Rep Speed for Power, Strength and Size
The speed in which you execute a certain movement refers to term tempo or rep speed. The tempo being used can determine the after effect the lift has on the muscle group. The movement can be of two things when you lift a weight. It can be mere work that tires out the muscle or it can be a means of stimulating more muscle mass. The main difference between these two movements is the rep speed. For now, we’ll concentrate our interest in the dangers of what tempo you use during your workouts.
When you are simply just working out and not training for muscle growth is when your main interest is satisfying your ego of lifting a heavy weight, or even finishing a particular number of repetitions for a given set. This type of training is dangerous as poor form while working out can cause a lot of injuries to your muscle tissue and connective joints. Poor form during exercise includes, swinging, jerking the weight around, using body momentum to get the weight up any way you can.
And last but not least, let’s get down to the training aspect of applying rep speed to your exercises. You might not think it, but it’s important to know how you apply rep speed to your exercises as it can determine whether or not you meet your goals that you are seeking out. If you want to train for power and strength, then you want to generally apply an explosive type of rep speed. Let’s take the bench press for example. When you are in position to go down with the weight, you want to go down with the weight in a controlled and slow manner. And then once you touch your chest, push the weight back up in a explosive manner.
To be more specific, we can use a time ratio for your workouts. For the example I have just set, you can use the ratio 3:0:1. The first number 3 represents the number of seconds it takes for you to go down. The number 0 represents the number of seconds when you touch your chest. And the last number represents the number of seconds it takes for you to push the weight back up. As you can see, applying the right tempo for your exercises is very important when going about achieving your goals.
So let’s say you want to apply a ratio that promotes size while bench pressing. You can use the ratio 2:0:2, or even 2:0:3. The concept of it is the slower you go while repping out, the more muscle fibers you’ll contract which will result in more damage to the fast twitch muscle fibers. At the same time, you have to pay attention to how much weight you’re using. That general way of thinking or saying does not always result in muscle mass, as you still need to apply a certain stimulus to your muscle when trying to gain muscle mass. As training for power also results in muscle size. Finding the fine line of gaining muscle size and strength is not something you can figure out on the first workout. It will take a lot of trial and error as you find out soon within your training.
Pull-ups for Fitness
Having a pull-up bar can prove to be one of the best and cheapest investments for the fitness value. They can be one of the best fitness tools to have on hand because pull-ups and chin-ups are one of the best exercises to do when it comes to body weight training. Right now, they have all kinds of pull-up bars, and cheap too. Right now I’m using a pull-up bar made by Iron Gym. For the amount of pull-ups I have already done since buying it and the shape I have already gotten into, it has been a $30 well spent. It’s cheap, well structured (sturdy), and also easy to set up. As opposed to being permanently attached, it simply slides securely over the door frame. And don’t worry, you wont fall and bust your bottom. Trust me, I’ve already tried. Let’s just say it uses leverage to stay put.
The Pull-Up: If you’re just starting out, you can place your hands anywhere where you feel most comfortable doing them. Typically, you would want to place your grip a little bit wider past your shoulders. If you’re using a pull-up bar at home, make sure the bar is set up high enough so that you bend your knees in a hanging position without your feet touching the floor. If they do, trying to get a workout with your feet touching the ground can be a nuisance. Alright once you get to working out, if you find out that you can’t even do one pull-up, here’s a few techniques you should incorporate.
Don’t get frustrated, just follow my directions. This time around, I want you to grip the bar with your palms facing you. This is called a chin-up. Or if you can’t do one chin-up with your palms facing you, here’s another method you can try doing. Get a stool or chair and place it near under the pull-up bar. Step on the stool and grip onto the pull-up bar. While you are standing on the stool and gripping the pull-up bar, pull yourself up until your head is over the bar completely. Next, let off the stool and and come back down as slow as you possibly can. These are called negatives. Do a set of 10 repetitions, for 3 sets total. As each week passes, keep testing yourself until you can do a pull-up and keep adding more repetitions for negatives.
You can still make good use of a pull-up bar even if you’re not interested in getting into shape with an exercise routine. Here’s something you can do to increase your pull-up strength. About 3-4 times a week, place your pull-up bar between the door of your room and leave it there for the remainder of the day. Now every time you pass it, do one pull-up. Or if you can’t do a pull-up, perform a set of negatives. In no time, you’ll be doing 10-15 pull-ups by the set. Trust me, with hard work and determination, you can reach that goal. But it all depends on you. As mentioned, pull-ups are a great way of to get into shape and can even be used as a solo type exercise to improve your upper body strength and core. Even if you can’t do one pull-up by yourself, use the methods I mentioned above. With hard work, you’ll be doing pull-ups like a navy seal!
Home Workouts on the Go
No matter where you are, you can give your body the workout it needs with just a few effective exercises. It doesn’t matter if you’re at work, the movie theater, your grandmother’s house, in the living room watching trash television, or even a walk down to your local gas station. Okay, okay, so I got a little carried there for a bit. As long as I get my point across, that’s what matters. Plain and simple, you can workout anywhere. So what if you’re not in the mood to workout, getting just a small workout in can boost your mood and relieve a lot of stress, and plus it’ll do your body some good. Check out these applicable workouts for at home exercises:
1. Sprinting: When you are going somewhere from point A to point B, rather than walking, try to sprint instead. So let’s say next time you have to do an errand or going over to a friend’s house, try to spring the whole way there to build some muscular endurance power. When you step on the athletic field, you’ll definitely see the carryover, and plus you’ll probably get more errands done with this way. Nothing better than getting errands done while getting your workout in all at the same time!
2. Push-ups: One of the best exercises to build upper body strength and overall core are push-ups. You can virtually do this exercise pretty much anywhere, even in the bath tub while taking a shower. If you want to work more of the chest, position your hands wide. If you want to target your triceps, position your hands closer inwards. For added difficulty and resistance, elevate your feet such as on a chair while you’re doing this exercise. A great way to get push-ups in is when you’re watching television. If you’re watching a football game or movie, do 30-40 push-ups every time a commercial comes on. If you’re going to watch trash TV all day, do it with a productive pace all at the same time will you.
3. Lunges: Although you might look a little goofy to the neighbors when you do lunges around your yard or inside your house, your quads and glutes will be thanking you after a good leg workout. With your torso in a erect position, take a long step forward and softy land, and then continue with your other foot. With this exercise, form is everything. Until your thigh is parallel with the ground, continue to drop your leg until then. Do not let your knee position past your toe. With this exercise, you want to work at a moderate pace, so slow and stead is key. The tempo at which you want to do this exercise is two seconds up and two seconds down. Working up to more sets as you advance, start out with one set of ten reps on for each leg.
High Reps, Shocking your Muscles, Training to Failure Myths Revealed
Training with high reps and light weight makes your muscles look more cut:
When it comes to looking more cut and shredded, it’s not done with with weights but rather in the kitchen instead. Yes, you build lean muscle mass when you lift weights, doesn’t matter if its high reps or low reps. But in order to look more cut, it’s mainly the foods that you eat that determines so. Because you can have all the muscle you want, but if you got a layer of fat covering it up, whats that going to do for your muscle definition? Ever heard of the term “great abs are made in the kitchen,” well there’s a lot of truth to that in reality. And yes, the intensity of your training does matter when you’re trying to burn fat, but if you’re not eating right nutritionally, what’s the point of your high endurance training?
To gain more muscle mass, you have to shock your muscles by keeping your muscles guessing:
This way of thinking or the concept of it is usually said by people that do not generally understand the physiology of how muscle grows and the processes that your body goes through when training to gain more muscle mass. When it comes down to it, muscles only know the movements of pulling, extending, contracting, and pushing. Changing the type of exercise performed does not change their muscle growth response. What determines your muscle growth process is the duration, volume and intensity that you apply to your body.
Training to failure is a must for maximum muscle growth:
This may be one of the most misunderstood bodybuilding concepts of all time. To achieve muscle growth, you do not need to train a muscle group to failure. It’s not necessary to workout a certain muscle growth to the point of no longer doing a repetition. All you need to do is to apply higher intensity to your workouts and to lift weights that are heavier than the previous set instead of doing an exercise to where you are no longer able to do reps.
For your muscles to grow, all you need is to do higher intense workout from previously before. It can be a waste of energy and not to mention over training to work your muscles any further than it can go. Training to failure will also result your muscles having to recover longer than usual.
As mentioned, when it comes to muscle growth and bodybuilding, there are many misunderstood concepts when it comes to training. It’s always important to do your own research or someone with reputable authority of a given training method to get the best out of your training.
Fitness Goals that Drive you to Succeed
What holds a bodybuilding program together are the goals that drive you to success. It becomes a purposeless endeavor when you train without goals. It’s the same as when there isn’t a destination in mind, a man cannot walk. A man will walk but where to? It can happen to you as well training without a specific agenda in mind. Goals drive your interest, your passion, and is the instigator of what keeps you going from day in and day out. It’s what originally initiated you to start training on your own accordance.
Right from the word go, goals can influence your decision in a bodybuilding program. For example, when you start a training program, there is something at the end of your training that you want to gain because of the training you’re doing. The way you train has a purpose, no matter what it is. When deciding your goals, you evaluate on how you would like to achieve it, causing you to start exercising as a immediate response.
You have to decide where to train when you decide to train your body that is. Whether if you want to join your local fitness club, or even set up a gym in your own home, it’s the goals in mind that contributes largely to your decisions. To achieve specific goals in mind, contributing factors such as personal trainer availability, weight equipment, convenience and even the location, also are factors upon your decisions.
We start training based around our goals when it comes down to business. We keep making decisions regarding the progress of the training, having your training style molded around achieving your goals. If you’re not getting the results you want, you simply change it up to a certain degree to accommodate your needs when getting the results you want. To put it simply altogether, you need a reason to train. If you don’t have a reason, or inner resolution, then training becomes boring and you go no where.
Even without a reason, training is better than not training at all. But like I’ve mentioned multiple times, in order to succeed, find the reason to train. Once you integrate your resolution and reasons to your training program, you WILL go far. Trust me on this. Also, just another small tip. When you do find out the reasons for working out and getting into shape, make sure you are doing it more for the better of you and not of anyone else. People that workout mainly for others and not for themselves generally do not succeed and do not go far when it comes to getting the results you want.
