Healthy Living and Exercise thread

[LugaJetboyGirl]

[quote name='ztemhead' post='1754846' date='Apr 14 2009, 15.43']just a note that I'm down 18 lbs as of today, which puts me 50% towards my bmi goal.

and this while driving a cab for a living, and all the unhealthy badness that entails.[/quote]

Awesome! Great news.

[Stego]

[quote name='Yagathai' post='1755082' date='Apr 14 2009, 18.19']If there's one thing a judo guy knows about, it's squats. ;)[/quote]




Bah.

Judo wusses, the both of ya. :P

[Roose Bolton]

[quote name='Stego' post='1754425' date='Apr 14 2009, 10.24']In what world is this true?[/quote]

In what world is this not true?

(yes I'm answering a question with a question due to your vagueness and failure to elaborate or correct as needed)

[ztemhead]

heh, I can't do squats without counting them out in Japanese. old habits die hard.

[lessthanluke]

Why are longish breaks wrong? Time between sets depends on how long you need to recover for your sets. Also why is 6 or 7 sets wrong . Last workout I did 8 heavy squat sets and around the same for bench. Different method of training.
[quote name='Stego' post='1755033' date='Apr 14 2009, 22.51']a couple of things:

-Machines only guesstimate calories. The numbers are good if you want to use them as benchmarks, but that is NOT the amount of calories you burn.

-You burn a lot more calories from weight training than you would think. But it's different for everyone.

-You gain muscle from weight training, and muscle burns calories just sitting there.

-'Long-ish' breaks between sets is doing it wrong.

-Six or seven sets of squats is doing it wrong.[/quote]

[Stego]

[quote name='LessThanLuke' post='1755318' date='Apr 14 2009, 20.34']Why are longish breaks wrong? Time between sets depends on how long you need to recover for your sets. Also why is 6 or 7 sets wrong . Last workout I did 8 heavy squat sets and around the same for bench. Different method of training.[/quote]


Longish breaks are wrong for anything but powerlifting. People wanting to get in better shape should not take longer than a minute. You don't want your muscles to recover. Beat them, beat them, and beat them some more.

Basically long breaks are for the people in the gym to socialize, IMO.

As for doing 8 sets, you're not working hard enough if you can do 8 sets. Unless you're on gear. Are you on gear?

Are you following the training program of someone on gear?

[Centrist Simon Steele]

All right--I'm going to do the couch to 5k program, but I've found I'm ready for week 3 of the program already, but I've been conditioning for a couple of weeks already.

So today I did thirty minutes--20 walk, 10 running at a fast pace.

I lifted for 30 minutes. I know the theory you can't make a lot of gain running hard and lifting in the same day, but the trainer at the gym (a ripped dude) told me that's not true. All the things people say not to do are excuses. The more you exert the more you do for yourself as long as your giving your muscles time to rest. Running and upper body lifting on the same day will work just fine. Sit ups or crunches are a must. He said it worked for every other dude with flat abs before all these "new" workouts came out.

I remember the military and how hard we pushed every single day. I'd never been so strong in my life.

Trisk--I believe the short waits between reps do a lot to help build your endurance and strength. I've heard 2 minutes is pretty standard.

[Derfel Cadarn]

My exercise at the moment is mixed between jogging round the local park and using the crosstrainer at work. One great thing about working at a 24hr organisation is that I have 24hr access to the gym. And it's dirt-cheap, works out at about £6 a month. Other workmates who pay x5 times that for commercial gyms have to suffer busy gyms and queues for the machines. Suckers.

My workout really depends on time and what shift I'm on. On early shift I'll either spend 20 mins on the cross trainer or go for a jog after work. On late shift I'll go for a jog before work and then 20 minutes on the crosstrainer on my dinner break at work. Nightshift I'll go for a jog in the afternoon and a 30 minute session on the crosstrainer, or skip the jog and spend an hour on the crosstrainer. I'll usually take a break on two of my days off and have a jog/gym workout on the other two.

No idea how accurate the cross-trainer is, but with the resistance set at 20% and averaging about 194 strides per minute, a 30 minute workout burns off approx 600 calories according to the machine.

I also do some work on the weight machines though I need to spend more time doing this.

Unfortunately my left ankle is inexplicably sore when I walk, though I don't remember bashing or twisting it. This is bloody annoying as I eat quite a lot of carbs and really want to get back jogging etc to burn them off. My weight is about 12 stone which I *think* isn't too bad for a 5 ft 9.5 inch height though I'm aiming to get down to 11 stone. A few years ago I was between 13 and 14 stone so I'm really keen not to let that happen again.

[Yagathai]

[quote name='LessThanLuke' post='1755318' date='Apr 14 2009, 20.34']Why are longish breaks wrong? Time between sets depends on how long you need to recover for your sets. Also why is 6 or 7 sets wrong . Last workout I did 8 heavy squat sets and around the same for bench. Different method of training.[/quote]

First, if you're doing 8 sets, they aren't heavy. They're at most medium, and then you're lifting for size. If they're light, you're lifting for tone and endurance. If you're trying to build strength, we're talking like 4 or 5 sets, low reps -- 5 tops -- and by the last one you should be screaming like a little baby.

You don't want to rest too long between sets because you want to be sure that you work all of the muscle groups involved in the lift. Everyone favours one group over another, and will work that one harder. The idea is that the group you favour gets tired with short rest intervals, so in the next set you're using that group less and the other groups more. If you rest too long, that group won't get tired enough and you'll continue to favour it. The problem with that is that, first of all, you get less overall strength, and you're also more prone to injury.

If you feel like you've had enough rest, you've had too much.

[lessthanluke]

I'm a powerlifter so yeh I take long breaks. I'm currently following a program called sheiko . Its high volume andthe point of it is too over train to a certain extent. No I'm not on gear(too young imo) and I'm training plenty hard. Sheiko is tough
[quote name='Stego' post='1755331' date='Apr 15 2009, 01.44']Longish breaks are wrong for anything but powerlifting. People wanting to get in better shape should not take longer than a minute. You don't want your muscles to recover. Beat them, beat them, and beat them some more.

Basically long breaks are for the people in the gym to socialize, IMO.

As for doing 8 sets, you're not working hard enough if you can do 8 sets. Unless you're on gear. Are you on gear?

Are you following the training program of someone on gear?[/quote]

[Yagathai]

[quote name='Stego' post='1755331' date='Apr 14 2009, 20.44']Longish breaks are wrong for anything but powerlifting. People wanting to get in better shape should not take longer than a minute. You don't want your muscles to recover. Beat them, beat them, and beat them some more.[/quote]

I agree, but I think 2-3 minutes is a more reasonable interval for the average person. YMMV, of course. Some people have the fiber density to pull off optimal gain from one minute rests.

[Yagathai]

[quote name='LessThanLuke' post='1755360' date='Apr 14 2009, 21.13']I'm a powerlifter so yeh I take long breaks. I'm currently following a program called sheiko . Its high volume andthe point of it is too over train to a certain extent. No I'm not on gear(too young imo) and I'm training plenty hard. Sheiko is tough[/quote]

It has a funny name?

[ztemhead]

[quote name='Chataya de Venoge' post='1755341' date='Apr 14 2009, 17.53']Hi, I'm Emilie and I'm a Chocoholic.

I'm going to try to be good. Back to the carrot sticks.[/quote]

"When you're on the chocolate, you make all these rules for yourself. I told myself whatever I did I wouldn't ever trick... So two months later, when I'm trickin'..."

As for doing that many sets of squats, I like it because

a) it burns a ton of calories
b) I'm [i]good [/i]at it. I need the ego gratification of being good at something physical.
c) I do it because I can. My legs recover quickly and I like to push my limits regarding endurance and strength.
d) it tightens up my left knee so I'm not as worried about it going gitchy again in the future

It's fair to say from what I'm finding here, and other places, there's a few different routines to follow depending on your goal. A typical squat routine for me is like this:

1 warmup of 95 lbs X 10 reps
1 mid set of 155 X 10
2 or three sets of 225 X 10

all of the above with maybe 60 to 90 seconds rest between sets. It's after this point where my breaks get long. depending on how I feel or what else I'm doing that day I might add more weight and do less reps, or I might save a little energy for later and move on to something else.

I'm cool with this part of my gym routine. Of all the things I need improvement with, squats ain't one of them. Tops on the agenda at the moment is perfecting my deadlift (still) and learning clean and press.

[ztemhead]

off to gym now, will post more when I get back :P

[lessthanluke]

Yagathai and stego, you need to stop talking/thinking in absolutes with regards to training.

[Stego]

[quote name='LessThanLuke' post='1755378' date='Apr 14 2009, 21.31']Yagathai and stego, you need to stop talking/thinking in absolutes with regards to training.[/quote]



There are a billion ways to train. Most work. Shorter breaks for less reps and heavy weights work [i]better[/i]. End of story.

[Nakkie]

Stego, that depends entirely on what you're training for. Less reps, fewer sets, higher weights are good for gaining strength, but again, it depends on what your goals are. Also, shorter breaks are not better, your central nervous system takes a beating every time you lift really heavy, and needs several minutes of recovery in order to get better results. Ideally if you lift really heavy (working toward a 1 rep max, or 5 rep max) you should be resting at least 5 minutes between sets at the higher weights.

[lessthanluke]

[quote name='Stego' post='1755383' date='Apr 15 2009, 02.42']There are a billion ways to train. Most work. Shorter breaks for less reps and heavy weights work [i]better[/i]. End of story.[/quote]
In your opinion.

[ztemhead]

[quote name='Nakkie' post='1755388' date='Apr 14 2009, 18.51']Stego, that depends entirely on what you're training for. Less reps, fewer sets, higher weights are good for gaining strength, but again, it depends on what your goals are. Also, shorter breaks are not better, your central nervous system takes a beating every time you lift really heavy, and needs several minutes of recovery in order to get better results. Ideally if you lift really heavy (working toward a 1 rep max, or 5 rep max) you should be resting at least 5 minutes between sets at the higher weights.[/quote]

the personal trainer guy in Men's Health agrees, though I read the article a long time ago and can't locate it now.

Also, I reckon this is why powerlifters spend hours and hours in the gym rather than marginally more than I do.

good 'nuff workout just now, though my squats didn't live up to my earlier post. deadlifts felt good, though I'll be needing either wrist wraps or chalk going forward. stupid bar keeps slipping out of my hands.

[Yagathai]

[quote name='LessThanLuke' post='1755391' date='Apr 14 2009, 21.55']In your opinion.[/quote]

:lol: How utterly fatuous.