New(est) Training Questions

Training
81

[quote]Christian Thibaudeau wrote:
Thy. wrote:
Thib, I can pass the wall squat test even with standing very close to the wall (toes just a few cm’s back). Is this good for squatting ?

As a side question - what is a good ROM and technique in leg presses to target the quads specifically ? No matter what I do I seem to get mostly hams and glutes stimulation with full ROM.

Yes it is good for squatting. But your scoliosis would bother me a bit. Since I can’t see you, it is hard for me to make a recommendation.

For the leg press try to keep your feet close and lower on the board.[/quote]

Sure, I know, just curious to find out what nature had planned for me before it fucked up my spine :slight_smile:

I can squat safely (relatively anyway, nothing is safe when dysfunctional spine is under load) only above parallel, so I use high pin squats. If I break parallel with weights above 50 kg, my hips and torso act funny when coming out of hole due to unstability/assymetry in the lower lumbar.

BTW, thanks for even bothering to remember my issues and so on, with so many things on your plate (well, must be hard to forget when I ask 100 dumb questions daily) :slight_smile:

82

hey coach,

two quick questions

1.)
i found myself overtrained unfortunately, i suffer some weird insomnia and anxiousness through out the day and lack motivation to train… what rest-day-period would you suggest?

2.)
how can i find out if I’m the neurologically efficient or if i’m the neurologically INefficient bodybuilder?

83

Thibs,

I’m taking a whole bunch of supplements, could you critique which ones you find useless or pointless for a beginner/intermediate at the age of 18 like me?

I’m currently 5 ft8 160pounds, and around 10% bodyfat, with a max deadlift of 340, max front squat of 220 and bench of 200

Morning: zinc, vitamin D (the sun sets early at montreal as you’ve noticed), DMAE + vinpocetine+ fish oil + vitamin B + piracetam or aniracetam or oxiracetam as my nootropic stack, and st john worts (i have seasonal depression)

Pre- Workout: Whey, Leucine, beta alanine, creatine

Post: whey, vitamin e, some vitamin c if the session was stressful, magnesium

If I’m feeling sick or my lymph nodes are swollen I take selenium, zinc, and vitamin e and c and a dose of fish oil

At night I take magensium, bacopa and Z-12 or ashwangandha.

If it is too inconvenient to answer, do you offer nutritional/supplement advice for a fee?

84

Hopefully I get a reply back so here goes. I’ve recently noticed that usually my left is stronger than my right. I’ve been trying to get my right arm stronger by doin working each arm separately when I can. Yesterday, that was the furthest thing on my mind as I was in the gym basically to completely FAIL my shoulders. but the most peculiar thing happened. MY RIGHT ARM SEEMED TO BE DOING MOST OF THE WORK NO PROBLEM.

My left arm was noticeably struggling on every barbell lift, although I could tell it was stronger. It may have not fatigued, though. But when it was getting close to failure, even though the left arm was stronger in the beginning of the lifts, the right arm took over despite the amount of pain it had over the left. Could you explain that and if not do give some tips on what I’m trying to accomplish? thank you CT.

85

CT - What do you find to be the three or four best exercises for upper chest/clavical development? Would you include floor presses?

86

I was wondering how should I organize my workouts with the protocol? I"m a football player and I wanted to run and lift 4 days a week(run in the morning and lift in the afternoon). Basically I’m terrified of over training. Will using the protocol with the lifting only suffice?

87

Thib,
I just have a couple questions.
First of all I have chicken legs (specifically the calves) but it has been difficult for me to do anything about it. I have tendonitis in my knee so squats and leg extensions aren’t realistic. Are there any exercises I could do that wouldn’t aggravate my knee?

Also, I plan to cut down quite a bit in a couple months or so. I am in the high-teens as far as body-fat goes and all of my fat is concentrated in the chest and belly area. The chest is really what bothers me though. I have sort of a “moobs” thing going on. Is there something I can do about this in my diet or training or am I pretty much stuck with them?
Thanks

88

[quote]Campy17 wrote:
Thib,
I just have a couple questions.
First of all I have chicken legs (specifically the calves) but it has been difficult for me to do anything about it. I have tendonitis in my knee so squats and leg extensions aren’t realistic. Are there any exercises I could do that wouldn’t aggravate my knee?
Also, I plan to cut down quite a bit in a couple months or so. I am in the high-teens as far as body-fat goes and all of my fat is concentrated in the chest and belly area. The chest is really what bothers me though. I have sort of a “moobs” thing going on. Is there something I can do about this in my diet or training or am I pretty much stuck with them?
Thanks[/quote]

‘Moobs’ are a sign of high estrogen levels. Either due to the exposition of estrogen in food or because your body is converting a lot of its testosterone into estrogen (which means that you have low testosterone levels by the same token).

FIRST
Cut all fast food and as much ‘transformed’ food items as possible from your diet. These are often high is estrogenic substances

Drastically increase your consumption of broccoli (good natural anti-estrogen) and fiber (fiber helps flush out estrogen as you detox your body)

Try to avoid anything stored in a commercial plastic bottle or box (e.g. drinks in a plastic bottle), and most of all DO NOT EAT FOOD FROM A PLASTIC CONTAINED THAT YOU PUT IN THE OVEN OR MICROWAVE. The heating process will release a lot of the xenoestrogen from the plastic.

Do not eat soya, tofu or other soya-based products

SECOND
Use REZ-V (resveratrol) first thing in the morning, and zinc (up to 200mg for the first 2-3 weeks) in the evening

REGARDING TRAINING
Heavy lifting for low reps on big compound movements is the best type of training for you

Now, regarding your lower body. You might be able to deadlift since they don’t require as much knee flexion as the squat and leg press. Otherwise, various types of lunges will have to do.

But obviously the first order of business would be to have your knees treated.

89

[quote]mstorm wrote:
CT - What do you find to be the three or four best exercises for upper chest/clavical development? Would you include floor presses?[/quote]

  • Wide grip bench press to the neck
  • Close-grip (just inside shoulders) incline press
  • Hyght flies
  • Seated steep incline overhead press (seat at 75 degrees)
90

[quote]Mondy wrote:
Morning: zinc, vitamin D (the sun sets early at montreal as you’ve noticed), DMAE + vinpocetine+ fish oil + vitamin B + piracetam or aniracetam or oxiracetam as my nootropic stack, and st john worts (i have seasonal depression)

Pre- Workout: Whey, Leucine, beta alanine, creatine

Post: whey, vitamin e, some vitamin c if the session was stressful, magnesium

If I’m feeling sick or my lymph nodes are swollen I take selenium, zinc, and vitamin e and c and a dose of fish oil

At night I take magensium, bacopa and Z-12 or ashwangandha.

If it is too inconvenient to answer, do you offer nutritional/supplement advice for a fee?
[/quote]

Seems fine… by that I mean that nothing seems out of place. My only concern is the pretty hefty use of nootropics. Even when I was competiting in olympic lifting I never used more than one of those at a time. I would simply use Alpha-GPC + DMAE as a base and MAYBE add one of the other three as needed. But never than one at a time, rotate them every 3-4 weeks.

91

[quote]padrinho wrote:
hey coach,

two quick questions

1.)
i found myself overtrained unfortunately, i suffer some weird insomnia and anxiousness through out the day and lack motivation to train… what rest-day-period would you suggest?

2.)
how can i find out if I’m the neurologically efficient or if i’m the neurologically INefficient bodybuilder?

[/quote]

  1. probably elevated cortisol at night. I would use 400mg of phosphatidylserine with your evening meal and before bed along with 10g of glycine (both times)

  2. I would also take 3 caps of Z-12 30 minutes before bedtime

  3. I recommend continuing training BUT no more than 20-30 minutes per session 3 times a week. Every week at a total of 10 minutes to the week… for example:

Week 1. 30 - 30 - 30
Week 2. 40 - 30 - 30
Week 3. 40 - 30 - 40
Week 4. 40 - 40 - 40
Week 5. 50 - 40 - 40
Week 6. 50 - 40 - 50
Week 7. 50 - 50 - 50

Train as early in the day as you can

92

Coach,

I used the article on using Box Squats to warmup and activate the CNS. It has helped a lot. I follow it up with back squats ramping up with 5X5 and finish off with a burnout set of reducing the last used weight down 85% and get as many as possible. My only problem is this:

I’m not using this for just a quad workout, but a full leg sessions. So on top of this I do 3 sets of leg curls, leg press, and SLDL.

Would it be okay to save the burnout set on squats for the end of my workout? I feel completely drained when I do it before my other exercises so I’m thinking I could just use it as a finisher.

Thank you
-Adam

93

[quote]ashylarryku wrote:
Coach,

I used the article on using Box Squats to warmup and activate the CNS. It has helped a lot. I follow it up with back squats ramping up with 5X5 and finish off with a burnout set of reducing the last used weight down 85% and get as many as possible. My only problem is this:

I’m not using this for just a quad workout, but a full leg sessions. So on top of this I do 3 sets of leg curls, leg press, and SLDL.

Would it be okay to save the burnout set on squats for the end of my workout? I feel completely drained when I do it before my other exercises so I’m thinking I could just use it as a finisher.

Thank you
-Adam

[/quote]

Normally the ‘rep out set’ is the last thing you do for a muscle group. With legs this can be tricky because the basic leg movements involve all the lower body musculature. So obviously, repping out on the squat might hurt the rest of your workout. It is perfectly fine to do the rep-out set at the end of the workout in this case. The only downside is that this set might not be as effective because your lower body will tired a bit more.

I would recommend:

A. Box squat activation
B. Squat 5 x 5
C. SLDL
D. Squat max reps set
E. Leg curl

I would drop the leg press for this workout.

94

CT

Sorry if this is off topic but in terms of internships do you have any personal recomendations (any facilities you rate highly or know are taking interns on) for a 6-12 month placement? (English speaker if it makes any difference). Thanks.

95

[quote]jk270 wrote:
CT

Sorry if this is off topic but in terms of internships do you have any personal recomendations (any facilities you rate highly or know are taking interns on) for a 6-12 month placement? (English speaker if it makes any difference). Thanks.[/quote]

Not really. Private facilities and high level strength coaches do offer interships (I used to myself) but normally these are 5-7 days internships and they charge you anywhere from 1000 to 4000$ for that time period.

I’m sure that some do accept long term interns, maybe even for free, but those are rarely at places where you’ll learn anything.

96

Thank you for your reply, I do not use piracetam and oxiracetam and aniracetam at the same time. I rotate them on a daily basis.

For the seated goodmorning, I lack the mobility to touch my torso to my thighs without rounding my lumbar spine, but I find I can get into a lower position if I perform the standing version. Should I replace it with the standing version instead?

What would you recommend for a lower body mobility plan? After filming myself I realized my lumbar spine still rounds when I go ass to grass on front squats. I’ve tried Pavels “prying” technique, step overs /duckunders with a flat lower back and even extensive rolling of the hip flexors and stretching of the calves.

97

[quote]Christian Thibaudeau wrote:
jk270 wrote:
CT

Sorry if this is off topic but in terms of internships do you have any personal recomendations (any facilities you rate highly or know are taking interns on) for a 6-12 month placement? (English speaker if it makes any difference). Thanks.

Not really. Private facilities and high level strength coaches do offer interships (I used to myself) but normally these are 5-7 days internships and they charge you anywhere from 1000 to 4000$ for that time period.

I’m sure that some do accept long term interns, maybe even for free, but those are rarely at places where you’ll learn anything.[/quote]

Yea that’s what I was afraid of. Thanks anyway.

98

CT,

Forget where I read this but what is your recommendation on dosing with fish oils? It was a value of x/Kg or x/lbs, or something on the lines of that.

Thanks,
FA

99

[quote]Christian Thibaudeau wrote:
Campy17 wrote:
Thib,
I just have a couple questions.
First of all I have chicken legs (specifically the calves) but it has been difficult for me to do anything about it. I have tendonitis in my knee so squats and leg extensions aren’t realistic. Are there any exercises I could do that wouldn’t aggravate my knee?
Also, I plan to cut down quite a bit in a couple months or so. I am in the high-teens as far as body-fat goes and all of my fat is concentrated in the chest and belly area. The chest is really what bothers me though. I have sort of a “moobs” thing going on. Is there something I can do about this in my diet or training or am I pretty much stuck with them?
Thanks

‘Moobs’ are a sign of high estrogen levels. Either due to the exposition of estrogen in food or because your body is converting a lot of its testosterone into estrogen (which means that you have low testosterone levels by the same token).

FIRST
Cut all fast food and as much ‘transformed’ food items as possible from your diet. These are often high is estrogenic substances

Drastically increase your consumption of broccoli (good natural anti-estrogen) and fiber (fiber helps flush out estrogen as you detox your body)

Try to avoid anything stored in a commercial plastic bottle or box (e.g. drinks in a plastic bottle), and most of all DO NOT EAT FOOD FROM A PLASTIC CONTAINED THAT YOU PUT IN THE OVEN OR MICROWAVE. The heating process will release a lot of the xenoestrogen from the plastic.

Do not eat soya, tofu or other soya-based products

SECOND
Use REZ-V (resveratrol) first thing in the morning, and zinc (up to 200mg for the first 2-3 weeks) in the evening

REGARDING TRAINING
Heavy lifting for low reps on big compound movements is the best type of training for you

Now, regarding your lower body. You might be able to deadlift since they don’t require as much knee flexion as the squat and leg press. Otherwise, various types of lunges will have to do.

But obviously the first order of business would be to have your knees treated.[/quote]

Coach,

I’ve been hearing alot about the Xenoestrogens that can leak into food from plastics. I work anywhere from 10-12 hour days at work, and can’t afford to eat out every day, so packing food from home is the only option. Do you have suggestions to offer on alternate storage containers that are safer to microwave, and also where I might find them. I’ve been trying to find a glass water bottle to replace my poland spring bottle I re-use constantly, but I can’t find anything large enough that it would last me the whole day.

100

[quote]Fuzzyapple wrote:
CT,

Forget where I read this but what is your recommendation on dosing with fish oils? It was a value of x/Kg or x/lbs, or something on the lines of that.

Thanks,
FA[/quote]

1g per % of body fat