Not needing to cook
Still lost me there, I’m afraid.
It needs to be read with tongue firmly in cheek
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Just in time for a World Series appearance! Great Timing! Go Braves!
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Yup! And UGA is on pace to win a national title as well.
The Falcons… eh… But I’m a Panthers fan and hate them anyway
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So if you didn’t tag the wrong person, why are you tagging me?
I’ve trained more times today than you have in the last 2 months.
You said I have one lower-body day. I squat, a lot.
I think you have the wrong person.
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That’s the spirit!
Anyway, that’s a big move, I hope it goes smooth and y’all get settled in nicely.
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You ever try cooking with cool whhip as the main ingredient?
Honest question. I haven’t. I’ve done a couple of no-bakes but there it is in the name. No-bakes.
An old friend of mine is really into this subject and rebellion against the social/structural way that driving and car culture has changed America. This subject does have some teeth to it.
We grew up in an old mining company style borough where everything was within walking distance, and as kids walked Everywhere! It really is significantly different now. No more small grocers/butcher shop type places. A lot of neighborhoods are now huge cul-de-sac type developments off of a highway access, shopping in bulk. All good points.
His solution was to move to Colonial era of Harrisburg where the place was built and still has a lot of infrastructure from pre automotive America.
Somewhat telling though that he has the mobility to make a lifestyle adjustment like that. Not everybody can simply do that.
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I don’t 100% know what cool whip is (I’m imagining some form of laboratory grown spreadable marshmallow?), but I’m pretty confident we don’t have it on this side of the pond.
I remember reading a passage in a Bill Bryson book somewhere which detailed his attempts to walk a fairly modest distance through an American town and being blown away. As a European, I found it very hard to imagine not being able to walk around. Sadly, this is slowly changing. While still incredibly rare, there are now places which are essentially off limits without a car.
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Thanks @FlatsFarmer!
@SkyzykS I think you and @EmilyQ make a good point that there are definitely pockets in America where you can get way from highway living, but, like you say, you have to purposefully seek those geographies.
@dagill2 I think what’s in your favor is the vast majority of your infrastructure was built prior to the car as the standard mode of transportation; it definitely slows the highway expansion.
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100% And in turn, I becomes possible for large portions of the population to live car-less. Not having a car is not that unusual in the UK. My dad didn’t learn to drive until his mid-30s, by which point he had 2 grown up kids and a payed off mortgage. My better half has neither a car, nor driving licence at 34, and those are just examples in my very immediate family. It becomes a chicken/egg kind of a thing.
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That’s actually really cool. Living downtown in major cities can enable that here, but it’s expensive and still kind of a hassle
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If I could avoid the expense of two cars for my family I definitely would.
We lived without any cars in the household for a few years, pre-kids. It was a very freeing time in many ways, if I didn’t need the car for work, I’d consider doing it again.
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Might I suggest shifting this hijack to one of y’alls training logs instead of pulling this dude’s thread further off-topic.
I’m glad we solved the Cool Whip dilemma, but I think we need to get back to making sure his training and diet are sorted out before he wastes the better part of another decade with a poor plan.
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The OP peaced out haha. He decided he already knew exactly what he needed to do all along.
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Ok I apologize, I just needed some time to regroup. Maybe I am just thinking I know better than I really do and in fact my training/diet program all are atrocious. The reason I said I think volume works better for me was because I really never made any progress with 5x5 or programs similar to that (maybe due to diet and other factors). I also kind of really like this type of split and I like working out 6 times a day preferably in 8-12 rep range:
Chest/Tris
Shoulders/Legs
Back/Bis
As far as diet goes, I have now subscribed to a healthy lean bulk meal prep service (https://www.fuelmeals.com/). My BMR was 1568 from the lab test so my TDEE should be roughly 1.725x1568 = 2700, aiming at macros around: 250P, 100F, 200C from this meal prep. It’s all pretty clean food (no coolwhip, none of that).
I think right now I am just far too weak to try to lose/cut weight and I’m going to end up in exact the same cycle I have been in where I constantly switch between cut and bulk, I just started “bulking” since August and been gaining some strength at least. I want to give lean bulking a try, my waist is only 32.5" (its still not ideal but its not obese), I think I just really lack muscle which drives up my body fat %.
So if this diet looks sorted out ^, I guess training is the next one to look at once again. This is what I’m currently running as an example of chest and shoulders:
Chest/Tris:
3xAMRAP (as long as AMRAP >= 6 and <= 12) flat dumbbell bench press, always try to increase. rep each session in any (or all) of the sets, up 5 lbs on the set if 12 reps are hit
3x8-12 decline bench pin machine (RPE 8-9 usually)
3x8-12 chest press machine (RPE 8-9)
3x15-20 rope chest flies
4x8-15 tricep extension machine, last set drop set
4x8-12 tricep pressdown, last set dropset
Volume wise, it doesnt look too bad? I guess the main faults were that there is no barbell bench press (is that really necessary?) and that I am going AMRAP every single time
Shoulders:
3xAMRAP (as long as AMRAP >= 8 and <= 12) dumbbell shoulder press, always try to increase. rep each session in any (or all) of the sets, up 5 lbs on the set if 12 reps are hit
2x10-15 dumbbell shoulder press with lighter weight
4x8-12 lateral raises dumbbell
4x8-12 rear delt fly
4x8-15 dumbbell shrugs
These are 2 of the “sample” things I am running, I generally like high volume and higher reps and more easily progressed in this (since its always easier to increase a rep in this range compared to 3-6 which I tried in the past unsuccessfully). And I just run this loop 2x a week (so working out 6x a week).
My main goal is just aesthetics, want to gain some size (and then cut down), I don’t really care about strength but I kind of realize without strength the size isn’t coming. That being said, from my research the 8-12 rep range is pretty good for hypertrophy purposes as long as progressive overload is there (and avoiding risks of injury from going over capability weight-wise). I also have read that volume is the key driver for muscle growth.
Now if you are still baring with me, I have regrouped myself and would like to really understand what you think is the optimal approach for this main goal above (please keep in mind, strength is secondary, I’d be perfectly happy if I could bench 135 but look like one of the goal pics i sent, that however isn’t happening with 135 bench). I also would like if it it is possible to stick to my split and keep the rep range somewhat high and also have time for things like isolations.
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Hey dude,
I dunno about anyone else, but I appreciate you coming back and talking about making some meaningful changes. I had written you off - I love being proved totally wrong in situations like this.
I never got much out of flat bench, to be honest. I do think incline or decline bench are good options as well, but I’m definitely not in the group that thinks BB benching is necessary to have a decent looking chest or grow size. To directly answer your question - in my opinion, no, barbell bench is not necessary, whatsoever.
Assuming you meant 6 times a week - you can also do this, but the volume of the workout you put out there means you’d be doing 40 sets of chest a week, and 34 sets of shoulders, not counting the fact that chest work involves shoulders and all the other carryover. So yes - it looks like we have some strong and aesthetically pleasing people here who have gotten good results from 6 times a week, but - again, just my opinion - you can tone down the volume if you want to keep the frequency this high. I think the 8-12, or even the 8-20 rep range, is great for hypertrophy, so go ahead and run with that if you want to.
If you’re willing to make more of a serious change, I think it’s just a good exercise to find a program written by a professional with a track record of getting results out of people, and follow it to the T - this gives you experience, discipline, and some ideas to implement when you structure your own training program.
I honestly think the program @j4gga2 suggested, which I have suggested in the past to many people, is your best option here.
It was suggested to me by one of the pro bodybuilders who frequents this site, and it gives you a great deal of freedom in terms of days per week, exercise selection, etc. Gives you a LOT of tools to learn how to structure your own bodybuilding program, and it’s built to meet the type of goals you’re looking for.
Basically, I think if you’re handing over your nutrition to a meal prep plan at this point, you should hand over your programming to someone who knows what they’re doing, and then you can decide for yourself, after following the program TO A T, what you liked about your own programming, and what you could have improved on.
Once again, I love being proved wrong in these situations, so do me a favor and prove me wrong here. Start a log in the training log section too, if you want.
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Don’t worry about that. Trust in the process and start thinking long term.
Just put in the work and let the magic happen.
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Thanks a lot! appreciate it, the “no-nonsense 5 day training split” looks kind of cool, although it is only doing Chest once per week which I read was sub-optimal since frequency out-does a lot of extra volume all done in a day?