I ran across an article from Molly Galbraith and thought it really had some solid material in it. The info is basic and I've said it a million times, however, the way she puts it, is simple and easy to understand, and I think a ton of people can benefit from these two simple ideas.
1. Stick with a diet/routine long enough to get results! Everyone wants results from their routines, like yesterday, and this can cause frustration and “the grass is always greener syndrome.” Any time a new routine or diet comes out that sounds cool, everyone wants to jump on the bandwagon and they end up skipping around from routine to routine and diet to diet without ever really sticking with one and seeing results. There are tons of great routines out there. Pick one, stick with it for 6-8 weeks and see results! This will also help you in the future in knowing how your body responds to certain training/dieting stimulus. Do you feel like you gained a lot of mass incorporating heavy deadlifts into your routine? Awesome! Does the Anabolic Diet give you great energy? Wonderful! Do barbell complexes rip the fat off of you? Great! Did you get some awesome gains from Wendler’s 5/3/1?Fantastic! Sticking with a diet or routine long enough to see results is the best way to figure out what works for you and what doesn’t. So quit jumping from one thing to another like a Chihuahua with ADD!
2. Let big, compound movements comprise the bulk of your exercises! If it’s been said once, it’s been said a million times – these are the money exercises: squats, deadlifts, pushups, pullups, bench press, rows, overhead presses, lunges and all of their variations. These are the exercises that will make you strong and build muscle in the shortest amount of time. They are also the exercises that create the biggest demand on the body and burn the most calories. Get good at these exercises and do them often if you want to reach your goals! Enough said.
Okay, those two were soo good, I am going to give you a extra one
3. Focus on strength! Until you can properly squat and deadlift at least your body weight for females and two times your body weight for males, and bench press at least half your body weight for females and one time your body weight for males, you have no business doing body part splits. Getting stronger opens up so many doors to so many other types of training, and makes that training infinitely more effective. Think about it, how effective will your metabolic circuit be if you can barely do five push-ups? How many rounds will you make it through before your upper body gives out on you? And think about doing curls on your “arm day.” How will your results improve if you are doing hammer curls with 30 pound dumbbells instead of 10 pounds? What kind of effect will that have on your hypertrophy training? Astronomical, right? Training for strength will also help improve the strength of joints and ligaments and help prevent injury when you are training explosively, like doing sprints or plyometrics. So the bottom line is: training for strength is the way to go! Once you have built up a decent strength base, you can try other types of training and reap major results.
If you can do these 3 things, you will be miles ahead of 90% of the other guys/girls in the gym, and you will be bathing suit shopping with a smile in no time. Thanks again to Molly Galbraith for the great article!
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