Short and Sweet

Short and Sweet - Shoulders and Arms

Training doesn't have to be an hours and hours training that one body part to exhaustion, mix it up!! This is exactly what I did today, cramping two workouts into one, achieving one of the best workouts I've had in a long time and here it is.

1. A) 10x10 Barbell Shoulder Press
       B) 10x10 Skull Crusher
       C) 10x10 Barbell Curl

My first exercise I worked as a tri-set using German Volume training as my basis hitting the main compound exercises for the muscles I was training. Little tip, always schedule tricep first into the tri-set. Its pre exhausted from the pressing with one thing you must always remember it's a bigger muscle group than the bicep, taking up more of the upper arm, so train it harder!!! This was hard but so rewarding in that I felt that I shocked the muscles more than my normal routine, 100 reps is a lot of volume. Don't focus on weight!!! Tempo, control and rest time is crucial. Always stay below 45 seconds between all sets.

2. A) 5x12 Seated Lateral Raise
       B) 5x12 Reverse Push Downs
       C) 5x12 Hammer Curls

We're now focusing more on the isolation of the muscle, splitting the muscles heads. Focus paid to the lateral head when performing the seated raise, avoid swinging and take the weight down if you can't reach a full contraction. Bring the bench up to 90 degrees, full range of motion with a slight twist at the top of the movement, 'pinkies high', so your little finger points to the sky. This will generate more of the movement onto the lateral and slightly the rear delt. Reverse push downs will target the lateral head, which often gets neglected when performing the usual push down along with hammer curls hitting the long head of the bicep.

3. A) 5x15 Cable frontal raise
       B) 5x15 Overhead Extension
       C) 5x15 Single Lying Cable Concentration Curl

Again perform all three as a tri-set with the focus now being on pushing the muscle beyond fatigue, don't neglect tempo as the reps have increased with attention always  paid to the contraction more so when training arms or just training in general, more so when you up the reps. Squeezing, along with a full range of motion and contraction I think always stimulates the muscle over weight used. With the frontal raise use a rope, squeezing the rope out at the top with thumbs high. The cable curls perform lying down, avoiding any swinging of the weight ensuring your arm is pinned in and elbow down.

And that's it, 20 sets in totally, over 220 reps for each muscle group all in under an hour. The pump and overall exhaustion to the muscle is something I haven't achieved in a while. So keep your workouts intense and you're onto a winner.

Jack

Sleeve bursting arms!!

Sleeve bursting Arms

With the summer now well and truly upon us everyone is changing jumpers for t-shirts and all that hard work you've put in over the winter months you really want to show off. The first thing that draws any attention when it's t-shirt weather is your arms!! Here are a few last minute training tips to really get your arms bursting out of your sleeves.


Add more volume to your triceps!!
Triceps are often neglects when it comes to training arms purely as they're never seen but they take up two thirds of your upper arms, it's not all bicep you know!!! These as a muscle I have found can take a lot of volume as they're used in every pushing motion you do so in order to force them into growth you must train them many different ways to shock the muscle. Train them through different rep patterns with a low rep, high set day on your chest day with a high rep, low set day following shoulders. Focus on tempo and contraction of the muscle and then other times just overload the tricep as much as possible. These methods will stun the muscle, forcing it to grow. Mix the exercises up in your routine adding in reverse push downs, reverse bench and cable skull crushers as oppose to the normal exercises you may do. Lastly over work the lateral head of the tricep which runs from your deltoid, the outer part of the tricep. Kick backs and over head extension are great in isolating this head as the others are often used more in the pushing exercises. This will bring greater depth to your arm size thus create that sleeve bursting look.

Tempo and good form when training biceps!!
So many people now see the top guys in the industry curling heavy weight and automatically employ this type of training into their routine with horrendous form and are not stimulating the muscle at all. This is unless they are curling to gain bigger traps and back. Yes use this shock tactic at the beginning of the workout but don't comprise form for it, as soon as you feel your form is going maybe get one or two cheat reps in but then stop. Move on to an isolation exercise such as a preacher, concentration or incline bench curls where form is a great deal harder to cheat on. Drop the weight down slightly and focus on really tempo and squeezing the muscle at the top of the movement, pushing blood into the muscle. You can add a few force reps in when you're fatigued through either help from a partner or if you're performing a single arm curl get the other hand involved, exhausting the bicep and pushing for growth. Much like the tricep train both heads of the muscle, wider than shoulder width for the short head and closer grip for the long head. I like to include rope hammer curls, lying wide  cable curls and reverse dumbbell curls to really hit both heads.

Train your forearms!
Many people when training arms neglect the forearm but they're still part of the arm. With people wanting to more and more lift heavier weight they opt for straps, meaning their grip strength is poor this never really training forearms. Larger forearms automatically give a more atheistic look to the arm and stronger forearms will help assist when you're looking to move more weight as they act more often than not as a fixator, allowing you to squeeze the bar harder, engaging more muscles. Reverse curls and wrist curls are the two I like to use and get rid of those straps!!!!

So there are three easy tips to add into your programme in order to see results and have sleeve bursting arms.

Jack 

Do I always need to go heavy?

The most common objective in any gym by any avid gym goer is to lift heavier. This may not always be to build muscle, but a majority want both strength and size. But does lifting heavier promote muscles to grow and become larger? Well, you may say, Mr Olympia Ronnie Coleman always states ‘Everybody wants to be a bodybuilder, but nobody wants to lift no heavy-ass weights’ and he had some insane muscles. But is this true?

There are many different leagues of thoughts some believing muscle will only grow if you lift heavier but others believe you can just as effectively build muscle through using lighter weight but with higher reps. Now you may even ask ‘well surely the heavier I go I’m going to build strength so surely the muscle will have to grow’. So what is the difference between training for size and strength?

Strength is about increasing the force production, thus in bodybuilding terms being able to lift a heavier weight. Size is in our case the growth of a muscle through creating microscopic damage to the muscle in order for it to repair larger, this is hypertrophy in its simplest state.

When training for strength the general programme to follow is high weight along with low reps. This training is what I like to say to clients is much like a update on your computer, there to shock the body and thus promote the central nervous system into to thinking it has to increase motor unit recruitment. Much like an update on your computer will promote other parts of your computer to work more efficiently. This basically means the use of more muscles to perform that exercise. In contrast the goal with building size is to promote building muscle and strengthening bones, forcing the muscle tissue to grow stronger and develop. 

So you may ask, well which one should I do, I say both!!! There is a place for both in your programming if you're really serious about not only putting on size but getting stronger. Come on you may want arms the size of Simeon Panda but you also want to be able to deadlift 5 plates or bench press those 50kg dumbbells. The answer is therefore simple, include both in your routine. Here are a few pointers:

1. Begin the session with the heavy, compound exercise for that muscle group your looking to train. It will put pressure on the central nervous system but recruit every muscle within that group, hitting them in a different way, somewhat of confusion. I like to call this blunt force trauma training. Pushing the muscle beyond its limit.
2. Going heavy however doesn't mean you use momentum to cheat the rep or you lose focus on the muscle group you're training purely to lift the weight. Always have control over the weight you're lifting, this is where the strength will be built otherwise you'll just be further prone to injuries. 
3. If you're going heavy at the beginning don't then have a full workout planned after. You're body will already be slightly fatigued, reduce the volume and weight and focus on tempo of the exercises but most importantly the contraction. Really feel the muscle working, use forced reps or negative reps to really push the muscle beyond failure. 
4. Time under tension as partial mentioned above is critical in this stage. Use strict form focusing on the eccentric and concentric phases gaining maximal peak contraction. This doesn't mean a few cheat reps are out of the question, but do the fundamentals first. 

So the final point is do I need to lift heavier to gain muscle, the answer is yes, its a contributing factor. It will aid in the strength of the muscle and promote the central nervous system to become stronger however form shouldn't be compromised because of it. Hypertrophy still has its place to cause the breakdown of the muscle for it to grow back stronger but more importantly larger. So as a pair they go hand in hand and should be used to optzimumize both strength and size.

Happy Training

Jack

Keeping in shape whilst away!!

Now with everyone paid off the crazy bills from Christmas it's time for a holiday, which is one of the reason why I'm writing this with you in mind. Furthermore I'm currently out in Australia for work and a, on the same position as many of you without a gym.

Firstly what your eating is the most important. Now I know your on holiday and you've got to relax therefore meaning you can eat and drink what you want, but as always do it in moderation. If you can go for the healthier option then do. Now I know how hard that can be with most countries washing salads in their own water meaning it's not the best thing to eat, trust me I know I'm struggling in India at the minute. But try and pick up the protein options and not the fried food!!!! With the alcohol side go with the lighter calorific drinks, stay away from the beers and instead opt for a gin and tonic.

Now on to the workout, if there is no gym to do your usual workout and only your room then what do you do?? You can still do a muscle building workout in your hotel room with just your own bodyweight. You can use easy exercises like press-ups, squats, dips and burpees onto advance exercises such as crab walks, ice skaters, crocodile walks and even as far as handstand push ups. So putting this all into your hotel room circuit:
20 press ups,
length of your room crocodile walk,
30 squats, crab walk length of room,
10 burpees,
15 dips.
 For press ups, squats and dips use time under tension for a count of 4010. This will add that little bit more too your workout, helping with the building phase. Give this a try for four rounds, changing if needed the number of reps to your specification.

If the weather is nice and you want to get outside you can also have a get workout. Use any poles you can pull bodyweight too, eg pulls ups, or rowing movements. Use benches for dips along with bars for bodyweight skull crushers. Involve sprints, walking lunges along with squats and you'll have yourself a great workout, all using your bodyweight.

So next time your in your hotel room not knowing what to do for your phys for the day give the above a go.

Jack