Possible to lose weight and gain muscle?

[duchman]

Ober,

Wich ones are you disagree'ing with. You write good stuff. Can't beat youre word (and english) LOL



Speeking,
Do what ober sad go to mixedmartialarts.com and ask there better than me.

[Szczepankiewicz]

Hey Duchman,

Do you run a copy of MS Word, or another word processer?

[Grapevine]

Ober gives good advice. I want to add some things:

On the weight workout. In case you don't know how to recognize them, compound movements involve 2 or more joints in the lifting. This requires more muscles of the body to move the weight, and more coordination of the muscles. Example: Curls only involve range through your elbow joint when you do the movement strictly; that's an isolation lift, using only one joint. Pull-ups (or lat pull down machine if you can't do pull-ups) involve range through your shoulder joint and your elbow joint; that's a compound lift. Other examples of isolation: chest flies, lateral raises (some call them shoulder flies), tricep pull downs, leg extensions, hamstring curls. Other examples of compound: bench press, dips, shoulder press, squats, deadlifts. Compound movements will get you stronger, make you use more calories, and improve your balance and coordination more than isolation lifts.

Not all isolation movements are bad. Some parts of the body can only be most effectively worked by them. Neck, grip, calves, and abs come to mind. But if you're starting out, you can forego these except for the abs.

Rather than working a couple of body parts a day, I think working nearly the whole body each time and giving yourself adequate rest between would be better. Pick a compound exercise for the lower body, then pick one pushing and one pulling exercise for the upper body, and finish off with abs. For example on one day do squats (works legs, hips, lower back), then bench press or dips (chest, triceps), then one armed dumbell row (upper back, biceps), then abs. Another day use the same strategy but vary the exercise: deadlift (lower back, hips, legs, traps, grip, and a little bit of biceps), shoulder press (shoulders, triceps), pull-ups (lats, upper back, biceps), and finish off with abs.

On the anaerobic conditioning, a great and simple way of doing that is with dumbell swings. Start with a dumbell that you can curl 15 reps. Get into a half squat and hold the dumbell in one hand hanging down between your legs. With your arm slightly bent but rigid, swing the db up above your head. Do it explosively by driving with your legs and hips like you want to throw the dumbell straight up into the air. You should end up with your body and legs fully extended, even on your toes if neccessary. Then let the db swing back down in the same arc that it went up. It'll swing through your legs past your body a bit. Then swing it up again and continue. Change hands every 10 reps. Try to do 40 reps a hand. It should only take a few minutes to do. Your lungs will feel like they're outside your body when you're done. Your lower back will be VERY stiff. Your legs and hips will be tired. If you can do the 40 reps per hand, use a heavier db next time. Aim for a db that you can do between 20 and 40 reps with. Guaranteed you will curse the Russians who popularized this exercise.

[Szczepankiewicz]

Excellent post man.

I wonder, what is your prescription for rest between exercise days? I have always believed that a minimum of 48 hours and a max of 72 hours is necessary.

[Grapevine]

Rest is dependent on the individual, the intensity of the workout, what other things are done (like martial arts or cardio), and the quality of the rest.

Where you are in terms of experience counts too. Except for the intinial first few workouts where your body will get very sore from major adapting, people who are starting out won't need as much rest as later when they've reached closer to their genetic potential. Generally the heavier the weight the more rest you're going to need. This sounds illogical since the whole premise of lifting weights is to adapt your body to moving increasingly heavier weights, and therefore the relative effort you put in should be the same as the weight increases and your strength keeps pace. But in reality, gross poundage makes a difference. So in the beginning stages 48 hours might be all you need before your legs recover for another round of squats. But later on, be it months or years, when you're stronger and moving more weight, you're going to need more rest between those rounds of squats.

Also, the size of the person counts. All things being equal in terms of age, experience, and conditioning, a 150 lb guy lifting 150 pounds will need less rest than a 300 pound guy lifting 300 pounds. This probably is related to the gross poundage lifted.

But then, how you design the program also affects rest requirements. If you do very heavy weights, low reps (2-5), and long rests (at least 4 minutes) between sets, and stop a rep or two before you actually fail to make the lift, you could realistically do the same lift every day. Such a routine develops neural recruitment for strength gains rather than developing bigger muscles. You can get VERY strong on this kind of routine, but your muscle endurance would suck, which is basically what powerlifters and Olympic weight lifters do. On the other hand, if you use a lighter, moderately heavy weight and do 8-12 reps, multiple sets with less than 90 sec rests between, and go to failure at the last rep, I wouldn't be surprised if you need a whole week to recover. That kind of routine tries to get the muscles bigger and demands more rest between workouts.

I guess I'm trying to avoid giving a a hard and fast rule of how much rest. You have to experiment and find that out for your particular body. Generally, if you're still sore you should still rest that part of the body. If you feel a little run down overall you should rest period. Beginners tend to ignore rest as element necessary for progress. It's just as important as the workout itself.

[Szczepankiewicz]

Well, I never skip the rest. I usually rest 4-6 months between sets.

Thanks for the info man. That was insightful!

SZ

[duchman]

Great stuff!!

Are you professional trainer?

What are youre favorite excercises for explovisnes??
Weight i mean.

[Grapevine]

No I'm not a PT. Most of them don't know what they're doing anyway. I was lifting for about 15 years before that, and most of those years were spent doing useless stuff. After the initial burst of progress the first couple of years lifting that happens to all beginners, I was at a virtual standstill thereafter. The past several years I was struggling just to maintain strength due to my reaching middle age, and I was losing the battle. I was just lucky to have met some people who knew what they were doing a little over a year ago and they pointed me in the right direction. Once that happened I found other sources on the net and in books, and I applied them and was amazed at the results. In the past year since I've learned and applied this kind of stuff, my progress has been phenonmenal. I'm stronger now than I've ever been.

The site that Ober mentioned earlier--mma.com--their Strength & Conditioning Forum, is a great place to start. Friendly and knowledgeable people. They'll point you to other sites too.

As far as explosiveness is concerned, most people recommend olympic lifts--cleans and snatches--and their variants. Plyometrics would be good too but they can ruin joints if you don't work up to them correctly. Personally, I think explosiveness is a bit of a misused term in our art. People usually want to be "explosive" so they can shoot that takedown better, or transition into that armbar while passing the guard faster. I think it has more to do with doing the technique correctly and smoothly than anything else. I've seen so many guys try to explode into a shoot that they make that little bit of a jerk with their body before they shoot. Classic telegraphing of a move. The better way would be to work on transitioning between a casual step and a shoot in a smooth move. If your first step in a shoot looks like a normal advancing step, the opponent's reflex won't fire and you'll be able to get in better.

Being explosive definitely helps your game, but first things first. Just like learning correct grappling technique first before getting stronger to make that technique even more effective, you need to learn to do the technique smoothly from start to end before you can try to add explosiveness to the equation.

[Oberleutnant]

dutch: I disagree with "one recovery run (long) " and one of the website references (Bodybuilding.com ?).

[Oberleutnant]

Listen to grapevine, he has some very good insight!

There are a greater number of knowledgeable contributors on this topic at the mma.com forum than you'll find here (and im under the impression the knowledgeable ones on this forum already frequent the mma.com S & C forum. I post there as HERTSWENIP.

________________________________

This is life. You either die sitting in the bleachers or you die playing on the field.

[duchman]

Body building.com has great section and sports and conditioning

[brothaman]

not just for bodybuilders.

Probably the best insights in muscle building and conditioning ever. You can't argue with success.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0684857219/qid=1005683015/sr=2-1/ref=sr_2_31_1/107-4382485-8641349

werdup,

bm

[Oberleutnant]

brothaman: You've got to be kidding.

[brothaman]

Ahnuld.

Hey!!! Whattaya have against Ahnuld!!???

The guy has gotten more titles to his name than anyone will ever have.
Seriously, there is a chapter on athletic conditioning and mental preparation for competition that I found to be very insightful. You should check it out.

peace,

bm


"If it bleeds, we can kill it." -dutch

[Patterson]

Do I even have to answere?

Is it possible to lose weight and gain muscle? My iq of 149 tells me yes, you can lose fat, while gaining muscle, at such a rate that you end up losing weight!