Mighty Stu, How do you Train?

Training Bodybuilding
101

Glad you guys seem to be appreciating my responses here. Makes an ‘old man’ feel good -lol.

SPENRCERULZ- Well, I will first point out that I was oddly strong in the weight room right from the get go, but actually putting on size was more difficult. I never really got caught up with all the tiny/specialized exercises. Even when I add more variation to my routines, I keep the basic strength stuff, which is probably why, even depleted, pre-exhausted, and damn tired, I still rep the 100’s for shoulder presses pretty easily (again, I’d prefer more size!). While Shoulder presses have ALWAYS been in my various programs over the years, so have DIPS. ALong with the usual chest work, I imagine those two exercises probably contributed a lot to my bench pressing ability.

Something else I could note, is that I would always do shoulder day the next day after chest. I know some people will argue that there is overlap, and you need a few days between, but it is the overlap that made me put them together. I figure once they’re both toasted, then they will get the maximum recovery time I can give them before hitting either muscle group again. You mention your own bench numbers, but let me know exactly what you’ve been doing, and maybe we can come up with something as a better alternative.

KICKUREFACE- Thanks man, but if you look at the numbers being put up by the lightweights in any issue of POwerlifting USA, you’ll agree with my earlier assertion. For a BBer, I’m pretty strong, but as a powerlifter, no one has to worry about me breaking their records -lol

MOJOMIKE36- Glad you appreciate all the mistakes I’ve made and are learning from them :slight_smile: Remember, I COULDN’T make muscle gains when I was doing a lot of LI cardio (running) all the time. Even now, as I’m cutting for a show, except for the last week, when I’ve absolutely had to put in some extra bike-time just to burn some calories, I always prefer Interval work. It’s more muscle sparring, better at partitioning your body towards muscle and not fat, and you don’t have to be there for an hour at a time (for most of the time I included any cardio in my prep, is was only 20 min, twice a week!) Bottom line is that you want to get away with as little as possible. To paraphrase Dr. Joe, you don’t want your cardio sessions to be workouts in themselves that your body has to recover from (keep them minimal!). It’s only this past week (3 weeks out from my show!) that I’m doing some form of cardio everyday, and to be honest, my body doesn’t seem to like it! -lol

S

102

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:
…Guess it’s weird to realize that I’m not a newbie anymore. I had the same feeling teaching college, all I could think of was the really great professors I had had, who were obviously better qualified than I was to be teaching anyone anything…

[/quote]

Hi Stu,

Just wanted to say thanks for all of your wisdom on this thread! Good stuff, I particularly found the statment above to hit close to home. I am just completing teaching my second year of college and this certainly struck a chord with me! I felt this way more times than not, especially the first year. I am starting to settle in a bit more now.

We really are capable of so much more than we often give ourselves credit for regardless of whether it is our physiques, our careers or our conquests! You are an inspiration…rock on o’ mighty one!..LOL

103

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:
Glad you guys seem to be appreciating my responses here. Makes an ‘old man’ feel good -lol.

SPENRCERULZ- Well, I will first point out that I was oddly strong in the weight room right from the get go, but actually putting on size was more difficult. I never really got caught up with all the tiny/specialized exercises. Even when I add more variation to my routines, I keep the basic strength stuff, which is probably why, even depleted, pre-exhausted, and damn tired, I still rep the 100’s for shoulder presses pretty easily (again, I’d prefer more size!). While Shoulder presses have ALWAYS been in my various programs over the years, so have DIPS. ALong with the usual chest work, I imagine those two exercises probably contributed a lot to my bench pressing ability.

Something else I could note, is that I would always do shoulder day the next day after chest. I know some people will argue that there is overlap, and you need a few days between, but it is the overlap that made me put them together. I figure once they’re both toasted, then they will get the maximum recovery time I can give them before hitting either muscle group again. You mention your own bench numbers, but let me know exactly what you’ve been doing, and maybe we can come up with something as a better alternative.

S
[/quote]

I do the same thing as far as keeping the basic lifts in check goes.

I normally do legs in between chest and shoulders but trying to fry my shoulders is worth a try. lol

as for my workout:
Push Ups 2x30
DB bench press 10x10 (german volume training it helps burn fat)I use 35 lb. DBs
Bench Press 5x5 w/185 I build up to the 185
Incline Bench press w/135 I use the same weight for the entire exercise except the last set which I go to increase the weight.
Tricep Pushdown 4x8 w/170
Dips 4x10 just added this one in last week.

Idk if providing my shoulder workout will help as well or not but it couldn’t hurt.

leaning lat raises 10x10 (GVT)
HS shoulder press 5x5 w/170
front raises 5x5 w/25 lb DBs
Incline Lat raise 4x8 w/ 15lb DBs ( im thinking of trading this out for the standing military press cause all in all it doesn’t feel right to me)
DB shrugs 4x8 w/ 55lb Dbs
HS shrugs 5x5 w/ 230

thanks for all your help stu.

104

Hey Stu, thx for the numerous long posts, a good interesting read. I just have a couple of quick Q’s.

When you did back squats, how low did u go?

and

If you could go back in time and give the young you one piece of advice, what would it be?

105

Thanks stu.

106

SPENCERULZ- OKay, first off, are we trying to build up strength, mass, or burn fat? Because we need to know what direction you’re going in. You start with a ton of volume/lower weight work before you even get to the real ‘meat and potato’ stuff. You could keep the pushups as a ‘warmup’ if you’d like, but after that, I would go right into the real heavy compound work. If bringing your flat bench numbers up is your priority, then go to it right away. I understand the appreciation of GVT, but it’s absolutely killing any chance you have of progressing with your poundages on any exercise afterwards. Keep things simple. I guarantee a basic program will yield results if you stick with it for a month or so. Try something ismple like this:

-warmup (pushups if you’d like)

-Flat BB presses - do a few warm-up/‘feel’ sets, raising the weight on each one, but never actually straining, or reaching failure (I will do the bar for 10 reps, then each successive warmup only gets 5). When you get to your work sets, pick a weight you think you can handle for 6-9 reps. COnsidering that you have been working up to 185 lbs, use that for your first work set. In all likelihood, you’ll be able to raise the weight a little bit for your other work sets.

-Flyes/Cables/IncFlyes- Some sort of isolation exercise. We already did a nice compound to start with, but most folks cannot get by with compounds alone. Take your pick of any of the exercises I just listed, and focus on lifting with your pecs (nt your shoulders, and not banging handles/dumbells/cables together at each rep), and getting a good squeeze. This will serve as a great pre-exhaust for…

-Incline DB Presses- You can do Barbell if you like, but I figure if you’re doing flat Barbell, do incline with dumbells. (do one ‘feel’ set, and then pick a work set weight similar to the rep range you used for flat BB)

If you use this simple (SIMPLE!) program, I guarantee your bench weights will go up from what you’ve become accustomed to.

ANONYMAS- When I used to do heavy back squats, I would go to about parallel, and then all the way up. I was concerned with moving the most weight I could, and as such would stand up and get that little ‘rest’ so many trainers do. These days, going for muscle stimulation, I never lock out my legs, preferring to keep tension on them the entire time, moving in an almost rhythmic fashion, up and down.

If I could give myself one bit of advice? In all honesty, I was guilty of what most new trainers do, I honestly thought I was eating enough, and as frequently as I needed to. I figure if I had a few scrambled eggs for breakfast, a tuna sandwich on whole wheat for lunch, and some kind of meat for dinner that I would get huge given enough time. If you’re young, and your hormones are high, and you do almost anything athletic, given the right nutrition and rest, your muscles will grow. While I did make very quick strength gains, I fully believe that had my nutrition been better, I would have made quicker size gains as well.

S

107

I am trying to lean out while avoiding cardio while gaining strength… admittedly not the smartest idea… lol

this is definitely something I will try, umm what set range do you propose I use?

Thanks a lot for your help stu

108

Let me start with the best piece of advice I can for leaning out while maintaining muscle mass… train for size when it comes to the weights. Regardless of what you’re doing diet wise, lifting heavy will continually stress the fast twitch fibers which are responsible for the majority of muscle gains in the first place. If your body doesn’t feel it needs muscles in a certain area in a specific amount, it will always rather reabsorb it (use it elsewhere) than maintain it. However, if it continually has need of muscles to do work required of it (ie. training hard!), it will attempt to support it (send nutrients [calories!] there).

When I first tried to bring my weight down from 205 to 190, I changed nothing about my training program, which was geared towards hypertrophy, I simply adjusted my total calories down a small amount, and made sure my P+C meals were early in the day (except for PWO), preferring more P+F (+ green veggies) as the day wore on. If you give yourself a slight deficit food wise, but still get enough protein to support a size-based training protocol, you should see some recomposition without any cardio -I’ve done it myself :slight_smile:

S

109

Absolutely. I wish someone had told me this when I first started.

This really ought to be stickied.

110

[quote]Spencerulz wrote:
I am trying to lean out while avoiding cardio while gaining strength… admittedly not the smartest idea… lol

this is definitely something I will try, umm what set range do you propose I use?

Thanks a lot for your help stu[/quote]

I tend to keep my rep ranges around 6-10 for most exercises, although sometimes, I’ll do less reps, and really slow things down (especially if something like a nagging injury is acting up). Other times, I may up the reps and lighten the load just for variety’s sake. I know I’ve gone on in the past about using different rep ranges for the soleus and the gastrocnemius, but on occassion, I’ll reverse what I normally do, just for something new. I like to think that counting reps is just a way to measure time under tension, and that a muscle will receive the most growth stimulus around 30-40 seconds. I’m sure there’s a lot more info on the subject, but this has worked pretty well for me.

S

111

[quote]LUEshi wrote:
When I first tried to bring my weight down from 205 to 190, I changed nothing about my training program, which was geared towards hypertrophy, I simply adjusted my total calories down a small amount, and made sure my P+C meals were early in the day (except for PWO), preferring more P+F (+ green veggies) as the day wore on. If you give yourself a slight deficit food wise, but still get enough protein to support a size-based training protocol, you should see some recomposition without any cardio -I’ve done it myself :slight_smile:

Absolutely. I wish someone had told me this when I first started.

This really ought to be stickied.[/quote]

What I think messes up a lot of folks’ attempts at fat loss, or even recomposition, is that it is a damn slow process. I was losing LESS THAN A POUND A WEEK when I did this. I certainly wasn’t looking in the mirror every day (or even every week) and going “oh yeah, this is working out great!” I had to just play the ‘numbers’ game, and have faith that if I stuck to my simple plan, things would happen. If after a few weeks, there was no change, then I would sit down, assess what I was doing, and try something else. By trying something else, I don’t mean change everything, I mean change ONE THING. If my workouts (weights, and cardio is applicable) are constant, and my daily food intake is constant in terms of numbers, I have two places to play with. In my particular case, I played with the calorie numbers, dropping an extra 100 cals every day until I found a steady pace that had me losing about 2 lbs every 3 weeks (with no loss of strength).

S

112

Great thread. :slight_smile:

113

Bump! Put all that hard work on the big stage and kick some ass Stu!

114

Lol, thanks bro. If anything, this whole experience is testing my mental fortitude. Dieting is not always fun, but let me tell you, as your body truly starts to run out of fat to use, it gets more difficult to control your eating. It’s not like I’m thinking constantly about doughnuts or anything, but the limited portions are brutal. I find myself drinking huge gulps of water between every bite of food hoping to feel just a tiny bit more full.

The next time I do this (after not going back up so heavy, maybe 190 lbs tops), I think I’ll come down even slower, and with small amounts of intervals earlier on, hopefully allowing me to keep more size, and diet on more calories. I know Dorian used to raise his cals for a few weeks before a diet, rationalizing that once his body acclimated to the higher intake, he could effectively “diet” on what was formerly his maintenance levels.

S

115

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:
What I think messes up a lot of folks’ attempts at fat loss, or even recomposition, is that it is a damn slow process. I was losing LESS THAN A POUND A WEEK when I did this. I certainly wasn’t looking in the mirror every day (or even every week) and going “oh yeah, this is working out great!” I had to just play the ‘numbers’ game, and have faith that if I stuck to my simple plan, things would happen. If after a few weeks, there was no change, then I would sit down, assess what I was doing, and try something else. By trying something else, I don’t mean change everything, I mean change ONE THING. If my workouts (weights, and cardio is applicable) are constant, and my daily food intake is constant in terms of numbers, I have two places to play with. In my particular case, I played with the calorie numbers, dropping an extra 100 cals every day until I found a steady pace that had me losing about 2 lbs every 3 weeks (with no loss of strength).

S
[/quote]

It’s so true. Dieting is an act of faith. Your diet is a lot different than mine (you’re a bodybuilder trying to get shredded, I was an FFB trying to be not fat! XD) but I understand that mentality. I don’t really post a lot, but I lurk here and I’ve followed this and your contest prep thread. GL in the show!