Advice on gaining muscle weight and fittness.

-ADREN-

Ok,

I've been a lazy ****e for the 1st year of college. This has made me feel pretty useless now, because in school I was playing sports and keeping fit, and made me feel several times better than I do now.

So I'm getting back into it, at the moment I'm doing 30 mins of an intense cycle a day, along with sit-ups etc.

Next year I intend to go back to rugby, but I need to gain at least another stone or two id say, in the form of muscle.

At the moment, I'm 20, 5,8 72 kg (11 1/2 stone), with slightly below the optimum body fat percentage for my age.

My question is, what is the best combination of food and work outs in order to gain weight and keep fit? Avoiding stuff like the protein supplements etc..

Regards,
-Coz.

Bam Bam

My exercise programme.

10/10

I can give you my workout (I lost over 40 kilos with that workout in 1 1/2 years)

First of FOOD, most important is to eat small meals over the day, plan your meals in advance, I have all my Rice and Oatmeal packed in advace in small plastic bags weighted so i know one plastic bag is excactly 100 g of what ever.
Chickenfilets are very good low on fat and high in protein.
Be careful with Tuna, because it is high in mercury.

Here is what I eat a day:

07.10
NO FOOD

09.00
First meal containing of:
100g Oat Meal
2 FULL eggs (don't mind the extra fat you need it over the day)
1 Banana
1 Scoup Protein Powder (I recommend 100% Whey)

12.30
Sec meal containing of:
100g Brown Rice
1 Chicken Filet (grilled on a george forman grill the day before)
1 Thomato

15.00
Third meal containing off:
100g Oat
1 Scoup of Protein Powder
1 Apple

17.30
Weight Training

19.00
4 meal containing of:
1 Head of Salad
1 Can of Tuna
1 Thomato
1/2 Onion

2 Table Spoon Cold Pressed Olive Oil
3 Table Spoon Black Vinegar
Salt
Pepper

20.00
Last Meal containing of:
1 Low fat cottage cheese mixed with 1 Scoup of Protein Powder, this is slow digesting Protein and will help you not getting into a catabolic state over night.
(You get the low fat cottage cheese cheap at Aldis)

MOTIVATION:

Regarding foof motivation is the hardest on the weekend, you have time to think and go places you should not go, keep yourself occupied at all times, most people including myself get cravings for the wrong stuff when they get bored.
If you have the tendancy to buy crap food at work as in Cola and Sandwiches, well don't take any money with you for a wile and you will see how easy it is after a wile to say no.

Always prepare your food in the evening before bed, you make a commitment right there saying I will NOT eat **** today.

CHEATMEALS:
Have a cheatmeal (MEAL not a cheat day) once a week, I keep my cheatmeal realtivly clean, I buy frozen fuit at super valu and mix them with milk and Protein Powder in the blender, when i blend them it's like Ice Cream hmmmm
Do not go to Burger King or any other Fried Food haven, it's all **** and crap for you anyways.
Better have something of value, Food Emporium a istanbul mix or what ever.
Make sure you do NOT make it a cheat DAY, only one meal.

CARDIO TRAINING:

Morning Cardio is best if you want to loose weight/fat fast and effectivly:
Best ist if you combine Cardio with weight lifting.

Here is what I do and it seems to work for me:

Morning Cardio on an EMPTY Stomach:

5 min warmup
15 min HIIT (look up HIIT it's a way of doing your excercise more effectifly specialy in the morning)

After that I wait for another hour before I eat, this is no good if you want to bulk and get a lot of muscles fast, but it will help to get shredded.

WEIGHT TRAINING:

If you are new to Weight Training, than take it easy, a full body workout (light) at the beginning is best to start with.
Best is to jump over your own shaddow and ask as much questions as possible before you attend weight lifting, if you think weight lifting is easy you are wrong, it is VERY hard to do right.
You will look like a tool if you do excercises wrong, and where I go weight lifting the serious guys NEVER think you are enoying when you ask questions.

Before I started lifting seriously I read EVERY bit of information on www.bodybuilding.com forum I could see. (this is the best page/board Fitness
and BBing related ever.

Get a training partner asap, this will help you to get motivated and go to the gym evern if you don't want to, after a wile NOT going to the gym is not an option and you feel grumpy if you had not your workout a day

Here is my trainingspartner and my own Trainings plan:

Monday:
Chest and Biceps:

Thuesday:
Legs and Abbs:

Wednesday:
OFF DAY

Tuersday:
Back and Traps

Friday:
Shoulders and Triceps


If you need more info PM me

-ADREN-

Hey thanks for that reply..

Just a few things.. That diet, looks like id just loose a whole load of wieght instead of gaining any. I mean what about a nice big spuds carrots cabbage and steak dinner? ...

Also that is really confusing... theres like a hundred different things being told to you. For working out, could I just do Press ups sit ups etc??

-ADREN-

actually im just getting more and more confused...

Whats the deal with cals.. do you have an x amount that your supposed to eat a day? if thats the case then why do we go out and excersise everyday to burn them away?

Surely if we only eat as much as we need perday, we shouldnt have to go excersise?

Im all confused..

IRONSIDE2005

Hi ADREN,

You should check out these web sites, it is a complete workout/bodybuilding program, I did it before, very easy to follow and great results.

www.bodyforlife.com
www.bodyforlife.ie

Hope this helps

joejoem

Im putting on a good bit of muscle at the moment and that is mainly down to eating healthily, loads of protein, im avoiding carbs after 14:00, you need to put on weight but make it good weight. I excersize almost every day and keep loaded with protein shakes, whey shake in the morning and after lunch and then after the gym (at around 7:30) and finally a caesin protein drink (slower releasing) before bed. For breakfast I have the whey shake mixewd with porridge, naturla jogurt and honey. Lunch either salad mixed with loads of ham/chicken fillet or tuna melt (low fat cheese) then a protein shake mixed with milk at around 3 and then for dinner something like steak and salad. This will make you bulk but bulk muscle, there is no point in just throwing on fat

poobum

-ADREN- wrote:

actually im just getting more and more confused...

Whats the deal with cals.. do you have an x amount that your supposed to eat a day? if thats the case then why do we go out and excersise everyday to burn them away?

Surely if we only eat as much as we need perday, we shouldnt have to go excersise?

Im all confused..

look you naturally use a certain amount of cal a day(varies daily no definate amount) but if you want to get fitter eg gain muscle or lose weight or lose weight or both, for gaining muscle you use more cals so you need your intake to be more!
if you want to lose weight your intake has to be less then we you use everyday so it starts taking from your fats stores!
you can combine these together but in reality they wont work very well together! you will proably lose more muscle then you gain if you try do 2 of these at once!

-ADREN-

So basically,

1. I need to find out how many cals im eathing a day at the moment?
2. Add an extra 3000 a week to that?
3. Find a beginners weights programe, and
4. Do like 20 mins of intense cardio a day?

and if I follow this I should be getting fitter and stronger?

poobum

it depends on alot more then just eating more it depends on what you eat for serious muscle building eat about 150g protein a dayat least twice that in complex carbs and a little fat(cant remember the figure its like 60g or something but cant remember exactly) this of course varies from person to person!
it also depends on when you eat it!
how hard you train
are you trying to get fit for sport? if so what sport? or just a general fitness?

-ADREN-

Trying to get fit for rugby, and to put on a bit more muscle weight pretty much.. Is seems like a bit of a balls to do really Seems awfully complicated..

poobum

-ADREN- wrote:

Trying to get fit for rugby, and to put on a bit more muscle weight pretty much.. Is seems like a bit of a balls to do really Seems awfully complicated..

in the same boat as you! whats your current weight, bodyfat, height, bench deadlift, etc.... and importantly what position are you trying for?

-ADREN-

Well im 5,8 72kg, 21% body fat (got that off one of those fancy weighing scales things)... I've never done weights really before, but have always been quite built naturaly, stronger that most backs on my school team. I'm going for either center position.

joc_06

you wanna play rugby then you want power and speed. stay away from bodybuilding routines: they'll turn you into a big slow weak sh!t.
your best bet is WS4SB. check it here
http://www.defrancostraining.com/articles/archive/articles_westside2.htm
im telling you to do this. do something else if you want. it might work but it prob wont unless its something along the lines of this article. i've gone from a 5.5 40 to a 4.8 (last week) next yr im gonna hit sub 4.5. thats criminal pace

10/10

joc_06 wrote:

you wanna play rugby then you want power and speed. stay away from bodybuilding routines: they'll turn you into a big slow weak sh!t.

lol that's just not true, you are just another one who promotes bodybuilding myth.
First BBing does not make you weak, it it does anything it makes you more fokused since you have concentrate all the way through your trainings session

10/10

-ADREN- wrote:

Trying to get fit for rugby, and to put on a bit more muscle weight pretty much.. Is seems like a bit of a balls to do really Seems awfully complicated..

Look it is not complicated:

i would do the following:

Since you want to do this for Rugby i recon you want some mass:

Now it is hard to gain "lean" mass and not turn into a fatass, but it is possible if you keep up your cardio.
What you need to do is NOT to be afraid to eat eat eat eat eat.

You need to gradualy incriese your calorie intake, (personlay i would go to 3000+ calories).
That of course requires you to eat 6-8 small high calorie meals a day.

Have a look at nurtition connection in Cable street, they sell a Massgainer from Optimum that should help you to balance the budget cause it can get quit pricy to eat a lot, escpecialy in Ireland.

Before you start your bulking phase, read every thread in bodybuilding.com ask as many questions as possible + keep a log from the very first day what you eat when did you eat how much and so on.

TRAINING:
You need to do cardio, but not to much since it will "eat" your hard earned muscles as well, i would recommend 2 times a week cardio...
1Month
stationary bike 30 min moderate speed and level.
2Month
Running/jogging 30 min moderate pace

joc_06

10/10 wrote:

Look it is not complicated:

i would do the following:

Since you want to do this for Rugby i recon you want some mass:

Now it is hard to gain "lean" mass and not turn into a fatass, but it is possible if you keep up your cardio.
What you need to do is NOT to be afraid to eat eat eat eat eat.

You need to gradualy incriese your calorie intake, (personlay i would go to 3000+ calories).
That of course requires you to eat 6-8 small high calorie meals a day.

Have a look at nurtition connection in Cable street, they sell a Massgainer from Optimum that should help you to balance the budget cause it can get quit pricy to eat a lot, escpecialy in Ireland.

Before you start your bulking phase, read every thread in bodybuilding.com ask as many questions as possible + keep a log from the very first day what you eat when did you eat how much and so on.

TRAINING:
You need to do cardio, but not to much since it will "eat" your hard earned muscles as well, i would recommend 2 times a week cardio...
1Month
stationary bike 30 min moderate speed and level.
2Month
Running/jogging 30 min moderate pace

Ignore this advice if you want to succeed at rugby in a centre position. you will turn into a weak slow sh!t relatively speaking. BBers have the most muscle mass of any class of athlete yet they are one of the slowest and deinitely not the strongest.

YOU MUST INCORPORATE LOTS OF CARDIO. This should start off as 300m sprints then 200m then 100m then 60m then shorter distances. Rarely if ever go over 300m sprints. This is for stamina which you will need a nice bit of but more power over 40yrds is the key
In rugby you sprint and you sprint often. YOU never cycle or jog at a moderate pace so shy do it in training. all this does is trun your lovely fast twitch muscles into slow twitch sh!te

Im telling you what you need to do. Defranco is one of the worlds greatest strength and power coaches and he has trained many of the highest paid sportmen on earth in the nfl which is none too different to rugby.

Rugby is all about power and speed in the backline. Its not about static strength at all. Who cares if you can bench 200kg if it takes you 10mins to do 1 rep. Its much better to do clap pushups than slowar$e bench's. Fast rep bench's one week folowed by max strength benchs the next will give you the best of both worlds. ALways try to incorporate plyometrics into your workouts.

At the end of the day, speed always wins and thrills. BOD would be nothing without his immense speed.

No offense to BBers but you do not understand how field sports work. if you think a 30 min jog is good for anything. And as for saying cardio eats into your muscle, that is true for a BBer but for athletes who have to sprint to compete then its kinda absurd telling them not to.
There is no bulking phase in rugby as such not for backs anyway. Obviously you will always try to put on muscle and increase power but not at the expense of your speed. You need to add weight gradually so as your running technique is not adversely affected. If you bulk you run the risk of injury bigtime plus you will lose amount of pace which is a big no no.

joc_06

10/10 wrote:

lol that's just not true, you are just another one who promotes bodybuilding myth.
First BBing does not make you weak, it it does anything it makes you more fokused since you have concentrate all the way through your trainings session

:rolleyes:

there are no myths about BBing. The facts are that they have the most muscle mass of any class of athlete so therefore they should be the fastest and the strongest per pound of bodyweight. Coleman is 285 cut yet i doubt he'd run under 6secs for the 40 and i know he can ONLY deadlift 800lbs. This is a huge weight but still almost 100kg behind the best in the world.
FACT: BBer's are weak and slow relatively speaking.
They aim for med to heavy weights at high reps to promote sarcoplasmic hypertrophy which is in effect "built for show" as opposed to the "bulit to go" strength and power athletes who bible is 5x5 and 3x3 who aim for myofibrillar hypertrophy
http://defrancotraining.com/articles/archive/articles_muscle-equal.htm

-ADREN-

Ok thanks for your advie one that. Sounds quite good. I took a look at that site though, I dont have half that equipment, or access to it.. and I dont know half the excersises it is asking me to do.

Any suggestions?

Plus that site says nothing about what and how much to eat, im still complete lost in that front.

Its obvious now that im not looking to do any of that body building stuff, just really want to get fit, keep my pace and get stronger.

joc_06

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=3023769&postcount=3

not bad advice here. add creatine too

-ADREN-

So if I eat something simular to that everyday (id like to avoid creatine. or is protien supplement just the same?) and learn how to do that defrancotraining workout, I should be on my way?

10/10

joc_06 wrote:

They aim for med to heavy weights at high reps to promote sarcoplasmic hypertrophy which is in effect "built for show" as opposed to the "bulit to go" strength and power athletes who bible is 5x5 and 3x3 who aim for myofibrillar hypertrophy
http://defrancotraining.com/articles/archive/articles_muscle-equal.htm

:rolleyes:
Yep that must be it... if you want to believe that bbing makes you slow, jsut one thing, you mentioned Ronnie Coleman, well he is not going to be Ronnie n or any other pro for that matter, he will NEVER be the size of Coleman, everybody whos mildly interested will know that from beeing jacked up to his eyes Coleman has also wonder gentics.
We were talking about a good natural size, cannot see anything wrong with that .
Problem in general is (that is my opinion) Sarcoplasmic Hypertrophy all that stuff makes it to complicated, to many people trying ti shift the attention to them and make a buck out of it.
i say keep it simple do some weights

joc_06

I really cant make head nor tail of what you just said.
Very good advice there at the end. "Do some weights" Recipe for success for definite. Im sure you've seen huge gains doin just this - whatever exactly it is.

Please stop leading this guy up the wrong path. you plainly dont know what you're talking about.

Now lets try to help this guy out.
first off you have to join a gym. and a good one too. (note good one doesnt mean newest brightest lights most machines etc. It means one that has a bench, a squat rack, area for olympic lifts and lots of discs and dont mind you throwing them about)

then if you need any help with the exercises ask the instructor (prob wont tell you because they know fvck all like 95% of other gym goers) check exrx.net. theres a listing of 100s of exercises with gifs there of the exercises being performed

Theres nothing wrong with creatine. if taken correctly its 100% safe. id definitely advise you to start training without it. definitely take protein though. after a year or so once you think you've plateaued then think about creatine again. not until then though as you'll gain now pretty much regardless what you do as long as you eat right. you are now at the easygainer phase which is why yer mans advice of "just lift weights" (hints at him bein new to this) would prolly work to a degree in that youd grow muscle v fast and be happy with it but it may not be the correct muscle in the correct places. could be just dead weight that'll slow you down and have no impact on rugby at all.

get you r diet right first and flexibility, then gym. you must have the basics or as a mate of mine says you're at nothin

10/10

joc_06 wrote:

I really cant make head nor tail of what you just said.
Very good advice there at the end. "Do some weights" Recipe for success for definite. Im sure you've seen huge gains doin just this - whatever exactly it is.

Please stop leading this guy up the wrong path. you plainly dont know what you're talking about.

Now lets try to help this guy out.
first off you have to join a gym. and a good one too. (note good one doesnt mean newest brightest lights most machines etc. It means one that has a bench, a squat rack, area for olympic lifts and lots of discs and dont mind you throwing them about)

then if you need any help with the exercises ask the instructor (prob wont tell you because they know fvck all like 95% of other gym goers) check exrx.net. theres a listing of 100s of exercises with gifs there of the exercises being performed

Theres nothing wrong with creatine. if taken correctly its 100% safe. id definitely advise you to start training without it. definitely take protein though. after a year or so once you think you've plateaued then think about creatine again. not until then though as you'll gain now pretty much regardless what you do as long as you eat right. you are now at the easygainer phase which is why yer mans advice of "just lift weights" (hints at him bein new to this) would prolly work to a degree in that youd grow muscle v fast and be happy with it but it may not be the correct muscle in the correct places. could be just dead weight that'll slow you down and have no impact on rugby at all.

get you r diet right first and flexibility, then gym. you must have the basics or as a mate of mine says you're at nothin

People like you make it such a joy to be here ... **** this lol I'm out of here you ignorant bastard

joc_06

yes i helped a guy out. very ignorant.

roberteboot

10/10 wrote:

People like you make it such a joy to be here ... **** this lol I'm out of here you ignorant bastard

Id love to know where this came from he seemed to be giving fairly good advice.It might be a good idea to have a search on the net for advice on sport specific exercise,weights etc.I remember reading a book a while back and it had alot of great exercise and weights programmes that would be perfect for you(although it was actually geared towards american football).Once you get the exercises you could have a look on exrx.net to see exactly how theyre done.