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I exercise for mobility only. I am not overly interested in changing my physique. I’m 5’2, 120 lbs and 46yo.
But as I exercise, weights obviously get easier over time and I’ve bought more weights to increase resistance.
My question is what will happen if I don’t keep increasing my resistance? What if I just use 10 lb weights and my body finds them easy - Will my muscles stay the same or will they deteriorate because they’re not struggling? If they stay the same, that’s great. But I don’t want them to like start to flab? Is that a thing for muscles?
Im not increasing protein to create muscle mass or anything either. Just normal food, regular exercise and real life.
You should still be aiming to progressively increase the reps and/or weight over time, even if you aren't trying to build muscle. The reason is that as we age, we all start to lose strength and muscle mass (sarcopenia). The best way to counteract this natural decline is to continuously challenge muscle. If you just keep doing to same weight, your strength and muscle mass will decline more rapidly over time.
okay, thank you
Why do my vision gets "smooth and colourful" like kind of dizzy after standing up when I do exercises like back extensions and lying hamstring curls, I can reduce it if I don't get up right after finishing the set, but was wondering what it is and if anyone else experience it
Im probs gonna post this on tmr one tmr morning but ill post this on here might as well .
Im fat , im 180.4 lb , a teenager , 5'7 . Probs gonan have another growth spurt . Im doing the DofE thing next year (doen bronze , for non brits its a expedition and some other stuff thing for teenagers and young adults )
Im wanting to imrpvoe my strength , expecially my left , since im much stronger on my right .
I am gonan,be carrying a big heavy bag , mainly on my hips and a,bit on my shoulders , so I need strong hips , shoulders , chest , shoulder blades , arms , thyes etc will help . Wil be walking up hilly , rocky areas .
Im gonan lower my choclate , improve and try increase my sleep . Gonan try walk more , do more stuff like squeezing ball , leg strength exercises. Etc but I also especially need to do weight strength stuff
One of my issues is when doing weights I hurt one of the muscles in my chest if I do strength stuff on my left arms , (my right arm is much stronger than my left) . Im doing the expedition (2 and a half days walking a lot of miles each days I cant remember how many )
How often should you be lifting to achieve a moderately decent physique… my friend goes to the gym 6-7 days a week, sometimes twice a day (if he has to get his steps in or didn’t complete his bench press the day before) his time in the gym is anywhere upwards of 3 hours daily. He will usually do full body workouts, he favours kettlebells, swings, raises, get ups etc, and then might add rdls or squats and bench presses, he will also do plyometrics and is convinced these are ultimate „fat burners“.
Honestly, he looks pretty mid considering he‘s investing 21+ hours of his weekly life at the gym. He is strong but constantly complaining about physique… I keep stressing that he likely needs 1-2 rest days, steps (office job) and needs to work on his diet as a foundation, prioritising protein (I think he gets 80-100g in at 92kg of protein weight), rather than trying to push for change from the gym. He is just convinced that if he drops any exercise that he will „get fat“.
The program and diet matters more than a set time. A program like supersquats could get you jacked on 3x 1-hour sessions a week. It seems his program is not aligned with his goals(looking jacked), I wouldn't expect someone to look great if they mostly did kettlebell work 3 hours a day, 7 days a week. That's basically GPP work and conditioning.
Can get plenty big on 3-5 days a week. 3 hours a day every day sounds like a lot of unnecessary/unproductive volume.
Chances are the work either isn't intense/stimulating enough or his programming/diet isn't on point if he truly looks 'mid' from so much gym time. That or it's legitimate work and he just isn't recovering enough for growth.
But it depends what the goals are. If he's just trying to stay lean and maintain weight, it's easier to find your maintenance calories at a lower activity level rather than trying to out-exercise your diet. If he's wanting to build a more muscular physique, then gaining a bit of fat is just part of the process. Gotta break some eggs to make an omelette.
7 is at the point of doing more harm than good. 3-4 is good. All the magic happens outside the gym.
There’s a saying your friend should hear: you can’t grow a baby in 1 month by throwing 8 more women at it.
As always, it depends on how you program things. Agata Sitko, the top IPF women's lifter right now, trains SBD 7 days per week
This is not an endorsement or recommendation for most people, but 7 days per week isn't inherently bad
Totally. Smart programming always wins. But, buried in the post op mentions their friend tries to do full body days.
One could rotate big SBD lifts each day, adding light accessories like swings and bodyweight work so they’re still full-body days, but IMO you’d be finagling so much to balance it that it becomes redundant.
Sounds like he's prioritizing recovery 0%
Need advise on a workout routine shift
My normal workout routine is Pull - Push - Legs - Rest- Upper - Lower - Rest.
However this friday i have a christmas party at work so i cannot do my upper body workout that day. Next week i have decided to take a rest/deload week.
This week would it make much of a difference wether i change my routine to Pull - Push - Legs - Upper - Rest - Lower - Rest or Pull - Push - Legs - Rest - Rest - Upper - Lower?
I imagine the second option is better for recovery but to be quite honest i would prefer to switch the thrusday and friday since i would like to do other things on sunday and enjoy my vacation earlier.
Would switching thrusday and friday be a problem in terms of how close my upper day is to my push day? Thats the only thing i am concerned about. Or will the effect be minimal since its only a one time case? Hope someone can give some advise
You could swap the days as you suggest. You could also condense the upper and lower days into a full body day hitting your main lifts for both. Or, since next week is a deload, just move the missed workout to the first day there - a deload week doesn't /have/ to be 7 days.
You could also just skip it altogether - it's only one workout in a lifetime of workouts.
Basically whatever works. It's only one workout, don't sweat over it too much imo.
Thanks in that case i might just swap thrusday and friday. Its my prefered option but i wasnt sure if it would negatively impact my gains
Due to losing Thursday, I'm doing that day's session a day early.
Consider just doing a low volume full body instead of your lower day. Rep range higher for some, rep range lower for others.
Im not a fan of full body personally. So out of my two options of swapping the thrusday and friday pr moving it to saturday/sunday does it really matter?
Am I just an idiot for not being able to understand this? Why does lifting lighter weights for more reps give me worse DOMS than heavier for less reps even if the overall volume is the same?
My kids had been sick and I didn't want to infect the gym so I worked out at home on Monday. All I've got are two 10kg dumbbells so I worked with what I had. I was doing 5x5 80kg squats on my last leg day so to keep volume consistent I did 5x20 20kg squats with the dumbbells. My legs feel just as sore as they did when I first starting lifting a few months ago.
Am I a moron cause volume is volume in my brain?
There's more metabolic stress from higher rep sets. And it's a novel stimulus to you.
It's not because you can get closer to failure; this is almost always the opposite. More often than not, people end high-rep sets because they're painful, boring, and exhausting. Not because they actually failed.
And your bodyweight is the same in both, so I am not sure what that comment refers to. BW doesn't factor into squat weight.
Someone explained it once in %. IE if you can only lift something exactly 6 times and you do 5 reps, you got 83% to failure; if you use a smaller load that you can lift exactly 21 times and do 20 reps, you get 95% to failure.
Recovery demands will be different because of the extra 12%.
That's not the same total volume, as you are also moving your body weight.
Fuck yeah right that makes sense too. Hadn't even considered that perspective
Sometimes it’s just the novel stimulus. It always makes you sore despite how trained you are.
Nothing fuckin novel about my wobbly knees mate.
Would the time under load make a difference here?
If you you only ever train in the 8-12 rep range a 20 rep set is novel stimulus.
Yeah no I understand the concept I was making a lil joke.
Damn, sorry, my early morning brain had its sense of humor still sleeping haha.
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This has been removed in violation of Rule #2 - Posts Must Be Specific to Physical Fitness and Promote Useful Discussion.
I always feel like I’m exploring my lower back when doing shoulder exercises. Am I supposed to be tensing my core to avoid this?
Yes, you should be bracing while moving things overhead.
Your lower back will always be involved when lifting a weight above it. You can do shoulder/overhead work seated to minimize it, but it can't be completely removed.
Gym only has weight plates going up in 5,10,15,20,25 for the olympic bar
And microplates upto 70kg for the standard bar
So everytime i wanna add weight i have to increase the total by 10kg which is alot
Im doing starting strength sorta workouts and my bench is still around 50 kilos so i can work with a standard barbell however deadlifts and squats is higher
I have been doing deadlifts for sets of 8 reps and then increasing by 10kg when i hit 8
But i feel this wont work with squats, what sort of progression do u recommend in this situation
Just add a couple more reps instead of stopping at 8. Any form of progression will get you strength benefits, of which additional reps are one.
If doing sets of 10+ for Deadlifts is unrealistic (no shade, that shit is fatiguing,) do 1-2 heavier sets for ~5 reps then drop the weight and do 8s. Any weight you lift above ~70% of your 1RM will cause meaningful strength development and blowing your whole wad going to failure isn't how you gain strength anyway.
Can you bring your own micro plates to the gym? Buy them on Amazon and keep them in your bag for when you need them.
Anyone follow any of the popular programmes on the Boostcamp app?
I'm an intermediate lifter, and looking to follow one of th emany popular programmes on the boostcamp app.
What worked for you?
All of GZCL's programming is great for intermediates.
Question you might know the answer to: when you fail your t1 on GZCLP, do you call it immediately on that exercise for the day? For instance, if I fail the 3rd set on bench while doing 5x3, should I start doing sets of 2, or just stop benching for the day and move to 6x2 the next week?
Keep attempting the weight for 3s. It could just be a mis-groove.
Have been doing a slighty modified version of this UL program. It's balls to the wall every set which has been super fun and rewarding https://www.boostcamp.app/users/7oSIzY-science-based-upper-lower
I ran the bullmastif base phase when I had abundant free time (the workouts are not what you'd call minimalist). How much you'd enjoy it depends on your opinion on LARGE volume training, but it was fun to try as a kind of challenge and I did make reasonable gains.
GZCL's Jacked and Tan is great
I second this opinion. I've ran it three times in a row (36 weeks) and am finally plateauing.
I ran Reddit/metallicadpa PPL for about a year and a half. I liked doing it and made a lot of progress in strength and size. It‘s simple but solid and it’s a good selection of exercises for an intermediate. It doesn’t try to be different or OpTiMaL, it’s just barbells and a balanced set of isolation exercises.
Does anyone else feel the effects of undereating protein almost immediately? I successfully struggled through some heavy squats and deadlifts today and wondered why my performance was so low before realizing I forgot to chug a protein shake yesterday that I had specifically put into my meal plan to meet my protein goal. This left me over 30 grams short of where I needed to be. I've heard it's the accumulative effects of protein intake that matter the most. But I find my day-before eating has drastic effect on lower rep workouts. I also notice that deficits have a similar effect even if moderate and if I'm not a deficit the type of foods I'm eating (processed vs. whole) still have an impact. I feel like I've figured out how to plan around these obstacles. Just curious how common this is for others.
I would say under eating Carbohydrates would lead to immediate low energy for any lifting or endurance sports. You will feel it if you don't have enough glycogen in your muscles (carbs). Protein, on the other hand, shows up in your recovery, and it shows up in lack of muscle tissue being built over time.
That makes sense. I definitely had a lot of carbs so maybe it was just an off day
That's not how that works at all.
But undereating food in general can have a negative effect on performance. In fact, I find that undereating carbs, or under-hydrating has a much bigger and more immediate effect compared with protein.
This is not a thing that protein does.
Protein hasn't been a factor; the difference between 100-180g of protein is pretty negligible for a 180lb male if all other factors are the same.
Carbs and just total calories, on the other hand, yes. If I eat significantly fewer carbs or calories one day, then training the next day is probably gonna feel harder.
This seems more mental than anything, if everything else is fine.
Are your shakes just protein or protein + carbs? Like others, I've felt similar if I've not eaten enough generally, but I've never put that down to specifically protein. Maybe a hydration thing too?
There's a bit of carbs I think but pretty minimal. I definitely wasn't hydrated well but I'm usually not admittedly. I find it doesn't affect my lifts much.
I've noticed a difference if my carbs are lacking late the previous day.
This is likely nocebo or a spurious correlation
Never thought “I fell a little short of the protein I wanted and that’s why I didn’t have my usual drive” but I have thought “shouldn’t have missed that meal or should have eaten a little more today”.
30g of protein the day before a hard session is unlikely to make any sort of difference. Many factors come into play in terms of how good you feel on a particular day, and I would put missing 30g of protein pretty far down on the list.