guitarslinger
Don Juan
First of all, I'm 23, a university nutrition student and a qualified personal trainer, so I know what I'm talking about. One of the biggest problems for beginners, or even intermediate lifters is that they've got the motivation and the balls, but they get into the gym and swing weights around like a bull in a china shop. That's fine if you want to look tough and get nowhere, but if you are interested in making some gains there are a few simple things that you can do:
Form
This is probably the most important thing about weightlifting. Depending what the exercise is, you want to isolate the muscle/s in question without getting other prime movers into the equation. The most common ones are the bench press and bicep curls.
When bench pressing, pretend that your belly button is glued to the bench. It helps if you put your feet up on the end of the bench. This will prevent you from arching the small of your back and getting your shoulders into the movement. If you have trouble putting size onto your chest, this should help you out a lot.
Bicep curls are also usually performed with terrible form in an effort to curl more weight/reps. Try doing them sitting backwards on a preacher curl bench, and keep your arms pressed against it, don't swing your arms on the way up, make sure it is a controlled movement. Isolating your bis properly will make them blow up like a watermelon.
Those are the most common two, but next time you are in the gym ask an instructor to show you the correct form for all your exercises and spot you for a set. They key is isolation, and although it may be harder, doing your exercises with a lighter weight with correct form will give you a much better workout.
Push to failure
Say you are doing 3 x 10reps on your bench press. You hammer out two sets of 10, then you knock out 8 on the last set and finidh up. You have to push it. Get someone to spot you all the time on your last set. All the reps you did up to that point don't mean anything, thoise last couple of reps of the last sets is where all your gains are. Big muscles are made by tearing the muscle tissue, and when it reapirs it forms thicker and stronger. You MUST make sure you push to failure on the last set of every exercise, even if it means adding a few more reps. Tear the muscles, eat your food, and they will grow.
Resting
Some of the power lifters out there may disagree with me on this one, but the longest rest you want to have between sets is about a minute. 30 seconds for abs, they recover faster, and 45 for biceps if you want a good pump, but a minute at most keeps your nervous system primed for the exercise you are doing.
Motivation
Every time you workout matters. Every rep you push out matters, every crunch, every metre you run. It also matters when you don't. You can't see it at the time, but the effects are 3 days away, that is about the time your body is recovered from a workout. You go three times a week, that's 156 times a year. Imagine now what your body would look like 156 workouts from now. It will look like that, but you've gotta put in the time now. If you ever feel like you don't want to go, you're too tired, you're too busy, just remember that one day you will look like a god, but to do so you have to get up and go. The best part about this is that even if you feel lousy beforehand, you will feel great once you've got those endorphins flowing through your body.JUST DO IT!
And when you're done....
If you've busted your gut, used good form, pushed out those last reps like your mother's life depended on it, go get some food and give yourself a pat on the back, you deserve it
Form
This is probably the most important thing about weightlifting. Depending what the exercise is, you want to isolate the muscle/s in question without getting other prime movers into the equation. The most common ones are the bench press and bicep curls.
When bench pressing, pretend that your belly button is glued to the bench. It helps if you put your feet up on the end of the bench. This will prevent you from arching the small of your back and getting your shoulders into the movement. If you have trouble putting size onto your chest, this should help you out a lot.
Bicep curls are also usually performed with terrible form in an effort to curl more weight/reps. Try doing them sitting backwards on a preacher curl bench, and keep your arms pressed against it, don't swing your arms on the way up, make sure it is a controlled movement. Isolating your bis properly will make them blow up like a watermelon.
Those are the most common two, but next time you are in the gym ask an instructor to show you the correct form for all your exercises and spot you for a set. They key is isolation, and although it may be harder, doing your exercises with a lighter weight with correct form will give you a much better workout.
Push to failure
Say you are doing 3 x 10reps on your bench press. You hammer out two sets of 10, then you knock out 8 on the last set and finidh up. You have to push it. Get someone to spot you all the time on your last set. All the reps you did up to that point don't mean anything, thoise last couple of reps of the last sets is where all your gains are. Big muscles are made by tearing the muscle tissue, and when it reapirs it forms thicker and stronger. You MUST make sure you push to failure on the last set of every exercise, even if it means adding a few more reps. Tear the muscles, eat your food, and they will grow.
Resting
Some of the power lifters out there may disagree with me on this one, but the longest rest you want to have between sets is about a minute. 30 seconds for abs, they recover faster, and 45 for biceps if you want a good pump, but a minute at most keeps your nervous system primed for the exercise you are doing.
Motivation
Every time you workout matters. Every rep you push out matters, every crunch, every metre you run. It also matters when you don't. You can't see it at the time, but the effects are 3 days away, that is about the time your body is recovered from a workout. You go three times a week, that's 156 times a year. Imagine now what your body would look like 156 workouts from now. It will look like that, but you've gotta put in the time now. If you ever feel like you don't want to go, you're too tired, you're too busy, just remember that one day you will look like a god, but to do so you have to get up and go. The best part about this is that even if you feel lousy beforehand, you will feel great once you've got those endorphins flowing through your body.JUST DO IT!
And when you're done....
If you've busted your gut, used good form, pushed out those last reps like your mother's life depended on it, go get some food and give yourself a pat on the back, you deserve it