Anyone here bench, lift weights, etc?

[niffnoff]

So I've just started working out in the college gym, and doing running and the such, but I really wanna get some training in weights. Anyone here know what the best weight would be for someone who's never done that kinda thing? I know it's a broad question but I'm just curious.

[EtherealEntity]

Just use the bar (20kg presuming it's a standard bar) until you feel comfortable.
Same applies with all exercises really. Get comfortable and then put the weight up gradually as you see fit.
Eventually you want to aim for around 6 reps and use a weight that only allows you to do that.

[EtherealEntity]

Also get a trainer to check your form

[Aevolve]

Get someone who really knows what they're doing to walk you through form.

Form ALWAYS >>>> Amount of weight


EDIT: Half ninja'd in like 3 sec.

[niffnoff]

Lol I figured, I started on a 20kg and did 3 sets of 5. But I felt I could do more so I did a 40kg (2 x20 kg) and I did 2 sets of 6. Man they did kill me off

[Hollowway]

To this day I think the best info out there is in Schwarzenegger's Encyclopedia of Modern Bodybuilding. Great routines, multiple exercises, technique, etc.

And +1 to form > weight. You want to be the guy curling 50 lbs weight in proper form with full extension, not the dude with 100lbs just rocking back and forth with his arms bent.

But be careful of picking a personal trainer. I know a decent amount about form, and I see "trainers" in the local gym violate that all the time. The best trainers are in real weight training gyms, not the local health club. Those guys don't know squat. ( No pun intended!)

[niffnoff]

Most the people at my college are fitness freaks and have been doing it all semester long. I just follow advice from the most hench people possible and get pointers on the way and try. I do alot of cardio and such, so I know form is the more important thing over reps right now.

[EtherealEntity]

Originally Posted by niffnoff

Lol I figured, I started on a 20kg and did 3 sets of 5. But I felt I could do more so I did a 40kg (2 x20 kg) and I did 2 sets of 6. Man they did kill me off

Don't know your build but that sounds about right for a beginner

[EtherealEntity]

Also in direct answer to your original question - the 'best' weight is the one at which you can't get out the last rep. As soon as you can, it's not the best weight anymore

[niffnoff]

Originally Posted by EtherealEntity

Don't know your build but that sounds about right for a beginner

Uhhh, I couldn't tell you dude, but I'm just going through the paces, replacing fat for muscle hopefully not that I'm massively over weight these days I just wanna do more than cardio and work outs.

I felt so relieved after the final rep. chest pain. OW

[EtherealEntity]

As long as you learn to tell the difference between PAIN and working your muscle Pain is bad, but yes you could absolutely describe a good workout as painful haha.

Also, get a spotter so you can push yourself more. I didn't know my true limits on bench press when I was training alone. I'd always consider the last rep almost failure and then stop. As soon as I got a spot however and was more confident, I found a whole new mental and physical level at which I could keep going - easily taking over 5 seconds to get my last rep up. I'd never go that far without a spot, but if you have someone there you can go a lot heavier.
Once I found that feeling and knew what to aim for, my bench weight and chest size progress has become 3 times as fast.

[JP Universe]

I've just been working with a couple of dumbells lately in the loungeroom while I watch TV. It also helps if you're watching Ripped guys on TV. Jersey Shore etc lol

[niffnoff]

Originally Posted by JP Universe

I've just been working with a couple of dumbells lately in the loungeroom while I watch TV. It also helps if you're watching Ripped guys on TV. Jersey Shore etc lol

Lol if anything that DE-motivates me. I wish I had my own dumbells but sadly I don't and probably won't till after college when the gym ain't free no mo. But I know what you mean.

[TheBigGroove]

working out with your own body weight is a great way to start, i.e. pushups for chest, dips for triceps. AND you can start out doing a lot of these at home and supplement the routine with just a set of light'ish dumbells.

Personally I'm at the point now where I'd have to do 60+ pushups to feel any kind of 'burn' but you'll definitely feel satisfied with this kind of routine for at least 3 months.

and when you do start lifting with heavier weights DEFINITELY do some research (youtube is great) on form, technique, routines etc. Also don't forget to try different lifts out on both barbell and dumbells. my bench plateaud at 205x7 reps for about 2.5 months until I started benching with dumbells - and keep in mind I was only benching with 85lb'ers. Now I'm able to get 225 for 6 reps.

edit: dumbell press workouts are also great because they're RELATIVELY safe without a spotter

[TheBigGroove]

Originally Posted by EtherealEntity

Also in direct answer to your original question - the 'best' weight is the one at which you can't get out the last rep. As soon as you can, it's not the best weight anymore

this is a great point and one I really didn't understand the merit of until recently. This is why having a spotter is a must when you get into heavy weights - forced repetitions are the only way to get stronger! Going to failure (or realistically just before) is a must once you start making big gains - you need someone there to help just a bit with that last rep.

You have the realize that muscle builds/gets stronger on the way down (the negative). For example with bench press, the pressing-up motion squeezes blood into your pecs, and letting the weight back down to your chest tears into the muscle fibers...then you press again and more blood is allowed in...repeat...viola big solid man-boobs.

[ExousRulez]

I have some kind of "workout gym" in my garage and I use the bar with 2 20lbs and try to do at least 30-45 up and downs at once 5-10 times a day as well as pull ups/push ups.

After starting online school in november I have gained like 20 pounds of fat, I guess I ate more since i'm always home and didn't eat at school but whats the best way to lose some of my stomach? Around a year ago I was easily able to 20-30 pull ups and now I can only do 10-15 because of my weight as well as my dad as a VERY large stomach (he weighs around 250-270 and is shorter than me) and I don't want to be like that.

[Captain Shoggoth]

Eat right. That doesn't mean starve-it means maintain a caloric deficit (take in less calories than you work off during the day (say 500kcal less than your maintenance amount) and eat healthy foods. That's the proper way to lose weight, and really is the only viable way

[EtherealEntity]

Originally Posted by Captain Shoggoth

Eat right. That doesn't mean starve-it means maintain a caloric deficit (take in less calories than you work off during the day (say 500kcal less than your maintenance amount) and eat healthy foods. That's the proper way to lose weight, and really is the only viable way

Yep

I kinda overskimmed your post OP:

Originally Posted by niffnoff

Uhhh, I couldn't tell you dude, but I'm just going through the paces, replacing fat for muscle hopefully not that I'm massively over weight these days I just wanna do more than cardio and work outs.

Good time to mention that you can't exchange fat for muscle as is common belief. You can't build muscle while in a caloric deficit (i.e. losing fat) - the best you can do is maintain it.*

Your options are:
Bulk then cut- caloric excess, building muscle and perhaps a little fat. Cut later to reveal a body of more muscle than you had before.
Cut then bulk- caloric deficit, maintaning muscle (hopefully) and losing fat. End up skinny and toned, and then bulk slowly trying not to put on too much fat.


*This isn't always strictly true - seems quite a few people can make 'noob gains' whilst cutting fat. However, I'd still consider it a true statement and avoid thinking of this as a viable option.

[Greatoliver]

As well as the form over weight, I would say learn when to stop if something hurts. If you feel like you pull something, don't carry on going as actually injuring yourself can put you out for weeks. If it causes pain, then something is wrong.

Also, appreciate rest time - muscles need time to build, and overtraining is not going to build as much muscle if you let your muscles regrow.

There are some guys who give great advice here

[SenorDingDong]

Something that I didn't see yet (although I may be blind ) is a warm up; I believe that warming up is as important, if not more so, than exercising in the first place.

Take a rubber band, brand new; if you try and stretch it far, it'll snap. Why? Because it's tight. Take a rubber band that has been worn in a bit, and you'll be able to stretch it a lot further because it is looser.

That rubber band is your muscle; when it's "cold", it's like a brand new rubber band. After a warm up, your muscles are more like that good, dependable, worn-in rubber band, full of elasticity.

Do a simple warm up so that your muscles aren't straining as much, even if that warm up simply involves moving your arms and legs around for a couple minutes, or doing a light weight set.

[soliloquy]

be careful on the arnold forms though.
he may have been MASSIVE, and was lifting far more than what normally people are lifting these days, but if you look at some of his old pictures, you'd see the weirdest forms ever.
when lifting on his biceps using a barbell, he would arch his back completely, for example.

however, reading up on it, you'd see reviewers saying that 'if you lifted that much, then you were forgiven'.

so you may take arnolds workouts as a guide, but dont take his form.

[TheBigGroove]

Originally Posted by soliloquy

be careful on the arnold forms though.
he may have been MASSIVE, and was lifting far more than what normally people are lifting these days, but if you look at some of his old pictures, you'd see the weirdest forms ever.
when lifting on his biceps using a barbell, he would arch his back completely, for example.

While you do have a very good point for 'normal' folks, when you're a body builder lifting huge amounts of weight (tears into the muscle more and thus makes it bigger) during your bulking phase, you can cheat on the way up and really work the negative. I see this a LOT with biceps for body builders. They get the bar going with their body weight on the way up then let it down slowly. As I said in an earlier post, you really only tear into the muscle fibers on the negative (when you're letting the bar back down). So he is arching his back just to get the weight up there so he can let it down and do the more essential part of the workout in terms of body building and getting huge biceps. HOWEVER! if you're not a body builder who has a good amount of experience lifting and a good amount of muscle in your back, core, legs and everything else to keep yourself from getting hurt, you wouldn't really ever want to do this...it would just hurt you before it did any bit of good. Hope that made some kind of sense.

[Uncreative123]

Originally Posted by JWGriebel

Something that I didn't see yet (although I may be blind ) is a warm up; I believe that warming up is as important, if not more so, than exercising in the first place.

Take a rubber band, brand new; if you try and stretch it far, it'll snap. Why? Because it's tight. Take a rubber band that has been worn in a bit, and you'll be able to stretch it a lot further because it is looser.

That rubber band is your muscle; when it's "cold", it's like a brand new rubber band. After a warm up, your muscles are more like that good, dependable, worn-in rubber band, full of elasticity.

Do a simple warm up so that your muscles are straining as much, even if that warm up simply involves moving your arms and legs around for a couple minutes, or doing a light weight set.

Thanks professor. Since you're wrong about this too, you can choose to ignore it as well.

For those not quite up to date with the advances in our knowledge of stretching, here's the short version.

• Stretching, regardless of form, does not reduce muscle soreness.
• Static stretching, whether before or after exercise, does not prevent and, in excess, may even cause performance injuries.
• Static stretching of a muscle before exercise decreases its subsequent performance.
• Static stretching does not increase strength or muscle gains from resistance training.

To understand why, first look at what happens when you stretch a muscle. Broadly speaking, there are three mechanisms by which range of motion, passive or active, can be increased:
Viscoelasticity increases. Simply put, the more elastic a muscle, the more it can be stretched out. However, viscoelasticity isn't the same as elasticity, and for this reason muscles are not at all like rubber bands, as often stated.
"Like solid materials, they demonstrate elasticity by resuming their original length once tensile force is removed. Yet, like liquids, they also behave viscously because their response to tensile force is rate and time dependent" (Weppler & Magnusson, 2010).
Neural stretch tolerance increases. The more permissive the nervous system, the greater the ROM it allows the muscle-tendon structures to reach. There are several neural mechanisms, like agonist reflex activation, that contribute to the increased extensibility, but let's use neural stretch tolerance as a catch-all term for all neural processes here.
Muscle length increases. The longer a muscle, the longer its ROM. As such, increases in ROM can be due to any of these factors. The assumption of most stretching programs is that muscle length increases. However, this is based on outdated and methodologically flawed research with improper use of terminology.
The following is what really happens to the above properties when you stretch a muscle:
Viscoelasticity may increase after hard stretching, as in over two minutes, but this is only temporary.
Depending on the amount of stretching, viscoelasticity returns to baseline within about 10 minutes after two minutes of stretching; or 20 minutes after 4-8 minutes of stretching; or an hour after some seriously hardcore yoga.
Stretch tolerance increases.
As this is neural learning, like memorizing words, this is a more permanent adaptation. However, the increased stretch tolerance is lost over time and can be reinforced by repetition, much like words are gradually lost from memory and reinforced by repetition.
Muscle (and tendon) length stay exactly the same.

When you stretch a muscle, no permanent structural adaptations take place. All you do with most stretching programs is teach the nervous system that it's okay to relax the muscle a bit more when stretched.
Most of the neural adaptation actually is an increase in pain tolerance. Any increases in range of motion still present the day after the stretching are due to purely neural adaptations.
Let me emphasize for effect: You can't increase a muscle's length by stretching it.
This, of course, has far reaching implications for the use of stretching in flexibility training, warming up, and postural correction.


Based on the findings listed in the introduction, static stretching before your training sessions is a very bad idea. Dynamic stretching is also unnecessary, though some of the most effective warm-up drills are dynamic stretches.
According to the specificity principle, you should remember what it is you're preparing your body for during the warm-up. Activate the muscles that need activating, do a few compound dynamic stretching drills, and start on your main movement. Sometimes it's enough to just do the warm-up sets of the movement you're preparing for.
Whatever you do, you should normally be done with it in less than five minutes. Warm-ups are overrated, and the empirical evidence that extensive warm-ups enhance performance or decrease injuries is weak. Furthermore, evolutionarily speaking, it just wouldn't make sense if humans needed long warm-ups.

[sverrejk]

Yes I'm lifting weights! My record is 90kg in bench press.. not that much I think but I always progress so i'm going to try to reach one time at 100kg before this semester is over!

High-intensity training is recommended if you've been lifting for half a year, you will need a spotter though but it helped me out A LOT. I went from 5 rep on 75kg on a GOOD DAY benching. To 8 reps on 80kg, when I followed a 3 week HIT(high intensity training) program!

I think it's called mayo-reps(don't know what its called in English really :p)

But the main concept is;
Pick a weight you can barely do 12 or 15 repetitions on
20 second break, then you lift 3 times(this is heavy as hell though)
20 seconds break, lift 3 times
20 seconds break, lift 3 times
20 seconds break, lift 3 times

You need a spotter because it should be impossible to do the last 2 sets without help. What this type of exercise does, is that you activate almost all the muscle fibers compared to "normal" exercise where you take 6-10reps on each set with a minute+\- break.

I did this for 3 weeks, and now I'm exercising "normally" for 3 weeks before I start with the HIT for 3 weeks, so I go in a 3week cycle with this until I'm happy with my muscles! If that day ever comes I guess I'll exercise around 2 times a week just to keep in shape!

[USMarine75]

^ that's phenomenal! Wait, what's this kg you speak of?

Start lifting pounds then we can talk.