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I just worked out at the gym for the first time

It was great! My whole body is aching. I just ate my first meal of the day (worked out on an empty stomach) of salt and pepper scrambled egg, a turkey slice, and beans, on toast. A good meal to repair muscles? My question is, what should I do for the rest of the day to maintain the strength I've gained today?

Reply 1

SarahB_

I doubt just one visit to the gym will give you that much extra strength. Try keeping it up regularly & eating a high carb meal a couple of hours before you go is probably a good idea :smile:

Reply 2

Jakelammo

what exactly are you trying to acheive, muscular endurance, strength, or just trying to beef up? what you should eat depends on what you are looking to do with your body...

Reply 3

Becca <3.

1

:withstupi
Exactimoooooo!!!
:biggrin:

____x.

Reply 4

Anonymous #1

OP

Gaining strength

Reply 5

londonboym

9

well jus let ya muscles rest for tonight and tomora and go again sunday. ya dont wanna be overtraining, causes more harm than good

Reply 6

Jakelammo

he could go tomorrow yet do different body parts, eg monday chest and shoulders, tuesday legs, wendsday biceps triceps etc

Reply 7

Speleo

7

he could go tomorrow yet do different body parts, eg monday chest and shoulders, tuesday legs, wendsday biceps triceps etc

Split routines are crap, use a heavy compound plan like this http://www.t-nation.com/readTopic.do?id=459533

EDIT: Well, split routines are crap unless you are an experienced body builder, which you are not.

Reply 8

Eblis_O'_Shaughnessy

5

Anonymous

It was great! My whole body is aching. I just ate my first meal of the day (worked out on an empty stomach) of salt and pepper scrambled egg, a turkey slice, and beans, on toast. A good meal to repair muscles? My question is, what should I do for the rest of the day to maintain the strength I've gained today?

Great PWO meal, although if you had the eggs without the yolks it would be better for faster digesting protein.

As for what to do the rest of the day... keep eating. More carbs, more protein.

Speleo

Split routines are crap, use a heavy compound plan like this http://www.t-nation.com/readTopic.do?id=459533

EDIT: Well, split routines are crap unless you are an experienced body builder, which you are not.

Agreed, 100%. Chad Waterbury is awesome. He really knows his stuff.

Reply 9

Anonymous #1

OP

^What's a PWO meal btw?

Today my body is completely stiff. Is it supposed to? Or am I supposed to try and, erm, loosen up?

Reply 10

Eblis_O'_Shaughnessy

5

Anonymous

^What's a PWO meal btw?

Today my body is completely stiff. Is it supposed to? Or am I supposed to try and, erm, loosen up?

PWO = Post Work Out.

When you first start working out, you will feel in a lot of pain after. Your body isn't used to that level of microtrauma or that level of lactic acid buildup. The more you get used to lifting, the less you will get sore. Over time you probably won't be sore at all unless you're overdoing it (in my opinion). It's very rare that I'm sore after a workout, for example.

Despite what people may have you believe, soreness isn't necessarily the sign of a good workout.

Reply 11

Anonymous #2

I miss the soreness...

Reply 12

Eblis_O'_Shaughnessy

5

Anonymous

I miss the soreness...

Some soreness is a good feeling, some isn't.

Have any of you guys ever done 20 rep squats? 2 sets of that is the hardest workout you will probably ever do in your entire life.

You pick a weight that is your 10 rep max, and then you keep going up to 20 reps. Take as long as you need to between each rep over 10, but don't finish the set until you get to 20 reps.

The pain you'll be in the next day is so bad you might not be able to walk. I did a couple of sets of it once, and I haven't done it since.

It's good to push yourself during a workout, but there's such a thing as pushing yourself too hard and overtraining. 20 rep squats are amazing for growth, but if your workout is stopping you from moving properly and functioning in your everyday life, you shouldn't really be doing it.

It's the same with other muscles as well as legs. Why do 16 sets for your chest and not work it for another week, and have the two or three days after the workout be so painful you can't move your arms closer to your body than perpendicular because it hurts your pecs too much, when you can get twice the growth out of 4 or 5 sets of bench press 3 times a week without being basically crippled with pain for a day or two after the workout?

Reply 13

jointhedots

16

Anonymous

^What's a PWO meal btw?

Today my body is completely stiff. Is it supposed to? Or am I supposed to try and, erm, loosen up?

It's pretty normal at first, but if it's affecting your mobility then you should go a bit easier next time. Are you warming up/down properly?

Reply 14

akmd

11

I'm thinking of doing the following as a work-out from tomorrow:

Monday

Flat bench barbell bench press and incline dumbbell press

Tuesday

Weighted chins and bent over rows

Wednesday

Squats and dumbbell lunges

Thursday

Military press and dumbbell shoulder press

Friday

Deadlifts and stiff-legged deadlifts

This is what I would do for each exercise:

Set 1: 12 reps 60 seconds rest Set 2: 10 reps 60 seconds (slightly heavier weight) Set 3: 8 reps 60 seconds (slighlty heavier weight) Set 4: 6 reps 60 seconds rest (slightly heavier weight) Set 5: To failure with the set used in set 1

What do you think?

Reply 15

Eblis_O'_Shaughnessy

5

akmd

I'm thinking of doing the following as a work-out from tomorrow:

Monday

Flat bench barbell bench press and incline dumbbell press

Tuesday

Weighted chins and bent over rows

Wednesday

Squats and dumbbell lunges

Thursday

Military press and dumbbell shoulder press

Friday

Deadlifts and stiff-legged deadlifts

This is what I would do for each exercise:

Set 1: 12 reps 60 seconds rest Set 2: 10 reps 60 seconds (slightly heavier weight) Set 3: 8 reps 60 seconds (slighlty heavier weight) Set 4: 6 reps 60 seconds rest (slightly heavier weight) Set 5: To failure with the set used in set 1

What do you think?

Not very good, to be perfectly honest. You seem to have the right idea in that you're using compound lifts (I love the fact that you don't have any isolations), but it's too high rep to be of any use for myrofibril hypertrophy and training of the CNS (i.e. for strength gains) and it doesn't recruit enough motor units nor train the muscles often enough to maximise sarcoplasmic hypertrophy, despite you having the right idea for the most part with the rep ranges.

A better idea would be a full body or a push/pull routine. I'm assuming from your rep ranges that you're wanting size rather than strength, in which case I would recommend something like this:

4 or 5 sets of bench press
4 or 5 sets of squats or deadlifts
4 or 5 sets of weighted pullups or bent over rows
4 or 5 sets of shoulder press

Aim for 35-50 reps per workout for each muscle group (which you make up out of the 4 or 5 sets. If you're doing 12 reps per set then don't do 5 sets, if you're doing 6/7 reps per set then do 5 sets). Obviously vary your lifts by changing between dumbbells and barbells, width of grip, that sort of thing. Do it three times a week.

You'll get much better results than only hitting each muscle once a week, believe me (assuming your goal is to build mass). Unless you happen to be one of a very unfortunate genetic minority who happens to respond better to split routines. One of the main (and for that read ONLY) benefits of split routines is the way they allow you to chisel your body's shape. Push/pull and full body routines can't be touched for gaining sheer mass, but split routines allow you to hit the muscles in such a way as to craft a specific shape to your body that full body routines don't allow (for example different exercises to hit the different heads of the triceps more or less to your preference). Where you're doing all compounds, you lose that specificity of isolation exercise that allows you to craft shape.

Anyway, I'm guessing since you're asking for advice on a routine like that that you're not an advanced enough lifter to be looking at chiselling what mass you have, but rather are looking to gain as much mass as you can.

For that reason, full body is king.

Reply 16

AYE

10

I'm not too sure about the fullbody thing, I mean its good for strength but all the guys in my gym dont really those trypes of workouts and they are massive. Probably power lifts like deadlifts only make up around 30% of their workout.

Reply 17

Eblis_O'_Shaughnessy

5

AYE

I'm not too sure about the fullbody thing, I mean its good for strength but all the guys in my gym dont really those trypes of workouts and they are massive. Probably power lifts like deadlifts only make up around 30% of their workout.

And they've taken YEARS to get to those sort of mass levels, and they're now at the stage where they're finding it harder to gain mass because they're so far above their natural mass levels, so they need to look to greater levels of microtrauma rather than more motor unit recruitment.

If they've been doing splits all along then they could've got to where they are in half the time. They've just been doing splits because for some stupid reason it seems to have become "the thing to do."

Full body routines = more motor unit recruitment = more muscles used = more GH produced = better muscular gains.

There's tons of articles on T-nation about this sort of thing, I'll just take a quick look and see if I can find a couple.

EDIT:

http://www.t-nation.com/findArticle.do?article=04-073-training (T-Nations's Best Training Program of the Year 2004)

Also, read these two, they will make things very clear:

http://www.t-nation.com/findArticle.do?article=06-181-training

http://www.t-nation.com/findArticle.do?article=06-182-training

These ones are less important but still relevant:

http://www.t-nation.com/findArticle.do?article=04-061-training

http://www.t-nation.com/findArticle.do?article=04-068-training

This one has a bit on why splits suck compared to full body: http://www.t-nation.com/findArticle.do?article=06-171-diet

http://www.t-nation.com/findArticle.do?article=06-087-training

"Probably around 80-90% of the population, 80-90% of the time, will respond best to total body workouts.

And I'd say that maybe 90-95% of the population, 90-95% of the time, will respond best to either total body or an upper and lower split." - Alwyn Gosgrove

"Let’s cut the bull**** and get to the brass tacks. For decades, men built slabs of muscle with simple, three day-per-week training programs. They trained their whole bodies in one brief workout session and they grew big and strong. Scoff all you want, but tens of thousands of trainees can’t be wrong." - Chad Waterbury

These guys are the best personal trainers on the planet. They all agree that for almost everybody, full body routines are the best. Read some of those articles and you'll get an idea of what it's all about.

Reply 18

akmd

11

That was very helpful. Thanks for the advice. I've revised my program based on what you've said. This is how it looks:

Monday

4 sets of bench press 12 reps per set
4 sets of deadlifts 12 reps per set
5 sets of bent over rows 7 reps per set
4 sets of shoulder press 12 reps per set

Wednesday

5 sets of shoulder press 7 reps per set
5 sets of bent over rows 6 reps per set
5 sets of bench press 7 reps per set
5 sets of squats 6 reps per set

Friday

5 sets of bent over rows 7 reps per set
5 sets of deadlifts 6 reps per set
5 sets of shoulder press 6 reps per set
5 sets of bench press 6 reps per set

If doing 4 sets:

Set 1:60 seconds rest Set 2:60 seconds (slightly heavier weight) Set 3: 60 seconds (slightly heavier weight) Set 4: To failure with the set used in set 1

If doing 5 sets:

Set 1:60 seconds rest Set 2:60 seconds (slightly heavier weight) Set 3: 60 seconds (slightly heavier weight) Set 4: 60 seconds rest (slightly heavier weight) Set 5: To failure with the set used in set 1

You're right. I am concentrating on building mass at the moment. My ultimate goal is to have a healthy body that looks attrsctive to others as well as being able to take care of myself if I find myself in a violent confrontation (Obviously, I hope I never have to experience the latter). I also want to do this for the rest of my life. I'm in this for the long haul.

Reply 19

Eblis_O'_Shaughnessy

5

I like it. A lot, actually. I like the way you've added in low volume and high volume days (proportionately). I think that's a pretty nice little routine. You could try doing squats twice a week instead of deadlifts twice a week on alternate weeks as well. Obviously you'll be varying the lifts with grips and dumbbells/barbells.

I like it. Sweet little routine.

I just worked out at the gym for the first time

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