Mr. Mini Muscles

[Armbar]

Skull Crushers work mainly your triceps. Think bench press, but at the top of the lift, you bend your arms at the elbows, slowly dropping the bar towards your forehead and back up. Try with lighter weight at first to see how much you can do, or these might really become skull crushers...

[parkerlineage]

Sounds good...thank you for the advice, and I will certainly follow it.

I'm pretty sure I'll never be Mr. Universe - as ivette said, genetics play a big part, and my genes are for tall, skinny people. But, with your advice, hopefully, I can get a little more muscle mass.

Thanks, all!

Parkerlineage

[Hudson]

Genetics don't say much, and in fact in amatuer competitions for bodybuilders, genetics don't come into play much at all, provided the competitor trained smart enough.

Even Arnold wouldn't get big off of endurance exercises.

Well, he might.

But if you want to grow, you need to lift heavy weights that tax the muscles to a point of failure and then rest so they recover bigger and stronger then before. Then you repeat.

Check out bodybuilding.com ... they've got some great stuff, not just for bodybuilders either.

[parkerlineage]

Do I need a workout buddy to spot me while I do all these things?

[Aodhan]

I have rather good definition on my arm muscles, and my deltoids are okay sized, but my chest is only so-so, my stomach is still more of a two-pack, and my biceps are virtually non-existant.

Why is this? And any advice?

Random info, in case this helps anybody: 6'5", 180 lbs, 9% body fat, 21.3 BMI

I wouldn't pay too much attention to BMI scales, most are not even close for athletic builds.

Your biceps are almost nonexistent because they get very little use (comparitively) in MA. Your biceps are designed to bring your lower arm to your upper arm. You use it some when you pull back your arm from a punch, some when you do elbow strike techniques. Triceps and chest get much more use.

As far as your abs, that may be genetics. You certainly don't have bodyfat covering them. The abdominals are a sheet of muscle that run from your ribcage down to your pelvic area, and their function is to curl the torso forward. (Obliques are responsible for rotating side to side.) What causes the "six pack" effect is the muscle bulging out around the connective tissue that helps hold them. If your two pack is in the upper area, work the lower abs, and vice versa.

There are tons of different exercises, depending on what your goals are. Do you just want more mass? Mass and speed? Speed? Strength?

I'd suggest sitting down and writing out your exact goals such as "I want to increase my biceps by 2 inches, get a 6 pack, increase strength by x%", etc. Then you can design a program around those goals.

And yes, training with a partner can be very helpful. Someone there to spot and encourage, and someone that also will get your butt in the gym when you might not be feeling like it.

If you have more specific questions, just let us know.

Aodhan

[Ryokeen]

I just relised from what you just said how severly hard my own program is. I'm 15 and my Program consists of 90 sit ups in class in a variety, 90 soop push ups in class,a nd 500 daily outside of class. Not in one setting, but between 1pm-10pm. I also work kata and techniques.

If you're like and me and don't have the money, or just don't wanna waste it, try pushing yourself as hard as you can, generally after your daily comute so you rest it off. We're taugh to never just sit and watch tv, we are to streatch,do pushups, or do kata while enjoying ourselves.

We train hard because we want to, We all want to try and beat his record or 11 years undefeated.

My suggestion, unless you want to go the way of the lifting, is to just up it alot more gradually so you cna get use to it.

My sensei never lifts at all and he can bench atleast 600 wiht his legs for sure 600, prolly more. They are quite scary.

Have fun either way you go .

[elbows_and_knees]

it's more than genetics, it's lack of weight training. small chest = lack of chest exercises - like bench press. small biceps are harder... lack of weight training, but also lack of protein. The biceps are among the hardest muscles to induce growth upon. You really need to eat to grow them.

as for the abs, you HAVE to be more than 9% bodyfat - either that or you have weaker abs than you may think. less than 10% and you should have a visible 6 pack.

[elbows_and_knees]

Do I need a workout buddy to spot me while I do all these things?

No. but if you do, be more careful, until you are comfortable with the form. I never have a spotter, but I make make increases more gradually, and never train to failure - which there's really no need to do anyway.

[CapitalKarate]

Before I say anything, do NOT do bicep curls, or any isolating exercises, they only teach your body how to use those muscles by themselves. If you want to get more mass on your biceps do reversed pull ups, they hit the biceps very well and they also are a compound movement (which is what you want if you want to train to help with your ma training. But, you really shouldn't care about how you look, instead worry about performance. If a sports car looks totally awesome with the best paint and incredible looking shape, but has a v-4 with -100 horsepower, what good is it?

If you really want functional fitness that will incredibly help with your MA training pm me and/or go to forums on crossfit.com and ask what to do.

[ivette_green]

I laugh the hardest at people who only work out. Especially when they never do cardio or anything like that. I look at them and think, sure you have muscles, but what can you do with them?

Genetics don't say much, and in fact in amatuer competitions for bodybuilders, genetics don't come into play much at all,

Steroids are used even in amatuer competitions...

I think going to the gym every once and a while is okay. But once you start focusing on your muscle size, instead of what your muscles can do for your when you're doing sports, then you're going down a weird, drugged out path.