Workout Wednesday #12

Today's Post:
     There are many myths around exercise and diet that always circulate around the internet and around social circles that many have fallen into believing them to be true.  When I first started exercising regularly, most of the time people would give me advice on things that they had heard before regarding exercise.  The things I would hear were: doing crunches every day to get a six pack and loose weight, eating before exercise is the worst thing you can do and the more time that you exercise the more strength, and size you will gain.  Things like this are always heard everywhere and every day by people who are trying to "help" you out.  Whether it is family and friends or even that guy at the gym who looks like hes in shape, most of the time the things you hear just aren't fact. 

Workout Wednesday #4

Intro:
     Pre-Workout supplements are supplements you take before your workout which will give you more energy and a much better pump giving you a better workout.  Having a better workout could be doing more repetitions or even moving up in weight on what you are working out.  Moving up the latter for weights would mean you are getting stronger and size will increase.  Other pre-workout supplements aim at weight loss rather than focusing on your muscle gain and will cause your body to heat up and make you sweat more than you usually do and are usually called thermogenic fat burners.  Some use these to help define their bodies or for competitions.  Whatever your goals are, with the supplements your taking, you are hoping to get the most out of your workout and you hope to have your workout time be more effective.

Workout Wednesday #3

Intro:

    Now it is time for the 3 day split!  This isn't so much of a drastic change from the 2 day split from last week where instead of focusing solely on upper body one day to lower body the next day, here you are focusing on different muscle groups each day.  With the three day split it seems like you are doing less work than the 2 day split but that is because you are adding an extra day to split up the workouts throughout the week.  This way, even though you are doing less exercises in any given workout day, you should be adding even more intensity to your workouts each time you go to the gym.  Also by doing this split unlike most other splits, it allows you to recover the other days muscle groups without really using that muscle group.

Workout Wednesday #2

Intro:
     Today I will be talking about the two day split.  This is a follow up from last weeks Workout Wednesday where I talked about the one day split.  Again just to let you guys know, a "split" is just a weight lifting schedule that someone can follow weekly.  This "split" tells you what muscle groups to workout what days of the week or how many times a week.  It will also tell you how many sets you should do and how many repetitions you should do during your workout.  This usually varies for everyone who designs their own workout.  I will share with you the two day split that I have used in the past.

Headaches

Yesterday:
     I couldn't find the time to do a blog post yesterday and still keep my sanity.  I am currently dealing with donating two different cars even though I initially only wanted to donate my car.  For weeks I had taken care of what I thought was everything to get ready for the donation of my vehicle except I missed probably one of the most important things for getting rid of a car, the car title.  In the back of my mind I always thought I knew exactly where it was, "It has to to be either in the glove box or in my safe".  Turns out, it wasn't in either of the places I usually keep my things, it was lost.  In order to try and find the title, it seems like I turned my house upside down and every document ever was scattered throughout the house.  After about 3 hours of straight looking in the house, I had the worst headache I have had since I finished up my school semester.  All of this for a small piece of paper that would give the charity ownership of the car.

I Hate Allergies!

Today:
     I have yet to meet another person anywhere that actually enjoys having allergies.  They get in my way regardless of what I'm doing.  Other than with medication I am not immune to them.  I could be laying down and the damned allergies will just start attacking me for no reason at all.  Itchy eyes, runny nose, and scratchy throat for a small period of time that seems to be hours long.  Dealing with my allergies was what I was dealing all day today for the most part. 

My New Workout Plan

     Recently I have decided to switch my focus from maxing my bench press to focusing on maxing my deadlift.  I wouldn't say my bench press was very impressive.  I could bench press 225 a couple of times without assistance but coming to that from where I started was great in my eyes.  Now, I've switched from working out mainly my upper body to working out my lower body more.  This means I had to change my workout routine, which meant adding an entire day dedicated to leg exercises and adding cardio to my daily workouts. 
  The reason I wanted to change my focus was because I actually started noticing the physical changes in my body more than I had before.  About a year and a half ago I finally started exercising regularly for the first time in my life and I weighed in at about 280-85 pounds.  Now, depending on diet/water intake, I vary anywhere from 240-55 pounds.  Thats fine and all but I started noticing my lower body was starting to look more thing than my upper body was.  I had strong arms, bigger shoulders and a strong chest but my legs started looking puny.  That is the reason I decided to focus on my deadlift over my bench press.
     My workout changed from a three day split to a four day split.  I had to do the four day split since I added the full leg workout day.  Doing this split also helped me give my body more of a rest. Here is how my new workout plan looks like:

day one - I workout my chest and triceps with a sprinkle of abdominals
day two - I will workout my back and biceps
day off - I would do solely cardio (jog/bike) with some abs
day three - I work on my shoulders and traps
day off - again i would do cardio with abs
day four - DREADED LEG DAY
day off - this is the last day off i usually take the day off completely after legs

     Along with changing my workout, I had to learn how to properly do the deadlifts.  I believe this was the part that took me the longest i think since I had my form all wrong to begin with.  I had a friend go workout with me and watched some videos to really get it down.  I finally got it down and finally starting to see some progress on my legs.
       I used this series of videos to help me out with my deadlift form.  I learned quite a bit from this guy as well.  I recommend everyone to watch the series.  I only posted the first video so if anyone is interested just look up the rest of the videos on youtube.