Jack

I use mine post-weight workout. In my shake(actually a Weight-gain shake) there is 25g of whey, and 50g of sugars, 0 fat, about 300 calories. Blended into a pint of milk, that's 550 calories, 40g protein, 75g carb, 10g fat - mix of fast and slow digesting proteins, excellent for after a tough weight workout. Chocolate flavoured, too.

Thank you Mike, and congratulations on the 1000 posts!

One of the common myths of exercise is that you can 'shape' a muscle. You cannot. You can specifically target different heads of the muscles to grow more, but that is as far as it goes. 'Toning' is a mere combination of size and lowering fat. If you want your arms and abdominals to be more cut, you will have to lose fat. You will want to keep exercising as normal, but add a jog before breakfast 3-4 times a week into your schedule. You will also want to cut down of sugary foods, and lower your food intake slightly. Once a week you can have a day in which you eat a lot more to bump your metabolism back into the fat-burning zone. Don't let yourself go hungry ever though. Basically, bump up the training and lower the food intake. Be sure to drink plenty of water!

A combination of bodyweight calisthenics and weights must work well, since you have the ideas of endurance, flexibility, strength stamina, and possibly speed with calisthenics, with the speed and great strength correct weightlifting will give. A good combination. Incorporating both into a routine may be difficult due to recovery time needed after exercise. Perhaps a workout may go something like this.. Upper Body: Bench Press Pullups Military Press Hindu Pushups Lower Body: Squats Deadlifts Calf Raises Hindu Squats Back Bridge They can work together well I think if you incorporate them into the same workout, spreading them out onto diffierent days makes it a lot more difficult with days for rest and recovery.

Also, what is fancy about an iron bar?

Bicep Curls are a poor movement that do not build much strength by weightlifting standards. Try Pullups or Dips with a heavy weight belt around your waist, they'll build you some 'Functional strength' very nicely. Either way, these Power stones sound exactly like normal weight equipment just in a different shape and more traditional - how is moving a stick with concrete on the end going to prove more effective than moving an iron bar? The idea of adding more concrete on the end is the idea ofm progressive resistance, something strongly featured in weightlifting that you were shrugging off. Now it appears in a traditional form you consider doing it, even though it is basically the same thing, overloading your muscles with tension from an external weight, just in an old package. They are probably just as effective as each other. What are some of the drills you do with these stones? Tell me, what was your routine like in Weightlifting? Chances are you got the sets wrong, the reps wrong, or the wrong movements for building good strength. Weightlifting takes a lot of research to do properly, you can't just pick up a dumbell and hope you'll get big. On another note, I did try those combat conditioning exercises for one week. I noticed an increase in my Bench Press(chest and tricep muscles) but my Military Press(shoulder) and Pullup gains were minimal, infact the number of Pullups I could do was reduced. Leg strength increased slightly, about as much as another week of weight training would have increased. I do however, now include Hindu Squats and Back Bridges at the end of my leg/back workouts. My weight remained the same. Ps. forgive harsh tone of this message, I'm writing this on a monday morning before school.

I don't see how holding a weight in a fixed position just because it is "traditional" will build more "raw strength" than weight training which involves moving the muscles through a full range of motion. Do you have any studies to show that holding a weight above your head or infront of you for a period of time builds more strength than moving a weight through a full range of motion? Traditional ways are not always better than more modern ways.

Radok, that would be from all the testosterone, not just the muscle being bult.

Women have only 1/100th of the essential muscle building hormone "Testosterone" that men have, this means it is naturally impossible for women to get bulky, don't worry. The women Bodybuilders you have seen which are very large and ripped have taken additional testosterone as well as pro-hormones or anabolic steroids. Keep up ther strength training to build and to a degree grow the size of muscles, and then start adding more cardio to shed off the fat, and you will create the "toned" effect.

I see Martial_Artist's point here and I would have to say that I agree.

Planks? I've never heard this term before, care to explain them?

GoldDragon! Where have you been my friend? Wrist strength - a great exercise for this is the "Farmer's walk" This involves holding two heavy dumbells by your side and walking around with them gripped tightly. Pick a weight which you can't help but drop in one minute - this really builds some grip strength. Pushups, there are a lot of different variations. Do a search on them in the Health and Fitness section, and look for the post entitled, "Upper Body Strength" - there is a list of different pushups somewhere in that thread!

Good post KickChick! If you can't find time to get to the gym, make time. Or you can always go the calisthenics route - these require no equipment -Hindu Pushups, Hindu Squats, Back Bridge, Pullups, Dips and the like. You get resistance but not progressive resistance, but are still good at building strength and endurance.

No probs. Glad its all working. My own abs are slowly fading behind the accumulating layers of fat that come with any Bodybuilding Bulking period. I'm gaining with minimal fat and bulking clean, but the fat still does build slowly. Oh well abs, see you in six months buddy. LOL.

Hehe, great work Mike! Keep it up and it will start to stand out more and more. Let us know how it goes!

Concerning the weight routine, it could do with some improvement. Ditch the Curls. If you want size, 3 sets of about 8 reps is good. If you want to focus more on strength, try 4 or 5 sets of 3 to 6 reps, and do not go to failure. If you want to work your body evenly and efficiently, you want the basic compound movements that utilise multiple muscle groups at once. Bench Press Military Press Pullups/Chins Barbell Row Dips Deadlift Squat These moves will get you good strength and size. Do not worry about isolation movements like curls or tricep kickbacks. Hope this helps. If you don't gain any weight or strength with this, EAT MORE.

Kickboxing originated with Karate practictioners becoming frustrated with the lack of full contact matches allowed, and created a new sport in which they could utilise Boxing techniques with Karate foot techniques. It is well known MA history, that I put the reliability of above a single page, written by a single organization, that my computer cannot even translate into a language I can read.

If I Recall Correctly, the Deltoids are the Shoulder muscles, and there are three deltoids - anteriar, medial, and posteriar. Some good Bodyweight exercises that will work the shoulders are Incline Pushups, and Hindu Pushups. Weighted movements include Military Presses, which work all but strain the anterior deltoid the most, Shrugs, and Side/Front/Rear Lateral raises.

Tighter muscles will come with heavy strength training. Toning is simply a state of having muscle with little fat to cover it, so losing fat and toning up are the same goal really. Lift, do cardio, and eat to lose weight and you will reach your goals.

https://www.bodybuilding.com Under writers, choose "Layne Norton" and scroll through his list or articles until you see one about "Cutting". That should help you.

I try to eat 6-8 times throughout the day, small meals. How many breaks do you get during the school day? I have two breaks, about two hours apart, which is perfect for timing meals. I can eat breakfast around 7am, snack at 10am break, snack at 12:30am lunch, snack at about 3pm after school has finished, come home, workout, a protein shake at about 5-6pm, and then dinner at a bit before 7. Finally another meal at around 9-10 before I head off for bed. If you only get one break during the school day, you can always try to get in a quick bite between lessons, just to prevent catabolism(body turning to stored reserves for fuel, that means your muscles being broken down for energy!) If you are aiming to gain strength and muscle mass like I am at the moment, to aim for calorie-dense foods, and complex carbohydrates. You would want such foods as.. Eggs Milk Cottage Cheese Peanut Butter Steak Chicken Beef Lamb Tuna Bread(wholemeal) Pasta Rice Potatos Orange or Grapefruit Juice Green Veggies Fruits These are all good foods, proteins and good carbohydrates.

Beginners can lose fat and gain muscle at the same time, due to the complete shock to the system. After a short period of time however, it becomes impossible and one must eat and train according to their goal - to gain muscle you must eat a caloric excess, to lose fat one must eat a caloric deficit. Both cannot be done at the same time. With lifting weights and gaining a little muscle, you are going to a gain a little fat - which is why then later you go on a seperate "diet" called "Cutting" by Bodybuilders to lose the fat whilst maintaining as much muscle as possible. And yes, muscle needs fuel, and will use fat for this fuel if needed.

Myths, myths, and myths! Lift my friend.

Isn't Modern Wushu now taught at the Shaolin temples? It is more of a tourist attraction now.

Yes - Dumbell Presses and Flies. Try 3 sets of each and finish with a couple of sets of pushups to fail.