Help with Getting a Pump!

Training
1

Hello!

I’ve been into working for around 3 years or so (all started when my dad showed burpee pull-ups when I was 11, we worked up to 100 in 20 minutes. Worst father son bonding experience ever lol, it was awesome) Ever since then I’ve always done some type of working out, and about a year ago I started Ross Enamait’s Never Gymless routine’s. Three months I ago I did a strength routine that used 4-8 reps, and for the past month or so I’ve followed a routine geared more towards aesthetics. Now comes to my problemo, After 3 years of training I’ve definitely felt my muscles get slightly larger, but I’ve never gotten that “skin-tearing pump” that everyone talks about. I understand that it’s not important, but I’d really like to know what it feels like to have a pump like that. My routine at the moment consists of around 6-12 reps, doing 9 sets for chest, back, and legs, and 6 sets for shoulders, biceps, and triceps. My rest periods are 45 seconds to a minute in length. I believe my form is pretty good as well, and my intensity is also high. I remember a few days ago doing handstand pushups and my last rep of my last set literally took me at least 10 seconds to push all the way up Any help would be much appreciated!

Thanks!
Sam

2

omg this is so funny!..oh wait…no it’s not…

bye bye troll

3

[quote]jskrabac wrote:
omg this is so funny!..oh wait…no it’s not…

bye bye troll[/quote]

I promise I’m not a troll, what made you think that if you don’t mind me asking. Sorry, I’m 14 haha. :stuck_out_tongue:

4

[quote]Geico wrote:

[quote]jskrabac wrote:
omg this is so funny!..oh wait…no it’s not…

bye bye troll[/quote]

I promise I’m not a troll, what made you think that if you don’t mind me asking. Sorry, I’m 14 haha. :P[/quote]

Makes sense now. There’s been a few threads lately about stuff like pistol squats or single arm handstands or something with some posters just trying to get a laugh.

5

[quote]jskrabac wrote:

[quote]Geico wrote:

[quote]jskrabac wrote:
omg this is so funny!..oh wait…no it’s not…

bye bye troll[/quote]

I promise I’m not a troll, what made you think that if you don’t mind me asking. Sorry, I’m 14 haha. :P[/quote]

Makes sense now. There’s been a few threads lately about stuff like pistol squats or single arm handstands or something with some posters just trying to get a laugh. [/quote]

Cool! Thanks for giving me a second chance!

6

[quote]Geico wrote:
My routine at the moment consists of around 6-12 reps, doing 9 sets for chest, back, and legs, and 6 sets for shoulders, biceps, and triceps. [/quote]
Which exercises do you do?

7

[quote]kakno wrote:

[quote]Geico wrote:
My routine at the moment consists of around 6-12 reps, doing 9 sets for chest, back, and legs, and 6 sets for shoulders, biceps, and triceps. [/quote]
Which exercises do you do?[/quote]

At the moment it’s been all bodyweight exercises, incorporating some gymnastic style moves. My chest routine consists of ring full depth pushups, ring flies, and ring dips where I go hands to chest level. Biceps are normal and narrow grip chin-ups. Triceps and back are same format. How does it look? After my workout I grabbed some dumbbells in my garage and started doing curls to see if it was because it was bodyweight and that wasn’t the case either haha.

8

[quote]Geico wrote:

[quote]kakno wrote:

[quote]Geico wrote:
My routine at the moment consists of around 6-12 reps, doing 9 sets for chest, back, and legs, and 6 sets for shoulders, biceps, and triceps. [/quote]
Which exercises do you do?[/quote]

At the moment it’s been all bodyweight exercises, incorporating some gymnastic style moves. My chest routine consists of ring full depth pushups, ring flies, and ring dips where I go hands to chest level. Biceps are normal and narrow grip chin-ups. Triceps and back are same format. How does it look? After my workout I grabbed some dumbbells in my garage and started doing curls to see if it was because it was bodyweight and that wasn’t the case either haha. [/quote]

I have no familiarity with gymnastic ring work.

As far as “feeling the pump”, typically I’ve experienced it when doing multiple sets at 8-12 reps, with weights that I can barely get the last reps. Usually at about the end of the 3rd set I’m feeling a pretty good pump. From there, I can increase the pump by trying to do another set, or by lowering the weights and doing more sets.

I have a feeling that you’re just not using enough weight to begin with. I think you need to be using a weight where you can’t get any more than 12 reps out of it. (That’s what works for me at least.)

When you do 12 reps of ring pushups, are you able to do 13 reps, 14 reps? Or are you barely able to do 12 reps?

9

[quote]LoRez wrote:

[quote]Geico wrote:

[quote]kakno wrote:

[quote]Geico wrote:
My routine at the moment consists of around 6-12 reps, doing 9 sets for chest, back, and legs, and 6 sets for shoulders, biceps, and triceps. [/quote]
Which exercises do you do?[/quote]

At the moment it’s been all bodyweight exercises, incorporating some gymnastic style moves. My chest routine consists of ring full depth pushups, ring flies, and ring dips where I go hands to chest level. Biceps are normal and narrow grip chin-ups. Triceps and back are same format. How does it look? After my workout I grabbed some dumbbells in my garage and started doing curls to see if it was because it was bodyweight and that wasn’t the case either haha. [/quote]

I have no familiarity with gymnastic ring work.

As far as “feeling the pump”, typically I’ve experienced it when doing multiple sets at 8-12 reps, with weights that I can barely get the last reps. Usually at about the end of the 3rd set I’m feeling a pretty good pump. From there, I can increase the pump by trying to do another set, or by lowering the weights and doing more sets.

I have a feeling that you’re just not using enough weight to begin with. I think you need to be using a weight where you can’t get any more than 12 reps out of it. (That’s what works for me at least.)

When you do 12 reps of ring pushups, are you able to do 13 reps, 14 reps? Or are you barely able to do 12 reps?[/quote]

About a week ago I was only able to do 3 sets of 12 pushups where the last rep was a major struggle. The other exercises I’m doing are closer to 8 reps on. I’m am pretty positive my intensity is there, but of course I have nothing to compare it too. hehe. I’m actually planning on moving to a more difficult exercise on the ring pushups. Before I was doing them with my feet elevated. On my back workout, 2 of the 3 exercises I do are wide grip pull-ups and regular grip pull-ups. I can do 17 pull-ups max (just tested this past weekend, my personal record! Way excited) My last workout went 10 10 9 reps on the wide grip pull-ups and 9 9 8 reps on the normal grip pull-ups. Thanks for the suggestion, much appreciated!

P.S. Yesterday I did 5 sets of 20 pushups with 30 seconds rest after my workout to see if I could get a pump. I could tell there was more blood than usual going to my chest, but my skin didn’t have that super tight feeling. Luckily I’m still getting good results without the pump!

10

I did an arm workout earlier today and my arms were 1/2 an inch bigger by the end of it. I can definitely tell there is increased blood flow and my skin did feel a little bit tighter, but that certain feeling Arnold describes wasn’t there. :stuck_out_tongue: It really didn’t feel that much better than before. Could it be because I’m 14, and I have to wait for a few more hormones to kick in?

11

I remember starting to lift around that age and having ridiculous trouble getting pumps and feeling terrible about it… nowadays pumps are more painful than anything. Either way, whatever you do, keep doing lots of pull ups and body weight exercises, that’s the best thing you can do right now and ultimately the pump may have to wait for your muscles to develop a little more and just simply have more mass to “pump up” with blood.

Some cool pull up variations you can try is to do them wider and wider, and do some sets where you hang completely for a second or two then explode up, that gives me crazy pumps nowadays. Biceps pumps are easy to get if you try to max out on chin ups in a 3 min. period, just keep doing them as fast as you can and take a little time resting as possible and try to break the last number every time.

Lastly, make sure you’re getting your rest and eating enough, I remember back in the day having a burning need to work out every day and as it turns out the only thing stopping me from growing was me training too often and plateauing like crazy.

good luck!

12

[quote]lbraga wrote:
I remember starting to lift around that age and having ridiculous trouble getting pumps and feeling terrible about it… nowadays pumps are more painful than anything. Either way, whatever you do, keep doing lots of pull ups and body weight exercises, that’s the best thing you can do right now and ultimately the pump may have to wait for your muscles to develop a little more and just simply have more mass to “pump up” with blood.

Some cool pull up variations you can try is to do them wider and wider, and do some sets where you hang completely for a second or two then explode up, that gives me crazy pumps nowadays. Biceps pumps are easy to get if you try to max out on chin ups in a 3 min. period, just keep doing them as fast as you can and take a little time resting as possible and try to break the last number every time.

Lastly, make sure you’re getting your rest and eating enough, I remember back in the day having a burning need to work out every day and as it turns out the only thing stopping me from growing was me training too often and plateauing like crazy.

good luck![/quote]

Awesome! Thank you so much! Now I don’t feel so bad about not getting one. I’'m up to 3 sets of 10 on wide pull-ups, when I reach 12 reps I may have to try that variation out, sounds cool! Also, if you don’t mind me asking, around what age did you start to get a good pump consistently in your workouts?

13

[quote]Geico wrote:

Awesome! Thank you so much! Now I don’t feel so bad about not getting one. I’'m up to 3 sets of 10 on wide pull-ups, when I reach 12 reps I may have to try that variation out, sounds cool! Also, if you don’t mind me asking, around what age did you start to get a good pump consistently in your workouts?
[/quote]

Why are you so interested in getting a pump?

14

[quote]LoRez wrote:

[quote]Geico wrote:

Awesome! Thank you so much! Now I don’t feel so bad about not getting one. I’'m up to 3 sets of 10 on wide pull-ups, when I reach 12 reps I may have to try that variation out, sounds cool! Also, if you don’t mind me asking, around what age did you start to get a good pump consistently in your workouts?
[/quote]

Why are you so interested in getting a pump?[/quote]

Just to know what it’s like. Many articles I’ve read describe as the epiphany of training. I’m definitely not going to change my routine for it though.

15

It will be harder to get a “pump on” when doing exercises such as ring pushups. This is because there is so much stability required with the exercises that your stabilising mucles will probably fatigue before the main muscles like you pecs etc. Meaning they won’t feel like they are pumped. While this may be annoying at this stage just remember you are still young and with well developed stabilising muscles you will have a much lower chance of injury when you start throwing the big weights around.
It’s hard to get big on stability exercises, even though some of those gynmasts look pretty bloody ripped.

16

[quote]Geico wrote:

[quote]LoRez wrote:

[quote]Geico wrote:

Awesome! Thank you so much! Now I don’t feel so bad about not getting one. I’'m up to 3 sets of 10 on wide pull-ups, when I reach 12 reps I may have to try that variation out, sounds cool! Also, if you don’t mind me asking, around what age did you start to get a good pump consistently in your workouts?
[/quote]

Why are you so interested in getting a pump?[/quote]

Just to know what it’s like. Many articles I’ve read describe as the epiphany of training. I’m definitely not going to change my routine for it though.[/quote]

It’s not. Being strong and in shape is where it’s at.

17

Thanks, I’ll just happily keep plugging along with my strength gains then! :smiley:

18

After watching this video im not as quick to assume someone is simply a troll.