[csaba73]

Guys,

below some images, training and nutrition log - would you pls assist me. Clearly I do not have the DNA of a bodybuilder, still I'd like to add some muscles to my frame and maybe get leaner. You have already provided great advise to me - for which I thank you all - still I feel disappointed by the results after 8 months training. Please help:

1/ From the images below what would you estimate my BF% to be - lost faith in BIA and calipers
2/ considering the training log and images what muscle groups to focus on training (all :-) ?)
3/ am i maybe overtraining - little progress in mirror ?
4/ should I do some bulking / cutting - some hints on how to do this?

5'11" - 163 lbs - 36 yo

Much appreciated!



TRAINING LOG
------------

All exercises to be carried out one-after-another without any rest, only when all three exercises are carried out you can rest for 60 secs. Rep range 7-9. Weights remain equal for entire workout. First and

Third exercises are compound and second is isolation.

GIANT SET - DAY 1

Triceps (3 sets - 1 min rest)
1. Skull Crush 80 x 8
2. Close Grip Bench 130 x 8
3. Dip bodyweight (=165) x 8

Shoulders (3 sets - 1 min rest)
1. Standing DB rear 30 x 8 (maybe I could replace this with military push - although then I'd loose one exercise for rear shoulders)
2. Lat raise 16 x 8 (this burns like hell!)
3. Seated DB raise 45 x 8

Chest (3 sets - 1 min rest)
1. DB Bench Press 65 x 8
2. DB inclined fLY 30 x 8
3. DB Decline 55 x 8


GIANT SET - DAY 2

Hamstrings (3 sets - 2 min rest)
1. Deadlift 290 x 8
2. Good morning 110 x 8
3. Machine assisted Ham-Glute (about 20 lbs of support) x 8

Traps (3 sets - 1 min rest)
1. Standing Shrugs w/ BB 230 x 8
2. Standing DB Row 50 x 8
3. DB Shrugs 90 x 8 (I need to get heavier DBs)

ABS (3 sets - 1 min rest)
1. V-hip raise 35 x
2. Double Crunch 35 x
3. V-up 20 x

--- If I can walk the day after in the morning 50-60 minutes cross-country running ---

GIANT SET - DAY 3

Arms (3 sets - 1 min rest)
1. DB reverse curl 22 x 8
2. BB wrist curl 105 x 8

Biceps (3 sets - 1 min rest)
1. BB Curl 95 x 8
2. DB Incline curl 35 x 8
3. BB Preacher curl 95 x 8

Back (3 sets - 1 min rest)
1. Pullup bodyweight + 22lbs (190) x 8
2. Incline lat/trap raise 25 x 8
3. Single arm DB row 95 x 8


GIANT SET - DAY 4

Quads (3 sets - 2 min rest)
1. Squat 200 x 8
2. DB Lunge 45 x 8
3. Single leg Leg Press 120 x 8

Calves (3 sets - 1 min rest)
1. Standing in squat rack 450 x 8
2. Single-leg standing calf raise 90 x 8
3. squat rack (goofy stance) 450 x 8

Abs (3 sets - 1 min rest)
1. V-raise
2. Crunch (but I might go for a crunch with a 90 db pressed against chest)
3. side crunch

--- If I can walk the day after in the morning 20-30 minutes HIIT ---

Warmup: 5 minutes of rope skipping and heavy-bag.
Workout duration: 50 minutes (without warmup)



NUTRITION LOG
-------------
6 Meals a day about 2200 cals - 200 grams protein

Breakfast
Weetabix (3 wavers)
whey protein (1 scoop)
skimmed milk (300g)

Snack
1 egg + 5 egg whites - fried
mixed salad (50g)

*training usually here*
Post-workout shake
Protein powder (1 scoop)
Waxy Maize (1 scoop)
Creating (1 tbsp)

Lunch
chicken breast
rice (50g)
mixed salad (50g)

Snack
EAS protein 30g bar
Banana

Dinner
chicken breast
rice (50g)
mixed salad (50g)

Pre-bed
Cottage cheese (50g) or Casein-protein (1 scoop)

[crull]

your first day should be chest, shoulders and then tris, but your shouldn't do all 3 of them together on the same day, this seems to me like kinda overkill
try something like this:
day1: chest- bi's
day2: legs
day3:rest
day4:shoulders - tri's
day5:back- traps

and you should drop the giant sets if you want to gain muscle and perform mostly compoundmovements
and you should increase your cals 2200 is very low
meal 1 should be something like that: dextrose/maltodextrin about 50 gramms with 5 gramms of creatine and 10-15 mins after that a whey shake with about 40-50g proteine
meal2 looks fine, but add oats or some brown rice, maybe even potatoe
and with your pwo shake, mix the creatine with the waxy maze in water and 10-15 mins after that your whey(i assume 1 scoope is about 20 g? if such is the case than take 2 scoopes)
on your lunch, i would increase the rice a bit, about 100 g maybe more
on your second snack, drop the protein bar and get some real food, maybe fish with some brown rice or some pasta
dinner looks fine, maybe up the rice a bit, and your pre bed meal is perfect

so your diet isn't bad, you have the right idea, you just have to ramp in more carbs and some healthy fat ;D

[101bodybuilder]

why would you have dextrose in the beginning of the day i thought it was for PWO?

[crull]

Originally Posted by 101bodybuilder

why would you have dextrose in the beginning of the day i thought it was for PWO?

your body doesn't have food the whole night so you want an insulinspike in the morning to refuel your body quick with glycogen etc.

[cutlerfan]

I say **ck genetics!! What really stands out to me is that you underestimate the benefits of resting during training. It's ok to superset or triset on occasion but it looks as if you are lean naturally. Resistance training with enough weight to keep yourself in a low rep range 7-9 merits 90 sec. to 2 min in rest time between sets. If you can keep up that kind of muscle endurance for sets with only 60 sec. of rest then you might want to adjust your working sets to heavier weights because it isn't enough resistance. You will gain more lean mass from workouts if you relax a little between sets and concentrate on your target muscles rather than getting your heart rate up crazy high. Leave that to your morning HIIT.

[csaba73]

Originally Posted by crull

your first day should be chest, shoulders and then tris, but your shouldn't do all 3 of them together on the same day, this seems to me like kinda overkill
try something like this:
day1: chest- bi's
day2: legs
day3:rest
day4:shoulders - tri's
day5:back- traps

and you should drop the giant sets if you want to gain muscle and perform mostly compoundmovements
and you should increase your cals 2200 is very low
meal 1 should be something like that: dextrose/maltodextrin about 50 gramms with 5 gramms of creatine and 10-15 mins after that a whey shake with about 40-50g proteine
meal2 looks fine, but add oats or some brown rice, maybe even potatoe
and with your pwo shake, mix the creatine with the waxy maze in water and 10-15 mins after that your whey(i assume 1 scoope is about 20 g? if such is the case than take 2 scoopes)
on your lunch, i would increase the rice a bit, about 100 g maybe more
on your second snack, drop the protein bar and get some real food, maybe fish with some brown rice or some pasta
dinner looks fine, maybe up the rice a bit, and your pre bed meal is perfect

so your diet isn't bad, you have the right idea, you just have to ramp in more carbs and some healthy fat ;D

Crull, thanks a lot - makes a lot of sense - some questions/clarifications:
1/ you are right 2200 kcals is too low - my maintainance is 2700 kcals - I am cutting - now at around 8% BF if I can trust the BIA scales

2/ your creating timeing is confusing - I though you had to take creating AFTER workout and preferrably with a nice insulin spike from waxy maize - I was told off in this forum not to use simple sugars to achieve this as it does not help refuel your muscle glycogen only the liver glycogen - i am a bit confused now

3/ why do you not mix the entire pwo shake together and drink in one go - it takes about 30 minutes before your stomach can process your drink anyway.

4/ scoop size - great point - most manufacturers include a scoop with their product and guess what it is around 20g while on the box it reads one serving = 30 g (not sure why this is). Anyway I meant 30g.

5/ instead of protein bar (which I keep as when-all-else-fails food :-) ) - how about 3 slices of wasa wholegrain with 2 tbsp of peanut butter and 2 servings of 0%-fat yoghurt
a/ All products - Wasa Global
b/ Power Butter

6/ how about barley instead of rice?

7/ what training would you recommend instead of giant sets?

[csaba73]

Originally Posted by cutlerfan

I say **ck genetics!! What really stands out to me is that you underestimate the benefits of resting during training. It's ok to superset or triset on occasion but it looks as if you are lean naturally. Resistance training with enough weight to keep yourself in a low rep range 7-9 merits 90 sec. to 2 min in rest time between sets. If you can keep up that kind of muscle endurance for sets with only 60 sec. of rest then you might want to adjust your working sets to heavier weights because it isn't enough resistance. You will gain more lean mass from workouts if you relax a little between sets and concentrate on your target muscles rather than getting your heart rate up crazy high. Leave that to your morning HIIT.

cutlerfan - you are right with some exercises, most notably quads and hams I cannot do 60 secs rest but go for 2 minutes - the first minute is to avoid fainting - the second to drink water - I sweat like a pig during these exercises :-)

what routine would you recommend instead?

[cutlerfan]

Originally Posted by csaba73

cutlerfan - you are right with some exercises, most notably quads and hams I cannot do 60 secs rest but go for 2 minutes - the first minute is to avoid fainting - the second to drink water - I sweat like a pig during these exercises :-)

what routine would you recommend instead?

Day 1: Back, Bi's
Day 2: Chest, Tri's
Day 3: Rest
Day 4: Shoulder's, Traps
Day 5: Legs

For all body parts except legs choose a weight that enables you to do 12 reps with good form before failure. Then either stick with that weight or increase 5-10 lbs. after the 1st or second set depending on how you feel. You should never go less than 7 reps. Also, do 4 sets of every movement before moving to a different exercise. For legs choose a weight where you fail the first working set at 15 reps... legs tend to respond better to higher rep ranges again do 4-5 sets per movement. Back, Legs should have 16-18 sets total per workout, Bi's and Tri's should have 12 sets per workout MAX with this split. Only because they are already getting worked from the back and chest before hand. Do around 20 sets for deltoids making sure to hit the three deltoid heads adequately. Train Traps by doing 4 sets of 3-4 different exercises. Always resting at least 1-1.5 min between ALL sets or slightly more if you need to. When you train for lower reps (8-12) with heavier weight, it's important to rest the muscles and stretch between sets to let the muscle recover.

About your diet, Crull is pretty spot on I would say, I would take two scoops of protein at breakfast and PWO instead of 1 because those are two of the most important meals of your day. Also add 1 cup of oatmeal at breakfast for sure, to fuel your workout, and 1 cup white rice mixed with 1 tbsp of sugar immediately post WO. I think you if you get to where you want to start bulking again, if you incorporate these things you will start growing like crazy. Good luck brother.

[crull]

yeah, you still take creatin PWO, but in the morning your depleated and you want to refuel your creatine deposite too before working out, and the dextrose will spike your insulin, i'll take the dextro in the morning and PWO, well with the creatine and proteinwhy to wait a bit, well i don't know, but many members with better knowledge than i have suggested this, and i tried that and had better gains, the simple shugar will spike your insulin and will refuel your glycogen FAST, complex carbs are used to fuel you overtime, and you should only take the simple ones after waking up and PWO when your body needs to be refueled fast and has to get out of the catabolic state

you could do that with the yoghurt etc. but i prefer a normal meal with meat etc^^

sorry i don't know what barley is/are, i don't know every englisch foodname, i'm still learning the language :P

and well i would do just single sets, with mainly compound movements