Hot answers tagged bodybuilding
43
In general, training while sore is perfectly fine and usually beneficial, subject to a few caveats discussed below. Almost every serious athlete frequently trains while still a bit sore from the previous workout.
Image from the wikipedia article:
The first thing to understand is supercompensation: a short while after training, your muscles end up a bit ...
40
To gain good weight, to bulk, to add muscle, you need to:
Stimulate growth by lifting heavy
Provide fuel for growth by eating a lot
Prioritize your goal by getting your life in order
Most healthy people who do these things gain weight. Mostly muscle.
1. LIFT HEAVY
Tell your body that it needs to get bigger by lifting heavy.
Either buy a barbell and a ...
26
Age and genetics are the major factors in testosterone generation. It peaks in your 30s and drops steadily thereafter. There are some things you can actively do to increase testosterone level, but the effects will be miniscule compared to what your age and genetics have already given you.
Kraemer et al, 1991; Kraemer et al 1990:
High volume, multiple ...
17
First of all, don't worry about "becoming a hulk." The average guy who works out 3-4 times a week and eats a reasonable diet will never get past the fit/toned stage you're looking for.
Second, the key to a good beginner program is KISS: keep it simple, stupid. The only thing you need to worry about is 1) consistently stress your muscles by working out ...
14
Certainly there is a correlation between muscle mass and strength, but there is more to the story. Two reasons why muscle mass and strength may not be completely congruous are:
Muscle fiber density
Muscle utilization
Density:
Your muscles are composed of four different types of fibers (slow-twitch, and three forms of fast-twitch). These fibers have ...
14
Take a look at this article on Alcohol and Nutrition Facts. It's pretty long, so I'll try to summarize the high points.
Unlike proteins, carbs, and fats it cannot be stored by the body, so it takes precedence over all other metabolic functions.
The enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase helps in metabolizing alcohol, but what it can't metabolize is absorbed by the ...
13
Toning exercises are done to teach the body to more efficiently conserve it's resources (such as oxygen) and to build endurance. Doing that many reps with that light of weights is likely not achieving much of an effect at all. Your muscles are developed by use, and that easy of an exercise relates closer to cardio than to a true workout.
Simply put, ...
13
If you are looking to build mass, you should rest 45-60 seconds between sets of 8-12 repetitions for optimal gains. This timing builds optimal muscle mass and hypertrophy.
If instead you are looking to improve your strength or endurance, you should be looking at a 3-4 minute break between sets. You'll want 4-6 repetitions with heavier resistance for ...
12
Wide pull-ups
Source: This blog.
I can't believe nobody has mentioned this yet. The muscle that gives the overall appearance of 'broad shoulders' is the 'Latissimus dorsi' or your 'lats'. Wide pull-ups are a great exercise for targeting this region as well as your shoulders (deltoids), arms (both biceps and triceps), and forearms (from gripping the bar).
...
12
It is quite well known, that average adult human being needs about 8 hours of sleep a day.
In terms of feeling well rested, It does not matter how long you sleep, rather what quality is the sleep You are getting. The same goes for muscle building. Sleeping 7-8 hours every day would be the optimum. More than that, and you risk oversleeping, which, in my ...
11
If you want size, you don't want to rest very long - perhaps under a minute between sets. Your goal in the gym is to get your muscles as fatigued as possible as quickly as possible (and then go home to eat!)
I'm currently doing a hybrid workout to gain size (but I still want to work on strength a little, which is generally my long-term goal) and my workout ...
11
Another option for building your shoulders is the Shoulder Press.
Front Raises will also help build your shoulders.
To build any muscles, it's important to do a variety of different exercises that target different muscles in the same area.
As @Adam pointed out, military presses and exercises that target large muscle groups is critical to building ...
11
The Four Hour Body examines a couple "protocols" for increasing testosterone, albeit with the goal for increased sexual performance rather than muscle development:
Protocol 1: Long-term and Sustained
Fermented cod liver oil + vitamin-rich butter fat - 2 capsules
upon waking and before bed.
Vitamin D3 - 3,000-5,000 IU upon waking and before ...
10
Taken from here:
Standing Military Press
The military press is in league with squats, deadlifts, and bench presses as one of the mandatory exercises for all serious weight lifter. If you are not overhead pressing you are not really lifting. This is the ultimate compound pressing exercise for your shoulders.
Video
10
The full answer is beyond my scope of understanding; however, there is only one time in a trainer's life where they can build muscle and lose fat at the same time. That's when they are a beginner and are currently obese. Based off of information from Dr. Kilgore in "Practical Programming for Strength Training" we have a couple variables for building ...
10
Unless you are already strong, this is the wrong plan. Putting bodybuilding before strength training does not make any sense.
Strength Then Bodybuilding
Virtually everyone in the strength and bodybuilding community agrees: one becomes a bodybuilder by developing a base of strength and mass first, then targeting specific muscles and body-composition work. ...
10
Rippetoe & Kilgore describe in Practical Programming why many trainers--particularly strength trainers, and most particularly weightlifting trainers--eschew crunches:
The lower back is supported from the anterior by the abs, and ab work done correctly, protects and assists lumbar stability. "Done correctly" means that the abs are strength-trained, as ...
10
Sure it's possible, but it depends on what you are personally willing to sacrifice.
There are 168 hours in a week. Even if you work 60 hours in a week and sleep 56, that leaves 52 hours of the week available. If you are single without kids, it is plenty of time to get in the workouts needed to shape your physique the way you want.
However, it will require ...
9
There are two key concepts to understand when trying to get stronger:
Overload. The disruption of homeostasis, where the body must adapt and hypercompensate in order to handle that demand in the future.
Recovery. The rest, nutrients, and calories your body needs to support hypercompensation.
So yes, you do need to continue to increase weight in order ...
9
Once And For All Time: Protein Shakes Are Not Magical
We get a lot of protein shake questions. What should I put in it? and when should I drink it? and will my spleen explode if there's ice in it? The mysteries of protein shakes are many, and the science is weak.
Protein Shakes Are Just Protein...In Shake Form
Here's the deal: don't overcomplicate ...
9
So far, of the books I've read, Practical Programming for Strength Training by Dr. Kilgore and Mark Rippetoe seems to be the closest to what you are asking. The biggest challenge you will find, and it's called out by Dr. Kilgore in the first chapters, is that most exercise and fitness research is spent on beginners and basic levels of fitness. There is ...
9
Make this website your best friend: http://www.t-nation.com/
Here's a little checklist I wrote for myself.
BULKING: after figuring out calorie needs bump up the number 600-1,000 calories every single day
more calories per bite
add olive oil to everything
big Ziploc bag fill w/ almonds, cashews, raisin, peanuts, M&Ms, snack throughout the day
protein ...
9
Does an alternate form minimising quad and hamstring development exist?
No, there isn't a squat that minimizes quad and hamstring development. If you don't want your legs to get stronger, just skip lifts that involve them.
Might it be preferable to substitute in power cleans for one of the squat workouts?
It depends what your goals are. If you want to ...
9
You're already doing the first and most important thing: you're working the upper body more than your lower, since you're on GreySkull LP rather than a more squat-and-lower-body-pull program like StrongLifts or Starting Strength.
It is important to note that you're entering the realm of bodybuilding at this point: developing aesthetics instead of strength, ...
8
There are established ways for externally measuring virtually every muscle group in the body, most of which require little more than a flexible tape measure. Based on this page:
Neck - Measure at the thinnest part, usually just under the chin, above the Adam's Apple.
Chest - three measurements:
Chest contracted (made as small as you can by ...
8
Sorry to disappoint you, but having lots of time is not necessary at all for getting your body in top shape, and it won't contribute to your gains. For better or worse, the program I recommend (based on current scientific research) simply doesn't take very long:
Strength training with standard compound exercises, which are bench press, squat, deadlift and ...
8
Body-building is an individual pursuit that requires specific understanding of the individual in question. A general beginner's course would be so simple as to be useless - there is no sense in writing a body-building guide for average height adult males under 60 kg; they have much more fundamental problems. Likewise, 120 kg average height females should not ...
7
I don't have a source, but there is no such thing as "improving the shapeliness of existing muscle" - you are either adding, maintaining, or decreasing the amount of your muscle mass. You can't improve the appearance of your muscles without either adding muscle mass or decreasing fat percentage.
A lot of the discussion of "toning" seems to come out of a ...
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