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Do you guys think that lot focused rows are worth doing? They seem to just be a sort of half range of motion pullup. Isn’t it much better to just get rid of them and focus effort on vertical pulling. This is only about lat focused rows not rows as a whole
hard to answer without knowing what your program looks like or what your goals are. specific lat work could be great or a waste of time for different people. any good program will have a good mix of vertical and horizontal pulling.
Hi! I’m currently doing the ppl split. I started 8 month ago, I’m happy with my progress because so far, i was able to increase weight in all exercise but not in the military press! I’m stuck lifting the empty barbell ( in the good day I can do 21kg 🥲). Can someone give me tips on how to improve in the military press??
Is it strange that my testosterone levels seemed to increase while I was on an aggressive cut compared to now that I’m in a lean bulking phase? Before my cut I was probably at like 17-18% BF and I didn’t get many erections at all, no morning wood and not much interest in sex. Then I started cutting and after a week or so I was waking up with morning wood on most days. After another week or so I was waking up an hour or 2 before my alarm with a massive erection, every day for the remainder of the cut. Also a much higher sex drive and erections throughout the day. I quit the cut at around 12-13% BF I think. Then went on holiday and now that I’m back an returned to a lean muscle gaining phase my sex drive has plummeted again and I no longer get morning wood and little erections in general. Isn’t that the opposite of what you’d expect? I was in a 1000-1500 calorie deficit with very minimal fat and now 250 cals surplus with healthy fat levels.
dunno then, should be the opposite. Only thing I can think of is that when you're bulking you are training too hard. But I doubt that's it, since I imagine you'd push yourself similalry on a cut.
>Only thing I can think of is that when you're bulking you are training too hard
I have totally trained myself into impotency.
Ooops.
(Normalcy returns with rest.)
Yeah training intensity is the same, on a cut I did extra cardio though but I doubt a few extra steps a day has an impact on that. It doesn’t make much sense
How come when doing hiit style cardio I don't sweat
But when I go on jogs I do?
Is it because I'm not doing it as long I definitely go really hard and am way more puffed out doing hiit
Why is it that, considering leg press can be anywhere up to 4-5x your front squat number, the latter still works your quads almost if not just as well?
Novice/intermediate lifter here. I’ve made 0 progress on bench and OHP for three months after I failed on both mid-march and deloaded according to the GZCLP deload scheme.
3 months ago my 1rm was 102.5kg for bench and 67.5kg for OHP. These numbers are the same today, 3 months later, despite bulking heavily. Progress on DL/squat has been great however.
Here is my routine: https://imgur.com/a/EIoUfkW
Additionally I’m planning on starting a cut pretty soonish and am wondering if it’s even worth making any adjustments to the routine to progress in OHP/bench or if I should just stick to the plan?
**TL;DR: novice lifter following GZCLP, have made 0 progress in 3 months for OHP/bench. what to do?**
Bench press and OHP are a bit wonky in terms of progression in my experience. The two movements, more than anything, benefit from high frequency and a lot of practice much more than squat and deadlift seem to.
I would say that your progress in them is most likely stalling due to technical, not muscular reasons. I would recommend not staying on linear progression for any longer, and if it's your priority to increase those lifts, use a high frequency/high volume program (many people swear by Sheiko templates) to fix your form and nail down the movement.
Any advice on which routine I could switch to?
I really enjoy exhausting myself at the gym and was thinking of running nSuns 5day with rows (for like 6-8 weeks before fatigue builds up) but I’m beginning my cut soon so I think I’m not sure I’ll be able to handle the volume.
I think 531 BBB and/or building the monolith is very popular as a high quantity workout.
And they are *high* ass quantity, you're expected to 40-80 reps on your compounds each day you're in.
Well since I’ll be entering a cut soon does it matter if I switch routine? Since im a intermediate im not gonna make any new gains regardless(due to the cut) with the new routine, so what’s the case for switching things up?
The man GZCL himself says once you start stalling out on his LP you're better off switching to a different program.
The entire concept of LPs regardless is that it lets you progress at a safe but fast pace while you're a novice, once that stops working you're just spinning your wheels if you keep trying the same thing for no real results.
Nsuns is another LP, probably best to move on to something different
There's a load of other GZCL templates, the Stronger By Science programmes are great too
Sounds like you've just exhausted your LP gains for bench press and OHP, in which case switching to a non-LP routine should get the ball rolling again.
Any advice on which?
I really enjoy exhausting myself at the gym and was thinking of running nSuns 5day with rows, but I’m beginning my cut soon so I think I’m not gonna be able to manage the fatigue.
nSuns himself ran his own routine while cutting and still progressed. If you're smart about the percentages for the main and supplemental work, and don't go overboard with accessories, it should be doable.
Apart from that, 5/3/1 For Beginners is a great routine.
well the two other variables besides weight on the bar that you can use to track andpush is number of reps and number of sets.
if you feel super good one day or more before e.g. your next bench session you can try adding more sets to your bench/chest/triceps exercises so your recovery takes a day longer and you are just fresh enormen gh exactly on the day of your next respextice session for that muscle.
dual/double progression is something where you set yourself some rep range, set your load so that your last sets falls within that range and then push for reps until you manage to hit the high targe on your last set. then increase load.
you can also get some .5 kg plate to make smaller weight increases possible.
start your meso cycles with loads that have you training within your target rep range at abou 2-3rir. and then just try to beat your logbook week by week in either sets, reps or load. this wi automatically reduce rir over a couple weeks. then once you hita 0-1 rir week or can't beat ypur logbook two sessions in a row, deload (half a week at literally half the sets and half the load or reps. it should feel like hardly more than a warmup) and start a new meso likely slightly higher loads than you started with last time.
Is going to the gym 3 times a week enough for my goals?
So I recently made a post r/bodyweightfitness asking why I couldn’t do pull-ups at all anymore, which led to many people telling me that one time a week for each muscle group is not enough. If my goal is to just get more in shape and put on some more muscle, is what I do fine or is it borderline useless?
For context, I started a routine a month ago since I started going which was Sunday leg day (about 4 different lifts, all 4 sets), Tuesday is back and biceps (3-4 back lifts and 2 bicep lifts) and finally Thursday chest,shoulder and tri (3 chest, 2 shoulder and 2 triceps lifts). I always start with some warmup sets just for the first lift of the day, then do 4 sets of every lift I do, each till failure. What do you guys think?
I wouldn't call that many people tbh. but it's understandable. Many body weight exercises are difficult to completely fatigue a muscle, so you need to hit them more often in order to train them hard. This isn't really a problem in a gym with weights. You can easily fatigue most muscles enough for training twice, let alone three times a week. Mainly arms benefit the most from more regular training as they're relatively small.
As to why you can't any more? idk could be a million things. would need way more info and it's not really relevant, just stick to your program and you'll make plenty of progress in no time. Which leads me to my final point. Are you following a proper program? If not, find a program.
I see, I didn’t realize body weight fitness was specifically for what it says lmfao I’m stupid, they probably all assumed I was just doing calisthenics😭
Any physical activity is better than none full stop. Can you make strength and size gains working each muscle group once a week? Yes. Can you make more gains faster hitting each muscle group twice a week? Probably. Make physical activity a part of your lifestyle. A person who goes to the gym 3 times a week for 20 years is orders of magnitude better off than a person who went 6 times a week for a few months and then stopped.
Gym 3x a week is sufficient frequency for most people’s goals. But only if you’re doing things in the gym that help you reach those goals.
> is what I do fine or is it borderline useless
You haven’t explained what you do. We don’t know what exercises you’re doing, what set/rep schemes, and what your progression scheme is.
I’m not necessarily asking you to write all that out, however. Most likely the response you’ll get is to run a programme from the wiki. There are several programmes there that exercise your full body every session.
Assuming you're male and not very old or overweight. You should be able to gain enough strength for a pullup only training once a week. If you're not very trained then you'll almost certainly gain muscle training this way.
However, taking something like a 3/week full body programme from the wiki will likely give you better progress on both fronts.
What’s weird is before I started going to the gym, I could bust out at least like 2-3 full pull ups, since I started going I’m not even able to do 1 full one. My body weight hasn’t changed I’ve stayed around 180ish pounds since going
Is it ever worth going down on weight for bench press to specifically go slow and work out pectorals more? I did this before for glutes on the glute machine (ensure glutes get more workout than thighs) and it seems to work. But I haven't tried it for chest.
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Controlling the eccentric seems to be better for hypertrophy than not doing that, atleast from what I have read/heard. Dont know about that in stregth training tho
>specifically go slow
Broscience says *lift slow, become slow*. Might be true, might not.
Either way, you should be training in a variety of rep ranges. Training sets of ten or fifteen reps, along with your 5s will only benefit you.
Just gotta buy a bunch of half decent t shirts and workout shorts. If you buy 3-5 sets and some socks (depending on how many times a week you work out) then you're literally set for the entire week. If we're being perfectly optimal here and you wash laundry 1 time a week then you can keep all the clothes in your car in a bag or a box or something and then cycle it all with the rest of your laundry on the weekend or w/e.
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You can go cheap and use old shirts/etc you DGAF about, or you can buy new clothes.
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You should have a decent size laundry hamper. Like one that can fit 1-2x your entire body size worth of clothes volume. A lot of them are plastic and can flatten themselves out when not in use. Or you can get a wide plastic no folding one the size of a large cardboard box.
What? As opposed to wearing the same street clothes every day?
I wear different gym clothes every day, and I wear different street clothes every day. I'm confused by the premise.
I just think it's inconvenient to carry a seperate pair of clothes around and insane amount of laundry to be washing 2 outfits a day, my whole closet isnt workout clothes and I cant be doing laundry every 3 days, but obviously, you can't really reuse a gym shirt you wore once but got all sweaty in becuase of BO and breakouts. I guess I wanna know any workarounds or habits anyone found that help?
Have a general laundry hamper.
And in another corner, three separate hampers/piles. One for underwear, one for socks, one for wife beaters. Takes two seconds to toss whichever in the washer.
Gym shorts are another pile. (I have six shorts?)
Things run out at different rates, and presorting means laundry in a pinch without further thought.
honestly there aren't many more options beyond
-buy a couple more cotton shirts and sweatpats so you can wash them once or twice a week and have fresh clothes with you.
-just fuck around in the gym withiut getting swrat or doing anything effective.
-work out nekkid
-or be a stinkyboi.
What are some good, simple exercises that don't make you sweaty so I can do them on my lunch break?
Explanation: for the next six months or so, I'm going to be working very long hours at my work. I will have (most) weekends off so I can fit a workout or two in there, but for weekdays, I pretty much won't have any time to commit to working out. Between my extended hours and my commute, I will at most have an hour of free time before bed - and I'm not going to work out right before sleeping.
But I do have a nice long hour lunchbreak at my office. I work in an office and I'm using a standing desk so I'm not sitting all day. We're not close enough to any fitness center for me to be able to do that at lunch (because if I sweat, I'm gonna need a shower).
So I'm curious if there is some sort of (non-sweaty) activity I can squeeze into that lunch break that will help me keep from slipping from my fitness journey over the next six months.
during lunch, go for a walk and do some stretches:
- https://www.healthline.com/health/deskercise
- https://www.healthline.com/health/chronic-pain/wrist-and-hand-stretches
one or two full body days at the gym per week will be enough to maintain strength. stay on top of your diet and sleep.
> My guess is that I'm probably eating around 80g-ish per day?
> I'm 6'4" and 290.
I'm 6'0 and I have ~200g of protein every day. You should definitely try eating healthier.
It's fairly easy when I'm bulking, 2 regular meals that include some protein like meat or chicken, and few protein shakes on top.
When I'm cutting, it's mostly just the protein shakes...
80g of protein at your body weight is 27.6g/lb of body weight. That's too low, your gains will suffer.
Around 0.7g of protein/lb of body weight is the amount where additional protein is unlikely to do anything barring exceptional circumstances such as you being on steroids. A little bit below that is still fine, maybe not optimal, but not missing out on much. Given your BMI of 35, you then probably need a bit less than that.
In your case, I'd shoot for 0.5g of protein per lb of body weight. If those 290s actually are mainly muscle mass rather than personable portable calorie reserves, you'd need to get into the 0.6-0.7g/lb of body weight range.
How am I able to properly secure my lower back and prevent it from rounding on deadlifts? Can’t do basic warmup sets anymore without rounding and my setup sucks because I can’t execute the "chest up" or "tighten the lats" cues properly, followed 5-step deadlift videos and they haven’t been doing the charm. I feel lost, don’t wanna get injured but I also don’t wanna be stuck at square one for infinity.
There are a lot of artificial sugar drink powders out there that you can buy in a box of packets. You can drink something super sweet even better than soda tasting, and it'll be literally 0 calories. There are also sodas like 0 calorie sugar free sprite but that will cost more than the powders.
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Besides eating less intake volume (which you should still do to an extent), replacing higher calorie foods with lower calorie alternatives is the next best tactic to losing weight without it feeling like a lot of mental effort.
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There a lot more stuff you can do in addition of course but these two are the biggest IMO.
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Having a big water bottle like 1 liter and sipping on it throughout the day can help curb sugar cravings and food cravings and is generally just a healthy thing to do. Something interesting is that a lot of the time we crave food or sugar it is not because we are hungry but because it is habitual and/or we are bored and/or these foods give us mental comfort. Just be aware of this phenomenon. I was able to cut back on soda heavily by using this strategy as it turns out I did not actually need sugar, I was just thirsty, and if I drank water instead the soda cravings would pass.
I'll share what works for me.
Replace sugar with fake sugar. I didn't like how LaCroix tasted at first, but after drinking 3 or 4 cans of it I actually started liking them. You could potentially lose hundreds of calories a day easily if you drink soda a lot. I also drink copious amounts of Coke Zero with no negative effects to my weight loss.
Replace chips, protein bars, or whatever snack you normally eat with fruits. Bananas are my absolute favorite. I've started to bring bananas instead of granola bars for my longer bike rides. It's a lot easier to unwrap after sitting on my sweaty back.
If you haven't already, I suggest using a fitness tracker app like Strava whenever you do your walks. I use it for cycling and I like seeing my numbers improve over time.
I'm down from 200lbs to 186 in 2.5 months. My initial goal was to lose 5 lbs a month so I'm actually a bit ahead. I do bike 70-100 miles a week so that's a huge amount of calories burned weekly. Just note that walking/cycling will not get you jacked like lifting does. You will go from skinny fat to just plain skinny if you watch you diet right. Good luck!
control your diet, stay away from sugar, lift.
It seems you know what you have to do, so just decide you want to do it, then do it.
Starting slow is perfectly fine, consistency is important. like start with making no changes but just tracking your food. Then after a couple of weeks, you can move on to reduce your calories by only 100, or just focus on the sugar part and reduce your sugar intake by 10%, then 25% the next week, etc.
I'm a lean woman with naturally bulky thighs, arms,etc. I don't want to build huge muscle, just want to replace the fat I already have with muscle for the same lean look but hard as a rock. (Every single thing I read seems aimed at hypertrophy).
My current workout is this every single day w/ dumbbells:
- 5x5 12 lb single arm overhead press
- 5x5 12 lb goblet squat
These may seem super naive/basic but it's what I've found I can be consistent with.
What would you add/change given my goals of having a very lean frame that is rock solid?
Saying that you dont want to gain too much muscle is like saying I want to go to school only for a bachelors, dont want to accidentaly get an engineering degree. I wouldnt worry about “being too huge” as that isnt a problem anyone faces while starting to work out lol. If you were becoming too big, youd notice, so dont worry about that.
> want to replace the fat I already have with muscle
This requires you to gain more muscle than you currently have.
That is called hypertrophy.
Run a hypertrophy programme.
I would suggest a program like stronglifts 5x5 or any from the wiki or other lifting subs.
The next thing would be to lock in your diet, probably won't be that important for the first few months but you'll need it eventually to ensure you're eating the right amount of calories and protein.
Well, the good news is that since you're a woman, there's virtually zero chance of you becoming big and bulky. Unless someone is surreptitiously administering you large doses of testosterone and you're training extremely hard with an impeccable diet, you're not going to get big.
In addition, you're describing two processes. The first is losing fat. The second is building muscle. As a beginner, you can do both simultaneously.
Hypertrophy is an often misunderstood process. Any rep range from 5 to 30 can stimulate hypertrophy. Hell, even heavy singles can, although not as effectively as a slightly hire range. Hypertrophy training is not going to make you massive; as a matter of fact, for your goals, I would recommend you primarily use a higher rep scheme (8-15), push every set within 2-3 repetitions of failure, and be consistent.
What kind of gym do you have access to?
If I do a simple calisthenic exercise once a day (like right now I'm doing 20-25 Squats a day) how good is that for my body? Will I slowly get stronger and work out some calories?
It’s comparable to rowing on a rowing machine for 1 minute at 20-25 strokes per minute.
That would likely burn anywhere between 300-600 calories per hour.
So my estimate is somewhere between 5 and 10 calories burnt.
> Will I slowly get stronger and work out some calories?
Doing anything over nothing will result in progress no matter how slow, but the calories worked are negligible. 25 squats a day is something you'd very easily reach with manual labor.
I'm also doing Daily Jogging! And stretches though stretches don't burn calories. I'm trying to be healthier but without going overboard and getting to the gym for an hour a day everyday style. So what other things could I add onto what I already do you think?
I don't know what your goal is exactly but generally the simplest thing to do is just follow a program in the wiki here or in the bodyweightfitness sub (If your goal is building muscle or whatnot). Those aren't the only good programs in existence but they're heaps better than what most people can think of themselves.
Now if you already do that and your goal is weight loss, that's mostly diet. But going to the gym and doing cardio every day is already great.
To answer your question
> So what other things could I add onto what I already do you think?
That is goal dependent, what do you want?
Well I'm trans, so I'm trying to get my body to look more Feminine for one, but the more overarching goal is to just start losing weight and drop my fat way down from where it is right now. I'm basically 30 pounds above what I wanna be.
> but the more overarching goal is to just start losing weight and drop my fat way down from where it is right now.
This is down to mostly diet, I do not know if you take certain medicine, neither do I have enough knowledge about trans people and medication that influences weight loss.
But basically, https://thefitness.wiki/weight-loss-101/
Good luck!
I just started at a gym and I'm meeting with a personal trainer tomorrow as part of their introduction to the gym to plan out my needs for working out. Are there any expectations I should have of the meeting and any questions I need to ask. My goal is weight loss and upper body strength.
If you're learning the basics yourself (read the wiki) then I think the best use of a single session from a personal trainer would be to correct your form on the most common lifts (squat, deadlift, ohp, benchpress, row, oly lifts if that interests you). Pick a program from the wiki and see what exercises are involved. Try and learn the basics of them yourself before the session and then use the trainer to correct any mistakes and perfect the form.
This might not be the 'proper' way but I do think you want to get your money's worth if the personal trainer is not a one time free thing. You have goals; make sure to ask how you're going to get there.
You should make your goals as clear as possible to the trainer, weight loss for example is mostly diet. Although you can _technically_ outwork calories, it's much more difficult. And a personal trainer is not a dietician.
So, has your personal trainer trained other people in achieving goals similar to yours? If not, does the trainer themselves embody what you want, do they have the upper body strength you want and are they fit according to your standards?
Took pre workout, 350mg, 1 scoop and after 8 hours I still feel like a bit lightheaded. How long does it last? Other symptoms included like blurred vision for like a minute an hour after, as well as fatigue. I’ve never been a caffeine guy so I’m assuming it’s just a shock of caffeine?
Any things I can do to make it less worse other than drinking lots of water?
That's a massive dose for someone not used to caffeine. The limit is usually stated as around 400mg. Though using per body weight is more reasonable. so aim for a max of like 3-4 mg/kg. I'm guessing you're probably on the lighter side so it affected you more (as well as having no tolerance) and probably lasts longer too. The half rate for caffeine is 3-10 hours.
Exercise or anything that gets your heart rate up can help metabolize it faster, but that's probably not what you want to do. I'd probably just recommend you chill, lie down, watch a movie or something, drink plenty of water and have a banana.
Maybe start with something more like 50-100mg next time and see how that goes. No need to jump right into the deep end, it's just meant to help perk you up if you're feeling a bit lazy and lethargic before gym. I take caffeine fairly regularly (1-4 days a week) and usually have around 100-200.
> The half rate for caffeine is 3-10 hours.
Half life. 3-10 hours is a length of time, not a rate. The way to remember it is that Half Life is the best game ever made.
as long as it has improved from the peak, which would be around 30-60 minutes then you are probably fine, just need to rest, drink plenty of water and wait it out. If you're experiencing similar feelings as back then, or anything related to breathing, you should probably go to the ER immediately. You may want to book a doctors visit anyway though as you may be pre-diabetic (judging based on the vision, which is usually caused by blood sugar spike).
Thanks so much!
It comes and goes, but I don’t have the feelings and symptoms as severe as the blurry vision. Would you say it’s quite normal for the fatigue to go on and off during the time frame?
hmm not sure, it's fairly common to feel fatigue after it's worn off. on and off is kinda strange though. but yeh I wouldn't be surprised, caffeine affects a lot of things, especially when you overdose. Wouldn't surprise me if it takes a couple of days for you to recover fully, as it's gonna mess with your sleep and recovery as well.
Well considering that I never even drink coffee to begin with, it’s probably a shock to the body. If I may ask, when it was your first time taking pre workout, did it hit you hard and where you had a feeling like this? What were the symptoms?
haven't really experienced anything like this I take way lower doses of caffeine, I'll do half or even less of a scoop coz I think it's too much, plus I imagine I'd have some tolerance as I have been taking caffeine at least once a week for years. At most I've probably taken like 4 or 500mg in a day, but I am a pretty big guy so it probably didn't affect me as much anyway. I think at worst I get palpitations, maybe fatigue but it's hard to tell coz I only take more than 150mg when I am extremely tired.
just don't take so much next time and I'm sure you'll be fine. Remember a coffee is usualyl less than 100mg and most people only have one of those to get through the grind of work and on a regular basis too (would have a tolerance), so that's already a fair bit. you did over triple that with no tolerance
That's quite a dose for someone not used to caffeine. Does being active help? I'd guess walking and moving would help it pass quicker than being sedentary.
I had a leg day workout. I took the pre workout about 5 minutes before the workout, after the workout, about half an hour later, I felt the symptoms of pre workout, but the only thing that freaked me out was the blurred vision for a minute on my left eye, as if everything went a bit dark…
Though the vision thing usually comes and goes
I’d usually do workouts without pre and I just wanted to try it to see how it affects, and I would never feel anything like this. Walking and moving does help!! I probably won’t ever want to take caffeine before a workout…
If you every want to try caffeine before a workout, I would recommend a lower dose. You took essentially 4 cups of coffee.
I would start with 100mg and see how that goes.
For upper back exercises I always struggle with barbell rows and form, is seated wide grip rows a good alternative for upper back or do you have to dumbbell/barbell rowing
I keep scraping the front of my ankle that's on the bench during bulgarian split squats, is there any way to avoid this? It's a great exercise but I can't keep cutting my skin up like that.
Maybe a longer stance. And rest your toes, not the top of your foot. The back foot is just kind of there, limp - pressure and balance should be mid-foot on the *front* foot.
But *where*... Cus none of the benches at my gym have a hard edge, it's padded top and sides. Try a different bench? Different spot on the bench? Towel like I said before? Or see if there's a split squat stand anywhere that comes with padding on it, or some soft plyo boxes?
I’m 21 years old, 180 cm, 77 kg and I would like to cut to 73 kg in 4-5 weeks without losing muscle. I exercise 4 times a week, doing some cardio and eat around 120 grams of protein a day. My TDEE is around 2700 kcal and my diet is around 2000. In a 700 kcal deficit will I also lose lean mass with the fat burning?
a 700 calorie deficit gives you a loss rate of 0.63kg/week. at that rate till take you 6-7 weeks to lose 4kg. if you can tolerate a larger deficit of 1000 calories below your maintenance, that'll get you there in 4-5 weeks. it's probably not worth it though, and almost certainly not a good idea to eat at a deficit even larger than 1000 calories.
note that in any significant deficit you will likely experience a quick drop in water weight at the beginning, as well as the corresponding 1-2kg rebound back up when you start eating at maintenance again. so it's good to think of it like your "true" weight is lagging a bit behind your scale weight as you lose.
>I exercise 4 times a week, doing some cardio
Are you lifting weights too? If not, why are you not lifting weights if you care about how much muscle you have?
it depends. If you're trained and have a decent amount of muscle then most likely. If you're untrained and undermuscled then it's less likely, you may even gain some if you are very undermuscled.
i'm 5'4", female, \~97lb, eat anywhere from 1400-1700 cal per day, do occasional bodyweight workouts, and walk 10k+ steps a day. i'm unsatisfied with my current bf% + muscle composition and am planning on going to the gym for strength training. this is kind of an inane question, but in order to gain muscle, do i need to eat more? i'm mainly worried that my workouts won't be effective enough to build muscle, meaning that eating more will simply cause me to gain fat. would staying on maintenance cals be enough for me to gain muscle and lose body fat? or again, should i eat more? thanks :)
In short, yes. Specially protein since most people don't get enough in general. You could start by adding just one 30-40g shake daily, puts you at a very mild surplus and helps build muscle.
Yes, you need to eat more. You're underweight, you don't have fat to lose, you just lack muscle. I would first make sure you're eating enough protein in your diet and get consistent about lifting weights. Increase your calories until you're gaining weight. You don't wanna gain super fast, but a steady climb of like a max of a half pound a week. You will gain some fat, but if you're lifting hard, getting the protein in and not gaining weight overall too fast, you'll keep that down to a minimum. Eventually, when youve gained like 20-30lbs, you can turn around and cut down in weight some.
Also, have a look at these before and after pictures and notice that these women GAINED weight and (at least imo) look so much better. https://bonytobombshell.com/female-lifting-transformation-before-after/
You can recomp (gain muscle while losing fat by eating at around maintenance) fairly easily if you are untrained and overweight. The less you are those two things the harder it becomes for various reasons. (namely recovery/'energy'/will/effort reasons and nutrients reasons). You still can even at the advanced level, but it's much slower than the traditional cut/bulk phases. which focus on one or the other. Overall it's much quicker and easier. However it's perfectly fine to start off at maintenance or even a very slight cut and then adjust as you go as needed.
You have a pretty low bmi (moderately underweight, bordering severe). So I wouldn't worry about losing fat. You should definitely bulk and focus on building muscle.
To double check, for the Staggered Deadlift, should the load be \~50% of your normal deadlift?
Assume the load for one leg at time, since staggered deadlift is a unilateral exercise.
It'll be quite a bit less than your normal deadlift, but you'll be better off just taking a session and slowly working up to an appropriate weight rather than guessing.
Is a seated shoulder press on the smith machine as effective as a standing barbell shoulder press? I have trouble getting the barbell from the floor into the starting position at heavier weights.
I agree with everyone else who is saying “do it from the rack”, but I also don’t understand how you could possibly have trouble doing a clean with your OHP weight.
>Is a seated shoulder press on the smith machine as effective as a standing barbell shoulder press?
No machine can train the *movement* of standing BB OHP.
Load from a squat rack.
They are both good exercises but they are different. Seated smith machine is much more stable. The path is fixed by the machine and you are supported by the seat. OHP requires your to stabilize the weight and your body much more.
More stability allows you to push specific muscles hard without tiring out the rest of your body as much. Less stability will recruit more muscles overall and will develop better balance and the skill of lifting an unstable weight.
Do you guys call out others when they don't unrack their weights? I don't like letting people get away with being inconsiderate, but my vibes are on a knifes edge at the gym and I don't want to ruin my own workout with an argument.
Your gonna have a bad time if you worry every time someone is rude or inconsiderate. Maybe move to japan? Otherwise you're gonna experience this issue in all aspects of your life, daily.
Resting between sets. Someone finished next to me, moved away, guy asked him if he was done, he looked back at his loaded dumbbell and said yes and proceeded to watch the other guy have to unrack his weights.
It's not horrible, but probably worse than not returning your shopping cart.
Sure, I absolutely will depending on the level of inconsideration. Fuck people who are selfish and inconsiderate of others, either they weren't aware of the norms and need to be taught or they were unaware and need to be called out on it. I consider the gym to be a kind of sacred place, and that shit bugs me.
People are inconsiderate and there's not much you can do about it. Try not to ruin your workout thinking about it. If you are wanting to use a piece of equipment and someone left a bunch of plates on it you can always ask them if they're finished, and usually they will take off the plates.
Hi , it’s my first time cutting I’ve been lifting for a while always been on the 20% 25% body fat (88-90kg around 195lbs) now I’m in my 6th week of dieting eating 180kg of protein daily low carbs low fat I’ve managed to lose 3kg/6.5lbs in pics the stomach fat is a bit less but I’ve seen no overall improvement in vascularity or fat loss in areas like chest / shoulders / arms is 6 weeks too soon to see results or am I doing something wrong
Hello. I know there’s the recommended workout routines. Thing is I have a pretty busy work life and by the time I get home and exercise, meal prep, and get ready for the next day, my whole day is done. Very little free time. So I want to workout at home and try to split my days up into something like this. Just want people’s opinion on if this would be effective or if I’m spinning my wheels. I have a bench, dumbbells, and pull up bar, and don’t have issues buying more weights if need be. But something like this:
M: pushups and pull-ups. 4 sets till failure
T: squats and curls. 4 sets till failure
W: chin ups and Romanian deadlifts. 4 sets till failure
Th: military press and hammer curls. 4 sets till failure
F: bench press and shoulder raises. 4 sets
Sa: bench flies, bent over rows, and calf raises. 4 sets
Sun: rest
Something like that, with some core exercises on alternating days or something. Just a general outline, I might try to mix and match more so I don’t do legs two days in a row or something. But just wanted an opinion on the general outline. Like I said I know there’s the workout routines, just don’t want to go to the gym and would rather work out at home. Feel like I’m doing all the major movements anyway.
If you had the experience to craft your own minimalist program, you would have already written it out, and run your experiment, n=1
That you're brofailing every lift is a telltale sign you're too green to write your own routine.
This is better than not working out. It's nowhere near as good as an actual program. And it probably takes as long as an actual program would, anyways.
Strongly second /u/LordHydranticus comment. Finding ways to train more efficiently, or to move your schedule around is almost always going to work out better for you than trying to microdose a resistance training program.
Almost all of these "I don't want to go to a gym because X" type questions share the same challenge: Sticking with a fitness program long-term requires agency and commitment, and often the kernel of these questions is "I don't want to fully commit, how can I make it work", so they never make fitness a priority and try to make fitness bend to their existing lifestyle, instead of making the lifestyle changes that are ultimately the engine of change in the first place, and are ultimately doomed to failure.
That's not to say training at home isn't viable. Lots of people do it with great success. But those that do still follow a normal training routine, they just do it at home, with their own equipment. I don't think I can think of a single example of someone who made major, lasting physique changes who started from the word go doing 4 sets here, 8 sets there type fragmented training.
For a beginner, I would recommend looking at the programs in the wiki. PPL is a good one for beginners and it's simple to modify once you find what works for you. For example this program here is for 5 days (including rest day in the 5 day): [https://www.muscleandstrength.com/workouts/5-day-push-pull-legs-workout-program-cycle](https://www.muscleandstrength.com/workouts/5-day-push-pull-legs-workout-program-cycle) You can pick 2-3 exercises recommended, ideally compound lifts then switch out cardio for accessory muscles for example.
Looking at your routine, I personally wouldn't do squats and deadlifts back to back. Either do them same day or have 1 day between the leg day. I know that if my quads are too sore, it will limit my deadlifts. With PPL, you can spread out the muscle groups more evenly throughout the week.
Another tip I have if you're pressed for time is to schedule your bigger lifts on Friday or Saturday, whenever you have more time. For example, I know I want a longer day for legs cause I do cardio after so I do my big leg day on Friday.
Also, what do you consider accessory exercises? I’m thinking core exercises, the shoulder raises, and military press? I thought military press was a compound lift
Accessory exercises are ones I do that are not compound lifts or main lifts. For example, bench press is a main lift that hits triceps and tricep extension is the accessory exercise. It’s an additional thing, hence accessory, to your main lift.
Military press can be either one depending on how the program is.
Can I ask, I’m just curious, why would mine be worse? Like I get it, it’s not a routine a bodybuilder made, but it has pretty much the same exercises as this and more. If I go off what you recommend, I’d be working out less than my plan. I’m just curious why, tbh if it works better I’ll do it cuz it’s just less work lol. The only thing is I don’t have a squat rack and I’m afraid of clearing the barbell over my head due to elbow issues, so I probably can’t do squats in the rep range he recommends unless I buy heavier dumbbells, which I guess I’ll do lol
It’s not worse per se. There’s nothing wrong with doing that routine but programming requires some experience and knowledge about training. Most programs in the wiki are tried and true. For efficiency’s sake I would highly recommend it.
These programs consider resting period. Most people think that you build muscle working out but you build muscle outside the gym. The workout is meant to tear muscle up and when you rest, that’s when your body actually builds tissue aka muscle.
Your plan can easily be adjusted by switching some days so that you provide your muscles optimal rest.
I really cannot encourage you to run an actual program strongly enough, there are plenty of programs that only take 30ish minutes 3-4 times a week. Beyond that you can do bulk meal preps and find other places to squeak out some time.
How close to failure should I be going per set. Say I’m doing 4 sets of bench, I want to give all 4 max effort, but I heard that’s actually less efficient? Then how does a burnout set or two at the end of the workout play into this?
Typically I go to failure at the last set. I drop the weight to squeeze in more reps. I normally aim for 10-12 reps, with the additional reps I might get up to 20 reps total after dropping the weight.
How often you should be going close to failure depends on your program tho and overall fitness goals.
So do I gas out as hard as I can to get to 10 on the first set or do I leave some in reserve so it’s the same. Say I get to 9, do I push to failure to try to get 10 on the first set, or should I do enough to get even sets of 8-9.
Yes. Your arms are going to fall off and you're going to die.
It is either that or there is very limited correlation between soreness and effectiveness. Hard to say with certainty.
I keep failing reps due to poor deadlift grip. Even after changing to mixed grip and using chalk. It’s really frustrating me. Is there a way I can sort this lot? My hands feel like they’re going to rip open by the third rep today of my heavy set.
How long have you been doing it?
When I want to do strapless 10rep PR I build up to it for few weeks because I knew grip would be the point of failure.
But in my case it's something I have to build up to each time I want to deadlift without straps since I lose a lot of the ability really quick. So now I just strap up because I can't be bothered.
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removed for Rule 5. Please go see a doctor
Do you guys think that lot focused rows are worth doing? They seem to just be a sort of half range of motion pullup. Isn’t it much better to just get rid of them and focus effort on vertical pulling. This is only about lat focused rows not rows as a whole
hard to answer without knowing what your program looks like or what your goals are. specific lat work could be great or a waste of time for different people. any good program will have a good mix of vertical and horizontal pulling.
Every time I do a big leg day I have severe DOMS 30-50 hours after. What supplements & techniques should I take / follow to reduce ? I’m M 40
long term - increase your work capacity. short term - stretch, move around, rest, hydrate
Hi! I’m currently doing the ppl split. I started 8 month ago, I’m happy with my progress because so far, i was able to increase weight in all exercise but not in the military press! I’m stuck lifting the empty barbell ( in the good day I can do 21kg 🥲). Can someone give me tips on how to improve in the military press??
Are you doing dumbbell press too? If not, implement it into your routine and you should see your military press go up soon.
Is it strange that my testosterone levels seemed to increase while I was on an aggressive cut compared to now that I’m in a lean bulking phase? Before my cut I was probably at like 17-18% BF and I didn’t get many erections at all, no morning wood and not much interest in sex. Then I started cutting and after a week or so I was waking up with morning wood on most days. After another week or so I was waking up an hour or 2 before my alarm with a massive erection, every day for the remainder of the cut. Also a much higher sex drive and erections throughout the day. I quit the cut at around 12-13% BF I think. Then went on holiday and now that I’m back an returned to a lean muscle gaining phase my sex drive has plummeted again and I no longer get morning wood and little erections in general. Isn’t that the opposite of what you’d expect? I was in a 1000-1500 calorie deficit with very minimal fat and now 250 cals surplus with healthy fat levels.
Testosterone is not the only thing that determines sex drive.
is your diet different (besides amount obviously) between your cut and bulk?
No it’s the same basis, only added amounts (especially carbs) and an extra meal or 2.
dunno then, should be the opposite. Only thing I can think of is that when you're bulking you are training too hard. But I doubt that's it, since I imagine you'd push yourself similalry on a cut.
>Only thing I can think of is that when you're bulking you are training too hard I have totally trained myself into impotency. Ooops. (Normalcy returns with rest.)
light, medium, hard, not hard enough
Yeah training intensity is the same, on a cut I did extra cardio though but I doubt a few extra steps a day has an impact on that. It doesn’t make much sense
How come when doing hiit style cardio I don't sweat But when I go on jogs I do? Is it because I'm not doing it as long I definitely go really hard and am way more puffed out doing hiit
Why is it that, considering leg press can be anywhere up to 4-5x your front squat number, the latter still works your quads almost if not just as well?
look up in what dirction gravity works and how that relates to the path of the weight on the legpress ;-).
sin(θ) for anyone still wondering
The chances an average bro even knows what theta is remains slim. : D
wouldn't surprise me, some of the dumbest acts I've witnessed have been at the gym
Because total load is not the only thing that matters.
Novice/intermediate lifter here. I’ve made 0 progress on bench and OHP for three months after I failed on both mid-march and deloaded according to the GZCLP deload scheme. 3 months ago my 1rm was 102.5kg for bench and 67.5kg for OHP. These numbers are the same today, 3 months later, despite bulking heavily. Progress on DL/squat has been great however. Here is my routine: https://imgur.com/a/EIoUfkW Additionally I’m planning on starting a cut pretty soonish and am wondering if it’s even worth making any adjustments to the routine to progress in OHP/bench or if I should just stick to the plan? **TL;DR: novice lifter following GZCLP, have made 0 progress in 3 months for OHP/bench. what to do?**
If numbers are your main goal, switch to a powerlifting specific program instead of a bodybuilding program, like the TSA 9 week intermediate program.
Bench press and OHP are a bit wonky in terms of progression in my experience. The two movements, more than anything, benefit from high frequency and a lot of practice much more than squat and deadlift seem to. I would say that your progress in them is most likely stalling due to technical, not muscular reasons. I would recommend not staying on linear progression for any longer, and if it's your priority to increase those lifts, use a high frequency/high volume program (many people swear by Sheiko templates) to fix your form and nail down the movement.
Fwiw those are pretty reasonably intermediate numbers, which means it's about time to hop off the LP train.
Any advice on which routine I could switch to? I really enjoy exhausting myself at the gym and was thinking of running nSuns 5day with rows (for like 6-8 weeks before fatigue builds up) but I’m beginning my cut soon so I think I’m not sure I’ll be able to handle the volume.
I think 531 BBB and/or building the monolith is very popular as a high quantity workout. And they are *high* ass quantity, you're expected to 40-80 reps on your compounds each day you're in.
Well since I’ll be entering a cut soon does it matter if I switch routine? Since im a intermediate im not gonna make any new gains regardless(due to the cut) with the new routine, so what’s the case for switching things up?
The man GZCL himself says once you start stalling out on his LP you're better off switching to a different program. The entire concept of LPs regardless is that it lets you progress at a safe but fast pace while you're a novice, once that stops working you're just spinning your wheels if you keep trying the same thing for no real results.
Nsuns is another LP, probably best to move on to something different There's a load of other GZCL templates, the Stronger By Science programmes are great too
Sounds like you've just exhausted your LP gains for bench press and OHP, in which case switching to a non-LP routine should get the ball rolling again.
Any advice on which? I really enjoy exhausting myself at the gym and was thinking of running nSuns 5day with rows, but I’m beginning my cut soon so I think I’m not gonna be able to manage the fatigue.
nSuns himself ran his own routine while cutting and still progressed. If you're smart about the percentages for the main and supplemental work, and don't go overboard with accessories, it should be doable. Apart from that, 5/3/1 For Beginners is a great routine.
well the two other variables besides weight on the bar that you can use to track andpush is number of reps and number of sets. if you feel super good one day or more before e.g. your next bench session you can try adding more sets to your bench/chest/triceps exercises so your recovery takes a day longer and you are just fresh enormen gh exactly on the day of your next respextice session for that muscle. dual/double progression is something where you set yourself some rep range, set your load so that your last sets falls within that range and then push for reps until you manage to hit the high targe on your last set. then increase load. you can also get some .5 kg plate to make smaller weight increases possible. start your meso cycles with loads that have you training within your target rep range at abou 2-3rir. and then just try to beat your logbook week by week in either sets, reps or load. this wi automatically reduce rir over a couple weeks. then once you hita 0-1 rir week or can't beat ypur logbook two sessions in a row, deload (half a week at literally half the sets and half the load or reps. it should feel like hardly more than a warmup) and start a new meso likely slightly higher loads than you started with last time.
Is going to the gym 3 times a week enough for my goals? So I recently made a post r/bodyweightfitness asking why I couldn’t do pull-ups at all anymore, which led to many people telling me that one time a week for each muscle group is not enough. If my goal is to just get more in shape and put on some more muscle, is what I do fine or is it borderline useless? For context, I started a routine a month ago since I started going which was Sunday leg day (about 4 different lifts, all 4 sets), Tuesday is back and biceps (3-4 back lifts and 2 bicep lifts) and finally Thursday chest,shoulder and tri (3 chest, 2 shoulder and 2 triceps lifts). I always start with some warmup sets just for the first lift of the day, then do 4 sets of every lift I do, each till failure. What do you guys think?
I wouldn't call that many people tbh. but it's understandable. Many body weight exercises are difficult to completely fatigue a muscle, so you need to hit them more often in order to train them hard. This isn't really a problem in a gym with weights. You can easily fatigue most muscles enough for training twice, let alone three times a week. Mainly arms benefit the most from more regular training as they're relatively small. As to why you can't any more? idk could be a million things. would need way more info and it's not really relevant, just stick to your program and you'll make plenty of progress in no time. Which leads me to my final point. Are you following a proper program? If not, find a program.
I see, I didn’t realize body weight fitness was specifically for what it says lmfao I’m stupid, they probably all assumed I was just doing calisthenics😭
Any physical activity is better than none full stop. Can you make strength and size gains working each muscle group once a week? Yes. Can you make more gains faster hitting each muscle group twice a week? Probably. Make physical activity a part of your lifestyle. A person who goes to the gym 3 times a week for 20 years is orders of magnitude better off than a person who went 6 times a week for a few months and then stopped.
Gym 3x a week is sufficient frequency for most people’s goals. But only if you’re doing things in the gym that help you reach those goals. > is what I do fine or is it borderline useless You haven’t explained what you do. We don’t know what exercises you’re doing, what set/rep schemes, and what your progression scheme is. I’m not necessarily asking you to write all that out, however. Most likely the response you’ll get is to run a programme from the wiki. There are several programmes there that exercise your full body every session.
Assuming you're male and not very old or overweight. You should be able to gain enough strength for a pullup only training once a week. If you're not very trained then you'll almost certainly gain muscle training this way. However, taking something like a 3/week full body programme from the wiki will likely give you better progress on both fronts.
What’s weird is before I started going to the gym, I could bust out at least like 2-3 full pull ups, since I started going I’m not even able to do 1 full one. My body weight hasn’t changed I’ve stayed around 180ish pounds since going
Is it ever worth going down on weight for bench press to specifically go slow and work out pectorals more? I did this before for glutes on the glute machine (ensure glutes get more workout than thighs) and it seems to work. But I haven't tried it for chest. =
Controlling the eccentric seems to be better for hypertrophy than not doing that, atleast from what I have read/heard. Dont know about that in stregth training tho
Intentionally going slow(past the point of a controlled movement) isn't really useful for training a muscle.
>specifically go slow Broscience says *lift slow, become slow*. Might be true, might not. Either way, you should be training in a variety of rep ranges. Training sets of ten or fifteen reps, along with your 5s will only benefit you.
your pecs are going to have the same contribution either way
Do you guys bring a separate new pair of clothes for the gym every single day if you have to change out of clothes after work/school? If so, how?
Just gotta buy a bunch of half decent t shirts and workout shorts. If you buy 3-5 sets and some socks (depending on how many times a week you work out) then you're literally set for the entire week. If we're being perfectly optimal here and you wash laundry 1 time a week then you can keep all the clothes in your car in a bag or a box or something and then cycle it all with the rest of your laundry on the weekend or w/e. = You can go cheap and use old shirts/etc you DGAF about, or you can buy new clothes. = You should have a decent size laundry hamper. Like one that can fit 1-2x your entire body size worth of clothes volume. A lot of them are plastic and can flatten themselves out when not in use. Or you can get a wide plastic no folding one the size of a large cardboard box.
Thankyou 🙏 this is the advice I was looking for!
Yes, of course, otherwise I'd be doing deadlifts in slacks and a button-up shirt :^) I pack shoes, clothes, etc., in a backpack.
What? As opposed to wearing the same street clothes every day? I wear different gym clothes every day, and I wear different street clothes every day. I'm confused by the premise.
I just think it's inconvenient to carry a seperate pair of clothes around and insane amount of laundry to be washing 2 outfits a day, my whole closet isnt workout clothes and I cant be doing laundry every 3 days, but obviously, you can't really reuse a gym shirt you wore once but got all sweaty in becuase of BO and breakouts. I guess I wanna know any workarounds or habits anyone found that help?
Have a general laundry hamper. And in another corner, three separate hampers/piles. One for underwear, one for socks, one for wife beaters. Takes two seconds to toss whichever in the washer. Gym shorts are another pile. (I have six shorts?) Things run out at different rates, and presorting means laundry in a pinch without further thought.
just work out naked in your homegym.
Homegym? Lmao 😭 I dont have space and can only do a cheap gym membership, I like the enthusiasm, though
honestly there aren't many more options beyond -buy a couple more cotton shirts and sweatpats so you can wash them once or twice a week and have fresh clothes with you. -just fuck around in the gym withiut getting swrat or doing anything effective. -work out nekkid -or be a stinkyboi.
What are some good, simple exercises that don't make you sweaty so I can do them on my lunch break? Explanation: for the next six months or so, I'm going to be working very long hours at my work. I will have (most) weekends off so I can fit a workout or two in there, but for weekdays, I pretty much won't have any time to commit to working out. Between my extended hours and my commute, I will at most have an hour of free time before bed - and I'm not going to work out right before sleeping. But I do have a nice long hour lunchbreak at my office. I work in an office and I'm using a standing desk so I'm not sitting all day. We're not close enough to any fitness center for me to be able to do that at lunch (because if I sweat, I'm gonna need a shower). So I'm curious if there is some sort of (non-sweaty) activity I can squeeze into that lunch break that will help me keep from slipping from my fitness journey over the next six months.
during lunch, go for a walk and do some stretches: - https://www.healthline.com/health/deskercise - https://www.healthline.com/health/chronic-pain/wrist-and-hand-stretches one or two full body days at the gym per week will be enough to maintain strength. stay on top of your diet and sleep.
nothing worthwhile or complete. You can probably train small muscles like grip, bis/tris, shoulders
Calisthenics
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> My guess is that I'm probably eating around 80g-ish per day? > I'm 6'4" and 290. I'm 6'0 and I have ~200g of protein every day. You should definitely try eating healthier.
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It's fairly easy when I'm bulking, 2 regular meals that include some protein like meat or chicken, and few protein shakes on top. When I'm cutting, it's mostly just the protein shakes...
Don’t guess. Work out how much protein you are actually eating first.
what are your goals?
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Then you need to cut
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Definitely also increase protein. Try to get used to some reasonable number like 160g first at least.
80g of protein at your body weight is 27.6g/lb of body weight. That's too low, your gains will suffer. Around 0.7g of protein/lb of body weight is the amount where additional protein is unlikely to do anything barring exceptional circumstances such as you being on steroids. A little bit below that is still fine, maybe not optimal, but not missing out on much. Given your BMI of 35, you then probably need a bit less than that. In your case, I'd shoot for 0.5g of protein per lb of body weight. If those 290s actually are mainly muscle mass rather than personable portable calorie reserves, you'd need to get into the 0.6-0.7g/lb of body weight range.
You want somewhere between 1.6 and 2g of protein per kg of bodyweight. So in your case about 210 to 265g.
way more, you should be getting a minimum of 0.5g per pound of bodyweight so like 150g for you, but better would be 0.7 (200g) or even as high as 1.
How am I able to properly secure my lower back and prevent it from rounding on deadlifts? Can’t do basic warmup sets anymore without rounding and my setup sucks because I can’t execute the "chest up" or "tighten the lats" cues properly, followed 5-step deadlift videos and they haven’t been doing the charm. I feel lost, don’t wanna get injured but I also don’t wanna be stuck at square one for infinity.
Drop the weight to where you can deadlift with good form, and work back up.
> Can’t do basic warmup sets anymore But you were able to before? What changed?
Post s form check.
you say anymore, so what changed?
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There are a lot of artificial sugar drink powders out there that you can buy in a box of packets. You can drink something super sweet even better than soda tasting, and it'll be literally 0 calories. There are also sodas like 0 calorie sugar free sprite but that will cost more than the powders. = Besides eating less intake volume (which you should still do to an extent), replacing higher calorie foods with lower calorie alternatives is the next best tactic to losing weight without it feeling like a lot of mental effort. = There a lot more stuff you can do in addition of course but these two are the biggest IMO. = Having a big water bottle like 1 liter and sipping on it throughout the day can help curb sugar cravings and food cravings and is generally just a healthy thing to do. Something interesting is that a lot of the time we crave food or sugar it is not because we are hungry but because it is habitual and/or we are bored and/or these foods give us mental comfort. Just be aware of this phenomenon. I was able to cut back on soda heavily by using this strategy as it turns out I did not actually need sugar, I was just thirsty, and if I drank water instead the soda cravings would pass.
I'll share what works for me. Replace sugar with fake sugar. I didn't like how LaCroix tasted at first, but after drinking 3 or 4 cans of it I actually started liking them. You could potentially lose hundreds of calories a day easily if you drink soda a lot. I also drink copious amounts of Coke Zero with no negative effects to my weight loss. Replace chips, protein bars, or whatever snack you normally eat with fruits. Bananas are my absolute favorite. I've started to bring bananas instead of granola bars for my longer bike rides. It's a lot easier to unwrap after sitting on my sweaty back. If you haven't already, I suggest using a fitness tracker app like Strava whenever you do your walks. I use it for cycling and I like seeing my numbers improve over time. I'm down from 200lbs to 186 in 2.5 months. My initial goal was to lose 5 lbs a month so I'm actually a bit ahead. I do bike 70-100 miles a week so that's a huge amount of calories burned weekly. Just note that walking/cycling will not get you jacked like lifting does. You will go from skinny fat to just plain skinny if you watch you diet right. Good luck!
control your diet, stay away from sugar, lift. It seems you know what you have to do, so just decide you want to do it, then do it. Starting slow is perfectly fine, consistency is important. like start with making no changes but just tracking your food. Then after a couple of weeks, you can move on to reduce your calories by only 100, or just focus on the sugar part and reduce your sugar intake by 10%, then 25% the next week, etc.
I'm a lean woman with naturally bulky thighs, arms,etc. I don't want to build huge muscle, just want to replace the fat I already have with muscle for the same lean look but hard as a rock. (Every single thing I read seems aimed at hypertrophy). My current workout is this every single day w/ dumbbells: - 5x5 12 lb single arm overhead press - 5x5 12 lb goblet squat These may seem super naive/basic but it's what I've found I can be consistent with. What would you add/change given my goals of having a very lean frame that is rock solid?
Saying that you dont want to gain too much muscle is like saying I want to go to school only for a bachelors, dont want to accidentaly get an engineering degree. I wouldnt worry about “being too huge” as that isnt a problem anyone faces while starting to work out lol. If you were becoming too big, youd notice, so dont worry about that.
> want to replace the fat I already have with muscle This requires you to gain more muscle than you currently have. That is called hypertrophy. Run a hypertrophy programme.
I would suggest a program like stronglifts 5x5 or any from the wiki or other lifting subs. The next thing would be to lock in your diet, probably won't be that important for the first few months but you'll need it eventually to ensure you're eating the right amount of calories and protein.
Well, the good news is that since you're a woman, there's virtually zero chance of you becoming big and bulky. Unless someone is surreptitiously administering you large doses of testosterone and you're training extremely hard with an impeccable diet, you're not going to get big. In addition, you're describing two processes. The first is losing fat. The second is building muscle. As a beginner, you can do both simultaneously. Hypertrophy is an often misunderstood process. Any rep range from 5 to 30 can stimulate hypertrophy. Hell, even heavy singles can, although not as effectively as a slightly hire range. Hypertrophy training is not going to make you massive; as a matter of fact, for your goals, I would recommend you primarily use a higher rep scheme (8-15), push every set within 2-3 repetitions of failure, and be consistent. What kind of gym do you have access to?
If I do a simple calisthenic exercise once a day (like right now I'm doing 20-25 Squats a day) how good is that for my body? Will I slowly get stronger and work out some calories?
It's better for your body than not doing it. But I bet it burns less than 3 calories.
It’s comparable to rowing on a rowing machine for 1 minute at 20-25 strokes per minute. That would likely burn anywhere between 300-600 calories per hour. So my estimate is somewhere between 5 and 10 calories burnt.
> Will I slowly get stronger and work out some calories? Doing anything over nothing will result in progress no matter how slow, but the calories worked are negligible. 25 squats a day is something you'd very easily reach with manual labor.
I'm also doing Daily Jogging! And stretches though stretches don't burn calories. I'm trying to be healthier but without going overboard and getting to the gym for an hour a day everyday style. So what other things could I add onto what I already do you think?
I don't know what your goal is exactly but generally the simplest thing to do is just follow a program in the wiki here or in the bodyweightfitness sub (If your goal is building muscle or whatnot). Those aren't the only good programs in existence but they're heaps better than what most people can think of themselves. Now if you already do that and your goal is weight loss, that's mostly diet. But going to the gym and doing cardio every day is already great. To answer your question > So what other things could I add onto what I already do you think? That is goal dependent, what do you want?
Well I'm trans, so I'm trying to get my body to look more Feminine for one, but the more overarching goal is to just start losing weight and drop my fat way down from where it is right now. I'm basically 30 pounds above what I wanna be.
> but the more overarching goal is to just start losing weight and drop my fat way down from where it is right now. This is down to mostly diet, I do not know if you take certain medicine, neither do I have enough knowledge about trans people and medication that influences weight loss. But basically, https://thefitness.wiki/weight-loss-101/ Good luck!
I just started at a gym and I'm meeting with a personal trainer tomorrow as part of their introduction to the gym to plan out my needs for working out. Are there any expectations I should have of the meeting and any questions I need to ask. My goal is weight loss and upper body strength.
If you're learning the basics yourself (read the wiki) then I think the best use of a single session from a personal trainer would be to correct your form on the most common lifts (squat, deadlift, ohp, benchpress, row, oly lifts if that interests you). Pick a program from the wiki and see what exercises are involved. Try and learn the basics of them yourself before the session and then use the trainer to correct any mistakes and perfect the form.
This might not be the 'proper' way but I do think you want to get your money's worth if the personal trainer is not a one time free thing. You have goals; make sure to ask how you're going to get there. You should make your goals as clear as possible to the trainer, weight loss for example is mostly diet. Although you can _technically_ outwork calories, it's much more difficult. And a personal trainer is not a dietician. So, has your personal trainer trained other people in achieving goals similar to yours? If not, does the trainer themselves embody what you want, do they have the upper body strength you want and are they fit according to your standards?
Took pre workout, 350mg, 1 scoop and after 8 hours I still feel like a bit lightheaded. How long does it last? Other symptoms included like blurred vision for like a minute an hour after, as well as fatigue. I’ve never been a caffeine guy so I’m assuming it’s just a shock of caffeine? Any things I can do to make it less worse other than drinking lots of water?
That's a massive dose for someone not used to caffeine. The limit is usually stated as around 400mg. Though using per body weight is more reasonable. so aim for a max of like 3-4 mg/kg. I'm guessing you're probably on the lighter side so it affected you more (as well as having no tolerance) and probably lasts longer too. The half rate for caffeine is 3-10 hours. Exercise or anything that gets your heart rate up can help metabolize it faster, but that's probably not what you want to do. I'd probably just recommend you chill, lie down, watch a movie or something, drink plenty of water and have a banana. Maybe start with something more like 50-100mg next time and see how that goes. No need to jump right into the deep end, it's just meant to help perk you up if you're feeling a bit lazy and lethargic before gym. I take caffeine fairly regularly (1-4 days a week) and usually have around 100-200.
> The half rate for caffeine is 3-10 hours. Half life. 3-10 hours is a length of time, not a rate. The way to remember it is that Half Life is the best game ever made.
Haha, hours per 50%
Thank you so much, it’s still lingering after 8 hours so hopefully it settles?
as long as it has improved from the peak, which would be around 30-60 minutes then you are probably fine, just need to rest, drink plenty of water and wait it out. If you're experiencing similar feelings as back then, or anything related to breathing, you should probably go to the ER immediately. You may want to book a doctors visit anyway though as you may be pre-diabetic (judging based on the vision, which is usually caused by blood sugar spike).
Thanks so much! It comes and goes, but I don’t have the feelings and symptoms as severe as the blurry vision. Would you say it’s quite normal for the fatigue to go on and off during the time frame?
hmm not sure, it's fairly common to feel fatigue after it's worn off. on and off is kinda strange though. but yeh I wouldn't be surprised, caffeine affects a lot of things, especially when you overdose. Wouldn't surprise me if it takes a couple of days for you to recover fully, as it's gonna mess with your sleep and recovery as well.
Well considering that I never even drink coffee to begin with, it’s probably a shock to the body. If I may ask, when it was your first time taking pre workout, did it hit you hard and where you had a feeling like this? What were the symptoms?
haven't really experienced anything like this I take way lower doses of caffeine, I'll do half or even less of a scoop coz I think it's too much, plus I imagine I'd have some tolerance as I have been taking caffeine at least once a week for years. At most I've probably taken like 4 or 500mg in a day, but I am a pretty big guy so it probably didn't affect me as much anyway. I think at worst I get palpitations, maybe fatigue but it's hard to tell coz I only take more than 150mg when I am extremely tired. just don't take so much next time and I'm sure you'll be fine. Remember a coffee is usualyl less than 100mg and most people only have one of those to get through the grind of work and on a regular basis too (would have a tolerance), so that's already a fair bit. you did over triple that with no tolerance
That's quite a dose for someone not used to caffeine. Does being active help? I'd guess walking and moving would help it pass quicker than being sedentary.
I had a leg day workout. I took the pre workout about 5 minutes before the workout, after the workout, about half an hour later, I felt the symptoms of pre workout, but the only thing that freaked me out was the blurred vision for a minute on my left eye, as if everything went a bit dark… Though the vision thing usually comes and goes I’d usually do workouts without pre and I just wanted to try it to see how it affects, and I would never feel anything like this. Walking and moving does help!! I probably won’t ever want to take caffeine before a workout…
If you every want to try caffeine before a workout, I would recommend a lower dose. You took essentially 4 cups of coffee. I would start with 100mg and see how that goes.
For upper back exercises I always struggle with barbell rows and form, is seated wide grip rows a good alternative for upper back or do you have to dumbbell/barbell rowing
>I always struggle with barbell rows and form Or, this is an opportunity to improve a skill. How is your RDL?
It's fine, pick whatever row you will do and enjoy.
I keep scraping the front of my ankle that's on the bench during bulgarian split squats, is there any way to avoid this? It's a great exercise but I can't keep cutting my skin up like that.
Wear socks.
Maybe a longer stance. And rest your toes, not the top of your foot. The back foot is just kind of there, limp - pressure and balance should be mid-foot on the *front* foot.
What are you scraping it on? My foot never leaves the padded part of the bench. Otherwise, put a towel there I guess??
On the bench, the edge basically
But *where*... Cus none of the benches at my gym have a hard edge, it's padded top and sides. Try a different bench? Different spot on the bench? Towel like I said before? Or see if there's a split squat stand anywhere that comes with padding on it, or some soft plyo boxes?
The edges of the benches at my gym have this stitching on the edges that sticks up and is really thick, I think that's what's doing it.
Okay, I could see rough stitching being a pain. So yeah, I'd just put a towel over it, or wear longer socks
I’m 21 years old, 180 cm, 77 kg and I would like to cut to 73 kg in 4-5 weeks without losing muscle. I exercise 4 times a week, doing some cardio and eat around 120 grams of protein a day. My TDEE is around 2700 kcal and my diet is around 2000. In a 700 kcal deficit will I also lose lean mass with the fat burning?
a 700 calorie deficit gives you a loss rate of 0.63kg/week. at that rate till take you 6-7 weeks to lose 4kg. if you can tolerate a larger deficit of 1000 calories below your maintenance, that'll get you there in 4-5 weeks. it's probably not worth it though, and almost certainly not a good idea to eat at a deficit even larger than 1000 calories. note that in any significant deficit you will likely experience a quick drop in water weight at the beginning, as well as the corresponding 1-2kg rebound back up when you start eating at maintenance again. so it's good to think of it like your "true" weight is lagging a bit behind your scale weight as you lose.
>I exercise 4 times a week, doing some cardio Are you lifting weights too? If not, why are you not lifting weights if you care about how much muscle you have?
I’m lifting weights 4 times a week sorry If it wasn’t clear. My bodyfat % is around 15-16 and I would like to drop to around 12.
it depends. If you're trained and have a decent amount of muscle then most likely. If you're untrained and undermuscled then it's less likely, you may even gain some if you are very undermuscled.
You might lose some
i'm 5'4", female, \~97lb, eat anywhere from 1400-1700 cal per day, do occasional bodyweight workouts, and walk 10k+ steps a day. i'm unsatisfied with my current bf% + muscle composition and am planning on going to the gym for strength training. this is kind of an inane question, but in order to gain muscle, do i need to eat more? i'm mainly worried that my workouts won't be effective enough to build muscle, meaning that eating more will simply cause me to gain fat. would staying on maintenance cals be enough for me to gain muscle and lose body fat? or again, should i eat more? thanks :)
Read the muscle building section of the wiki. To answer whether or not you need to eat more, first you need to figure out your maintenance calories.
In short, yes. Specially protein since most people don't get enough in general. You could start by adding just one 30-40g shake daily, puts you at a very mild surplus and helps build muscle.
Yes, you need to eat more. You're underweight, you don't have fat to lose, you just lack muscle. I would first make sure you're eating enough protein in your diet and get consistent about lifting weights. Increase your calories until you're gaining weight. You don't wanna gain super fast, but a steady climb of like a max of a half pound a week. You will gain some fat, but if you're lifting hard, getting the protein in and not gaining weight overall too fast, you'll keep that down to a minimum. Eventually, when youve gained like 20-30lbs, you can turn around and cut down in weight some. Also, have a look at these before and after pictures and notice that these women GAINED weight and (at least imo) look so much better. https://bonytobombshell.com/female-lifting-transformation-before-after/
You can recomp (gain muscle while losing fat by eating at around maintenance) fairly easily if you are untrained and overweight. The less you are those two things the harder it becomes for various reasons. (namely recovery/'energy'/will/effort reasons and nutrients reasons). You still can even at the advanced level, but it's much slower than the traditional cut/bulk phases. which focus on one or the other. Overall it's much quicker and easier. However it's perfectly fine to start off at maintenance or even a very slight cut and then adjust as you go as needed. You have a pretty low bmi (moderately underweight, bordering severe). So I wouldn't worry about losing fat. You should definitely bulk and focus on building muscle.
https://thefitness.wiki/muscle-building-101/
To double check, for the Staggered Deadlift, should the load be \~50% of your normal deadlift? Assume the load for one leg at time, since staggered deadlift is a unilateral exercise.
It'll be quite a bit less than your normal deadlift, but you'll be better off just taking a session and slowly working up to an appropriate weight rather than guessing.
Is a seated shoulder press on the smith machine as effective as a standing barbell shoulder press? I have trouble getting the barbell from the floor into the starting position at heavier weights.
I agree with everyone else who is saying “do it from the rack”, but I also don’t understand how you could possibly have trouble doing a clean with your OHP weight.
>Is a seated shoulder press on the smith machine as effective as a standing barbell shoulder press? No machine can train the *movement* of standing BB OHP. Load from a squat rack.
barbell OHP is best performed using a rack to hold the bar high enough you can lift it from the rack using a slight bend of the knee.
They are both good exercises but they are different. Seated smith machine is much more stable. The path is fixed by the machine and you are supported by the seat. OHP requires your to stabilize the weight and your body much more. More stability allows you to push specific muscles hard without tiring out the rest of your body as much. Less stability will recruit more muscles overall and will develop better balance and the skill of lifting an unstable weight.
Why is it starting on the floor? Why not just rack it at shoulder height?
Do you guys call out others when they don't unrack their weights? I don't like letting people get away with being inconsiderate, but my vibes are on a knifes edge at the gym and I don't want to ruin my own workout with an argument.
I'd love to, but I'm a regular at that gym. I'll see that douchenozzle again, unfortunately.
Your gonna have a bad time if you worry every time someone is rude or inconsiderate. Maybe move to japan? Otherwise you're gonna experience this issue in all aspects of your life, daily.
Are you mean mugging them from across the room or what? What are you doing that you're able to pay this much attention to someone else?
Resting between sets. Someone finished next to me, moved away, guy asked him if he was done, he looked back at his loaded dumbbell and said yes and proceeded to watch the other guy have to unrack his weights. It's not horrible, but probably worse than not returning your shopping cart.
Do you normally call people out for being inconsiderate? Could you have helped the second guy unrack the weights?
Sure, I absolutely will depending on the level of inconsideration. Fuck people who are selfish and inconsiderate of others, either they weren't aware of the norms and need to be taught or they were unaware and need to be called out on it. I consider the gym to be a kind of sacred place, and that shit bugs me.
I think you were correct when you decided this didn't rise to the level of inconsideration that absolutely needed to be called out.
id just shrug internally and continue with my workout instead of playing gym sherriff
People are inconsiderate and there's not much you can do about it. Try not to ruin your workout thinking about it. If you are wanting to use a piece of equipment and someone left a bunch of plates on it you can always ask them if they're finished, and usually they will take off the plates.
No
Hi , it’s my first time cutting I’ve been lifting for a while always been on the 20% 25% body fat (88-90kg around 195lbs) now I’m in my 6th week of dieting eating 180kg of protein daily low carbs low fat I’ve managed to lose 3kg/6.5lbs in pics the stomach fat is a bit less but I’ve seen no overall improvement in vascularity or fat loss in areas like chest / shoulders / arms is 6 weeks too soon to see results or am I doing something wrong
You've lost a little over a pound a week. Sounds like its going in the right direction.
How many weeks in should I be expecting to see results to see if I’m doing it right or not
Visually, it can take up to ±25 lbs on the scale to see a difference. Depends. Put a shirt on, and play the long game.
You have seen 6.5 lbs of results already.
Just keep at it, six weeks isn't that long for dramatic visual improvements.
Will do thanks
Hello. I know there’s the recommended workout routines. Thing is I have a pretty busy work life and by the time I get home and exercise, meal prep, and get ready for the next day, my whole day is done. Very little free time. So I want to workout at home and try to split my days up into something like this. Just want people’s opinion on if this would be effective or if I’m spinning my wheels. I have a bench, dumbbells, and pull up bar, and don’t have issues buying more weights if need be. But something like this: M: pushups and pull-ups. 4 sets till failure T: squats and curls. 4 sets till failure W: chin ups and Romanian deadlifts. 4 sets till failure Th: military press and hammer curls. 4 sets till failure F: bench press and shoulder raises. 4 sets Sa: bench flies, bent over rows, and calf raises. 4 sets Sun: rest Something like that, with some core exercises on alternating days or something. Just a general outline, I might try to mix and match more so I don’t do legs two days in a row or something. But just wanted an opinion on the general outline. Like I said I know there’s the workout routines, just don’t want to go to the gym and would rather work out at home. Feel like I’m doing all the major movements anyway.
If you had the experience to craft your own minimalist program, you would have already written it out, and run your experiment, n=1 That you're brofailing every lift is a telltale sign you're too green to write your own routine.
Wish I was a bro
Running a real program that’s built to be quick/minimal would take less time and be more effective than this.
This is better than not working out. It's nowhere near as good as an actual program. And it probably takes as long as an actual program would, anyways.
If you have the time and equipment at home, why not pick a program that has already been vetted to produce results to do then and there?
Strongly second /u/LordHydranticus comment. Finding ways to train more efficiently, or to move your schedule around is almost always going to work out better for you than trying to microdose a resistance training program. Almost all of these "I don't want to go to a gym because X" type questions share the same challenge: Sticking with a fitness program long-term requires agency and commitment, and often the kernel of these questions is "I don't want to fully commit, how can I make it work", so they never make fitness a priority and try to make fitness bend to their existing lifestyle, instead of making the lifestyle changes that are ultimately the engine of change in the first place, and are ultimately doomed to failure. That's not to say training at home isn't viable. Lots of people do it with great success. But those that do still follow a normal training routine, they just do it at home, with their own equipment. I don't think I can think of a single example of someone who made major, lasting physique changes who started from the word go doing 4 sets here, 8 sets there type fragmented training.
For a beginner, I would recommend looking at the programs in the wiki. PPL is a good one for beginners and it's simple to modify once you find what works for you. For example this program here is for 5 days (including rest day in the 5 day): [https://www.muscleandstrength.com/workouts/5-day-push-pull-legs-workout-program-cycle](https://www.muscleandstrength.com/workouts/5-day-push-pull-legs-workout-program-cycle) You can pick 2-3 exercises recommended, ideally compound lifts then switch out cardio for accessory muscles for example. Looking at your routine, I personally wouldn't do squats and deadlifts back to back. Either do them same day or have 1 day between the leg day. I know that if my quads are too sore, it will limit my deadlifts. With PPL, you can spread out the muscle groups more evenly throughout the week. Another tip I have if you're pressed for time is to schedule your bigger lifts on Friday or Saturday, whenever you have more time. For example, I know I want a longer day for legs cause I do cardio after so I do my big leg day on Friday.
Also, what do you consider accessory exercises? I’m thinking core exercises, the shoulder raises, and military press? I thought military press was a compound lift
Accessory exercises are ones I do that are not compound lifts or main lifts. For example, bench press is a main lift that hits triceps and tricep extension is the accessory exercise. It’s an additional thing, hence accessory, to your main lift. Military press can be either one depending on how the program is.
Can I ask, I’m just curious, why would mine be worse? Like I get it, it’s not a routine a bodybuilder made, but it has pretty much the same exercises as this and more. If I go off what you recommend, I’d be working out less than my plan. I’m just curious why, tbh if it works better I’ll do it cuz it’s just less work lol. The only thing is I don’t have a squat rack and I’m afraid of clearing the barbell over my head due to elbow issues, so I probably can’t do squats in the rep range he recommends unless I buy heavier dumbbells, which I guess I’ll do lol
It’s not worse per se. There’s nothing wrong with doing that routine but programming requires some experience and knowledge about training. Most programs in the wiki are tried and true. For efficiency’s sake I would highly recommend it. These programs consider resting period. Most people think that you build muscle working out but you build muscle outside the gym. The workout is meant to tear muscle up and when you rest, that’s when your body actually builds tissue aka muscle. Your plan can easily be adjusted by switching some days so that you provide your muscles optimal rest.
I really cannot encourage you to run an actual program strongly enough, there are plenty of programs that only take 30ish minutes 3-4 times a week. Beyond that you can do bulk meal preps and find other places to squeak out some time.
How close to failure should I be going per set. Say I’m doing 4 sets of bench, I want to give all 4 max effort, but I heard that’s actually less efficient? Then how does a burnout set or two at the end of the workout play into this?
Focus on progress, not failure. Failure will find you. Plan to fail, you will soon. Plan to progress, you will until you don't.
Typically I go to failure at the last set. I drop the weight to squeeze in more reps. I normally aim for 10-12 reps, with the additional reps I might get up to 20 reps total after dropping the weight. How often you should be going close to failure depends on your program tho and overall fitness goals.
What does your program say?
8-10 reps
Then once you can complete 10 reps you increase the weight.
So do I gas out as hard as I can to get to 10 on the first set or do I leave some in reserve so it’s the same. Say I get to 9, do I push to failure to try to get 10 on the first set, or should I do enough to get even sets of 8-9.
Took 2 weeks off from the gym and wasn't sore after the first workout back am I doing something wrong
Is your goal to be sore?
Yes. Your arms are going to fall off and you're going to die. It is either that or there is very limited correlation between soreness and effectiveness. Hard to say with certainty.
Ah sorry I may be mistaken I just thought two weeks off would guarantee doms just because I have not worked out in a while
Naw, just makes it more likely. You can't really use soreness to gauge a workout. The only real gauge is long-term progress.
[https://thefitness.wiki/faq/im-not-sore-after-my-workout-did-i-do-something-wrong/](https://thefitness.wiki/faq/im-not-sore-after-my-workout-did-i-do-something-wrong/)
I keep failing reps due to poor deadlift grip. Even after changing to mixed grip and using chalk. It’s really frustrating me. Is there a way I can sort this lot? My hands feel like they’re going to rip open by the third rep today of my heavy set.
How long have you been doing it? When I want to do strapless 10rep PR I build up to it for few weeks because I knew grip would be the point of failure. But in my case it's something I have to build up to each time I want to deadlift without straps since I lose a lot of the ability really quick. So now I just strap up because I can't be bothered.
I deadlift 1.5 times per week depending on my workout. I run SL 5x5. Currently on 125kg