanced I will try something like that.
I don’t mean to “not listen to good advice” as a poster said on the previous page. Really, I’m not. I am just pretty sure I will not grow at all on that kind of a program, and instead look like those teenagers on Bodybuilding.com forums - in other words look the same year after year.
Also, I am an aspiring powerlifter. At some point I am going to train using westside template. But not yet. Because I want to train fewer basic lifts more frequently than that template calls for.
Having said all of this, what do you think of the Push/Pull split I outlined on the first page?
I just want something basic and abbreviated, with enough rest days to fully recuperate but not turning it into a split program.
I am sorry if I seem like slippery fish, so to speak. It’s this ‘paralysis analysis’ creeping up on me again…
[quote]Der Candy wrote:
so what do you think of my workout.[/quote]
It is good. Change it anyway and read Shugart’s new article.
[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
Der Candy wrote:
so what do you think of my workout.
It is good. Change it anyway and read Shugart’s new article.[/quote]
Damn you Shugart! shakes fist
is this better:
Workout A
Front Squat 3 x 5-8
Flat Bench Press 2 x 8-12
Barbell Row 2 x 8-12
Workout B
Deadlift 1 x 6-10
Overhead Press 2 x 8-12
Pullup 2 x 8-12
what is your goal?
if you’re looking to get stronger u should modify your workout to something like this
workout A
front squat 5x5
flat bench 3x5
barbell row 3x5
workout b
deadlift 2x5
overhead press 3x5
pullup 2xmax
and say you do workout A twice in the same week, make one day heavy and the other day light but by increasing number of sets by 1 or 2 and dropping some high reps you should see some strength gains.
If your goal is getting stronger there are a couple of things you are doing wrong.
I read Shugart’s article. I don’t want to discuss it here, but for the majority of people it is useless. Why? Because you need indicator exercises to know if you are reaching your goals.
Say that your goal is to get stronger…that is too general statement. Say that you want to squat 300kg by next year. How far away are you? How many kg you will need and how much muscle mass you will need to lift that weight? With that plan then you need to every few months test yourself. And compare where you are to where you should be. If something is not right then analyze why and fix it.
However if you go around changing exercises, reps, sets, tempo, days of lifting. How are you going to know if there is progression or not? By testing yourself in that different exercise? It doesn’t translate to your goal.
As far as nutrition goes, I know the whole business of “I want to increase my strenght levels (or muscle mass) but don’t want to get fat”. It may work for a guy like Shugart that has all the sups he can get, but we are not part of Biotest and the shipping rates of tubs and tubs of Surge with Metabolic Drive is not feasible. I hate to break this to you but the only way to increase muscle mass is to increase fat mass with it. Granted there are methods to this madness so that you don’t gain more fat mass than muscle mass, but…understand that naturally you can’t gain muscle and loose bodyfat.
Here is what I do and recommend. First, divide the year into 4 periods.
1st period pure strenght gains. Eat wholesome foods but eat and eat and eat some more. If your lifts stagnate at this point eat some more.
2nd period stregth, but incorporate light conditioning. Limit carbs to breakfast and post workout.
3rd period fat loss, use CKD(moderate and low days) and complexes after the power stuff. Maintain strenght levels but not be stupid and try to see if you can get your 3RM to 5. Guaranteed you will fuck something up.
4th period ignite the strenght and hypertrophy. If any injuries or imbalances happened during the rest of the year, now is the period to correct them. If nothing major happened then eliminate the complexes but keep CKD (changed to medium and high days).
As for the workout I need to know your stats. And what is your warm-up method? Some guys get bogged down on them instead of pushing the heavy iron.
[quote]sawadeekrob wrote:
If your goal is getting stronger there are a couple of things you are doing wrong.
I read Shugart’s article. I don’t want to discuss it here, but for the majority of people it is useless. Why? Because you need indicator exercises to know if you are reaching your goals.
Say that your goal is to get stronger…that is too general statement. Say that you want to squat 300kg by next year. How far away are you? How many kg you will need and how much muscle mass you will need to lift that weight? With that plan then you need to every few months test yourself. And compare where you are to where you should be. If something is not right then analyze why and fix it.
However if you go around changing exercises, reps, sets, tempo, days of lifting. How are you going to know if there is progression or not? By testing yourself in that different exercise? It doesn’t translate to your goal.
As far as nutrition goes, I know the whole business of “I want to increase my strenght levels (or muscle mass) but don’t want to get fat”. It may work for a guy like Shugart that has all the sups he can get, but we are not part of Biotest and the shipping rates of tubs and tubs of Surge with Metabolic Drive is not feasible. I hate to break this to you but the only way to increase muscle mass is to increase fat mass with it. Granted there are methods to this madness so that you don’t gain more fat mass than muscle mass, but…understand that naturally you can’t gain muscle and loose bodyfat.
Here is what I do and recommend. First, divide the year into 4 periods.
1st period pure strenght gains. Eat wholesome foods but eat and eat and eat some more. If your lifts stagnate at this point eat some more.
2nd period stregth, but incorporate light conditioning. Limit carbs to breakfast and post workout.
3rd period fat loss, use CKD(moderate and low days) and complexes after the power stuff. Maintain strenght levels but not be stupid and try to see if you can get your 3RM to 5. Guaranteed you will fuck something up.
4th period ignite the strenght and hypertrophy. If any injuries or imbalances happened during the rest of the year, now is the period to correct them. If nothing major happened then eliminate the complexes but keep CKD (changed to medium and high days).
As for the workout I need to know your stats. And what is your warm-up method? Some guys get bogged down on them instead of pushing the heavy iron. [/quote]
Thank you. This is what I need to hear. I PM’ed you my stats.
I usually do warm-up something like this:
sounds like either Low Testosterone, illness, overtraining, lack of sleep (which can cause the first one, as well) or bad dieting ( you must make sure you have breakfast especially in a cold country like Finland)