Getting fit with SwordsMaster

[woad&fangs]

can't you go on a jog?

[Ice]

Swords, what do you think is better? Bicycle (staying in the same place) or running on the treadmill? Losing calories and training the leg muscles, as this is my focus this summer, along with the upper body.

Squats, other leg workouts, jump roping, sprints, and bike sound decent. I've heard running is hell on your joints, and this coming from a past cross country athlete.

[SwordsMaster]

Swords, what do you think is better? Bicycle (staying in the same place) or running on the treadmill? Losing calories and training the leg muscles, as this is my focus this summer, along with the upper body.

I have supplied a decent leg workout higher up on this thread, IIRC it included about 30 min on the bike, on a hillcourse, 20 min run, again, on a hill course, and 10 min row for 3000m.

Go back in the thread for more details.

[SwordsMaster]

So. SwordsMaster just discovered the new and so far most effective weight loss method. Losing 6 kg in 4 days, this particular one beats Atkins, and what have you.

It's called: dysentery. Here in Lagos most half spicy food will make you drop your ***. African spicy, and middle eastern spicy are in 2 different leagues... I thought i was used to curry, but damn!

Add to that the fact that malaria pills also make you regular, and you can't drink the water that isn't bottled, and you get a bacteria playground that will make dr. Pasteur sweat in his cold grave.

And since about the only thing your body can hold is water or tea, the weight loss is almost miraculous.

That being said, there's some nice food here. Not for the faint hearted...

[Geoffrey S]

I have supplied a decent leg workout higher up on this thread, IIRC it included about 30 min on the bike, on a hillcourse, 20 min run, again, on a hill course, and 10 min row for 3000m.

Go back in the thread for more details.

Must point out that 10 min rowing for 3000m is pushing it a bit for someone who has little experience with the things. An average heavyweight freshman (75 kilos and higher) on his first 2k trial can be expected to do around 6.35/6.45, with someone higher than 85 kilos probably pushing the 6.30 mark - an average lightweight (67-75 kilos), between 6.55/7.10. Most higher-level heavyweights in the Netherlands going all-out would push just under the six minute mark on the 2k. Not that the Dutch are on top of their game, but on average aren't too shabby.

Certainly for less experienced rowers, extra weight and length make a huge difference on the times achievable on an erg.

Edit: heh, and keeping things on rowing - your post above reminds me of some of the things lightweights do to just edge into their weight category on the last few days. All those herbs to lose some weight at the last minute make the facilities most unpleasant an hour before weigh-in...

[SwordsMaster]

Heh. Sure. Happens the same with boxing.

As of rowing, I do 2k in about 7.20, but i'm 1.78m and around 84 80kg, so relatively short. I aspire to 3k in 10 min, but you're right, it's not easy, I hover around the 11 min mark myself. But if you think about it, 3.5 min/km it should be doable if you can keep up the pace...

[Geoffrey S]

I'll admit it's a bit of a pet peeve of mine. When I go to the gym, quite frequently I see people abusing the erg. Rowing is pretty much all about the legs, which deliver far more power than the back and arms possibly can. Lots of people do it the other way round (and at max settings), and that's just not effective - there are far better ways to train the upper body. Plus, it's injury sensitive.

One of the best things to do, at least for practice, is to set the screen to show the power curve and row at a pace no higher than 22. Ideally, the curve is pretty close to a smooth bell shape, flattening out most towards the end. Was one of the first things our coaches made us do, and I do with new rowers, and it helps a lot.

[Odin]

i would like to know what the best excercise is for building chest muscles

bench press with a weight that induces muscle failure between the 6-8 rep range. Upon failure have someone help you finish the current repitition then decrease the weight by 10-25% and immediately continue the process until failure.

Do approx 5 sets of this every 72-96 hours (every 3 or 4 days dependant on soreness) for 3 months.

This is a bodybuilding principle and shouldnt be confused with other workout programs. Bodybuilding isnt for everyone and isnt generally accepted as an overall fitness methodology.

However, if you want to build your chest muscles this should work.

[Vladimir]

pushups. The marines do 800 a day.

Just because it's in a cadence doesn't make it so.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Woo! Been a while but I'm back in the game. 10th day of working out. Been starting out easy since I want to get some flexibility issues workout out before I get into the heavy lifting. Some hill sprints, some selective weight lifting, and some stretching. Having trouble with the stretching though. Anyone have experience with improving toe-touching ability?

[SwordsMaster]

Woo! Been a while but I'm back in the game. 10th day of working out. Been starting out easy since I want to get some flexibility issues workout out before I get into the heavy lifting. Some hill sprints, some selective weight lifting, and some stretching. Having trouble with the stretching though. Anyone have experience with improving toe-touching ability?

Well, flexibility is all about perseverance. If you want to grab your toes, then sit on the floor, grab a belt, put it around your feet and pull with your arms until it hurts. Stay there for 2 min, then breathe out, pull some more. Don´t do more than 5-6 min of this at a time. Do it every morning, and you'll be seeing serious gains in 3 weeks. Don't forget to develop the strength too.

[BigTex]

Well, flexibility is all about perseverance. If you want to grab your toes, then sit on the floor, grab a belt, put it around your feet and pull with your arms until it hurts. Stay there for 2 min, then breathe out, pull some more. Don´t do more than 5-6 min of this at a time. Do it every morning, and you'll be seeing serious gains in 3 weeks. Don't forget to develop the strength too.

Out of all the methods I've heard or used to stretch that has to be the most vicious. Thought I'd never say this, but SwordsMaster your hardcore.

Think I'm going to go try that now, probably to flexible for it to do much. I think I'll force my roomate to do it.

[SwordsMaster]

Out of all the methods I've heard or used to stretch that has to be the most vicious. Thought I'd never say this, but SwordsMaster your hardcore.

Think I'm going to go try that now, probably to flexible for it to do much. I think I'll force my roomate to do it.

Heh, thanks. That's how the soviet olympic gymnasts did it. If it's good enough for them, it's good enough for me...

[salemty]

hi i have a question. im am 15 yrs old and am already got some muscle and quite fit. i want to get more muscle but as i am a teenager i dont want to over-exercise. the reason i dont want to over-exercise is because over-exercise often contributes to pimples and acne and studies have proven this. any advice on how i get quite a bit of muscle without over-excersing. i am currently doing pushups and sit-ups in the morning and night. i do 2-4-6-8-10-8-6-4-2 sets for pushups and sit ups. any advice would be appreciate

[SwordsMaster]

hi i have a question. im am 15 yrs old and am already got some muscle and quite fit. i want to get more muscle but as i am a teenager i dont want to over-exercise. the reason i dont want to over-exercise is because over-exercise often contributes to pimples and acne and studies have proven this. any advice on how i get quite a bit of muscle without over-excersing. i am currently doing pushups and sit-ups in the morning and night. i do 2-4-6-8-10-8-6-4-2 sets for pushups and sit ups. any advice would be appreciate

Man, you'll get pimples no matter what. So stop worrying about it, and do your thing. Any of the workouts recommended above except the heavy lifting will work for you. You can join the marines with 17, so you can easily do 300+ pushups a day with no problems whatsoever.

Also, get a pullup bar, and work up to 20 pullups in 1 set.

[Beirut]

Here in Lagos most half spicy food will make you drop your ***. African spicy, and middle eastern spicy are in 2 different leagues... I thought i was used to curry, but damn!


That being said, there's some nice food here. Not for the faint hearted...

Sorry to be late asking, but can you expand on this? Would love to hear the details.

Omit no burn.

[SwordsMaster]

Sorry to be late asking, but can you expand on this? Would love to hear the details.

Omit no burn.

Heh, sure. I think the secret is in the local chili pepper. Green and nasty, while most spices will be hot in your mouth, and then dissipate, this chili is spicy in a completely different, nerve attacking/chemical burn kinda spicy. If you get some pepper juice on your hands, the skin will get red. Imagine what it does to your mouth and intestinal track...

Apart from that, I have been asking them to give me "oyibo spicy". (Oyibo is the local word for White man - not very polite if they say it, but they take it as a joke when i refer to myself as oyibo.) Oyibo spicy is very little spicy for their standards - at this stage i'd like to add they also abuse black pepper.

They have a variety of fried chicken recipes - most of them spicy, with curry powder (red), and the infamous chilis, a local "soup" called Okra or Okro, which they usually eat with a doughy substance called Ebo - essentially bread dough, but made in a different way. The soup is full of local herbs and leaves I don't know the name of, and has a very unusual flavour - it has a very yellow colour and is very tangy.

Another thing they have here that I love is coconut rice: it's prepared wth dry coconut powder, rice and hot red pepper. It's spicy, and eaten with chicken or beef and Moi-Moi (a paste made out of beans that may or may not be spicy depending on the cook).

Also, since there area lot of muslims here, it's hard to find pork in local restaurants, although most hotels have bacon and sausages and anything else you want.

Phew. Long post. I'll post more when i sample them...

[salemty]

swordmaster i would like to know how come i can do 80 push-ups in 1 set but i can hardly do 20 sit ups and i can hardly even touch my knees.

[SwordsMaster]

swordmaster i would like to know how come i can do 80 push-ups in 1 set but i can hardly do 20 sit ups and i can hardly even touch my knees.

Are you really asking me this question?

Obviously your arms are stronger than your abs. Or you have a beergut, which is worrying at 15...

That only means you need to do more situps

[salemty]

that suprises me though because it looks like i have a six pack. it is almost as if i have a fake six pack. it looks as if i have good abs but i cant do many sit ups. but i have also seen people who have no ab muscles at all and they are a bit fat but they can do like 100 sit ups at once. this all seems very confusing to me

[Ice]

that suprises me though because it looks like i have a six pack. it is almost as if i have a fake six pack. it looks as if i have good abs but i cant do many sit ups. but i have also seen people who have no ab muscles at all and they are a bit fat but they can do like 100 sit ups at once. this all seems very confusing to me

Just because you can see your abs doesn't mean they are strong. You might just have naturally low body fat or a high metabolism.

Just because others have no visible abs doesn't mean they don't have strong abs. You can do 1000 situps a day, but you are still not going to see them if there is a layer of fat covering them. You are going to have killer abs though, but they will be under the fat.

[salemty]

thx kush. ive always wondered about that. i appreciate it. thx once again

[BigTex]

that suprises me though because it looks like i have a six pack. it is almost as if i have a fake six pack. it looks as if i have good abs but i cant do many sit ups. but i have also seen people who have no ab muscles at all and they are a bit fat but they can do like 100 sit ups at once. this all seems very confusing to me

Visible ab's is purely related to body fat percentage. A six pack doesnt neccessarily mean you have strong abs.

Start doing barbell rollouts add 10 lb's every week, make sure to start light. Also parallel bar knee raises, or leg raises on chin up's. Though the rollouts may really be all you need, bout the best thing for your anterior chain and wont cuase back pain or destroy your discs.

Forgot to add, if you don't have wieghts at home, or don't have consistent access to a gym. Pick up an ab wheel, yes those stupid little tires that have been around forever. Their no more then 20$'s at a sporting goods store. It wont build strength as well as a barbell rollout but it will definately do the job in absence of the equipment.

[salemty]

illl just tell you all my excercises that i do twice a day. hopefully you can inform me of something to improve it. first i do 40 push ups where for the last 5 push ups i hold for 3 seconds for each push up. then i do 30 sit ups. then i do "the plank" excercise which i assume you know what it is. i do the plank for 75 seconds. i improve this slightly each day. so tomorow i will do 45 push ups with the last 5 hold for 3 seconds and 35 sit ups and hold the plank for 90 seconds. hopefully you guys can tell me how to improve this

[Ice]

illl just tell you all my excercises that i do twice a day. hopefully you can inform me of something to improve it. first i do 40 push ups where for the last 5 push ups i hold for 3 seconds for each push up. then i do 30 sit ups. then i do "the plank" excercise which i assume you know what it is. i do the plank for 75 seconds. i improve this slightly each day. so tomorow i will do 45 push ups with the last 5 hold for 3 seconds and 35 sit ups and hold the plank for 90 seconds. hopefully you guys can tell me how to improve this

What are you goals exactly?

[salemty]

hi again. earlier in this thread i asked what whas the best excercise to build peck muscles. i was told to do push ups. just wanna check again because i have been doing at least 75 push ups a day and have not seen any results. if anything i have lost definition in my chest muscles. i was wondering if there was another excercise? but i do not want to do any weight stuff like bench press at my age. if anyone could give me another excercise that doesn't involve weights i woulld greatly appreciate it

[salemty]

oh ive been doing the 75 push ups for a few months just to clarify

[Ice]

hi again. earlier in this thread i asked what whas the best excercise to build peck muscles. i was told to do push ups. just wanna check again because i have been doing at least 75 push ups a day and have not seen any results. if anything i have lost definition in my chest muscles. i was wondering if there was another excercise? but i do not want to do any weight stuff like bench press at my age. if anyone could give me another excercise that doesn't involve weights i woulld greatly appreciate it

What do you have against weights? It is perfectly safe.

[salemty]

well it seems that there can be quite big problems if you start using weights at too young an age. im only 15 and ive heard if you start weights too early it restricts how tall you can get

[BigTex]

well it seems that there can be quite big problems if you start using weights at too young an age. im only 15 and ive heard if you start weights too early it restricts how tall you can get

That's a rather bad myth. Right up there with deadlifts are bad crowed. Wieght lifting while your young can actually be very beneficial, especially for bone growth, density and development.

I've lifted since I was 3 (dad was a bodybuilder ) I'm '6"3. Really didnt stunt it there....

Now going crazy with wieghts when your young is bad.

Anyways getting your abs in shape will help with almost anything you do from sprinting, to lifting to just walking or standing. It'll even help your push ups it's called the core for a reason.