Tag Archives: building muscle

Acheive Personal Records Every Day

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In the weight lifting world you’ll hear the acronym PR all the time. PR is of course: “Personal Record”. I’ve really come to embrace PRs, not just in my weight lifting and exercise, but my overall life. I love to set Micro-PRs for things like shortest time to do a certain task in my job. Overall it makes me better and more efficient, and I can push those out over time and get progressively better in my career.

I also try to keep an eye on my negative PRs. I like to keep a lid on my longest time between gym visits, or the longest time before visiting my parents or other family. I’m also not great at billing my customers, so I keep an eye on that too. Constantly improving your positive personal records and keeping negative ones in check will consistently improve your life.

PR Every Day

Adam Glass came up with the Twitter hashtag #PREveryDay. Basically you can tweet your personal record that you set for that day and keep a record of your constant improvement.  There is even a twitter bot that you can follow that will tweet out everyones PRs based on that hashtag. It’s very motivational to follow that account, because you can see the ways in which others are making perpetual progress.

Being Sore After a Workout Isn’t Always a Good Thing

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Some people hold up being incredibly sore after a workout as a trophy of hard work and great gains. “No pain. No Gain.” Right….? No. Abusing your body and being sore will just reduce your overall productivity over the next few days. I’m not saying that ‘soreness’ is bad, but being so sore that you can’t move is. It also means that you pushed hard enough to potentially hurt yourself. The only acceptable time to be that sore after a workout is when you’ve just worked a muscle group that you don’t normally work, and still then: you probably pushed too hard.

There are steps you can take to alleviate soreness both through physical awareness and dietary means. Knowing what ‘good’ movement is when you’re exercising means: good form, controlled actions, and knowing when to quit. Dieting right will give your body what it needs for good strong muscles and make sure the right kinds of nutrients are available to repair them when they need it.

What makes muscles sore?

The medical term for muscle soreness is called DOMS (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness) in medical communities. Basically when you work hard enough to feel your muscles ‘burn’ they are being damaged by micro-tears that over the next few days will be repaired with any spare protein you’ve accumulated. You shouldn’t feel that for about eight hours. If you don’t feel that burn, you won’t grow new muscle and get stronger.

Some people think that stretching and ‘cool-down’ exercises can prevent muscle soreness, but that’s not true. It has no effect on it, because it isn’t caused by muscle contraction or the presence of lactic acid, so neither action should relieve pain unless you’re suffering from cramps. The reason people thought cool-down exercises worked was because it removes excess lactic acid from the muscles, and lactic acid was though to cause the muscle soreness. That has since been disproved though.

What can you do to prevent muscle soreness?

This is really tough to do, especially when you’re trying to bulk up. The first thing you can do is not challenge yourself. This is the easy way out. If you don’t challenge yourself, you won’t gain muscle, which may not be aligned very well with your overall goals. Then next best thing you can do is not push too hard, but challenge yourself enough to cause muscle growth.

There is no proven bullet-proof way to prevent it if you’re working yourself hard, especially when you’re starting a routine or working a new group of muscles. There is anectdotal evidence (not hard evidence) that warming up, gentle stretching, ice baths, and sports massages work. You can also try taking anti-inflammatory medicine. Remember not to work out while your muscles are sore. Give them time to recover.

What are your remedies?

Preventing and curing muscle soreness is elusive like hangover cures. Everyone has different methods that work for them and there isn’t a while lot of scientific data to back any one system up. What do you do?

Interview: Mike T Nelson

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Mike Nelson runs ExtremeHumanPerformance.com and has some great insights on metabolic flexibility and health in general. Here’s an interview I did with him:

Background

Mike is a PHD Candidate for Exercise Science and Kinesiology. His research topic is metabolic flexibility.

He was working for a BA of Natural Science and a BS in Mechanical Engineering from The College of St. Scholastica in Duluth, MN. He only got the BA of Natural Science before moving on to Michigan Tech, where he did two years of post graduate work in Mechanical Engineering. He later went to graduate school there and received a Master’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering after 8 years. Most of his classwork was in biomechanics engineering.

From college he went to work for a medical device company, which would pay for additional college courses after he was there a couple years. Mike took classes in exercise physiology because it was interesting to him (even his vacations). He ended up joining their PhD program about 6 years ago in bio-mechanical engineering.

Metabolic Flexibility

Your metabolism should be flexible. Certain people may be flexible or inflexible to certain nutrients like carbohydrates or fats.  When you’re flexible towards carbohydrates, you’re more likely to consume carbohydrates more easily as an energy source.  The same goes for fats. Outside of a lab, you can test your flexibility with carbohydrates by consuming large amounts of carbohydrates and seeing how you feel afterward.  You can do the same with fats.

Great Questions

Minimal Effective Amount: What is the minimal amount you can do to get the maximum effect?

If you’re really healthy, shouldn’t you be able to take more abuse in terms of foods, odors, and germs instead of the other way around?

Working with Pain

Make minor movements in the injured part of your body to where you feel resistance, but not pain.  Pay attention to your range of motion and gains over time. Your brain will learn again over time that moving in that way shouldn’t be painful, and it won’t be. When you start getting a larger range of motion back without pain, start adding speed and weight to the motion to increase the intensity of the movement.

Biofeedback

The most common way of biofeedback during exercise is the range of motion test where you reach for your knees and stop when you feel strain. I’ve done a post on that here. High quality movement will allow your body to move better. Doing exercises that improve your mobility, in general, will perform better and give you better gains.  You should test your range of motion between each exercise every day because your body changes every day.

Personal Records Every Day (#PREveryDay)

There are three metrics affected by exercise.  Those are: volume, density, and intensity. Volume is the total number of pounds you pushed during your workout. Density is just that volume divided by the amount of time you spent doing it. Intensity is the percentage of your one rep maximum. You should strive to set a personal record in your exercises every day.

Measuring Body Fat

The most accurate way to test your body fat is using a Bod Pod. There are other ways to measure your body fat like skin caliper readings, hydrostatic weight, waist/arm measurements, and taking pictures. Taking pictures and waist/arm are the most effective for people trying to casually lose weight or look better because those are more in line with their actual goals anyways.  You’d be surprised at the changes you’ll see in your physique when you actually document it.

Thank You

Thank you for reading or listening, or both. What did you think? If you enjoyed this interview, show your support by subscribing via email or RSS. You can leave a comment below as well.

Officially Weigh in Once a Week Maximum

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Weighing yourself on a weekly basis can give you a good idea of the progress you’re making.  It will help motivate you if you’re making gains or motivate you even more if you didn’t make your mark that week.  Weight also fluctuates naturally over time, so you’ll want to maintain a consistent schedule. Remember too, that you won’t see the results of today’s diet and workout until 4-24 hours later, so if you weigh in ever day, it’s most likely you won’t see today’s results until tomorrow.

Weight Fluctuates Greatly Over Time

Weight can fluctuate throughout the day or week.  Depending on your current weight, it might fluctuate up to five pounds or more.  Things like bowel movements, hydration, and food intake can all affect your overall weight. It can be off-putting to work hard and eat right, only to gain 2 lbs. because you’re more hydrated and feel better than you were last time you weighed in.

Weighing yourself at the same time on the same day each week will remove a lot of the variables mentioned above.  I prefer to weigh myself on Wednesday mornings before my morning shower.  This is before I’ve eaten, but after I’ve gone to the bathroom.  This mean’s I’ll be the lightest I can be, only weighing my natural body weight. I also avoid the unpredictable nature of weekend meals.

By all means, weigh yourself on Sunday evening after you’ve eaten. It’s all about consistency. If you weigh yourself at the same relative time, you’ll be able to get accurate relative results. When selecting the time you weigh yourself try to select the time of week with the least variability in your diet and water intake.  You won’t be doing yourself any favors if you weigh yourself today when you’re lightest and then tomorrow after a big dinner.

Results from Today’s Exercise Won’t be Visible Right Away

Whether you’re trying to gain muscle or lose fat, it doesn’t hop on or jump off as you’re exercising.  Sure it might look like you lose weight after an exercise because you didn’t drink any water and sweated out 3 pounds, but that isn’t real.  It can play the opposite way too.  Maybe you sweat out 1 pound and drink 2.  That means you just gained a pound that won’t stick around.

As your body synthesizes protein during muscle repair and burns fat for energy your weight will change.  That doesn’t happen during the workout for the most part. It happens in the 4-24 hours afterward when you go to the bathroom.  You’ll also want to give your body some time to normalize it’s water balance after a workout. If you’re anything like me, you’ll drink upwards of 60 ounces of water during your routine.

Stay Motivated with Consistent Returns

If you don’t know where your weight really is it’s hard to know if you’re gaining or losing.  Giving yourself consistency during weigh-ins gives you a really good idea of if you’re gaining or losing ground in your efforts.

If you don’t know where you are, it’s hard to feel good about the results.  If you don’t feel good about your results, there is a good chance you’ll slip. When you meet your goals, celebrate in a healthy way, and when you don’t, try harder for next week.  You only have seven days to meet your mark.

TREKDZ76Y2QR

Looking Back: 7 Articles from This Blog

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I was just reading over at John is Fit and came across a reference to a post that Darren Rowse of ProBlogger wrote called: 7 Links for Bloggers. Basically you look at 7 posts that you’ve written that fit into 7 categories and talk about them in a summary post. It’s a great way to feature some of your best and popular work.  It’s also a great time to reflect about what you’re writing. So, here’s what I came up with:

The First Post

Getting into a Fit Mindset

This was the first post. I wrote this specific one, because I was starting my journey and I needed to do exactly what I was writing.  You see, this blog isn’t about what I’ve done.  It’s about what I need to do.  I follow every bit of advice that I write here.  I may not excel at it, but I’m trying. I wrote that and followed every word.  Looking back: it worked.

The Post I Enjoyed Writing the Most

Pros and Cons of Vegan, Vegetarian, and Omnivorous Diets

This post really started off as a quest to find out the answer to which diet I should have.  I did a ton of research while I was writing it and I just couldn’t stop writing.  Ultimately I found out that I’d be just fine as an omnivore – as long as I could control myself.  I thought I could and I did.  I’m still going strong. I still find myself referring back to this all the time.

A Post that had Great Discussion

Synthesizing Protein Build Muscle

This blog is fairly new, so discussion is a bit sparse.  Still, this post got two comments and is thus the most discussed.  People were able give me additional information that I could research, and it ultimately lead to a few more post ideas.  I hope to get more discussion in the future, but this is a start!

A Post that had a Title I was Proud of

Weight Loss Isn’t Everything

Not only did I like the title of this post, I really enjoyed reading it.  I wrote it after a female friend of mine was talking about how she lost 27 pounds in 3 weeks.  That’s just not healthy. She was starving herself and didn’t feel very good a lot of the time.  She was getting sick a lot too. Weight loss really isn’t everything. Being fit is everything.

A Post on Someone Else’s Blog I Wish I Had Written First

How to Wake Up Inspired

Think Simple Now is a relatively new blog to me.  I started reading about two months ago.  Inspiration and motivation are really the backbone of being fit and I realize that more and more every day.  This post really just hit home for me.  I wish I had thought of it first, let alone writing it first.  Very, very inspirational words here.

A Post I Wish More People had Read

11 Simple Tips to be More Fit

This post really sums up how to be successful in your fitness goals.  It came during a lull in readership, but I really think its gold.  It sums up everything you need to do, and I always go back to it to stay motivated and on track.  As a matter of fact it also inspired many of the posts that followed it, including one great one that’s coming up soon.

The Most Visited Post Ever

Supplemental Reading: Great Fitness Blogs

This post easily received twice the traffic that the next most visited post, but I think that’s for a few reasons: 1) it’s the latest post and I’ve grown quite a bit since the beginning of this blog, 2) it featured other people who in turn sent their readers here, and 3) it’s really a great post to launch from.  I think a lot of people are recommending it.

Give it a Shot

If you do a 7 link challenge post in the fitness realm, I’ll link it up here.  I’ll also be posting other ones I find.  It’s really a great way to get a cross-section of someone’s blog fairly quickly.  It’s also a blast to write, so hit me up with what you’ve got.

TREKDZ76Y2QR

11 Simple Tips to be More Fit

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Looking back at what’s been done so far, I thought I’d give you ten easy tips that will help you be more fit:

  1. Be in the right mindset. Getting your mental game together will go a long way in improving your physical performance.  If you’re not where you need to be, identify the problem and neutralize it.  You mind can be the biggest hurdle in making yourself better.
  2. Drink enough water. Water is the thing that gives all things life.  It cleanses your system of toxins and allows you to extract energy from your food.  If you’re dehydrated, you’ll feel horrible and perform even worse.
  3. Work out. Really? Exercise is the basis of being fit coupled with a good diet. Get into a routine of working out at least three times a week for at least a half hour.  That’s a minimum.  If you can do more, do it. If you don’t exercise, you’ll never gain muscle and always be low on energy.  Don’t just exercise your body either.  Make sure you exercise your mind daily.
  4. Only eat carbs for energy and don’t over-do it. Having too many carbs will promote fat growth, but having too little will leave you starved for energy during your workouts.  You need carbs to build muscle.
  5. Use biofeedback to get the most out of your workout. Listening to your body is the best way to increase gains when you’re working out. Do range of motion tests before each exercise in your workout and you’ll get maximum results.
  6. Pick a diet that works for you. I’m talking about vegan, vegetarian, and omnivorous diets here. That whole South Beach, Atkins, Peanuts Only thing is just a gimmick.  Pick the one that fits your lifestyle and is the easiest for you.  I’m an omnivore myself.
  7. Eat high protein foods before and after you work out to build muscle. Get those proteins three hours before you work out and three to four hours afterward.  You’ll get maximum synthesis then and see excellent gains in muscle growth.  Of course only do it if that’s what you’re going for.
  8. Vary your workout to give tired muscles time to rest. If you give tired muscle groups that time to rest you can keep your heart rate up and give them some R&R at the same time. That will maximize your time to gain ratio.
  9. Don’t just worry about weight loss. Keep your mind on fitness, not weight loss.  Unhealthy weight loss can cause health problems later. Don’t sweat it out or starve it out.  Earn it.
  10. Cut out the alcohol. This is the single easiest way to lose weight and feel better. Alcohol dehydrates you and adds a ton of extra carbs and calories to you body that you don’t need.
  11. Strive for perfection and perpetual progress. This is the most important point.  Striving for daily perfection is what will keep you going forever. This will keep you from slipping back into your old habits. When applied to other facets of your life, you’ll only see positive things.

If you exercise (hah, see what I did there) those ten tips every day you will be well on your way to becoming more fit.  What tips do you have?

Weight Loss Isn’t Everything

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If you’re only on a fitness kick to lose some weight to look good for the summer, then your thinking is deeply flawed.  Being superficial about your health and wellness and doing it to look good will only get you so far. I will admit though: that’s better than not caring at all.

There is so much more to fitness than the finite goal of losing 5 or 10 or 100 pounds.  If you only strive to reach that goal you have a pretty good chance of falling back into old habits and losing everything you gained.  You need to get into the mindset of caring about your body and going beyond visible results.

Building Muscle

Building muscle will actually make you weigh more, but has added long-lasting effects beyond shedding fat.  You will feel better and have more energy, which if you haven’t heard – is a good thing.  Having more muscle also increases your metabolism, allowing you to enjoy those tasty foods you enjoy.  Don’t go overboard though.

Focusing on losing weight only could also come in the form of losing muscle, which you don’t want.  Reducing your body fat should be the only way you lose weight, otherwise you should be gaining weight in the form of muscle growth.  If you’re overweight now, don’t focus on that.  Focus on being healthy and growing muscle.  Everything else will fall into place.

Unhealthy Weight Loss

Losing too much weight too fast can have detrimental effects on your health.  Sweating out pounds or fasting for extended periods of time deprives your body of much needed nutrients and will cause health problems later. I always feel sorry for those Mixed Martial Arts fighters that have to sweat out pounds to meet their weight.  Couldn’t we just promote healthy sports?

Losing 25 pounds in 2 weeks isn’t something to be proud of if you only weight 150 pounds to begin with. A lot of that was probably water or muscle, and now you’re dehydrated and weak, leaving you susceptible to illness or worse. Being emaciated and tired isn’t what life is all about.

Christian Bale in the Machinist - Being emaciated and tired isn't what life is all about.

Let’s face it: if losing weight was all that mattered, we could all just pick up a nice healthy heroine habit and the pounds would just fall off.  Yeah.  That’s good for you.  If you didn’t pick up on the sarcasm there, I’m sorry.

Perfection in Both Mind and Body

Fitness isn’t just about a flat stomach.  It’s about striving for perfection both in mind and body.  Every time you reach your goal, set a new, more ambitious one.  Reach that goal too.  Getting into the mindset of perpetual progress will keep you healthy for years to come and spill over into other facets of your life in a positive way!

Striving for perfection is no easy task, but continuous growth will only lead to great things.  What seems hard now will be a breeze when you look back at it.  Remember when you couldn’t bench press the bar? Now you’re doing 265 pounds?! What?!

Please: tell me what your goals are.  Don’t just limit them to your own health and wellness.  Let’s talk ambitious life goals too!

Vary Your Treadmill Exercises

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Most people think you just hop on a treadmill and go.  You can adjust the intensity of your workout by increasing the speed and that’s just about it.  False.  It’s not just for cardiovascular workout either.

Varying the settings on your treadmill during your exercise routine can increase the effectiveness of your workout, because you work different muscle groups as your stride changes.  This allows tired muscles to rest and other muscles to pick up the slack.  More advanced treadmills also have programs to change the settings for you, so you don’t have to remember yourself.

Incline

The average treadmill also has an incline feature, and that incline feature can vary your workout greatly.  As the incline of your run or walk increases, you use different muscle groups and move from a cario workout towards a strength training workout.

Getting used to running at even a minor incline can also increase the power of your muscles enough that when you’re running at level, you can squeeze out a couple, or maybe even a few, miles per hour on your job speed.  Working those muscles can also increase your jump height and distance too.

Speed

When you’re running you can be doing one of four things:

  • Walking – this is great for warming up and cooling down.  At steep inclines it also promotes muscle growth.
  • Jogging – a medium jog is a great way to cool down after an extended run or intense sprint.
  • Running – extended running builds cardiovascular strength, which helps your heart keep up with your other muscles while you’re exercising.
  • Sprinting – sprinting builds muscle and burns fat.  You’ll want to work some intense sprints into each treadmill workout to round things out.  The best way to do it is in intervals that feel comfortable – like 30 to 60 seconds.

Rounding it Out

Try playing with different settings while you exercise on the treadmill.  Unless you’re doing an extended run to promote cardio, try not to stay on the same setting for more than 30 to 60 seconds.  Once again, some of the more advanced treadmills have preset programs that will change these settings automatically for you.  They’ll usually have descriptions of the programs and how each effects you in the manual.

Remember that you don’t have to do all of your walking/jogging/running/sprinting on a treadmill too.  When it’s nice out, try going for a run outdoors.  If you’re looking for cardio, pick a nice flat piece of terrain.  If you want to build muscle, throw in some sprints.  Hiking is also a completely different experience and can build some great muscle too.  Oh, and it can be fun too!

When I’m hitting up the gym, I usually start out my routine with 10-15 minutes on the treadmill to get warmed up.  About a third of the time I’ll kick it up and run a 5k (3.1 miles).  There’s nothing more exhilarating than finishing a 5k – except maybe going farther.

Do you have any additional exercised you do on your treadmill?  Have questions about anything I said?  Just contact me shooting me an email or leave a comment below.

Biofeedback: An Interesting Take on Human Performance

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Biofeedback isn’t a new idea, but some high performance weight trainers have taken a new spin on it.  The idea is that if you want to get the maximum gain for your weight training efforts, you need to listen to your body and do what it is going to perform best at during that specific workout.

What does that mean?

If you’re going to work out, but your body isn’t going to respond well to bicep curls, you won’t do them in favor of another exercise your body will respond well to.  maybe you’ll end up doing bench presses today instead of curls, and because you’re listening to your body the muscle you build as a result of the bench presses will be dramatically better than if you forced yourself into doing curls.

How do I do it?

There is a simple method for testing your body’s response to any given exercise.  You just stand with your legs straight and reach for your toes.  As soon as you feel your body resist the action, stop and make a mental note of how far you stretched.  Do a couple of test exercises at a minimal intensity and then do the stretch again.  Not how far you stretched again, but this time compare it to your original.  Is it better or worse?  Rinse and repeat this method for a few exercises.

Now that you know which exercises your body is responding to the best, you can focus on doing those exercises for that workout.  You’ll find that you have an easier time doing those exercises and you aren’t forcing your body to do something it didn’t want to.  You’ll want to stop and do biofeedback tests a few times during your routine to make sure nothing has changed.

I’ve included a video of they guys from AthleteCreator.com and Extreme Human Performance using biofeedback to do Bench Presses below:

This is a second video from GymJunkies.com doing much of the same:

The Science

Your body responds to every movement you make by restricting or increasing range of motion.  This is a defensive reflex that kicks in when you’re making movements you shouldn’t.  It’s function is to keep you from injuring yourself.  When you’re working out, doing range of motion tests for each exercise will tell your body whether that specific motion is going to be helpful or not.

The whole biofeedback system is based on your body’s innate ability to contract muscles to prevent range of motion when you’re not moving the way you should.  Think about when you break a bone and all of the muscles around that area contract to restrict movement.  It’s the same feedback system.  Utilizing range of motion tests during your workout give you a noticeable physical response to what your body wants to do.

Using Biofeedback to your Benefit

Utilizing biofeedback to find out what positive motions will get the best results during your workout will help you build muscle and burn fat.  When you’re doing exercise that don’t test well, you won’t see noticeable gains in your overall fitness, whereas when you do, you’ll feel better working out and see excellent results fairly quickly.  Biofeedback and range of motion testing seem to really give great results.  It will be interesting to see how this type of exercise evolves.