the 2nd
[quote]Kael231 wrote:
Here is the first pic…[/quote]
You are lean. You are not 4.1% and you can not “shape” your chest. You chest is small. Make it bigger. Eat more and quit bullshitting. If your chest measured an extra 6 inches you would see more “shape”. How about not missing anymore meals?
False! You can have a gut and be 4.1% bodyfat, its called a GH gut. But you don’t have it and you don’t have 4.1% bodyfat.
You can make your upper or lower chest bigger, you can’t “shape” it anymore than that. There is no hitting of the inside or outside chest. And when you post pictures to demonstrate your near-dead bodyfat levels, why cast a huge shadow on the front of your body?
-Matt
[quote]Kael231 wrote:
Yes I do have a small gut…and p.s. I went to the doctor 1 week ago to get my B.F. tested and yes…I am 4.1% you dumb fuck.
[/quote]
if you have a small gut you are not 4.1 maybe you missed a 1 and it was 14.1 there is not way you have a gut at 4.1 you would have nearly the medically necesarry body fat to maintain life, thats about as low as you can go, so if your doctor really said this he’s an idiot, or your changing what he said. bottom line gut=not 4.1%
[quote]Kael231 wrote:
Yes I do have a small gut…and p.s. I went to the doctor 1 week ago to get my B.F. tested and yes…I am 4.1% you dumb fuck.
[/quote]
I’m leaner than you are, and i’m about 10 - 12% right now. So you’re not 4% bodyfat.
Also, do you do squats, deadlifts, running, or anything that remotely works your torso? Your core looks significantly softer than your arms and chest. As for chest exercises, I’ve had similar problems developing pectoral mass relative to the rest of my body. I’d try the wide grip dips and more food. I’m also going to pull back my shoulder blades more on flat bench to isolate the chest, as most of the brunt seems to fall on my deltoids.
Hey Dude,
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You don’t have a weird shaped chest. It is small, that’s all. Pack on some more mass and no-one will give a shit.
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You are also lean, but no where near 4.1% body fat. Your doctor sucks farts out of dead seagull’s arses. You probably shouldn’t listen to him on things that he knows fuck all about.
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Before lashing out at people who know a bit more than you about the human physique (ie the dumb fuck comments), take $1.25, go to Walmart, and buy a fucking clue.
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You have a decent physique, but please don’t describe yourself or your chest as “stunning” unless you are Jessica Simpson.
Kael, from your pictures there is no way you are even close to 4.1%!!! Just to give you an idea, the top bodybuilders in the world compete somewhere between 3 and 5%. At that percentage you can see striations upon striations and you can’t even pinch a skinfold on most part of your body.
I have attached a photo of myself. This is at approximately 7% bodyfat (maybe a tad under). So, unless the lighting in your pics is SUPER unflattering you are closer to 12%. I’ved trained hundreds of athletes and bodybuilders and I’d say that 80% of them are much learner than you are and none of them properly tested under 8%.
The thing is that peoples believe that doctors are always right (especially when they like the answer). As a strength coach I work with several doctors and physiotherapists, my older brother is a doctor himself, and NONE of them had ANY class on body composition assessement in college or med school and testing bodyfat was not part of their learning.
Before you go on saying that pinched skin and measuring is easy. Know that it takes A LONG time of PORPER practice to be able to come up with a reliant measure.
That having been said, it’s true that you cannot change the genetic shape of your chest. If you knew how muscles contracted and adapted to training you’d only have to look at an anatomy chart to understand how that it impossible.
The muscle fibers in a muscle runs from one attachement to the other. The pectoral has two portions:
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Sternal head (going from the humerus up to the sternum). Which is pretty much 90% of the volume of your chest.
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Clavicular head (going from the humerus up to the collar bone).
Both portions are really separate muscles (even though most of the time they always work at the same time). So it is somewhat possible to put more emphasis on each portion.
This only means that there is such a thing as an “upper pec” (clavicular head).
HOWEVER the rest of the pectoral (sternal head) IS NOT divided into several portions. As a result (and read this 2-3 times please) you cannot increase the size of “specific” portions of this muscle because such thing doesn’t exist!!! You can only make the whole muscle grow bigger.
There is no such thing as “outer pecs”, “inner pecs” or “lower pec”.
Depending on how your pectoral muscle is shaped or attached it will grow up to look one way or another, you can thank your parents for that.
Now, you say that some peoples have full chest, others don’t have much inner chest, etc. This is only due to the genetic shape of their muscle.
One more pic … this is of a bodybuilder I train. Currently (in that picture) he is around 9%.
Also look at today’s powerful image (photo of a back double biceps in black and white) this is what 3% looks like. Are you tellin me that you are only 1% away from that? In your case (according to your stats) that would mean that if you lost only 1.75lbs of fat your muscle definition would look like that walking anatomy chart.
I remember seeing an EMG analysis of different chest exercises once that showed the decline bench press to be the best overall chest developer. According to the report, declines not only stimulated more motor units in the pec major than the other exercises, but also the pec minor. Yup, according to the EMG, declines worked the upper chest more than inclines. Admittedly, even after reading this, I still don’t do declines (or even inclines) nearly enough in my routines. That probably explains my lack of “upper” chest development. Anyway, I thought I’d share that.
Feedback, experiences? CT? Anyone?
[quote]Warrior Spirit wrote:
I remember seeing an EMG analysis of different chest exercises once that showed the decline bench press to be the best overall chest developer. According to the report, declines not only stimulated more motor units in the pec major than the other exercises, but also the pec minor. Yup, according to the EMG, declines worked the upper chest more than inclines. Admittedly, even after reading this, I still don’t do declines (or even inclines) nearly enough in my routines. That probably explains my lack of “upper” chest development. Anyway, I thought I’d share that.
Feedback, experiences? CT? Anyone?[/quote]
Actually, that isn’t completely true. Most EMG studies have shown INCLINES to affect the pec minor more. I do flat and inclines. The only reason I would recommend someone to add declines as a priority is if their shoulders are constantly taking the brunt of most of the force during the movement.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
Kael231 wrote:
Since no one seems to believe me when I say my BF is 4.1% I will be attatching pictures to this thread very soon.
Oh GAWD no! Damn you all…damn you all to hell!![/quote]
Damn you Professor, you’ve got me laughing out loud at work again…
I agree with PX … I personally like to use the decline press and dips because I’m shoulder dominant. Da_freak (bodybuilder I’m training) also respond best to declines.
I also like this exercise in the early phase of the preparatory period of my athletes since many of them have shoulder pains after their season.
BTW, the pec minor is NOT the “upper chest” the pec minor is “underneath” the pec major and its function is an adduction or a depression of the scapula. I have attached a photo of the pec minor.
So, if a movement is a superior exercise for the “pec minor” it really doesn’t say much. At least not when we’re talking about developing a massive physique.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
Actually, that isn’t completely true. Most EMG studies have shown INCLINES to affect the pec minor more. I do flat and inclines. The only reason I would recommend someone to add declines as a priority is if their shoulders are constantly taking the brunt of most of the force during the movement. [/quote]
It is possible that the authors of the iEMG study (Bompa and Cornecchia I think) confused “pec minor” and “clavicular head of the pec major” … if that is the case that surely indicates an approximate knowledge of anatomy and biomechanics and I’d be doubtful about their ability to perform a proper iEMG evaluation.
While I don’t disagree with those two presses I do disagree with EMG data as criteria for exercise selection.
More activation doesn’t necessarily mean more development.
I believe EMG activity is greatest for the hamstring in the leg curl and less so for a SLDL. However a much higher load can be utilized in a SLDL than leg curl, thus I believe it has more application for BB purposes (and much more).
[quote]Professor X wrote:
Kael231 wrote:
Here is the first pic…
You are lean. You are not 4.1% and you can not “shape” your chest. You chest is small. Make it bigger. Eat more and quit bullshitting. If your chest measured an extra 6 inches you would see more “shape”. How about not missing anymore meals?[/quote]
Even after the pictures everyone still says that I’m at 14%. I don’t believe my doctor forgot some factor and cut me 10 % short. Maybe my BF is more than the doctor measured but I don’t see how it can be at 14%.
As for the eating, my calory intake is 3200 a day with 180-200 grams of protein. I do eat, I eat my ass off to get that much food in with school and work. My metabolism is through the roof and I find it extremely hard adding weight to myself and even harder to add fat. Before I began working out, I weighed 135 lbs. and was a stick, no muscle definition anywhere, not even a flat chest but a chest that caved into my body. It took quite a while to build myself up, after all it’s harder to build muscle from nothing than it is to build muscle from fat.
As for the weight, I will definately spend time adding more mass to my body as a whole. I never really thought I should start cutting my body as many people thought, I just wanted a way to shape the bottom of my chest to cut off because I’m frequently told by guys at the gym, and friends alike that my bottom chest needs to show more and cut. I guess I should tell them to fuck off and worry about myself and accomplish my goals…after all I’m not even close to 190 lbs. and that is something that I will strive for.
Quite correct.
[quote]Eidolos wrote:
While I don’t disagree with those two presses I do disagree with EMG data as criteria for exercise selection.
More activation doesn’t necessarily mean more development.
I believe EMG activity is greatest for the hamstring in the leg curl and less so for a SLDL. However a much higher load can be utilized in a SLDL than leg curl, thus I believe it has more application for BB purposes (and much more).[/quote]
Kael, you make a lot of sense in your post! BTW, don’t get hung up on body fat numbers … they don’t mean squat. The mirror should be your judge. Some peoples look a lot leaner and muscular even at a higher body fat percentage.
You are also right about trying to put on as much mass as possible, it’s the right approach for you right now.
As for other “big guys” in the gym … let them do their own thing. Learn as much as possible from reliable sources and make up your own idea. Big guys are not always this way because of their sum of knowledge, you know!
BTW, here’s a little graphic I just created which described the function and structure of the pectoral muscle. As you can see the clavicular head (upper pec) and sternal head (rest of the pec) do have a slightly different function. However the sternal head itself only has one, so when you recruit this muscle group it works in its whole. There is no such thing as an outer or inner pec because the muscle fibers run all the way from one attachment to the other; there is no vertical division.
[quote]Kael231 wrote:
Even after the pictures everyone still says that I’m at 14%. I don’t believe my doctor forgot some factor and cut me 10 % short. Maybe my BF is more than the doctor measured but I don’t see how it can be at 14%.
[/quote]
I’d say that you are around 10-12%. Most people have very good abs and some oblique definition at 10%.
Did your doctor use skinfold calipers (pinch test). If so… how many sites did he measure? 3, 4, 5, 7? Did he use a formula to calculate your body fat from these data?
Many people will not use a formula. They only measure the 3-7 sites and calculate the average skinfold. For example if your measures were:
Biceps = 2mm
Triceps = 3 mm
Abdomen = 10 mm
Supra-illiac = 8 mm
Mid-axilary = 3mm
Pectoral= 3mm
Sub-scapular = 7mm
The average if the measures would be roughly 5mm. Then the guy takes this average and freely convert it to a percentage of body fat 5mm = 5%.
THIS IS WRONG!!! Not accurate AT ALL.
You must calculate the BF using a formula (tested on over 10 000 subjects before it was validated) and it’s quite complex.
We’ll just take the 4-folds formula, which is much simpler.
For guys it’s:
[%] = 0.29288x(S) - 0.0005x (S?) + 0.15845x(A) - 5.76377
Where S = sum of the 4 folds (pectoral, sub-scapular, abdomen, mid-axilary)
A = age
So …
0.29288 x 36 - 0.0005 x 1296 + 0.15945 x 17 - 5.76377
So % = approximately 7.5 to 8%
Not a huge difference, but still 3% with the same measures!!! And the 4 folds formula is moderately precise at best.
And what if he uses measures like biceps, triceps, quadriceps and hamstrings which are very thin in most men. That can also screw up the results.
You do seem to have nice shoulder and arm definition, so you are lean. But your abdomen seems soft (can’t really say, very bad lighting) and we have no leg shot so it’s hard to establish whole body fat percentage.
But from what I’m seeing I have a hard believing that you are lower than 10%. Just this year I measured 30 hockey players ranging from 16 to 28 years of age and most of them were really lean, most with more definition than you have. And the lowest one was around 8% and the guy looks like a freak.
I have once measured a guy at 4.2% and he had glutes striations.
That having been said, mirror should be your judge. Skinfold numbers don’t mean much.
[quote]Christian Thibaudeau wrote:
Kael, you make a lot of sense in your post! BTW, don’t get hung up on body fat numbers … they don’t mean squat. The mirror should be your judge. Some peoples look a lot leaner and muscular even at a higher body fat percentage.
You are also right about trying to put on as much mass as possible, it’s the right approach for you right now.
As for other “big guys” in the gym … let them do their own thing. Learn as much as possible from reliable sources and make up your own idea. Big guys are not always this way because of their sum of knowledge, you know!
BTW, here’s a little graphic I just created which described the function and structure of the pectoral muscle. As you can see the clavicular head (upper pec) and sternal head (rest of the pec) do have a slightly different function. However the sternal head itself only has one, so when you recruit this muscle group it works in its whole. There is no such thing as an outer or inner pec because the muscle fibers run all the way from one attachment to the other; there is no vertical division. [/quote]
Good work, CT. The bad thing is, someone will ask this same question next week.
One last thing … even the formulas used the calculate body fat are not very accurate. They were created based on average male (and female) evaluations. It doesn’t apply well to athletes and muscular individuals as it grossly underestimate BF %.
As an anecdote I had my BF measured by a Ph.D. in exercise science that actually teaches a university class on how to perform various physiological tests. And my result came out at around 1.5% using the 7 folds formula. At the time I was closer to 10% Just goes to show how reliable these formulas are. If you are an average person (15-18% body fat without much muscle mass) it will be relatively accurate. But with athletes, no way.