Fitness And Nutrition General

AM wheels done!

You could just ditch the glucosamine if it makes your search easier. The science behind it is pretty lacking.

Really? So is fish oil all I really need for joint support? If that's the case should I just stick to Opti-Men?

Are you even having joint problems? I keep my omega-X fats in balance to regulate inflammatory response, not for joint problems specifically.

I think so yes. My left shoulder tightens up a little bit sometimes especially towards the end of the week.

If you were to touch where your shoulder gets sore, is it the front kinda? Like your rotator cuff?

I had chronic rotator cuff flare ups for a long time and it was all due to bad form on bench press and going too heavy with that bad form. I also neglected doing very light simple rotator cuff exercises to them into shape. The bad form on bench was, on the way up, kinda curving the path of the bar towards my head. Also bouncing it at the bottom when I went heavy gave my shoulders a jolt when the momentum of the bounce wore off.

No it's the rear. In fact the tightness is exactly on my rear deltoid.

I don't know, I have friends in the climber community that swear by it but if you read the wikipedia page (which references some meta-analysis studies) and do some reading on pubmed, there's not a whole lot of definitively positive evidence that it does anything more than placebo. Contrast that with fish oil, which seems to have more positive stuff associated with it than water itself.

If it does do anything, the effect is likely very small and arguably only really advisable for folks who are exercising all the time (professional athletes, bodybuilders, or whatever).

St reach it with lite dumbbells bro.

Oddball question.

My main goal is to basically lose weight and slim down while maintaining what upper body I have at the moment. Currently do standing curls, single arm rows, seated shoulder press (recently added), and bench press.

Was wondering if flat bench or incline bench would be better for maintenance. And semi same for curls, standing or incline?

Any exercise you chose is fine. Just keep the reps high.

When doing chest does it matter much if I do 5 excersices 3 sets of 10 or switch it and do 3 excersices 5 sets of 10? 3 I'm doing is bench press then incline dumbell fly then incline press. If I added 2 more I'd add cable crosses and around the world's probably

*edit* if it helps I'm hitting muscle failure by the time I do my 5 sets of incline press

I'd start with your biggest lifts first. So do Incline Bench -> Bench -> Dumbbel presses, and leave the resistance work until you're spent.

So you could do 3 sets/10reps of 5 workouts, where in actuality, only 3 of them are free-weight training.

5 sets of chest is a lot, though. Depending on how hard you hit it, and going 10 reps a set (x3), thats 150 reps of chest. You likely could lower your total sets to 12 or so but just add one extra set to your main workouts and still get the better end of your workout.

But idk - I'm kind of biased towards incline bench press. Flat bench is only about bragging rights IMO, and if you really want to develop upper body strength, work on your incline. Flat bench you can do with dumbbells

Short of literal starvation (by which I mean fewer than 500 kcal per day), you aren't likely to torch your muscles hard enough for it to matter either way, especially based on the job you have.

FFXI once kept me almost literally immobile for a couple months and the muscle mass lost was minimal and bounced right back. The people who have to worry about losing muscle when they drop weight are the people who have a habit of being skinny as a rake and fighting for every ounce they gain. You're not that type.

And especially especially if you're still using them in the gym.

Edit: Just gonna drop these in here...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protein_Sparing_Modified_Fast
And an implementation of it by King Lyle:
http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/the-rapid-fat-loss-handbook

Related note: I really want to torch the fat on my body and I'm not concerned if I take some muscle with it. Problem is that I can't afford to be idle, so I can't just fast it away. I bike a bare minimum of 12.5 miles per day and regularly exceed that (for instance, I've done about 100 miles over the past four days, including two days on the job), and then my job itself is highly physical.

What kind of option do I have? I'm concerned that dropping too many calories will eventually lead to me collapsing either at work (especially now that it's getting to be summertime and I've always been lackadaisical about water) or, heaven forbid, whilst riding in the street. On the other hand, though, I've been hovering at 200 lbs. for months. I keep losing fat and gaining muscle, which is amusing and all, but I still have entirely too much adipose tissue.

Other than the basic calorie in and calorie out, another concept that I've been speculating about is the concept of meal sizes. In a conservation of energy concept, it's as easy as calorie in and calorie out and based on what I've posted about in the past, I'm a huge proponent of this simplistic view. While I still think calorie in/out is the largest contributor, the system is very complex and I have to concede that there must be other factors. When we're talking about the storage and utilization of fat, I think the concept becomes much more complicated. The complication comes with the concept that we don't always store and we don't always utilize.

This could all be a huge narrative fallacy but this won't and doesn't stop me from wondering. But this is why: Insulin is the molecule that determines blood sugar. It modulates the energy that you are utilizing and storing as fat. After a very large meal, you'll have a larger spike of insulin and after a while, some people will experience a "crash" after a meal. This is because a large amount of insulin is being released and removing blood sugar causes that "downer" effect, making you sleepy.

Now, it's well known that insulin is also the molecule that tells your fat cells to start storing. After all, the blood sugar has to go "somewhere".

So here's what I'm working with:
Eating large meals are notorious known to have larger insulin spikes and the average amount of insulin will be greater during these meals than several meals of the same caloric intake. You'll also notice physiological effects as well: large meals will make many people crash (ie Thanksgiving) while eating small meals more often during the day prevents you from having that glycemic crash. You'd end up producing less insulin which is responsible for the "store fat" signal.

Of course this is all speculation and I'd have to check the literature to see whether this is true or not but this type of experiment would require experiments where you'd have to inject insulin into people to see whether they'd store more fat. Physiology experimentation isn't exactly my forte.

On the otherhand, as anecdotes goes, in High School, I did double swim practices and weight room everyday. I was burning over 4000 calories a day and pretty much only ate a powerbar for lunch and a humungous dinner (5 Big Macs anyone?). I never had a six pack during high school. After college when I started doing Insanity and P90x with strict diet regiment (~200-300 calorie meals every 2 hours about) and got my six pack after ~2 months. I rarely crash after a meal and the energy level is doing really well.

I know about calorie balancing, but the ever-present problem is figuring out how many calories I've eaten. On Sunday, I had the entire day off (which is a lot rarer than you might think) and put 45 miles on my new bike over the course of 2.5 hours. Conservatively, I burned 3200 calories. I can doodle around to subtract BMR from that number and figure out what I nominally burned for that entire 24-hour period, so huzzah.

Now how the *** many calories do I burn when I spend 2 hours carrying cabinetry up 3-4 flights of stairs or spend 8 hours on my hands-and-knees prepping a grocery store for opening?

That's my real problem. I could just eat 1500 calories each day and leave it at that, but my body will not tolerate that after I've had a particularly long or hard day. If I listen to my appetite, though, I can easily exceed my burn even when I've done a rather absurd amount of work and exercise in that day.

As for the whole insulin spike and large meals and the like, it's been tested and found to be irrelevant. And the 6-pack thing has a lot less to do with level of fitness than it does with simply reducing adipose. I've seen my fair share of naked and nearly-naked 20-something men who weigh 110 lbs. at most and they have a 6-pack that in no way reflects their strength (which is approximately on par with an 8-year-old).

If nothing else, the multiple meal thing literally doesn't work for me. It just keeps me afloat on ghrelin and makes my life suck if I miss a scheduled feeding. But there is a fair body of research that suggests it is somewhere between completely irrelevant and very slightly negative. If it works for you, though, that's what matters.

Thanks ill digest that for next week. Any tips for biceps? I usually do bicep triceps and shoulders together. I get good burns in my shoulders and triceps but I feel lile.my biceps are lacking the next day. During the workout though I feel like I'm hitting them good. I use a workout app for routines I usually do a mix of curls mostly hammer preacher concentrated etc

If you have some sources, I'd be interested in seeing them purely on curiosity to the question that was posed and the methods that they decided to go about testing it. Many papers have the propensity to jump to conclusions quickly and based on the complexity of this system, I do not expect a simple answer as being tested to be true/false. But hey, if there are studies that are conducted well, I can totally be swayed and maybe I could learn something about their design.

Uh... let me get back to you on that when I'm less exhausted. I'll be taking a nap here shortly because I'm apparently turning into a senior citizen.

Oh yeah, here's another reason why I don't think it's entirely debunked.

Type 2 Diabetes typically occurs when your body stops responding to insulin. In effect, your fat cells are saying "no more!" and stopping the process of making and storing fat. The problem with this is because this leads to a high serum glucose level. Unregulated glucose is an oxidative compound which then oxidizes things you don't want oxidized. (This kills cells)

A new drug was created a few years ago that prevents insulin resistance. Utilizing this drug allows you to continue to manage your blood glucose level. But something odd occurred: most of the patients started gaining weight.

While I won't rule out the fact that this drug could be independently affecting another fat pathway, it is at least clear enough that it was affecting insulin which is linked to liponeogenesis.

Superset your biceps in between your bench on chest days. Either EZ bar curl, dumbell curls, or my favorite, Drag Curls. Since Chest day indirectly hits Triceps, save that muscle group for when you're doing back. You'll be more ready to go all-out if you save triceps/biceps for days when you aren't hitting the corresponding larger muscle group.

Shoulders you can (well, I do) do on your Chest day, since they are both considered "Push" workouts, and go hand-in hand for movements.

But if you devote your time to the larger muscle groups and simply superset the smaller ones in between rest periods, you'll see a nice pump and you'll get more out of your biceps than when doing all of arms together. It's almost T-Shirt Time!

That's just been my experience.

could u give me an example of super setting cause I've hear of it but it's foggy for me

The only bad thing about super-setting biceps on chest day is likely you are going to hit back the following day or in two days. That's going to impact your back day a bit.

Any tips on how hard I should be deadlifting? I've just been doing like 3 sets with 5reps and then the next week try to add 5lbs to each side and try to hit my 5x3 again. Not sure what a good method of reps/sets. Some people said I should do lighter, practice lifts and then do only one real set at the end. I've only been DLing for 6 months, but since I started with 140, I'm up to lifting 240 which I think is pretty decent for my height/weight 5'6 155lbs 14%BF.

Also I bike to the gym about 5 miles to and from, takes about 20min each way and it's kinda hilly. Wondering if that cardio is adversely affecting my strength during lifts

Probably very little. We're assuming he's not working out every day, and since the suggestion was not to do too many sets of Biceps, but to simply superset curls during rest periods on the bench, it will hardly make the issue. When you workout your back, your biceps are indirectly involved, But the opposite is not necessarily true (working out your biceps does not work out your back). Sure, when you go to do rows it will burn a little bit, but hardly enough to hinder his workout to an severe degree.


Supersets are basically working out without resting, whether it is the same body part of a different body part.

For instance, after 10 reps of bench press, instead of resting for one minute, you could do 60 pushups straight, do pullups, or do curls (or something else in between your rest periods). It tends to almost give your body a cardiovascular effect for the muscles you are working out - high reps making your workout more effective.

By doing Super sets, you will get tired much more quickly because you won't have the time to rest in between sets, but thats the fun part. you get more bang for your buck (or more workouts in less time). This helps in getting leaner a bit more than simply pushing heavy weights and resting for two minutes.

Another example of super sets is Squats and then immediately doing box jumps afterwards, or jump rope. Any workout done back-to-back with another that keeps your muscles working instead of resting could be considered a Super set. Shoulder Presses > Lateral raises

Do the Body-weight DL challenge.

Take your body weight of 155, and try to get as many reps as you can with perfect form. Make sure your hands are NOT Hand Over/Under grip. Do two overhand grips (your palms should be facing the ground). It works your forearms a bit more and helps improve your grip strength.

Or if you're not comfortable deadlifting to failure, set numbers. 185lbs 10 reps. Then 12. Then 15. Then climb back down. When deadlifting, DO NOT LEAN BACK. Biggest Deadlifting mistake. Stand erect and lift the bar vertically off of the ground, almost sliding along your shins.

Challenge yourself. And don't use straps or gloves (unless callouses force you to). Push through the reps and then set the bar higher.

Edit: and PLEASE use a belt. safety first my friend.

Thanks for all the help. Last question Probally If I go 3 days a week how would it be best to split up my lifting days since I obviously don't know what I'm doing. It's usually every other day. Been doing chest then bicep/tricep/shoulder then back/legs and then cardio/abs 1-2 times a week also.

cardio/abs is a waste of a day in the gym. Cardio can be thrown on at the end of every workout; or at home. You don't need a gym to do cardio.

As far as abs go, throw them in once in a while, but waste of a day to go in and do "ab day" Add front squats to your leg day if you aren't already. Those are better for your core than crunches ever will be.