The TFP Health Club

If you're getting beer with @Plan9 and @GeneticShift, you're getting me too.
Package deal.

/threadjack

 

Maybe I'll hitch-hike up to the next big meetup and down some malt beverages with all of yas

 

Please!

 

I do have some vacation time still left... Depends on how the wife's new radiation treatments are working, but she's got a trip to Vegas planned next month, only seems fair.

 

The wonderful thing about labeling yourself a hardgainer is that you never have to achieve anything at all, and you can still feel superior to people who have...( half-hearted joke there) Most hardgainers I ever knew eventually quit lifting ( at least with the goal to become a bb or powerlifter ). It's probably for the best. McRobert's big 'sin' may be in telling people who have no genetics or ability to improve themselves, in a certain way, that they should keep plugging along with something that they have no talent for. There very well may be no way that a genetically ungifted person can be a body builder. Like Baraka_guru, people should find something they like to do, and stick with it, or something that they can excel at. Spending your life doing something that you admit you don't have the ability to do might just cause a severe depression and poor body image. Be happy with what you have. ( unless you are a fat tub like me, ha ha )

( I'm pretty sure the article was, to some extent, a self parody, which is why I thought it was funny )

Less is more is also known in powerlifting and bodybuilding arenas, even the druggies know it. It wasn't even new when McRobert's and Ken Liestner picked it up for HIT training. Now Muscle and Fitness, there's a mag that espouses some very unrealistic workouts. Workouts that the guys whose names are attributed to them don't even do. Ghost writers generally make that crap up off the cuff, and put BB guy of the day's name on them... Go to some of the bodybuilder and powerlifter forums and find out what the 'real' competitors actually do. Might surprise you.

 

Being a "hard gainer" basically means you are not eating enough. I personally refuse to get fat while lifting. I'm not going to spend two years "bulking" and getting fat because maximum strength isn't my goal, but achieving over all fitness and being hot naked is. Being just about every powerlifter is obese or close to it, and almost every BBer is using if they are going on stage, I'm not going to worry about it.

Sure people will use it as an excuse, but they also use thing like "metabolic damage" as an excuse for not losing fat. If some people want to use it as an excuse thats their business, they were going to quit anyways.

At the same time I'm not going to overly stress that my bench is my weakest lift. I have narrow chest, my whole family does on my mothers side, thats where genetics does play a part.

 

Well it is an excuse, after all you COULD eat more and you were hungry, its just not worth it to you. I'd gain very quickly myself on 3000 a day.

Three times a week, I've contemplated getting a power rack at home so I don't need a spotter.

 

Power rack is a good idea. Still you need to make sure your form stays as near perfect as you can get it.

Have you tried a 5x5 workout? My bench went up pretty well on 5 sets of heavy(ish) weights, with adding small amounts the next workout, after achieving the 5 for 5. I did find that I needed a bit of warmup before the main work sets though, YMMV. Try a cycle or two of these and see if that works. Once you've added strength on the 5x5 you can switch it up to higher volume to shape your chest.

 

Yea I don't like to power rack bench in my gym since there are only two and I think they should be used for OHP, squats and deads first on the Olympic one. I don't want to be "that guy". I've done it when the gym is empty but there are only a months a year for that.

I've done the Riptoe method which is pretty similar. I DID greatly increase my weights on a lot of lifts but I slightly injured my knee on squats doing it, (my quads were strong my tendons not so much) and I'm doing my best to avoid injury. Since I do work without a spotter and often don't have one available when I work out I'm sticking to higher reps and doing a progressive program to increase reps and once I get to 12 increase weight and start the rep cycle over again. Its working well enough, and progress is slowed since I don't eat enough, but I'm happy with my current progress in relation to my life goals

 

I have found that sticking to 5x5 for too long will eventually lead to tendinitis. More warm up than is generally accepted is what I do, then I switch to something else when I start feeling the tendons start to get sore.

I think the 5x5 probably works (for the short term) because it reduces volume and allows for more recovery, but after you start lifting heavy, especially with the short warm ups, your tendons and joints start to take a beating. There's a reason the meat-necks wear elbow and knee wraps.

Thinking of switching my squats as we speak. My knees are getting sore, and I've been doing lower reps and higher weights. Maybe switch to 10's for a while and let the joints recover.

 

A fairly good article from a meat-neck about training: Don't Repeat My Mistakes Son - Iron Addicts Forums

It works into the less is better attitude which has been bandied about lately. There is also a reference to the use of ghost writing for workouts attributed to body builders.

 

Aaaaggghhh So my lazy ass needs help once again! Apart from the main problem being I cant be bothered to get off my bum, and the second main problem that when I start I get bored after a moment! I got a new job and had to undertake a competency assessment and failed! I had two timed swims to undertake, the first swim you have 65 seconds and I can make that one, its the second swim straight after where you have 45 seconds - I'm 4 seconds out every time! I guess its stamina as I struggle to even climb out the pool and can feel myself shaking in the few seconds waiting to be told to go! They want me to take the test again on Sunday and have suggested I 'get fit' before Sunday 9am! So that's two days to gain 4 seconds - as my car is ill I cant make it to the pool! I have been swimming head up breast stroke as we are supposed to maintain an eye on the casualty - I know front crawl is traditionally faster but I am far far slower with front crawl. So far this morning I have flailed around with the wii on just dance for over an hour - my arms are aching now. I thought about trying to run outside - perhaps up the hill - but I don't think I can walk up the hill without stopping and the cold air seems to make me struggle for breath!

Any ideas for what I should try and do? I have a complete lack of will power and normally only partake in any exercise if its competitive!

 

Is there a piss test involved? If not just take some caffiene or other (legal) stimulant beforehand... But, by all means, keep up the exercise. For competitiveness (of which I don't have much of) you could join a local athletics club of some sort, or join a BJJ studio. Lots of sweat, lots of competition.

 

6 weeks, 8 lbs down towards my minimum total 24 lbs reduction . . .

I really don't see much difference. Well, maybe the haircut. Decided against posting a pic because it really doesn't look like significant change to the old bod yet.

@Cayvmann I've done resistance as part of the gym visit for years. The Goodlife chain has these machines. Yah, folks don't like machines because of whatever. They still give you a workout when you do the circuit and actually push yourself. I don't do sets, but a visit to most stations plus a few curls of a 80# barbell and some rope pulldowns leaves me all weak and trembly-like. You can baby your knees too

 

@kramus I prefer free weights, but I certainly don't have anything against machines. Some of them are excellent. Do whatever is comfortable for you, and something that you can/want to keep doing. My main problem with machines is that I don't seem to be built, in any shape or fashion, to fit on most of them. My levers are different than average, I guess. A good group of machines lined up and you can do full body circuits, which can be quick and brutal, hopefully without tearing your joints up I mainly hurt my knees on machines. Leg presses and heavy leg extensions... Squatting, even heavy, most of the time makes them better, but once they're injured...

Some pulldown machines and cable row machines are some of my favorite gym equipment.

I believe that the workout that you are actually going to do is much better than the workout somebody else does, but you won't keep doing.

 

My earlier post could have used and editor