fatlossandmusclebuilding Blog

Who should train with weights…? In my opinion everyone should!

Weight training used to be shyed away from by everyone except bodybuilders and strongmen. It was thought that anyone else should keep away from lifting around heavy weights, as people associated weight lift with becoming muscle bound. Even professional trainers would keep their athletes clear of weight lifting in there training routines.

As advances in training techniques and more importantly research into weight training was made, the true benefits of training with weights was realised. It was discovered that training your muscles with weights can improve muscle tone, increase muscle size, increase strength, increase body weight and improve endurance. With these benefits being discovered, weight training soon became massively popular outside of  the bodybuilding world and into the main stream, from pro athletes and even the public. 

Now days almost every single athlete in any physical sport will have some sort weight training in their training schedules, in fact it is vital for them to complete at their highest possible levels.

The advanges of weight training should not only be used by athletes/sportsman. As mentioned the advantages of weight training include improved muscle tone, increase in muscle size, increase in strength, increase in body weight and improvement in endurance. If you are trying to improve your body, whether that is by building muscle or losing fat, weight training is essential. When trying to lose weight, or fat to be more specific, weight training will help prevent muscle loss that often occurs when people diet. The advantages of keeping muscle when you are losing weight are numerous. Maintaining and toning muscle whilst you are losing weight will prevent you from getting that scrawny, tired, unhealthy look to you. You often see people who have lost weight fast and look like a bag of bones! Also muscle actually burns calories! Even when you are resting your muscles burn calories, this will help in your fat loss.

Even if you are happy with the way you look and are not interested in altering the look of your body, weight training can still be an important part of your bodies well being. Having a strong musclular system can help reduce the likeliness of problems when you are older, including back problems. Through weight training you can build a strong core, which includes your lower back and abdominal muscles, which supports your whole upper body. This can reduce the chance of injury in every tasks, including mowing the lawn and even getting out of bed, you’d be suprised how many people injure themselves doing simple tasks.

So i’ll ask you again… ”who should train with weights?”…that’s right EVERYONE! Everyone can benefit from weight training, whether you are a professional athlete, a recreational athlete or even a none sporting person who wants to just stay healthy.  

If you are trying to pack on some serious muscle you need to concentrate on compound or multi-joint lifts. These are exercises that unlike isolation exercises, involve a number of muscle groups to perform. Exercises include the squat, bench press and deadlift, are examples of some of the best.

These compound movements put a lot of stress on the body and shocks the nervous system into releasing the largest amount of muscle building hormones. Also stimulating growth all over the body, so you will pack on size everywhere!

Compound exercises also allow you to shift a lot of weight which is what you need to develop new muscle. I must however stress the importance of proper technique with all of these exercises, as there is a high risk of injury if you try to shift a heavy weight with the wrong technique. I know I always go on about this in my posts, but it really is ever so important and i’ll continue to nag you with it in the future…sorry!

So base your workouts around compound exercises, but don’t completely dismiss isolation exercises. Exercises such as bicep curls are still great to throw in there, just perform them after your compound exercises.

For most bodybuilders, only interested in building muscle, stretching is the last thing on their mind. It has even been said that stretching before a weight lifting session actually leads to a reduction of strength during the session. There has been no definate answers to this come from research, but it has become a rule among bodybuilders that pre session stretching should be avoided. There is also the argument that stretching a cold muscle has the danger of causing an injury.

So what about stretching after a workout? This has been proven to increase flexibility, and unknown or ignored by most bodybuilders can actual lead to an increase in muscle strength. Spending an extra ten or fifteen minutes stretching after weights session, can really have a positive affect on your muscles. Concentrate on holding your stretches for at least twenty seconds or more, gradually increasing the stretch.

Not enough people stretch after they exercise there muscles, it is something that I highly recommend you give a try.

Here are the five things that you should pay attention to if you want to build muscle… 

1.  Progressive Resistance Training.

2.  Workout Techniques.

3.  Calories.

4.  Nutrient Ratios.

5.  Rest. 

Still need to know more? I’ll be explaining each in detail over the next few weeks, so keep checking for more!

It is great to have a training partner motivate you and to give you a spot while you are training. The thing that isn’t so good is having a training partner, is when you have one who is a bit to keen to help you with your reps. By over keen, I mean that they try and support you with virtually ever rep that you do. Although they are obviously trying to help you, you need to be completing as many reps as you can on your own to truly monitor your progress. Even just the sightest support can make a huge difference to how hard you are working to lift the weight.

The main reason I have brought this up today is because of a training session I had last week and then an observation I made in the gym today. I usually train on my own, mainly due to the fact that I like to keep my training time short and to focus on my own workout (sounds a bit selfish I know, but if I train with a partner I’m the worlds worst for chatting away!) Anyway I was working my chest in this particular training session, and at the time I was doing the raised dumbell press. A kind passer by had offered to pass the weight to me, and then proceeded to spot me during my set. Although this was very generous of him, he was a bit keen with his spotting and was pushing my elbows in on every rep. Not wanting to seem ungrateful I didn’t say anything and just carried on and ended up doing alot heavier weight for alot more reps than I would do on my own to try and compensate. Now you may think that I’m just an ungrateful whiner, but the reason for my moaning is that I couldn’t tell if I had done more than in my last session, as I was being helped a bit too much. For muscle gain you need to continually progress with the weights you lift and the repitions you complete, and if you have someone doing some of the work for you it becomes really hard to monitor your progress.

My other story was from being in the gym again today. I noticed a couple of lads shoulder pressing some huge weights, but the were hardly moving the weight at all and the other friend was taking most of the weight. For the best results you should be performing every exercise with proper form, which means completing the whole movement. So combining bad technique with someone else doing all the work for you, really isn’t very good at all. 

The job of someone who is spotting you is mainly a safety role, they are their to make sure that you don’t end up crushed under a heavy weight! They can help you by lifting you the weight and supporting you while you steady yourself, but for maximum results you should be doing all of the work yourself. Only when you come to failure and you can’t move the weight any more should they come in to assist, and maybe even for one more rep out with you.

So don’tlet your friend do all the work for you, the harder you work the better the results you will see.

Resistance machines or free weights, which is better? Firstly let’s have a look at the advantages and disadvantages of both…

Resistance machines are a lot safer than free weights to workout with. There is a high risk of injury when working out with free weights, you have to control the weights path without the assistance with machines. You have to really concentrate on proper technique, otherwise you can cause yourself muscle strains, tears and numerous other possible injuries.   

Machines work on a pre-determined path which makes them good for isolating the muscle group that you are working, when lifting free weights it is a lot more difficult to isolate muscle groups. That said resistance machines don’t strengthen your stabiliser muscles, as there is only one path that the weight can go. When training with free weights, you have to control the movement of the weight yourself. This balancing of the weights movement develops your stabiliser muscles.

Free weights give you alot more flexibility than resistance machines, there are countless different movements that you can perform with free weights to suit your needs. Resistance machines have the one or maybe two set exercises that you can perform.

Resistance Machines have the advantage that they are quick and easier to set up for a workout, a quick adjustment to a seat and a the movement of a pin to set or adjust the weight is all that is usually required. When using free weights you have to swop over plates and mess around with putting them back in the racks.  

You can see that resistance machines both have there advantages and disadvantages, which you prefer to train with is down to personal preference. My personal opinion is that resistance machines are great for beginners to start to develop their muscle strength. For more advanced trainers i think that for the majority of your workout you should use free weights, with proper technique great results can be achieved. The fact that you also develop your stabiliser muscles, makes them great for an all round strength. I do also believe that adding in the odd exercise performed on a resistance machine can give great results giving variety to your workouts.

There are many ways in which bodybuilders try to do more damage to their muscle fibres trying to produce more growth. One such technique is pyramid sets. This is basically when you start at a heavy weight and then continuously work down dropping the weight each time for five, ten or more sets. Eventually you will be struggling to lift virtually no weight as you have exhausted your muscles completely.

This ‘Pyramid’ technique is widley used among bodybuilders, so should we be following their example if we too want to build up our muscles? In my opinion no! You have to remember that alot of these ‘genetically gifted’ bodybuilders out there use drugs, steroids and other growth hormones are common. So for us natural trainers, it would be crazy to try and complete the same sort of training. Performing pyramid sets or similar techniques will extend the time that it takes for your muscles to recover.

There is no research out there to suggest that performing these pyramid sets, or even just extra sets with lighter weights at the end of your workouts, will help you build any more muscle than your usual three to five sets.

So in conclusion I would ignore what the bodybuilders are doing out there, and stick with three to five sets making sure you fail on your last rep of your last set. This should be more than enough to produce new muscle growth. 

After a tough workout it is normal for people to suffer some muscle pain for a day or two during recovery. If you are a new to weight training, you will find that for the first couple of weeks you will find the muscle pain can be quite bad. I remember when I first started training with weights, many years ago! I think I had worked my arms and my chest, and I’d really pushed myself. I woke up the next day and could hardly move my upper body at all! It was even painful to touch! Even seasoned trainers still experience muscle pain after particularly hard workouts, or if they perform exercises that are new to them.

Apart from this muscle pain being uncomfortable, it can also affect performance. If you train again when you muscles are still sore, you can find that you strength will be diminished.

 There has been research done into ways of reducing this muscle soreness, and the discovery that has been made is that certain fruits taken after exercise can reduce this soreness of the muscles. Fruits such as cherries, strawberries, blackberries and blueberries, consumed after a workout have been proven to help with the problem of muscle soreness. These fruits are high in phytochemicals, which have an anti inflammatory effect, which seems to be behind the positive effect they have on muscle recovery.

So try adding a handful of cherries, strawberries, blackberries or  blueberries to your post workout protein shake and help reduce the time you spend suffering after a heavy training session.

So What is the key to getting into great shape? It’s simple really… DON’T MISS YOU WORKOUTS!

 It may seem obvious, but we all know how easy it is to get into the habit of skipping workouts because we are tired, or we have something ‘better’ we want to do instead. The key getting into great shape is to train consistantly, get yourself to every single workout that you have planned in. 

 Combine your consistant training with good nutrition, keep it up for the long term, and you won’t be far from reaching the body you dream of.

I’m sure that any of you who have been inducted at a gym have been shown the ‘correct’ way of breathing when lifting weights or using resistance machines. Breath in during the negative part of the movement, then breath out during the positive or force applying movement. This is usually the breathing technique that the trainer will tell you to use, and under no circumstance should you hold you breath.

So is this true? Is holding your breath? Well in fact holding of the breath is a technique used by some powerlifters, it is known as the Valsalva maneuver. The theory behind this technique is that when you hold your breath you actual tense up your abdominal muscle, which leads to your torso become more sturdy. The only bad thing about this technique is that is does create a temporary rise in blood pressure, which is not dangerous unless you have high blood pressure anyway.

So which technique should you be using? Well in my opinion, the best way is to let your body decide naturally. Breathing is a naturally thing, your body should be able to adapt the way you breath to best fit the situation. Trust your bodys natural response.