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Originally posted by: SociallyChallenged
Originally posted by: damage424
I've seen the personal trainers in my gym train all their clients using compound lifting exercises. And to be honest, those exercises look like a lot of fun. I have this image in my head of what I want my body to look like and I'm going to get there. And I'm going to get there by May '10. Next summer should be a fun one. 🙂
Click to expand...

It's impressive that the personal trainers at your gym use them. Most utilize a bodybuilding-like program and have no idea why they do that. That's why I criticize the average personal trainer. Mark Rippetoe will be the best personal trainer you'll ever have though.
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Interesting. At the gym I go to all the workouts the trainers have their clients do seem to be similar to stuff you see in crossfit. I'm kind of curious about this actually, i'm going to ask one of them if they base their stuff on crossfit. One of the trainers is even this 250 guy who walks around in Vibram FF's. I've never seen trainers at my gym coaching people through stuff like bicep curls or other isolation movements. Come to think of it, the trainers at my gym are pretty awesome.

The gym I went to before this was 24hr fitness and i can't remember ever even seeing a trainer training someone there.
 
Originally posted by: KingGheedora
Originally posted by: SociallyChallenged
Originally posted by: damage424
I've seen the personal trainers in my gym train all their clients using compound lifting exercises. And to be honest, those exercises look like a lot of fun. I have this image in my head of what I want my body to look like and I'm going to get there. And I'm going to get there by May '10. Next summer should be a fun one. 🙂
Click to expand...

It's impressive that the personal trainers at your gym use them. Most utilize a bodybuilding-like program and have no idea why they do that. That's why I criticize the average personal trainer. Mark Rippetoe will be the best personal trainer you'll ever have though.
Click to expand...

Interesting. At the gym I go to all the workouts the trainers have their clients do seem to be similar to stuff you see in crossfit. I'm kind of curious about this actually, i'm going to ask one of them if they base their stuff on crossfit. One of the trainers is even this 250 guy who walks around in Vibram FF's. I've never seen trainers at my gym coaching people through stuff like bicep curls or other isolation movements. Come to think of it, the trainers at my gym are pretty awesome.

The gym I went to before this was 24hr fitness and i can't remember ever even seeing a trainer training someone there.
Click to expand...

Perhaps they're not necessarily personal trainers, but certified CrossFit trainers. That certification carries a fair amount of weight with it.
 
Originally posted by: SociallyChallenged
Originally posted by: KingGheedora
Originally posted by: SociallyChallenged
Originally posted by: damage424
I've seen the personal trainers in my gym train all their clients using compound lifting exercises. And to be honest, those exercises look like a lot of fun. I have this image in my head of what I want my body to look like and I'm going to get there. And I'm going to get there by May '10. Next summer should be a fun one. 🙂
Click to expand...

It's impressive that the personal trainers at your gym use them. Most utilize a bodybuilding-like program and have no idea why they do that. That's why I criticize the average personal trainer. Mark Rippetoe will be the best personal trainer you'll ever have though.
Click to expand...

Interesting. At the gym I go to all the workouts the trainers have their clients do seem to be similar to stuff you see in crossfit. I'm kind of curious about this actually, i'm going to ask one of them if they base their stuff on crossfit. One of the trainers is even this 250 guy who walks around in Vibram FF's. I've never seen trainers at my gym coaching people through stuff like bicep curls or other isolation movements. Come to think of it, the trainers at my gym are pretty awesome.

The gym I went to before this was 24hr fitness and i can't remember ever even seeing a trainer training someone there.
Click to expand...

Perhaps they're not necessarily personal trainers, but certified CrossFit trainers. That certification carries a fair amount of weight with it.
Click to expand...

Or they just know what the hell they're talking about.
 
I actually just talked with one of the trainers at my CrossFit gym. He pretty much said everything you guys have been saying all along. One thing that he altered from what I've been reading on these forums is he stated that he only works out for around 10 minutes. According to him, he keeps his workouts short, high in intensity and that way he gets his cardio in with his weightlifting.

For example, the day I spoke with him he said he was going to do deadlifts and situps. He takes very low rest time and just goes all out.

He also said, to lose body fat it is best to do high rep at whatever weight you can do until you can't do it anymore.

Oh and btw, I spoke with my good buddy over the phone a couple of days ago and I told him about how I think it's best for me to start compound lifting. Listening to his response opened up my eyes. I mean, he really gave me the push in the right direction a few months ago, but he really didn't know what he was talking about with compound lifting. He kept telling me I'm going to get bigger and bulkier. And I should keep up with my workout program now until my 12 weeks are over (in his program he thinks every 12 weeks you should change your routine).

I've been working on my squat at home this past week and I have seen a tremendous improvement in my technique and lsat night was the first time I was able to squat down and hold that position for several seconds.
 
Originally posted by: damage424
I actually just talked with one of the trainers at my CrossFit gym. He pretty much said everything you guys have been saying all along. One thing that he altered from what I've been reading on these forums is he stated that he only works out for around 10 minutes. According to him, he keeps his workouts short, high in intensity and that way he gets his cardio in with his weightlifting.

For example, the day I spoke with him he said he was going to do deadlifts and situps. He takes very low rest time and just goes all out.

He also said, to lose body fat it is best to do high rep at whatever weight you can do until you can't do it anymore.

Oh and btw, I spoke with my good buddy over the phone a couple of days ago and I told him about how I think it's best for me to start compound lifting. Listening to his response opened up my eyes. I mean, he really gave me the push in the right direction a few months ago, but he really didn't know what he was talking about with compound lifting. He kept telling me I'm going to get bigger and bulkier. And I should keep up with my workout program now until my 12 weeks are over (in his program he thinks every 12 weeks you should change your routine).

I've been working on my squat at home this past week and I have seen a tremendous improvement in my technique and lsat night was the first time I was able to squat down and hold that position for several seconds.
Click to expand...

Perhaps the trainers you spoke to don't have as much training as I thought. First of all, working out for 10 minutes is not a sufficient amount of time for development of thorough cardio. High intensity workouts are good, but they are not the only or even the preferred way to do lifting sometimes especially for beginners. You can easily hurt yourself even if your form is a little off. Therefore, these exercises aren't really advisable for people who are new to the world of weightlifting. I'm not against HIT or HIIT. I'm for them. However, that's not the way you should always do it. Sometimes you gotta split things up. And often times, depending on your goals, you need rest.

If you're going for cardio, a workout can be very short and effective via heavy weights. However, if you are looking to go for strength, rests are needed to let the body recover and the speed of the movements should be slowed and controlled. There's no way you should do a 3x5 of heavy squats as fast as you can. You skyrocket injury chances and the benefit is minimal. Your body actually secretes growth hormone during the breaks from work so cutting them out is... ehh, not a great idea if you're lifting heavy.

And this is where I go ahead and call the trainer an idiot. The best thing to lose body fat...? You ready for the answer? Diet first. Heavy training second. High rep workouts first of all produce a lot of soreness, which is not conducive to beginners or to overall progress. Secondly, that would work mainly on muscular endurance. Not strength.
 
For a "Crossfit" trainer, he's definitely missing large parts of the Crossfit methodology. For example, yes, you can definitely get a fantastic workout in 10 minutes. However, only doing such short workouts is not enough to properly develop "General Physical Preparedness" (GPP), which is the primary aim of Crossfit. This is why the real Crossfit posts a completely different workout every day: some are 10 minutes long, some 20 min, some 60 min, and some 5 min. Also, a pure strength workout comes up once a week on average. This will be something like "squat 5-5-5-5-5", will not be timed, and it is intended that you take the proper amount of rest in between sets to move the maximum amount of weight. If all your trainer believes in is 10 minute workouts, then he is severely limiting his (and his clients') gains in strength and not allowing them to develop their overall fitness in the broad manner that real Crossfit does.

Oh, and saying that high rep exercises somehow make you lose fat is just plain dumb. See the fat loss sticky for a real guide to weight loss.
 
Well, the trainer pretty much covered maybe 75% of what this forum has been all about. When he told me about the 10 minute workout I knew right there and then that the idea of a 10 minute workout is not going to do my any good. I realized that will increase injury on it own. And I'm most worried about injuring myself because I tore a muscle in my shoulder about two years ago (when I REALLY didn't know what I was doing). But he really did do a good job summing up everything (for the most part).

Still got plenty of reading to do on my book. We'll be hearing from me shortly. 🙂
 
Originally posted by: damage424
What is a cheap, accurate way to measure my body fat percentage from home?
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There really isn't one. Pictures are the best way to keep track of stuff like that. Calipers require training and the ones that use current/electricity aren't really accurate. If you take pictures once a week, you'll start noticing the differences.
 
Little confused...

At the gym I've been doing around 45 minutes cardio followed by air squats. I've been just practicing the form and technique and making sure I'm doing it the correct way. I also have some flexibility issues so all in all I've been doing this routine for about two weeks. Not to mention doing a plain old squat with no bar is hard as it is for me!

I told this to my friend and he got me worried. He said I should be doing the isolation workouts because I'm going to lose muscle if I don't lift any weights. I know he likes doing his routine because it has worked out great for him.

I'm pretty sure I understand the differences between isolation and compound and it is pretty clear compound is the way to go. He keeps telling me I'm going to bulk up if I do compound and again it clearly worked for him and he isn't going to budge. And I can't blame him.

But the main question and point to this post is: is my routine right now going to create muscle loss? 45 minutes cardio followed by stretching and squats (no bar or weights). Obviously I don't want to lose muscle, only fat.
 
Originally posted by: damage424
I want more cookies!!!! 😉

Yes 65 lbs in 15 weeks. I actually lost 25lbs in the first 2-3 weeks. But if you read carefully I wrote in I have absolutely no salt intake; just whatever is natural in my food. And because of this, I lost a lot of water a long with fat and gaining muscle all at the same time.
Click to expand...

what type of chicken are you eating? A lot of name brands inject brine or broth into the chicken to enhance the flavor. I have had a hell of a time finding noninjected chicken and eventually gave up and went with a local butcher.
 
Originally posted by: damage424
Little confused...

At the gym I've been doing around 45 minutes cardio followed by air squats. I've been just practicing the form and technique and making sure I'm doing it the correct way. I also have some flexibility issues so all in all I've been doing this routine for about two weeks. Not to mention doing a plain old squat with no bar is hard as it is for me!

I told this to my friend and he got me worried. He said I should be doing the isolation workouts because I'm going to lose muscle if I don't lift any weights. I know he likes doing his routine because it has worked out great for him.

I'm pretty sure I understand the differences between isolation and compound and it is pretty clear compound is the way to go. He keeps telling me I'm going to bulk up if I do compound and again it clearly worked for him and he isn't going to budge. And I can't blame him.

But the main question and point to this post is: is my routine right now going to create muscle loss? 45 minutes cardio followed by stretching and squats (no bar or weights). Obviously I don't want to lose muscle, only fat.
Click to expand...

Well, let's get something straight - we never told you to only do cardio. We told you to get on a resistance training program and to track calories and make sure they were under caloric maintenance. You need to read the fat loss sticky again. I explicitly state that cardio and caloric deficit, without resistance training, leads to loss of both fat and muscle.

Isolation lifts will do the job. However, compound lifts will do the job better and won't create weaknesses. Compound lifts don't change a damn thing. You can't bulk in a caloric deficit. It's impossible. It will put a priority on muscle repair and you will instead use the energy from your fat stores.

So where is the weightwork, man? Start light. Even if you are starting light, your body will prioritize. Also, the weight will stretch you out a bit and you can practice your form. You don't even need to do cardio now. You could do weightwork only (doing Starting Strength) in a caloric deficit and lose weight just as quickly.

PS: Your friend has no understanding of the human body. You can only lose weight in a caloric deficit. You can only gain weight in a caloric surplus. Tell him to sign up here so he can learn some info. Also, tell him he's a noob. Please? 😛
 
Originally posted by: Sedition
Originally posted by: damage424
I want more cookies!!!! 😉

Yes 65 lbs in 15 weeks. I actually lost 25lbs in the first 2-3 weeks. But if you read carefully I wrote in I have absolutely no salt intake; just whatever is natural in my food. And because of this, I lost a lot of water a long with fat and gaining muscle all at the same time.
Click to expand...

what type of chicken are you eating? A lot of name brands inject brine or broth into the chicken to enhance the flavor. I have had a hell of a time finding noninjected chicken and eventually gave up and went with a local butcher.
Click to expand...

Sedition, what type of chicken has brine and stuff injected? Are you talking about deli meats, or does this apply to breasts, cutlets, and legs + thighs?
 
Originally posted by: KingGheedora
Originally posted by: Sedition
Originally posted by: damage424
I want more cookies!!!! 😉

Yes 65 lbs in 15 weeks. I actually lost 25lbs in the first 2-3 weeks. But if you read carefully I wrote in I have absolutely no salt intake; just whatever is natural in my food. And because of this, I lost a lot of water a long with fat and gaining muscle all at the same time.
Click to expand...

what type of chicken are you eating? A lot of name brands inject brine or broth into the chicken to enhance the flavor. I have had a hell of a time finding noninjected chicken and eventually gave up and went with a local butcher.
Click to expand...

Sedition, what type of chicken has brine and stuff injected? Are you talking about deli meats, or does this apply to breasts, cutlets, and legs + thighs?
Click to expand...

Most chicken in general has it. The cuts sold by the butcher almost always have a salt solution injected into them.
 
The thing is, everything about compound lifting is brand new to me. It is taking a lot of time to be able to read the book, understand the book, then practice till perfect. I guess what I want to know is should I do iso workouts for now until I get everything in line with compound? I can cut the cardio back a little that way I can do iso and practice my squats after.

I thought doing squats and practicing them would be fine because I'm using my body weight, guess not.

Bah, I feel like I messed up the last two weeks. I lost weight this past week and hoped it was water, but it clearly isn't. By the way, the electronic body fat calculator that they have in my gym (I know they aren't good) showed I dropped a percent of body fat.... But I guess it's wrong anyway

And the chicken I eat is Perdue. It says it has no hormones or steroids.
 
Originally posted by: damage424
The thing is, everything about compound lifting is brand new to me. It is taking a lot of time to be able to read the book, understand the book, then practice till perfect. I guess what I want to know is should I do iso workouts for now until I get everything in line with compound. I can cut the cardio back a little that way I can do iso and practice my squats after.

I thought doing squats and practicing them would be fine because I'm using my body weight, guess not.

Bah, I feel like I messed up the last two weeks. I lost weight this past week and hoped it was water, but it clearly isn't. By the way, the electronic body fat calculator that they have in my gym (I know they aren't good) showed I dropped a percent of body fat.... But I guess it's wrong anyway

And the chicken I eat is Perdue. It says it has no hormones or steroids.
Click to expand...

Everything about compound lifting is natural, functional movements. The squat is like squatting down to pick something up. Overhead press is putting something away. Bench is pushing something away. These movements are not foreign to you. However, isolation lifts are. I feel you talk about compound and isolation lifts like they are comparable. They are not. Isolation lifts are for those who want bulky muscles that look nice, but promote a lot of weaknesses. Compound lifts can make you look good as well, but have no weaknesses. You should not do isolation lifts. You should practice your compound lifts. Practice makes perfect. That's like me asking should I study chemistry if I'm not completely sure about my politics info. It's not the same so you can't replace it.

Practicing squats is good. However, not making them weighted will cost you some muscle mass. You lost weight. That's fine. You may have lost a fair amount of fat compared to muscle since you're a beginner. However, eventually you'll start losing a lot of both. Don't feel like you messed up, just fix it and move on.
 
I didn't have time to learn proper form for everything all at once, but for the StrongLift workouts some of the exercises are much easier than others, and I'm betting you already know how to do at least a couple of them. I just had to read about them online once and was able to do these the next time I went into the gym:

push-ups
pull-ups
leg raises (ab exercise)
inverted rows
bench press

For the others (deadlifts, squats, OH press), I just focused on one at a time across multiple gym trips until I had the movements down. I didn't read any books, just watched videos and read articles online about how to perform the exercises. After a couple weeks of working out 3x a week I was able to do these three lifts. I started with just the bar on all of these. So you can start doing resistance training right now without trying to hard to learn the movements for compound lifts.

 
Some of you aren't going to like this post, but it's for the best.

My friend came down from college to visit and we talked a good amount about the program and what we do in general versus compound. Even though a part of me feels like it would be a fun challenge to learn compound lifting and incorporate them into my routine, I don't think it would be my smartest option for the near future.

I am comfortable doing all the iso movements. I've lost 70 pounds doing the bodybuilding program. Some of the exercises in the program are compound lifting anyway. I know bodybuilding is for show and compound lifting builds strength, but I'm not an athlete so it doesn't really matter.

But I still gained a whole bunch of knowledge reading these forums and I appreciate everyones support and advice.
 
Originally posted by: damage424
Some of you aren't going to like this post, but it's for the best.

My friend came down from college to visit and we talked a good amount about the program and what we do in general versus compound. Even though a part of me feels like it would be a fun challenge to learn compound lifting and incorporate them into my routine, I don't think it would be my smartest option for the near future.

I am comfortable doing all the iso movements. I've lost 70 pounds doing the bodybuilding program. Some of the exercises in the program are compound lifting anyway. I know bodybuilding is for show and compound lifting builds strength, but I'm not an athlete so it doesn't really matter.

But I still gained a whole bunch of knowledge reading these forums and I appreciate everyones support and advice.
Click to expand...

If you wanna go for the looks, then that's a good decision. It's all about what you want and what your goals are. If your goal is to try to look better, then a bodybuilding program will probably give you quicker results. If you ever decide that you want to play some sort of sports or anything, you may want to switch; but if not, that's alright. Check out the Max-OT program. I did that for a bit and I had some great results. If you are interested in it, I can email you a copy of the PDF.
 
Hey, it's me again.

So my friend suggested two products to me: cell mass and glutamine.

Can you guys give me the thumbs up or thumbs down on taking these?
 
Originally posted by: damage424
Hey, it's me again.

So my friend suggested two products to me: cell mass and glutamine.

Can you guys give me the thumbs up or thumbs down on taking these?
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:thumbsdown: Those are typical bodybuilder supplements that don't have any basis in research. Cell Mass is useless. It's just a bunch of stuff that supposedly helps recovery, but ultimately gets broken down into unusable components by the digestive system. If anything is going to help with recovery, it's eating lean proteins and leafy greens and staying hydrated.

Glutamine supplementation is actually potentially dangerous. If you use supplements for a specific amino acid, you can actually hinder the absorption of other amino acids. This is bad because you need all the amino acids for recovery.

On top of that, glutamine is actually only one amino group away from glutamate. The body often converts back and forth between the two. Glutamate is active in the brain as a neurotransmitter. If you increase the concentration of glutamine, you increase the conversion of glutamine to glutamate in the body. In the brain, this can result in a neurotransmitter imbalance specifically called excitotoxicity. It's deadly. Don't supplement either. You'll be wasting your money and will be hurting your body if you do. Tell your friend to find you research that glutamine is beneficial. There's a ton saying it's not and no credible studies saying it is.
 
Thanks for the response SC.

He told me it was a type of creatine, and I was under the impression that creatine is ok.

I'm down from 250 to 175, and I need to start putting on muscle. Friday I went really heavy on the weights and my body didn't respond to well; it took more then 3 days to feel back to normal. Maybe there is another supplement I can take to help the recovery process?
 
Originally posted by: damage424
Thanks for the response SC.

He told me it was a type of creatine, and I was under the impression that creatine is ok.

I'm down from 250 to 175, and I need to start putting on muscle. Friday I went really heavy on the weights and my body didn't respond to well; it took more then 3 days to feel back to normal. Maybe there is another supplement I can take to help the recovery process?
Click to expand...

Creatine monophosphate is fine. It's the one form of creatine that has proven to be useful. If you buy creatine, just buy it in that form. Don't buy anything fancy with creatine esters and all its other forms. It's just a waste of money. However, no form of creatine helps with recovery.

No supplement will make recovery better. The problem with a bodybuilding split is that you don't lift for a body part more than once a week. If you did, your body would adapt and your soreness would decrease significantly. Either use lighter weights and slowly increase or get a different program. Those are the best solutions. Make sure you're not lifting outside of your strength and skill zones.
 
Well, my friend got all pissy when I sent him what you wrote SC.

He says his cousin has her masters in fitness and bio and that he knows what he is talking about. He also said he was on it for a year.

I'm not sure if I should get what he told me or maybe look into Creatine monophospate or just stick to what I'm doing. Time will tell.

 
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