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06-29-2007, 11:58 AM
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I'm going to post this in here as well - I like having my articles in my journal. I used to keep them all with a table of contents on the front page, but Jim put the shaft to me and deleted my journal
 What I’d Do Different The great thing about reflecting on past experience is that you can use your hindsight and say “What I would do different if I could do it all over again…” Of course, there’s no way to go back, but there are things that you might’ve done in your past that you can learn from and do better in the future. Training and nutrition is no different. I have been training and eating like someone who knows what they are doing since I was 20 years old (I’m 31 now). Of course I worked out in high school and my first few years in the military, but in reality, I had absolutely no idea what I was doing until about eleven years ago. If I could go back to 1996 and change things that I have done in my own fitness life, here are the things I would do. I have adapted most all of these things in my own training and dieting strategies, but I can’t help but wonder what kind of progress I would’ve made had I been doing these things from the start. Of course, living and learning is all part of the deal. Each and every one of us must learn what works best for our own bodies through trial and error. With that being said, I’m going to try to keep this as general as possible and hopefully, someone who isn’t as far along as I am can apply this to what they are doing now in their own fitness programs earlier on than I may have. I would’ve stayed away from fitness magazines. -When I was thinking about writing this, there was one thing that kept coming into my mind about what I would’ve done different, and this one was it. I have more than a few reasons for this. First, I believe that magazines like Flex, Muscular Development and others give amateur weight trainers a false sense of what can be realistically achieved in specific periods of time. Magazine headlines like “Huge Arms in Six Weeks” and “Gain 100lbs on your Bench Press by Summer” are so incredibly misleading, but when you’re blind and hungry, you’ll take whatever you can get your hands on and when you’re starting out, your first ideas are usually the ones that are hardest to get rid of if they are wrong. You fail to realize that there really is no cutting edge, scientific information being released by these magazines, just the same old, tired, recycled articles they have been re-printing for years. Also, those magazines are usually quite depressing to the novice exerciser. Think about it – you workout hard for a year and after all of the sweat and effort, you still look NOTHING like Jay Cutler or Ronnie Coleman. You don’t realize that nobody else in the world does either; you just know that next to them, you’re still in terrible condition. My primary reason for staying away from magazines is the last one I’ll mention: the content within is dictated by supplement advertisers. Sure, most people understand that. However, the “ad-reports” are sometimes very misleading to the novice and the claims aren’t only amazing, they’re usually downright fraudulent. “Bill Smith Lost an Amazing 45lbs of Fat and Gained 25lbs of Muscle in 12 Weeks…” What else was Bill Smith taking? I promise you that it wasn’t the latest BS MuscleTech supplement. This leads to the next change I would make: I would’ve saved so much money on supplements... -When I browse through online forums or talk to someone about weight training, it never fails to surprise me the amount of emphasis that is put on supplementation. I have personally tried everything that has come and gone from the market in the last 11 years, and to be honest, there is nothing that has ever been legally produced that is going to make or break your regimen. “So, what supps do you take” or “What supplements should I be taking” is usually one of the first questions that a new trainee or person that discusses their program asks me. This usually comes WAY before “What should I be eating when” or discussion of how you have to train to expect a physical change. Television and magazine ads have perpetuated that. Of course, we’ve all had a friend that has taken something and sworn by it, and then we take it only to be disappointed in what it has done for us. Deep down, we want those supplements to work. Hell, if we didn’t we wouldn’t shell out the money we do for them, and the supplement industry is a multi-BILLION dollar industry. That’s BILLION with a B and multi meaning MANY times over. Realistically, supplementation is way down the list of important training factors. Proper training techniques, nutrition, along with rest and recovery are all way more important than what supplements one may be taking. In my personal opinion, the cost usually outweighs the benefit of supplementation. With that being said, I do personally believe that a high quality multivitamin along with protein supplementation is not only necessary but essential to reach performance daily intake levels of many nutrients. I would’ve mastered the basic exercises… -Of all the things that I have and will list, I believe this simple idea will change one’s physique more than all others. I too have gotten incredibly tied up in “feeling the burn” or the latest machine hype, but to be realistic, I would’ve had so much more lean body mass much earlier on had I concentrated on learning the basic lifts: dead lifts, squats, bench presses, leg press, bent rows, pull ups and other heavy compound exercises. I think one thing that many people become too obsessed with is changing the body one muscle at a time instead of collectively changing it as a whole. They become with individually stimulating each and every muscle group without thinking of the benefits of stimulating several different groups at once (increased natural hormone production that leads to serious muscle growth being the most obvious). No exercise tells the body to grow faster than a heavy exercise, and compound exercises (exercises that recruit more than one muscle group) provide the body with a greater stimulus to change. How do you incorporate this into designing your own training routine? Think compound exercises first and then incorporate isolation exercises to improve your performance and correct weaknesses that you discover while doing compound exercises. Improving weakness will result in improving your physique. I would’ve practiced moderation a bit more… -Everyone that knows me knows that I am the prototypical Type A personality. Everything I do is to an extreme. Whether it is business, personal relationships, travel or whatever, when I decide I’m going to do something, I don’t hold back. Don’t get me wrong, I love the fact that I train like an animal. But in this case, I think I would’ve practiced more moderation in my overall training and nutrition to avoid periods of burnout. I’m human, and pretty much everyone that reads this that has any training experience at one time or another has lost motivation to train and eat right for an extended period of time. Through training experience, I’ve learned that there are times when the body’s natural systems need a rest, and the body will respond to periods of lower volume and lower intensity. At some point, you need to take a step back and relax a bit. Missing one workout to rest and recover isn’t a big deal. However, to keep slamming away once you’ve hit that burnout will usually result into a much longer hiatus from your training, and days turn to weeks, which turn to months and THAT is how you lose all progress. Same principle applies with dieting. I’ve had extended periods of deprivation, living off only chicken breasts, tuna, whole grains, sweet potatoes, and green veggies to the point of which if I saw another one of those foods I was going to vomit. Again, an occasional day off of strict eating is NOT the end of the world, but constant deprivation usually leads to falling off the wagon, and then binge eating. What happens? Three months later it becomes difficult to tell if you have ever worked out in your life. I would’ve just shut my trap, turned off my computer, set down the book and lifted… -I’m guessing that more than one person that will read this probably shouldn’t be reading it – they should be in the gym lifting. I know more than one person that has a huge training brain but no muscles. Why? Because they can talk about training and nutritional strategies all day long and can analyze them with the best of us. But they just don’t apply it. All of the information in the world will mean nothing if it isn’t applied. Ironically, the things that most people on internet forums and message boards discuss are trivial at best. A gram of protein or a gram of carbs here, how many sets, how many reps, etc. are discussed ad nausea – my advice? Get in the gym and find out what it is you need! Doing anything is better than doing nothing at all, and by constantly reading studies and worrying about what everyone else is doing while you’re doing nothing isn’t going to make your physique change at all. I would’ve learned why I’m doing what I’m doing… -I realize this kind of contradicts the previous topic, but I think there is some merit here. Most people have no earthly idea why they do what they do. They just saw or heard someone else doing it so they’re doing it. I’m not saying you have to understand every system in the body. I’m a successful personal trainer, so that’s my reason for having this knowledge. But there is a point to where you should understand why you’re doing things and not just blindly do them. Remember that correcting weaknesses is what training is all about. Stimulate the entire body and give special attention to whatever area is lagging; this means that your training will constantly be changing and evolving as your weaknesses become strengths and other weaknesses surface. This also means that what works for your friend, buddy, cousin, aunt, wife, mom, dad, etc isn’t going to work for you because no two people have the identical weaknesses, genetic make-ups, life stressors, metabolisms, etc. I would’ve kept it simple… -I believe, as humans, it is our nature to avoid simplicity. While there definitely is a large amount of science behind training and nutrition, the truth of the matter is that changing your physique is not a matter of rocket science. It is not necessary to know each and every intricate working of the human body to drastically change the way you look. You want to lose fat? You need to increase your metabolism and force your body to burn more calories than you consume. You want to gain muscle? You need to train to stimulate muscle growth and properly feed the body to enable it to repair. In my training protocols, I use advanced nutritional and training theories to expedite progress. That is my job and what helps me make a living. However, most people tend to make this much more difficult than it needs to be. Most of us have seen the results in the “Body For Life” competitions that have taken place over the last several years. Do you know why that program is so successful? Because it is SIMPLE. A monkey can follow it and it is not a one size fits all program. So why on earth do most people insist that they’re completely different and insist on creating these elaborate routines and nutritional strategies that are far beyond their training experience and are not necessary for getting the most out of their metabolisms. I firmly believe that the harder something is to stick to the less likely that one will stick with it. If you keep your training simple, the probability for consistency is much higher. Consistency plus intensity will breed results… Each and everyone of us have our own personal beliefs on what works best for our bodies and many people will continue to get the same results doing the same things they’ve always done. They’ll convince themselves that it worked once and it will work again. Unfortunately, you are not the same person that you were just before your last workout. As you train, you are evolving, and so should your training and nutritional demands. Learn your body – if you listen, it will tell you what it needs! I fully expect to learn as much about changing my body in the next eleven years that I have in the previous eleven. I do believe that constant progress is possible and that one can avoid pitfalls and plateaus. Of course, life happens: we will get injured and there will be hardships and circumstances beyond our control. But if you stay on top of your training and allow it to change as your body changes and learn not only from your mistakes, but the mistakes made by others who have been in this game for a long time you can make constant progress, and the sky will truly be the limit! 
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06-29-2007, 10:37 PM
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Man, I'm learning about moderation now. I'm the same way, I like to train like an animal, but i'm learning some moderation here and there can let me train harder for longer.
Honestly, I'm to the point where I don't take hardly any supplements.
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06-30-2007, 05:57 AM
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Other than that, I don't take a lot of stuff.
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06-30-2007, 06:55 AM
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06-30-2007, 07:31 AM
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I'm waiting for my workout partner at my studio so we can squat and dead. I'm going to kick his ass for being late.
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06-30-2007, 09:21 AM
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I am a bad motherf*cker...
Squat/Dead Day...
Well, the idea today was do deads then squats, but I had 2 trainers training and they had 2 clients, so we started with squats. Since they were still going, we moved on to leg press and THEN to deads. BRUTAL. Squats 315x5 405x5 495x5 Wrap the knees 545x3x5 Leg Press 1000x10x3 Probably shoulda kept them wrapped, but my lower back was getting tight as hell. I didn't warm it up enough, but I've been paying a LOT of attention to it lately, so it's probably tired from the work I did on it the other afternoon. Deads Well, these were just going to have to be much lighter than anticipated, which is fine because I smoked them. Kind of funny rep scheme, but I was kind of cruising: 315x5 405x5 455x5 455x15 LOL I NEVER do high reps on deads, but we were just talking and I decided that since JLo did it earlier this week, I'd do it. I could've done 50 (maybe no). I was winded, but I felt fine. I decided to lay off SLDL this week. I've not skipped them in months, and my hams are tight now. Pull-thrus 150x15x5 GHR My ass, hams, and lower back are baked. 4sets x 10 I did some RC Situps as well while I was bs'ing with Carrie's clients. I feel great and I wouldn't mind working out again... But I'm going to relax and have a peaceful day.
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07-02-2007, 06:17 PM
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Smoked some benching and shoulder work today. Wanted to do RGBP too, but I kind of like having a big ass spotter when I do those so I just did one set of 285x8 and went ahead and racked it. Can't be getting tired in that position.
Anyway, the big story is that I did cardio today for the first time in 2 months. I don't do cardio for fat loss (I can get crazy lean without it) but for lung capacity. My asthma is allergy induced and I've been having a tougher time here of late, so I decided to throw in 30 minutes of pretty intense cardio work. I felt like it really opened my lungs and tonight, I'm not having any asthma issues. Beard doesn't mind cardio. With his pickiness, I thought he'd be miserable.
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07-02-2007, 06:57 PM
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07-02-2007, 07:08 PM
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__________________
College football training mode.
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07-03-2007, 05:01 AM
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If you don't feel it in your triceps almost immediately, then yeah, you're missing something.
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07-03-2007, 07:10 PM
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Thanks Nite.
I did my deadless back today. I'm telling you I'm getting so much more out of it by doing it this way as well. Bent Rows, baby... 225x15 315x10x4 315x8 This rest was low as hell on these. I was kinda rushing because a client had to chat my ear off and it cut my workout time down from 2 hours to like 1hr 15 minutes and I wanted some damn volume. I just didn't rest. I normally use pullups as a warmup exercise, but today I used them as a work one: BW+50lb db on a belt x 15, 13, 12, 10, 9 Rows got me, but I was keeping the rest to about 45 seconds. Wide grip, reverse grip pulldowns Old fave that hits those lats so differently than overhands do: 200x10 200x10 200x8 200x8 200x8 200x7 (assisted) Face Pulls SS with Rear Delt Raises 150x15 - 40x15 x 5 Straight Arm pushdowns 150x15x5 Higher volume and relatively higher reps in anything. Just wanted to hit things a little differently today. Back felt as if it was going to explode all day. Probably affected my bowling today (I was only throwing hooks though, so it was cool). This f'n beard keeps me hot as hell, btw. It's a b!tch to cool off, and with SA's humidity, it makes it even worse.
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07-03-2007, 10:01 PM
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Boyd, Im also getting addicted to old school T-Bar Rows, you know the ones with one end of the bar in a corner of the room. I love those. My 2nd favorite back exercise next to deadlifting.
__________________
TEAM 7 MOTOROLA
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07-04-2007, 05:42 AM
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