Common Gym Mistakes and Simple Solutions to them

Wardy257

Common Gym Mistakes and Simple Solutions to Them

As a Personal Trainer I see the same mistakes again and again, and again.  This thread is my attempt to help you guys and girls from falling into the same old traps.  I have tried to combine real life experience, stuff from text books, various training courses and stuff from science to create a good list for you all.

I have over simplified certain aspects, as I do not want to get all sports sciencey so please keep that in mind too.

1. You are not the exception, you are the rule.

Every single person who exercises at some point or other will convince themselves that they are different, that the normal rules don’t apply to them.  That they have the wrong genes, or the right genes, or that as a female they will gain arms like the Hulks if they lift more than 3kg, or that the only way they can bench big is to bench 3 times a week every week. STOP.  If you are reading this thread then you are the rule as all the exceptions will have their own Strength and Condition Coach, or be training under supervision from a Doctor or Physio.

The only exception we do have is DNA.  If your DNA is suited to being a marathon runner then you are probably never going to look like Phil Heath, if you put on muscle just by looking at a weight then you are probably never going to win the 10 km Olympic Gold Medal.  There is little point in training against your DNA, BUT don't blame your DNA for your poor results unless there is no other possible reason (you can train against your DNA if you are clever and lucky).

There are rarely really any other ifs or buts in the matter so do not try anything clever or different until you can scientifically prove that ‘simple’ does not work for you. So……..

2.  Keep it Simple.

For the average gym goer, even if you have been going to the gym for years there is often little need to train using elaborate split routines, isolation training, functional training etc.  If you want to get faster, then run faster.  If you want to be able to run 10km then gradually run further each session until you can run 10 km.  If you want to increase your flat bench strength then concentrate on lifting more on your flat bench rather than going mad lifting every bench variation plus assistance/isolation movements.  If you want to add mass then do the big movements (squat, press, deadlift) instead of trying to isolate each individual muscle head on each individual muscle as you probably don’t have enough muscle to isolate anyway!

That is not to say that the more complicated training regimes don’t work, it is a case of are they worth all the hassle?  Do you have enough knowledge to execute the program properly?  Or to even chose the right plan in the first place? Normally the answer is no.  Keep it simple.

3. Keep it specific.

If you want to get big then use at least 60% of your 1 rep max 6-12 reps, 2-4 sets and a max of the 3 exercises per body part/body movement, 45 – 90 sec rest.  If you want to get strong then use 60-100% of you 1 rep max for 2-5 reps, 4-5 sets and perhaps only one exercise per body movement (squat, deadlift, press), 2 – 5 mins rest.  If you want endurance then use 10-59% of your 1 rep max for 12-20 reps, 4-6 sets per body movement, 30-45s rest.  If you want to increase cardio output then run/walk/cycle etc at at least 70% max heart rate.  Train 3 times a week and add weight to the bar/distance/speed at least once a fortnight, ideally once a week on each movement/exercise.

If you work outside of these common rules/principles then you are most likely not maximising your gains (see No 1).   Doing that final set of dumbbell curls with 6kgs after you have already lifted 18 kgs is not going to help you, its just cardio and a waste of energy.  Checking your Facebook status between every set or sending a text as your “rest” is not going to help anyone.  Plan and time your rests intervals properly and execute them consistently.

4. Select the Correct Training Intensity.

This echoes much of No 3 so re-read that first.  When we exercise we are simply burning energy and the way in which we train determines, to a point, which form of energy we use.  By targeting that energy system with our training we force our bodies to get better at using that energy which promotes appropriate gains (strength, size, cardiovascular etc).  So in simple terms, to get strong we get better and using the creatine phosphate energy system, to get big we get better at using (and storing) the lactate acid energy system and to improve cardio output we get better at using the aerobic energy system.  The amount of weight we lift, the number of sets and the rest we take determines this as per No 3 above.

If you look at something like running the same logic applies, a sprinter will mainly use creatine phosphate, and 400m runner lactic acid and your long distance runner the aerobic system.  So your choice of training has to be specific to your goals.  There is no point going for regular long runs if you want to get big or strong.  Nor resting for 3 mins between sets if you are trying to increase aerobic capacity.

Just to be clear you can never fully switch on or fully switch off the 3 energy systems so they are always at work together.  All we can do is try to ensure we are mainly using the chosen system to obtain the chosen result.

If you are combining different elements of training in one session train in this order; Power, strength, size, cardio.

Real life counts too, if your job is physical that needs to be taken into account when you train.  Sometimes you have to compromise which can be frustrating, but treat these times as challenge.  Maybe this will force you to train smarter and find a way around this problem.  I used to use my old job as a teenager as part of my training and even now, nearly 20 years later I use some of the classes I teach as part of my training.

Final point on this one, training partners.  If your rest is waiting for your training partner then this may not be consistent nor specific, especially if you are adjusting machines/weights in between.  Training with 2 or more training partners when you are trying to get big seldom works, just too much rest and distraction (to you and the other gym members).  Is your training partner helping or hindering your gains?  Could you train concurrently to solve the problem?

Wardy257

5. Too much Cardio.

Whatever your goal people seem to do far too much cardio, even if they are a runner etc.  If you look at simply increasing health and reducing markers for heart disease any exercise is better than no exercise and carrying out any regular exercise 2-3 times a week is enough on its own.  You don’t have to do any cardio at all as your heart and lunges will be working as you lift weights.

If you are trying to loose weight/fat you have to consider that as you get fitter you will burn less calories for the same exercise/distance/intensity.  That’s kind of what getting fitter is all about, doing more for less.  So therefore, to keep burning calories you have to regularly increase the distance and/or speed/or intensity.  The problem is that there are only so many hours in the day so do you really want to keep increasing how long you spend in the gym?  Increasing intensity can lead to injuries and some people just aren’t build to run fast etc.  How fast can you go? Also, cardio inevitably reduces muscle as the body tries to decrease the amount of weight it has to lug around and source energy.  Less muscle equals a lower metabolism equals less calories burnt.  So cardio can be a vicious circle.

If cardio is your thing then mix and match it up; running, cycling, rowing, cross training, spin, circuits etc.  But please, please, please do some sort of regular resistance/weight training at least twice a week too.  This could be something simple like squats, press and a row and you could work on specific weaknesses such as glutes (so common) and hamstrings (common too, especially women).  All to often the cardio addicts are the ones who quickly gain weight/fat after a short break from the gym (illness, work, holiday) where as the people who mostly lift weights gain little or no weight/fat.

If your goal is size or strength then you need to find an appropriate time and intensity for your supporting cardio.  The Reg Park (the guy Arnie wanted to be!) way was weights at silly o’clock in the morning, cardio at night.  Dorian Yates, 6 time Mr Olympia, would do cardio on separate days to weights.  These guys would do Long Slow Duration type cardio, low intensity for 45  mins such as a walk on a treadmill.  The other, more recent technique is High Intensity Training such as sprints, sled pulls etc for sometimes as little as 15-20 mins.  See which one works for you and try to avoid doing cardio on the same day as weights for size/strength.

6.  Avoid Overtraining.

Unless you are at the upper echelons of your sport (see no 1) train 2-3 times a week max for no more than an hour.  No ifs, no buts and no coconuts!

If you can not stress your body enough in 1 hour then your training sucks or is non-specific (see No 3 and 4).   The exception is low intensity (heart rate less than 120 bpm), stretching and mobility which could be done in-between your 2-3 training days providing you don’t go crazy.

A common mistake in this area is the over use of isolation movements.  If you have to isolate every muscle you will be in the gym for hours where as you can do a compound lift (squat, press, deadlift, row/pull), and target multiple muscles at the same time.  You can train around 90% of your body with 3 lifts so why do 7-8 lifts?  There is a time and place for isolation work but for most people it is neither the time nor place.

The other side to this is training too many times a week or hitting the same old muscles again and again.  Your body is a system so although we like to split it up as back, shoulder, chest etc it is not the simple.  You can’t work your shoulders without having some effect on your back.  You can’t training your chest without some effect on your arms and shoulders and so on.  Appropriate rest is essential between body parts.

7. Avoid Under Training.

As an opposite of No 6 it is common for people to under train.  If you are injury/illness free then you should be able to squat more than 10kg whether you are male or female (a regular gym goer should be able to squat a bar with the equivalent of their body weight on it, at least).

Going to Step Aerobics or Zumba once a week, even if you sweat your shirt off is not going to make you very fit nor strong nor loose much weight.

Not training for more weeks than you do train is clearly going to add up to failure.

Whatever your chosen form or forms of training you have to gradually increase the intensity of the exercise regardless of whether you think you are already fit/strong enough.  If you don’t you can actually de-train or become too specific (only capable of performing at one discipline to the detriment of all others).

Do not sell your self short by gaining some fitness then thinking you are fit enough, keep pushing even if its adding 0.5% intensity per week.

The old saying that all men should take 10lbs off the bar, and all women should add 10 lbs to the bar still applies.  Ladies, you can be fit and strong and still look like (amazing/stunning) women so lift more!!!!

8. Poor Nutrition, Diet, use of Supplements.

Lets keep it simple, if your diet sucks you will not achieve your goals.

If you start a diet in which you decrease calorie intake and start an exercise regime at the same time you will most likely just make yourself ill.  Exercise first while cleaning up your diet and see how you are getting on.  Then you can reduce calorie intake if appropriate.

If you are trying to get big or strong but can not gain weight then its likely you are not eating enough.  If you cant even gain some fat its unlikely you can gain muscle.  Personally I find eating big calories really difficult, I get fed up with eating no matter how tasty the food is.

If you train like a pro but eat like an average American teenager you are negating most of your training.

Diet is also about the things you don’t eat as mush as what you do eat.  If you don’t get regular protein, fats, vitamins and minerals you are not going to be healthy.

There is nothing wrong with the odd treat/cheat meal but earn it first.  Go to the gym and work your but off then have your takeaway, not the other way around.

Supplements are exactly that, they are to supplement a healthy diet not replace it.  Ideally get all your macro and micro nutrients from your normal diet and only supplement when you have to.  Having 3 protein shakes a day is not going to compensate for an otherwise poor diet, poor training, poor sleep etc etc.

Wardy257

9.  Poor or No Warm up, Mobility, Stretching, Cool Down.

Only this morning I saw a guy come into the gym, straight into the weights room, 8 fast floppy reps with an empty bar then 2 plates on the ends and off he went.  I bet that is a lot of the guys reading this.  Where was the warm up?  Why did the empty bar reps not replicate the main lifts?  Floppy form in a warm up often means floppy form in the work reps/sets.

Always warm up in a specific manner to how/what you are going to train.  If you are going to train your back there is little point cycling or running as you don’t really use your back so row or use a cross trainer.  If you are gong for a run why warm up on a bike?

A warm up is supposed to be light, your heart rate should not be going above 120 bpm really.  If you feel stiff/tight warm up longer, if you have walked 15 mins to get to the gym then you might be warm enough already.

Stretching is a frequently debated topic and for every study proving one thing there is a study proving another.  I say just do it!  If your gym has a Powerplate then they are great for stretching but you can still stretch well on the floor/standing.  Stretch all the muscles you plan to use before and after training and try stretching between sets too .  About 10-15 secs for warm up, 15-20 secs for cool down once per position or twice if tight/stiff.

Mobility is simple getting the joints and muscles moving.  A key area for this is the hips, lots of small and big muscles that often need waking up to make them work in harmony. A lot of people loose lower back shape during squats and leg presses simply because their hips cant move properly (this can also be down to a weak core, or both).  For the sake of 5 mins mobility work its not worth risking a lower back injury that could effect you for life.

Mobility can be as simple as starting each exercise with an empty bar or light dumbbell.  Treat your warm up reps just like a maximum effort rep maintaining perfect form through the full range of movement.  It can be a good idea to vary the grip too, for example, for a barbell bench press do 5 reps hands wide, 5 reps hands normal and 5 reps hands narrow with just the bar.

The cool down is where you return to normal, get your heart rate back down, flush out toxins from the muscles etc.  The cool down does need to be too specific so a simple walk on a treadmill followed by stretching is often enough.

10.  Dealing with Training Plateaus and Overcoming Problems.

This could end up being the biggest topic, I will try and keep it short and simple.  So you have been training well but for whatever reason your squat is stuck at 100kg.  Every time you try and lift more you fail or can’t get to full depth.  You can squat 97 kg fine so what do you do now?

First thing is to study your training log and look for clues.  If you don’t keep a training log then do 20 burpees as punishment and go to WH Smiths and buy a notebook and start logging everything.  If you don’t log your training then how do you know you have plateaued?  Maybe you have inadvertently tried to lift too much too early?  Maybe a training log would show you have actually been lifting too much volume so are simply tired.  Maybe you have not been training your squat enough so it is no wonder you are failing.  Log everything!!

So you were a good trainee and have logged everything and you log shows no obvious reason why you cannot squat 100 kg.  There are now 3 likely reasons: Nutrition/rest, Form or a weakness.

So first are you eating enough and resting enough?  You may have just had a week of night shift followed by a week of restless nights sleep.  You may have been skipping lunch each day due to work etc.

What is your form like?  Sloppy form will only allow you to go so far.  Ask one of the Personal Trainer at your gym to check your form it wont cost anything.  Or ask someone who can squat big at the gym (anyone can squat light properly, it’s a big difference once its 100kg plus).  If the form is bad go back to basics, drop the weight, fix the form and build again.

Do you have a weakness?  This will probably be revealed with your form.  If you are tall you may be hamstring dominant so your quads could be weak.  If you arse comes up before your back then you back/glutes are probably weak.  If you knees buckle in then again its glutes or abductors and so on.

For the cardio guys/girls the same logic applies.  Check your log, check your diet and rest, check your form/technique and check for weaknesses.  I have met many competitive runners with tight/weak hamstrings, weak glutes who don’t appreciate how much this impacts their race performance.  Some simple Kettle Bells swings once a week can take minutes off a 10 km race time for these people.

For any other problems keep it simple.  Are you missing any part of the body when you train?  This is common (for guys its legs, for girls it upper body) so stop missing bits and train the whole body.  If you normally train with machines try free weights, if you normally use a barbell use dumbells.  If you normally use a wide grip try a close grip etc etc.

11.  Inappropriate Exercise Selection.

This could be another big section.  I will assume that any exercise that people do is performed correctly as any badly executed exercise is clearly inappropriate.

I have already touched on the over use of isolation exercises but I am going to say it again.  If you are trying to loose weight do you really think that seated bicep curls are going to burn through load of calories?  Biceps are a tiny muscle, even if you are Jay Cutler, and burn few calories and hardly tax the heart and lungs.  Your legs are the biggest muscles so squats, lunges, jumps etc are going to burn calories for fun.

If you are trying to make you core stronger than doing 3 sets of 100 crunches is not going to help as that is a cardio workout, not strength (see No 3).  Plus that only really trains one muscle so what about the others?

Training for a cross country run on a treadmill is not going to prepare your body for the undulating multi-surface terrain you are going to encounter during the race.  The odd treadmill session is fine and productive but you need to get outside and train in similar conditions to the race, regularly.

If you play hockey every Saturday there is little point in doing any cardio where you maintain constant speed as that does not mimic your sport.  Intervals, Fartleks, 10-15 m sprints and agility is far more specific.

If you are going to compete in your first 10 km then at some point in your training you need to run for 10 km!  Even if it is just once. Sounds obvious but people often run for 10 km for the first time during a race.

If you are trying isolate a muscle or muscles make sure the exercise you are doing in appropriate to that goal.  A big part of this is coming up in No 12 Form but often it is people not understanding what each muscle does.  Some muscles can share movements with other muscles so it can be easy to make a mistake.  The calfs assist the hamstrings in knee bending.  Shoulder extension is shared between the lats, delts, triceps, teres major so depending on your range of motion, elbow position etc you may not be working the muscle you want.  If in doubt treat your self to an app for your phone/tablet to help out and learn the main muscles, where the attach and what they do.  I use one as my brain is not big enough to remember it all, they are great.

Wardy257

12. Poor Form.

If you don’t perform the exercise correctly you will not get the correct results and risk injury. You need to be in control of the weight at all times so that means you can only use momentum to help in Olympic/dynamic lifts.

Half squatting is likely to make you quad dominant and ignore the glutes and hamstrings.  Rounding your back during any exercise is a fast way to injury, and will decrease the performance of the lats for back exercises.

If you use a gym make use of the Personal Trainer who is on shift to check your form.  Believe me we would far rather do that the clean sweat of treadmills!

There are times when you may want to change the form of the exercise which is different to poor form providing you do it consciously and consistently.  If you squat with your feet and knees close together you will hit the outer quads more, feet wide the inner quad more for example.  Biceps and hamstrings can respond well to having their range split in 3 where you train the lower movement, then the middle movement then the upper movement either in one big set of separately.  Please note that in all this you never ignore and part of the range of motion, you still train the whole muscle.

You should do everything you can to maintain form for all but the last 2-3 reps of each set.  If you are having to use poor form more than that then the solution is simple, reduce the weight.  Also, if you have had to cheat/use poor form to get the weight up then do all you can to lower it back down under correct form for maximum gains.

For all you power lifting types out there remember form changes as you lift more and more.  That is, when max effort lifting 100 kg in the deadlift your form will be different to several months/years down the line when you max effort 150 kgs.  The more you lift the more muscles come into play, the more technique matters and so on.

I regularly see people doing wide grip rows to hit the upper back, traps, rear delts etc which makes a lot of sense and is a good exercise.  The problem is they let their elbows drop and put the pressure on lats defeating the purpose.  Sometimes this is down to simply not knowing any better, others it is “ego lifting” as the proper movement should be done with less weight than a normal row (they are weaker muscles).  The elbows should be high for this exercise and I find it a bit of a killer myself.  The lesson here is to watch your elbows and other joints during exercises to target the muscle you want, reduce the weight if you have to.

If you are going to make use of Youtube to find guidance on form be careful as there are a lot of nutters on there.  There is also a lot of opinion dressed as fact and of course different people have different views.  Put a group of well trained, experienced Strength and Conditioning Coaches in room together and they will argue all day about training as that’s the way it is really.  You just have to use a bit of common sense, trial and error.

13. Excessive use of Functional/Sports Specific Training (F/SST).

I am a fan of F/SST, I believe it should be part of everyone’s training regime.  However, too much of it will decrease performance as much as not enough F/SST will decrease performance.

Firstly, as per No 11 and No 3 your F/SST needs to be appropriate to your sport or goals or it will be ineffective.  Sounds obvious enough but it’s a common problem even with qualified coaches.

For example, It may seem like a good idea for a tennis player to work on their base line strokes by using a cable machine in the same range of motion to their racket swing.  But is it a good idea?  I would argue not because the movement on the court will be a lot faster than the movement on the cable machine.  Also, in tennis the shot will be followed through, on the cable machine the shot will come to a slow stop and then be reversed with a loaded eccentric phase.  It looks the same at first, but it is a different movement.

Lunging onto a bosu ball is great if you are recovering from or trying to prevent ankle injuries but ultimately you will be limited in how much weight you can lunge.  Less weight equals less power/strength so this is less effective than conventional lunges or split squats.

Going backwards on a Cross Trainer is proven to help knee injures recover but that does not mean it will help strengthen your knees.  I have always regarded backwards Cross Training to be way too easy an exercise to improve anything and has limited functionality.

What F/SST is great for is converting your strength/power/fitness gains into sports specific movements.  Therefore, it is great for the final few weeks of pre-season and then top-ups during the season.  It is also excellent for overcoming issues such as plateaus and weaknesses (see No 10) and fixing form.

For example, squatting knees forward, hardly bending at the hip is really common with most newbies in the gym and even some of the regulars.  I have a lot of success using either functional trainers (cable machines) or TRX (Suspension Training) in fixing this issue.  So, for example, using the TRX I will get the client to hold onto both handles and squat backwards and down until their bottom is nearly on the floor (if they have the flexibility).  It is rare that people cannot do this as part of the original problem is their conscious/sub-conscious thinking they will fall over if the push the hips back in a squat.  By holding onto the straps their brain knows they wont/can’t fall over and suddenly the hips bend!  A couple of sessions squatting with TRX can be followed by normal squatting and from then on its onwards and upwards.  Once their back squatting has got better and they are able to squat with weight I may bring them back to the TRX to carryout pistol (one legged) squats or lunges.  However, the main strength/performance gains are from squatting with weight, not TRX/F/SST.

Wardy257

14.  Being Unscientific

I could not leave it on 13 so this final bit encompasses everything above and should underlie all of your training.

Way too many people are completely unscientific in there training.  Typically the guys chop and change their training at will or because they saw something on Youtube, or Facebook or the want to copy someone they saw in the gym.  For women it often the opposite, they do the same old routine week after week, month after month and wonder why they get no gains.

So choose your training plan to meet your goals ensuring it is specific and appropriate.  If you don’t know how to do this most gyms will provide you with either free generic plans or for a small charge you can get a Personal trainer to write you are personalized training plan.  Once you have you plan follow it for at least 6 weeks before you re-evaluate it and change or update it to suite.  Do not add or subtract exercises without a good reason (injury), do not skip a weight (ie add too much to the bar), do not increase the intensity for the first few week then, because your jeans now fit, stop increasing the intensity.

What you do need to do is log everything, the more you log the better.  Top body builders are all completely and utterly OCD and will log everything.  It wouldn’t surprise me if some of them log their toilet output.  Log the weights you lifted, the reps, the rest, how easy/hard it felt, warm-up activity, cool down, cardio (distance, pace, speed), heart rate, weight, body fat, calories, macros and so on.  Top body builders take regular photos of themselves doing their poses too, how vain!

At the 6 week point, armed with your log you have scientific and objective proof of your whether or not your program works.  Have you gained strength, lost weight, lost fat, improved cardio vascular fitness etc.  Your log should tell you.

You can then evaluate your training and if required make changes due to weaknesses, poor gains etc.  You then carryout your new plan for 6-8 weeks, logging everything and repeat.  It is actually really simple when it comes down to it, don’t make it complicated, do not over think it.

If you haven’t gained anything or gains have slowed you may just need to swap one exercise out/in or change from machines to free weights, swap Spin for Body Pump or simply increase or decrease calories by 5%.  I always describe this to clients as a like stepping stones across a river, lots of small steps forward in the correct direction to reach your goal.  It does not matter where you start as long as you get to the other side ideally by the most direct route!

Doing something once does not prove anything.  Give me a rifle and I bet I could hit a target 500m away so am I a sniper?  Well that depends how many rounds I needed and how repeatable this exploit was. Why am I mentioning this?  Simple, time and time again you see, for example, scrawny guys coming into the gym to train with a muscle bound guy.  They copy the big guys workout set for set just with smaller weights.  What is wrong with that?  Well potentially a lot…..

So this big guy must know what he is doing otherwise he wont be big and muscley?  Maybe but you need more information just like we still don’t know if I’m a sniper or got lucky.  So the questions are:

How long did take this guy to get big?  2 years, awesome. 10 years poor.

Is he big because he had an excellent training partner in the past?  Yes, well train with his old training partner instead.  No, ask more questions.

Has this guy always been naturally big?  Yes, maybe he has good genetics.  No, ask more questions

Is this guy on steroids?  Yes, walk away fast.  No, ask more questions.

If all the above works out ok 2 more questions.

Has he only ever trained himself?  Yes, he could have got lucky.  No, lets see some other results from other partners.

Finally and often forgotten,

Did he get big using this current workout, or is this the workout he now does for better definition or another goal?  Yes, great.  No, this is for definition/another goal well then this is not specific to the scrawny guy.

I have used a body building example but it works for strength, cardio, sports etc.  To be scientific you have to do some research and ask the right questions.  This day and age you should consider who is liable if you get hurt too (or you hurt someone else accidently), I would not let some one unqualified and uninsured train me.  I may discuss training ideas theory with a customer though as you never stop learning.

You also need to consider that if you have never trained before, or it has been a while, or this is your first time training with a program/partner/trainer you will make gains regardless.

We call this “Newbie Gains” and the gains can be quite big and quite quick at first.  I have a client who despite being a gym regular (but cardio only) gained 53% in the leg press in 8 weeks.  How do I know this, because he logged everything in detail (well taught of course).  So even if you don’t train as hard as he did, nor keep as good form etc you can still gain quickly and that is why logging and re-evaluating is important.  If you keep gaining then clearly you are doing something right, if you are not the read this entire post again.  You gains will reduce as you get fitter/stronger but they should not stop, especially for the average gym goer (all of us) as we will probably never get close to our genetic potential.

Conversely, don’t go too sciencey and only trust something if a study proves it.  There is a thick line between what works in a lab and what works in the gym.  A lot of the science stuff is meaningless in the real world and often gets misquoted by trainers/writers/marketing so be careful.

That’s it, if I remember any more I will add it.  Hopefully I spotted all the typos, please forgive me if I haven’t.  If anyone wants to add more please do and also feel free to ask question about any of it.  If you have any off topic questions please use a different thread of my ‘Ask a Personal trainer” thread.

EDIT: This took my flipping ages in the end, I hope it helps at least one person to make it worth the effort.

Charlts

Good stuff Wardy, enjoyed reading that and thanks for making the effort.

Wardy257

Typical, overnight I think of 3 more topics!!

15. Cheating.

This is similar to Poor Form so read No 12 first.  Humans are designed cheat, its how we survive.  All out sub-conscious brain wants to do is stay alive so it will do all it can to save energy.  So, for example, if you are doing a squat and your hamstrings are getting tired you may sub-consciously squat more shallowly, or move your knees forward to activate more quads etc.  This is great for the brain, bad for the body so you need to force the body to do what you want it to do then the body has to adapt.

This isn't just about weights either.  Stick anyone on a cross trainer and sooner or later without them even realising one of their feet (sometimes both) will start to angle in or out.  This is simply muscle fatigue in one of the quads (most probably) so your brain/body angles the foot to use more of the other quads to cope.  However, unless you spot and adjust this the weaker muscle will just remain weak and the stronger muscle will remain strong.

The simple message from this is your body will always find a way to cheat, the gym is the place where you stop it cheating so the body has to adapt.

Wardy257

16. I Want to Burn Fat From Here.

This is simple and short, you can not choose where your body burns fat from.  Just because you train the back of the arms does not mean you will loose your bingo wings.

Stop your body from storing fat by having a good diet, burn off the fat you do have by training hard and then it's fate.

17. I Want to Get Fit, Strong, Big and Loose Fat all at the Same Time.

As you have hopefully learned by now your training has to be specific to your goals.  If you have too many goals then you can not be specific.  

You can be fit but fat, you can be thin but unfit, you can have big muscles but be weak, you can have strong muscles but small muscles.  What defines this is partly DNA but mostly specific diet and specific training.

What most people do is join a gym and start a diet at the same time.  They then do lots of cardio (See No 5) to burn fat and weights to get big and strong all at the same time.  This is WRONG.

Lets use an example to prove the point.  You normally eat 2500 cal a day and go on a diet reducing your calories to 2000 a day.  You have also joined a gym and go 4 times a weak burning 300 cal per session.

The maths shows that you are now eating 3500 cal a week less, over a days worth of food, and are also now burning 1200 cal per week in the gym.  That is a cal difference of 4700!!!!  Do you really think that is healthy let alone productive?  You will initially loose weight doing this but within about 10-14 days you will be exhausted, probably get ill and then rebound (get fat).  If you join a gym do not reduce the calories too, clean up your diet ( reduce [email protected], not calories) and adjust to suite. And that’s just the calories side of things, now the exercise bit.

I wont repeat what I wrote about Cardio in No 5, please re-read it.  To get strong I need to lift heavy weight for 3-5 reps with a rest period of approx 3 mins between sets and I will mainly use the creatine phosphate energy system.  To get big I need to lift medium to heavy weights, 6 - 12 reps with a rest period of 60-90 seconds and use the lactic acid energy system.  They are different training systems, different energy systems and strength training also requires more co-ordiantion, power, CNS and is partly governed by individual biomechanics.  Therefore, trying to do both at once will always be a compromise and how big a compromise will depend on DNA, Form, Diet and so on.

So what is the answer? Periodisation of course.

In simple terms (for the average gym goer) this is just training once element at a time, in sequence to optimise gains.

So your average newbie to gym who wants to loose fat, gain muscle mass and get stronger could now train like this:

Week 1  -  Light cardio, stretching, mobility
Week 2  -   Light cardio, stretching, mobility
Week 3   -   Medium cardio, stretching, mobility
Week 4  -  Medium-Hard cardio, stretching, mobility
Weeks 5-8  -   Hypertrophy (build muscle size)
Weeks 9-12  -  Strength/Power
Week 13  -  De-load, low intensity cardio/weights

So whats the logic in all this?  I think its simple, but its my job so it should be for me.  We start by getting the body moving, nothing fancy and a low risk of injury.  We then gradually increase the intensity getting the heart and lungs working harder.  As we move into the hypertrophy phase the heart and lungs are still working as we build muscle.  Finally, we use our now (slightly) bigger muscles to move some big weights.  After this we have active rest, we deload and train light to recover.

Each training phase compliments the next training phase where as the original example has all the training contradicting itself.

Whatever your goal or starting point periodisation is the way to go about it.  Work in cycles of 6-12 weeks, deload, adjust, repeat.

reiteration

yep, great thread - thanks

Steve Kelly

Great post(s), thanks dude.
And for me, the timing couldn't be better!!
Now just need to find half-hour to read it all!