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Beginners
Now you have chosen your two starting exercises take a little time to make a log sheet. This is where you can write down the number of reps you have peformed next to each exercise and should help you make progress. You can see one I made on the
Weight to use
I recommend 5 or 6kg on a dumbbell and maybe 15-20 on a bar to start with. This should be enough to perform maybe 8 or 10 curls only. If you can continue after this point you need to add more weight to your equipment, so add 0.5 or 1kg. If you cannot get this far you must take a little weight off. Try to add 1kg after you can complete maybe 10 more reps than your last weight change.
Days To Train
This training method is geared toward exercising no more (and no less) than twice a week. This gives ample time for recovery and yet makes sure a level of exercise is reached to tax the muscles. The days should ideally be 3 days appart e.g. Monday and Thursday, Saturday and Tuesday or Sunday and Wednesday. Try to pick your quietest days, days where you won't be setting off to work directly after your session. For example, Sunday is a great day to pick as your first day as you can relax before and after the workout. You could also train to co-inside with your day off work, especially if this is midweek. Early morning workouts can also be ok as you can eat all the nutrients you need at your breakfast.
Before You Begin
On the days you are about to train on, make sure your equipment is easy to get to and is in good condition for use. Give yourself plenty of floorspace to move around in, with nothing on the floor you may trip on for fall over.
Drink at least one glass or water to help compensate for the fluid you will loose while exercising but only eat 2 or 3 hours before your start. You should also be aware of your clothing. Even exercising in a t-shirt may be too much as you can overheat easily once you begin. Wear short pants and a light t-shirt for the first exercise and then consider taking it off if you feel you are sweating a lot.
Warming Up
One of the most important lessons here is learning how to stretch before and after the routine. First of all, make your hands into fists and tense all the muscles in your body. Now relax every other muscle appart from the ones you will be working eg, the upper body and arms. With practice you will learn how to hold these muscles tense and put your full concentration into them while exercising (yet maintaining a relaxed, easy breathing posture over the rest of the body). This should relieve the body and especially the head from the pressures of a workout. Go for upper body first and make sure you stretch accross the shoulders and all arm muscles (even the neck). An easy way is to hold the arms out at a stretch and rotate them above the head, holding the stretch tention. Bring them back down in a circle until they are by your sides and then lift to chest level, opening your fingers as you do so. You may also need to look at using a jump rope to increase blood flow rates and maybe some shadow boxing to warm up.
Exercising
Once all the bodyparts are comfortably stretched you can begin with your first exercise. Each exercise should be smooth and accurate, with a 2 or 3 second 'lift' and a 4 or 5 second 'drop'. For example, if you were performing bicep curls or bench presses, you would raise the weight into position for 2 seconds and lower the weight again counting 4 or 5 seconds. This tenses the muscle more than fast repeats and helps consentration. Don't be tempted to release the pressure on the muscle at the end of each rep, maintain a certain tension at all times just as you did when stretching. Concentrating on the specific muscles like this actually speeds up performance gains. Try to perform each rep in it's truest form and push out the last one or two reps to improve your reps. Beginners should aim for 10 reps of each exercise but shouldn't push themselves past their comfort zone until 4 or 5 sessions down the line. By writing down how many reps you did in the logbook and aim to add one more rep per exercise on the next session. See star days below
Star Days
Every 4th session it is time to push yourself to the limit. Do each exercise as you would normally but this time push yourself to the limit and try to get as many 'true' reps completed as possible until you reach total failure on each exercise. This really shakes up the body and promotes the best gains - you will then hopefully have a much higher rep target to reach on your next session and soon the reps you found hard to complete on the last star day will be very easy by the time you reach your next star day. Remember to put a star or other symbol on the log book to show these days. If you feel you are not ready for your star day (through illness etc), simply continue for a few more sessions until you are, yet if it becomes a matter on motivation, push yourself!
Resting Between Exercises
If you have more than 3 exercises in your training plan, take a rest for a minuite or two after completing three exercises just to catch the breath. During this time, try also to stretch the bodyparts you have just worked. This relaxes the muscles and helps prevent aches and tight skin later on. After that, why not get a glass of water and sip it while cooling off. Don't try to drink lots of water, no more than a cup at least, as you can take as much fluid as you need at the end. When you have caught your breath and feel recovered you can continue.
Cooling Off
At the end of your routine, again take time to get some fluid into the system, maybe a cup to start with and then more as you feel you need it. Don't walk around with few cloths on for too long - leave a t-shirt on at least for 10mins after training until you feel you have cooled down enough to fully cloth again. Walking back into a warm (but not hot) room helps your body to readjust. If you are going to work that day, try to make it at least 30mins after your workout.
Eating
About 30 mins or an hour after you end your session, you should look at eating a snack or a meal. If you intend to eat a lot, leave it until an hour after the workout to give your body time to slow down - otherwise you may get digestion problems and extra gas. Make the food as nutritous as possible, with plenty or protein, carbs and vitamins to replenish your body. Don't be tempted to eat food high in fat as these will do you no favours at all. Also avoid greasy or extra spicy foods at this time as well. Fryed meat is ok, as is fish and lots of potatoes and vegetables.
Sleeping
If you intend to sleep shortly after your workout, leave it about an hour. Your body will get very tense and hyped due to the stress of exercise so you may find it hard to sleep at the very least. Waiting an hour lowers the blood pressure and lets everything settle down to a reasonable level. Sleep is also great for letting the body get to work on the muscles so try to get at least 9 or even 10 hours if you can, and on as many nights as you can.
Supplements/Diet
For this course you can use any supplements you think would be benefitial, like creatine or protein shakes etc. I personally wouldn't do without a course of multi vitamins and plenty of milk a day. All nutrition should be considerd but a bowl of cerial in the morning is a very good start, e.g. bran flakes, shredded wheat, corn flakes and wheat biscuits - you can even mix them if you like. A course of meal every second day will help a lot, as will vegetables (I find a tin of baked beans a good alternative as well).
Missed Exercise Days
Because the course starts with just two exercises it means yoy only need 10 or 15mins to do a full session, making it much easier to fit into your day. It the pressures of modern life means you don't get time to workout on the days you had planned there is no problem so long as you keep the three day rest between workouts.If you go a full week without a workout you can pick it up again by selecting the nearest date and continuing the course. You should still aim to beat your last rep count by at least 1 at every session. Taking longer than a full week off and you may need time to get back into the routine. Again, choose the dates you know you will be able to exercise on but this time, aim to beat your reps from the session before your last one. Be sensible, so obviously don't try to fit two 'star days' alongside each other and don't perfom another star day until you feel you are ready.TOP
1. First go though a warmup and note the rules fo eating and sleeping above. The first workout should consist of the very basics to get you started on your course. Start with the two exercises you chose to start with, e.g. for the pecs and biceps, and using a gripper will help the forearms and grip. A basic 6kg dumbbell setup should do for most people here but complete beginners may need to go for 5kgs instead. Perform as many reps as you are comfortable with for now as this is just to loosen up the body ready for later.
2. Three days later you should be ready for the second session. Don't worry if you still feel a bit stiff as this is part of the process, use caution though if you feel sore as this may be an indication of a pulling muscle. The important step here is to perform just half or 3/4 or the reps you did on the first session. This will relax all your muscles again and should sort out most stiffness.
3. Wait at least two days before the third workout. Here, aim for 10 reps of each exercise or as many as you did on session 1. If you can do 10 easily, do 11 or 12.
4. Star Day: Perform both exercises until you physically fail to lift the weights any more. Use up all your energy and focus it all into the muscles you are using. This session will dictate your aims for the next 3 workouts so make it count.
5. Relaxing ater the star day is important so if you feel you need an extra days rest in between workouts then take it. Leave at least 3 days rest in between workouts. Now you know how many reps you can physically do you should find it less of a problem motivating yourself to get there. Aim to perform one less rep per exercise than you did in session 4.
6. Aim to perform the same number of reps as you did in session 4 or one more. At this stage you can add one or possibly 2 exercises to your routine if you wish, but keep reps for these down to a basic level without straining.
7. Aim to perform one more rep than you did in session 4. If you have included additional exercises, perform half or 3/4 as many as you did last time.
8. Star Day: Perform all exercises to the max.
9. Aim to perform one less rep per exercise than you did in session 8.
10. Aim to perform the same number of reps as you did in session 8 or one more. Add another exercise if you wish.
11. Aim to perform one more rep than you did in session 8. If you have included additional exercises, perform half or 3/4 as many as you did last time.
12. Star Day: Go for it. If you can perform twice as many reps as you started with you may need to increase the weight on your dumbells.
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Dan (11/6/00)
