Routine: dodgy or OK?

[Porrage_Oats]

Hy guys

Following my biiig post (sorry!) about my diet the other day, I thought Id ask for some advice on my exercise routine. It is a very basic, full body work out which I aim to complete three times a week on non-consecutive days. I just wanted to check I have the type of routine correct, as theres no point in eating properly only to do the wrong stuff lol. Anyway, while I understand that a beginner like me should be targetting compound exercises (I think!) to begin with, im not too sure what category eveything falls into.

My goal has been to loose the flabby waist (lost a stone so far) and then build some mass on upper body. Dont want to be huge, just a bit bigger and more in proportion.

I expect the work-out to be OK (as it was the bloke at the gym who put it together, explaining that it was a good, broad basis for a beginner).

I will just list the exercises firstly, then ask about reps etc below:

I was advised to do this 3 * a week: (note - I have to use the machines as I have no-one to spot for me and prefer to exercise alone anyway)

Lever lateral raise
Inclined chest press
Lateral pull downs
Bicep curls
Leg press (sled)

and

Inclined crunches

and

~20 mins CV per session

What do you make of these exercises? Any good or am I barking up the wrong tree. So far I have been doing this lightly, but concentrating on CV to loose flab (I have lost about a stone) - now I want to try and build mass on upper body.

I have just about found the level of weight for each exercise as a base level. However I am none too sure about the strategy for trying to move up gradually and steadily:

- could anyone please offer advice on how many sets/reps I should aim for? I have been doing 3 * 8 so far, but not always making it to the end.

- on that point, should you train to failure or not? I have read different people advocating both ways on these forums - what are the lines of argument?

- I think I should concentrate on a basic routine for a while, till I make some initial progress. I know everyones different, but if you are completing your reps OK is that the only simple trigger to try and move up?

I remember when I did resistance work previously (years ago) I found it very frustrating as I found I get easily get "stuck" at certain weights and also my arms seem to just "stop" during an exercise when they fail. There is no burn or anything...just nothing there and I cant lift anymore- is that normal?

Thanks for reading and for any advice
Porrage

[Gareth83]

it's better to do a split. wher you perform one set of exercises on different days.

a common programme is doing:

Monday-Push

Wednesday-Pull

Friday-Legs

This gives a far better recovery time, for each body part rather than doing each part 3 times a week.

I like teh idea of 20min cardio sessions though at the end. good for fat burn.

Do this:
Push-Chest, shoulders,triceps
Pull-Back, biceps, forearms
Legs-Obviously legs and maybe abs

If you look at anyone's journal you'll get a better idea.

Depends what equipment you have at your gym. Do you have free-weights? olympic bar?? etc

to increase strenth you wanna be doing roughly 3 sets of 6 and try and increase each week or 2

[scott76]

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I remember when I did resistance work previously (years ago) I found it very frustrating as I found I get easily get "stuck" at certain weights and also my arms seem to just "stop" during an exercise when they fail. There is no burn or anything...just nothing there and I cant lift anymore- is that normal?

Sounds normal to me. You do the reps and they get a bit harder on the last few in each set ...then suddenly, in the last rep you complete, you get girly arms and can't do nowt.

Regarding the rest of your questions, I'll leave the floor open to the usual suspects. My prediction is that they'll tell you less machines, more compounds/less isolation work, split the routine in some way (eg. push/pull/legs/cardio) so you get proper rest time on muscle groups to allow them to develop.

Actually, I will make a couple of comments (and risk facing the wrath of the forum big boys!).

• I'd want to see some more variety / wider range if you are going to use machines. Looks at the moment that there are some muscles that could be overlooked. Print off a muscle chart and tick off the muscles you exercise decently. See if there's any obvious gaps (triceps?).
• I would advocate doing an exercise only once / twice a week on account of the allowing adequate rest to grow. There's no shortage of exercises out there and my personal opinion is that variety is good (on account of it being more like doing 'real' work).
• I'd be more inclined to do a solid decent CV session (split between rowing / x-trainer and treadmill) rather than 'bits' on normal workout days. No real theory to back this up, but I reckon it'd be harder work / more effective in getting the heart rate up and losing some surplus calories.

One final comment might be that you might have trouble bulking muscle very much if you're trying to lose some surplus bodyweight too. Logic dictates that to build muscle / body tissue you have to stick in more food than you need purely to 'maintain' your current body tissue. To lose it, you need to be in calorific deficit. The two won't work together. What *might* be worth considering is 'feeding' the body on days that are workout days, and the day immediately after each workout day, when it'll more likely be focused on feeding muscle development; and then doing your CV session (if you decide to do a pure one) first thing in the morning on an empty stomach, or minimal slow carbs, and lower the calories on that day or two.

Whatever you do, good luck with it. Bear in mind everyone on here has their own way. What works for you, works for you. What works for someone else, might not. Don't be afraid to experiment. Most people on here still are, to some degree.

EDIT: Oh look, Gareth beat me! I knew someone'd be in there with a split routine. Even before I predicted it!

[scott76]

Also worth knowing, if you want to understand the exercises you're doing and / or look for any new ones to target specific areas then this site will prove invaluable.

Surfstak passed it on to me, and now I'm passing it on to you.

[MartinM]

Porrage,

I'm an advocate of higher frequency training for muscle growth and for fat loss. An all body split done 3 x per week is great imo. The one thing you need to consider though is exercise choice and order. Try and do big muscles first and then progressively smaller ones.

Quadriceps e.g. squat or leg press
Hamstrings e.g. Leg curl
Chest e.g. DBell or BBell bench press
Back e.g. Lat pull down, Chins possible with some Rowing movements like 1 arm row or seated row.
Shoulders e.g. DB shoudler press
Biceps and Triceps if you want.

You shouldnt be going to failure if you are training a body part 3 times per week. I woudl suggest to do 2 sets per exercise above of 8-15 reps. Making sure you stop 1 rep shy of failure. Failure is ok if you are not training with the frequency you are but you will get far better gains without it. Try doing some Free weights as you wont be failing so shouldnt need a spotter too often.

p.s. Good post Scott

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it's better to do a split. wher you perform one set of exercises on different days.

Controvertial as per......

[Porrage_Oats]

Cheers for the info everyone, it is much appreciated!

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it's better to do a split. wher you perform one set of exercises on different days.

Yeh, from reading around the site I am seeing that split routines are popular and well advocated. Thanks for the tip - I will look into other beginners routines and see what I can work out.

You ask what equipment we have at the gym; im no expert but it seems pretty decent. They have a large range of free-weights also, but tbh I havent fully explored all the facilities, ive just been sticking to the simple sets the staff prescribed me - I'll definately have a better look round now though.

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One final comment might be that you might have trouble bulking muscle very much if you're trying to lose some surplus bodyweight too

Great point scott: before starting out I did some reading and learned that loosing weight/gaining muscle as goals are obviously at loggerheads. I intended to try and loose the flab first, so I would be building from a decent starting point. I have lost a stone and feel/look the better for it, however I still have a pot belly - I (perhaps wrongly) attribute this to the facts that I have never had a good toned gut, and have expanded it steadily over the years (I am 28) with m3 of beer lol. I still have modest love handles also. Do you think I should try and loose a few more pounds (ie to have flat sides etc) before trying to replace all this surplus bodyweight with lean muscle?

I know that while following a good diet supplemented with whey that most weight gain will be lean muscle, however I suppose its very likely that I could gain a few lbs fat also - is this another reason for getting fat down first?

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I'd be more inclined to do a solid decent CV session (split between rowing / x-trainer and treadmill)

Is CV work more effective if its split? Currently I just do cycling, I make it quite challenging though, as I perversley enjoy breaking a good sweat on the machine and the elated healthy feeling after it - God, what have I become? lol

When it comes to other CV items at the gym:

Treadmill - my body is not designed to run, and especially not on treadmills
X-Trainer - I like the ones without ski poles, where its a cross between stepping/running, but its just too hard to actually get on one as people tend to hog them
Rowing machine - no me gusta nada lol
Bike but for the upper body - felt it a bit pointless?

lol I am a real fusspot when it comes to CV!

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Biceps and Triceps if you want.

Hi Martin - Can I ask why you say "if you want" when it comes to these muscle groups? Is it because they will be worked anyway as part of other compound exercises?

To follow up on scotts point about making sure not to miss out muscle groups - does the body naturally regulate/spread growth to keep itself in proportion, or does it simply pack on the protein wherever the worst damage is (from lifting)? It was actually for fear of ending up with less developed biceps that I ensured they were included, as they werent to be originally!

Also, my left arm seems weaker than my right. My right is definately slightly more muscular - not noticeceable at all, but obviously I know as its my arm lol. When doing exercises with 2 hands (eg my chest press) I can feel the left threatening to give up the ghost a rep or two ahead of the right. Is this normal or am I some sort of oddball!?!

Thanks again for all this great advice:
I did my routine earlier and have been sitting in the happy afterglow ever since, following a good dinner. It seems this healthy business might be somewhat agreeable after all

Cheers
Porrage

[MartinM]

Porrage - Get your fat down first imo. Like you said, then you can have a good starting point to go on with.

I said include these if you want as the will get indirectly hit through all the other work you are doing. Your body doesnt just pack on muscle to stay in proportion, you need to train each body part. However biceps get trained with back and triceps with chest+shoudlers.

If you are going to continue doing the M/W/F routine maybe do arms on the friday session as you will ahve 2 days instead of 1 to recover.

[scott76]

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I have lost a stone and feel/look the better for it, however I still have a pot belly - I (perhaps wrongly) attribute this to the facts that I have never had a good toned gut, and have expanded it steadily over the years (I am 28) with m3 of beer lol. I still have modest love handles also. Do you think I should try and loose a few more pounds (ie to have flat sides etc) before trying to replace all this surplus bodyweight with lean muscle?

You've got to weigh up your own personal pros and cons (or possibly try my semi-suggestion from before with a bulk/cut cycle spread across a single week - no idea if that's really viable). What matters more to you - more muscle or less 'surplus bodyweight'? Either way, at some point you're likely to have to / want to try and shift the surplus. You can cut now or later...

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When it comes to other CV items at the gym:

Treadmill - my body is not designed to run, and especially not on treadmills
X-Trainer - I like the ones without ski poles, where its a cross between stepping/running, but its just too hard to actually get on one as people tend to hog them
Rowing machine - no me gusta nada lol
Bike but for the upper body - felt it a bit pointless?

lol I am a real fusspot when it comes to CV!

Another theory of mine, which is entirely unbased in any scientific fact is that for CV to be effective at shifting upper body body, it's no good only using your legs. I somehow feel that cycling for miles is still going to have very little bearing on saggy man-boobs (not that you have these, but they provide a more obvious example).

You may want to challenge yourself to some more varied CV work. Same theory as my belief in varied strength exercises - more variety can't hurt - less variety might leave some areas lacking. Learn to love your rower; works back, arms and legs as a minimum. You can also vary rowing a good bit, choosing to focus on arms / back / legs as you wish, and trying various combinations of distances / rest periods.

You mention people tend to hog the x-trainer (do you train at the same gym as surfstak? ). Maybe if you did a cardio session you could fit it in at a time when the gym is likely to be less busy?

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To follow up on scotts point about making sure not to miss out muscle groups - does the body naturally regulate/spread growth to keep itself in proportion, or does it simply pack on the protein wherever the worst damage is (from lifting)? It was actually for fear of ending up with less developed biceps that I ensured they were included, as they werent to be originally!

I think not. If you work a muscle harder, it gets bigger. If you neglect it, then it'll waste away. The biceps are actually unlikely to be one of the areas that get 'forgotten' as they get worked inadvertently while you do a lot of other exercises. That said, biceps rarely look too big so you may as well leave the bicep curls in. They're quite agreeable as an exercise anyway.

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Also, my left arm seems weaker than my right. My right is definately slightly more muscular - not noticeceable at all, but obviously I know as its my arm lol. When doing exercises with 2 hands (eg my chest press) I can feel the left threatening to give up the ghost a rep or two ahead of the right. Is this normal or am I some sort of oddball!?!

Very, very ordinary - certainly for me anyway. I'm still hoping that as my training progresses, it'll even out. Mot of my current strength has been developed from 'real work' which does tend to be less 'balanced' than gym training. I'm hoping that as the gym training becomes of greater input to my strength so it'll even out.

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I did my routine earlier and have been sitting in the happy afterglow ever since, following a good dinner. It seems this healthy business might be somewhat agreeable after all

It's not bad! That said, you read some of the posts on here and some people are so hardcore I don't see how it can be fun for them. A little of what you fancy can't hurt and neither does the ocassional missed session. Keep everything in proportion and it's all good. Don't beat yourself up the first time you let yourself lapse a little.

Oh, and start a training journal!