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When I first started working out (about 10 years ago), I was tall and skinny. My goal was to build muscle and get buff. After 6 months of training, I had gained considerable strength, but you wouldn’t know by looking at me. So what went wrong? I didn’t eat enough, and I didn’t get enough protein.
Men’s Fitness lists the 10 worst workout mistakes - Things you do that sabotage your progress and cost you muscle. Recognize a mistake as part of your daily routine? They also came up with some quick and easy fixes you can use to correct these problems and net truly awesome gains.
1. YOU DON’T EAT ENOUGH (FOR FEAR OF GETTING FAT)
Yes, extra calories can mean extra belly fat, but if you’re lifting consistently and correctly, most of what you’re taking in should be converted to muscle. The truth is your muscles will never grow without a surplus of calories. For a lean guy looking to put on muscle mass, 2,000 calories a day won’t cut it. In fact, this kind of restricted diet is actually the ideal recipe for losing muscle tis- sue and sparing fat, as it causes the body to shift into starvation mode and shed calorie-consuming muscle. It also makes you store fat for emergency energy. And the less protein you eat, the less of a chance you give your muscles to recover after a workout.
2. YOU AMP UP YOUR CARDIO
There are three ways that cardio typically cancels out muscle gains: doing it too often, doing it for too long, or doing it on an empty stomach. In general, daily cardio sessions simply burn too many cumulative calories to allow you the surplus you need for muscle mass, and the same can be said for sessions that last 45 minutes or more. Work out in the morning before breakfast and you only compound the problem. When you wake up, your body is already in a catabolic (muscle-burning) state, since a night’s sleep—time spent without eating—empties your tank. Working out immediately just reinforces this condition and costs you intensity—whether on the treadmill or with the weights. The end result: You burn muscle as fuel in place of calories you should have consumed at breakfast.
(I disagree on this point - Many experts say that it’s best to work out on an empty stomach, as you’ll force your body to burn fat to fuel your workout..)
3. YOU WORK TO EXHAUSTION
If the biggest musclehead in the gym has taught us anything, it’s that doing lots and lots of sets and reps to the point of total collapse (he can’t even muster his signature grunt!) is the best way to build muscle. Never mind that he’s a genetic freak and/or probably on steroids. More than 20 total sets per muscle group, or more than 15 reps per set, may leave your muscles swollen (hence the ego-enhancing “pump”), but it will be from inflammation, not actual muscle growth. Any weight that allows that much work is too light to cause sub- stantial growth, and you’ll reap no lasting gains.
4. YOU FAVOR BODY-PART WORKOUTS
Breaking your training down into chest days, back days, and arm days over- works some muscles and neglects others. It’s an old-school way to train—and it’s incredibly outdated. Most guys still do it, and many make gains for a while, but their progress eventually comes to a halt, usually due to injuries. Body-part routines also prevent your biggest muscles from ever learning to work together in the kinds of coordinated effort you need to lift really heavy weights—another major avenue for fast growth.
5. YOU SHUN STRETCHING
Boring? Definitely. But stretching has been shown to speed up recovery and increase a muscle’s range of motion, making more room for muscle fibers to grow. Simply lifting weights will increase your risk for injury and se- verely limit your ability to move athletically—so no matter how big you are, you’ll probably be picked last for teams.
6. YOU ONLY EAT SPORADICALLY
It’s true: Eating infrequently is nearly as bad as not eating at all. When you go more than three hours without food, your metabolism slows significantly.When that happens, every time you do get a meal, there’s a good chance that a large percentage of it will be stored as fat. Why? Blame your body. Without food, it slips back into starvation mode and starts to think it needs to hold on to every calorie it can get.
7. YOU RARELY ALTER YOUR ROUTINE
Doing the exact same workout week after week will, at best, prevent new gains, and, at worst, lead to burnout. Failing to impose any new challenges on your muscles—such as by increasing the weight you use or the number of reps you perform—simply helps keep them the same size, whereas pushing yourself harder than you’re accustomed to will actually spur new muscle and strength.
8.YOU ONLY TRAIN WHAT YOU SEE IN THE MIRROR
Focusing your workouts on trophy muscles such as the pecs and biceps may be more fun, but it won’t do much for your overall development. Since 70% of your body’s total musculature is located in your legs and back, your main potential for muscle gains will remain untapped. Furthermore, this kind of trainingwill leave you with muscle imbalances that lead to injury—and that can keep you out of the gym permanently.
9. YOU DON’T DRINK SHAKES
Chugging a protein-and-carb mixture after your workout starts the recovery process immediately, replenishing lost glycogen (your muscles’ energy stores) and providing the nutrients your body requires to repair muscle and grow more of it. Skipping the shake and casually waiting an hour or more for your next meal is like ignoring a cry for help.
10. YOU DON’T GET ENOUGH REST
Sleep is when muscle repair happens, so getting six or fewer hours of shut-eye a night limits your body’s natural production of crucial muscle-building chemicals, such as growth hormone. Too much activity outside of your workouts, such as playing sports, all-night dance parties, and extra stress—all of which are permissible now and then, but dangerous in excess—also cut into muscle gains. And if you’ve been working out seven days a week, we’ve got another pleasant surprise for you: You’ll lose muscle for sure. Such a high frequency won’t allow for regeneration, and your efforts will be wasted. And no, it doesn’t matter if you’re training different muscle groups each day—you still have the same central nervous system, and it still gets tired of having to deal with major physical exertion every day.
eDiets has one of the best new diets specially tailored to the season and related activities such as grilling. The Summer Fresh Diet Plan has combined the best of summer fruits and vegetables to give you a healthy way to work towards looking great in a bathing suit! The diet combines lean protein along with seasonal fruits and veggies to give you an easy way to eat balanced meals that provide hydration and complete nutrition during these hot months of the year.
A typical restaurant meal contains 1000 to 2000 calories, and up to 100 fat grams (more than a stick of butter!) - Which makes eating out while eating healthy a hard combination. But thanks to a new helpful tool that lets you research nutritional and healthy meals in your own neighborhood, it’s no longer a problem. Healthy Dining Finder does the hard work by evaluating the nutritional content of restaurant meals across the United States.
Type in your zip code and the site generates a list of restaurants in your area with a nutritional table of each restaurant’s menu items that meet Healthy Dining’s requirements:
1. Entrées (or full meals) must include at least one of the following:
2. Menu items must meet the following criteria:
3. Deep fried items (egg rolls, chicken fingers, tostada shells, etc.) are excluded from the website, except for very small amounts of garnishes, such as wonton strips.
Whether or not you have a computer to check out restaurants before dining, knowing what nutritionists look for when choosing a healthy menu can be helpful in making smart food choices.
• Calories: The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) uses 2,000 calories per day as a reference level for nutrition labeling. Healthy Dining’s upper limit of 750 calories for one meal represents about 37% of total calories for the day - reasonable, because a restaurant meal is generally the largest of the day.
• Fat: The USDA’s 2005 Dietary Guidelines recommend that total fat be limited to 20 to 35% of calories. Assuming 2,000 calories per day, the recommended fat intake for a full day is between 44 and 78 grams. The Healthy Dining fat guideline for one meal is 25 grams or less.
• Saturated Fat: The USDA’s 2005 Dietary Guidelines recommend that saturated fat be limited to 10% of total calories. Assuming 2,000 calories per day, the maximum recommended saturated fat intake for a full day would be 22 grams. Healthy Dining’s saturated fat guideline for one meal is set at 8 grams or less of saturated fat for the meal, again assuming the restaurant meal accounts for the largest of the day’s meals.
Of note is that most of the menu items featured on the site do not meet the FDA criteria for “healthy.” The criteria for the website focus on calories, fat and saturated fat, whereas the FDA’s criteria for “healthy” also include cholesterol and sodium. However, values for sodium and cholesterol are posted, so that consumers can make informed choices.
I hope everyone is enjoying their Fourth of July! I used today as my cheat day, but it’s back to the gym bright and early tomorrow morning! I’ll post my update early next week..
I ran into an old friend at the mall last week, and she looked remarkable, having easily lost 30+ lbs since the last time I saw her. I asked her what she was doing (diet, exercise, etc), and she talked about TrimLife.com. I had never heard of TrimLife before, so I did some research on the web to see what they were all about. I plan on losing my weight through good-old diet and exercise, but I figured others might be interested in what TrimLife has to offer.
Trimlife offers a 90-Day program designed to support, motivate and educate customers on how the body oxidizes fat while taking Trimlife Advanced. In addition, the program also includes a complete individualized food and exercise program, which is delivered by email daily. The web site offers access to recipes and diet tips, as well as a weekly newsletter for members.
While Trimlife Advanced is far from the most sophisticated supplement available, the program may provide much-needed support to the fitness novice.
Trimlife Advanced contains: Green Tea, which has been shown to be effective in increasing the thermogenic process; Maca Force, also known as the Peruvian Ginseng, which has been used successfully for centuries to increase energy; Bitter Orange, which may enhance the bodies responses, by increasing the metabolic rate.
Caffeine in the form of Yerba Mate and Guarana Extract may raise body temperature, which in turn burns more fat and provides additional energy; Calcium Pyruvate, is the most basic of mineral salts that in the body is known to strengthen bones; and The Botanical Energy Complex, which is made up of herbs with specified properties to possibly provide energy for increased physical activity and a overall well-being.
This so-called “Peruvian Ginseng” is from South America and is rapidly gaining attention in the United States for it’s success in supporting energy, stamina, libido and with hormone balancing for men and women. In Inca society, Maca was used like ginseng to impart strength. It acts as an energizer and anti-stress agent. In a study, Rodents fed Maca Force demonstrated greatly increased energy and stamina. Although lately, most of the attention it has received is for its potential in treating erectile dysfunction.
According to Trimlife, its weight-management specialists are experts in nutrition and obesity. They are very well attuned to the ramifications of unhealthy eating and how it affects our physical health and mental well-being. In addition to being certified personal trainers, all of them have several years of weight management experience.
Trimlife users may log into the web site and have their questions personally answered. This may provide welcome support to those who have never taken supplements before, and could use advice on how to adjust their lifestyle to yield the best possible results. However, the information may be too basic for more experienced fitness enthusiasts.
Review courtesy of TheThinReport.com
As far as Trimlife’s ingredients are concerned, this is a fairly standard blend. While some may also benefit from an additional appetite suppressant, others may find that the support offered by the program is enough to keep eating habits in check.
After completing the 90-day Trimlife Advanced program, users then have the option of continuing with a maintenance program, which offers special instructions and helpful tips for continued results. This sounds like an excellent strategy for long-term weight maintenance, although the Trimlife web site is unclear about exactly what kind of costs will apply.
