A good weight lifting workout...?!
Question: I'm a 5'11", 185 lb male. I run 6 miles 5 morning per week, but want to start adding weight lifting to my workout. I've always been a cardio guy, not much of a weights guy. Can someone recommend a proper routine (how much weight, how many reps, how often to do each excerice, etc.)? I'm not looking to beef up, just feel and look better.
Answers: I'm a 5'11", 185 lb male. I run 6 miles 5 morning per week, but want to start adding weight lifting to my workout. I've always been a cardio guy, not much of a weights guy. Can someone recommend a proper routine (how much weight, how many reps, how often to do each excerice, etc.)? I'm not looking to beef up, just feel and look better.
I could make a really specific workout plan for you, but there is so many good ways to workout that I think ill just put out the basics and let you figure out what you like best and make your own routine.
Your body technically only does the actual muscle building while recovering so don't overdo your workouts. 3 or 4 times a week will be enough to build muscle, keep the workouts simple and short and let yourself rest the other days. Lots of sleep too! You might think you need to workout all the time so you feel like you are doing something to your body, but if you lift too much your body won't change a bit because you arn't letting it recover.
You can basically break down the body into 3 major muscle groups. You can throw in some isolation exercises (calf raises, curls, abs) if you want but you can really cover the entire body with 3-4 exercises.
There is a push muscle group. pecs, triceps, front delt.
The pull muscle group. lats, rear delt, biceps.
Last there is the legs group. calves, hams, quads, gluts, and also often uses the core muscles for stabalization
Ok so when picking exercises keep these things in mind.
If an exercise uses more weight it is either a smaller range of motion, or uses more muscle. If you are using more muscles at once you are building muscle more effieciently, and probably hitting more muscles in general than if you just did a bunch of isolations.
THE EXERCISES
First off try not to use machines. They tend to do part of the work for you because you don't need to stabalize or guide your motion. Stuff like calf raises are fine because the stabalization helps you lift a significant amount more weight.
Push: Benchpress and dips are amazing. You can add weight to dips with a dipbelt. Tricep extensions do good isolation on the triceps. Chestpress is ok too except for it usually uses a machine but some of the machines have a very natural motion to them, and you can use that some if you want. It is very similar to benching but easier for begginers.
Pull: Chinups are pretty much all you need to do. You can also add weight with the dipbelt for chins. Lat pull downs are pretty much the same at chins. Seated rows, Bent-over rows are also great pulling exercises. You can isolate the biceps with curls. curls helps increase forearm strength if you switch up between different types of curls (overhand, underhand, hammer curls). This also prevents wrist pain.
Legs: Deadlift. Deadlift also does a tremendous amount for the core, lower back, delts, and shoulders. If you can find a trapbar, or hex bar, you are set for life. Trapbar deadlift does amazing things for you. Squats are really great too. Try box squats, and full squats. Different ranges of motion on squats will work certain muscles more than others (true with most exercises really). Calf raises are pretty neat too, just keep your knees and hips still and do a full range of motion.
For abs do weighted decline situps or anything with weight really. There is about a million ab exercises out there, just pick something that challenges your strength.
Ok you can split pull push and legs up and do one per day of the week you workout or do them all every day, or do somethign like 2 mixed upper body days and 1 lower (that's what i do anyways). Any way is pretty effective. For beggining i recommend doing all of them each day so you learn the motions faster. Do sets of 5-12 reps 1-4 times for each exercise or until you are tired and that will be a good workout. You can also do high rep once you start to improve your strength a bit. It really doesnt matter as long as you work your muscles hard and challenge yourself with higher weights and more reps.
Eat a lot of food, and drink a lot of milk. You need it to grow muscle, especially protein. Then get your sleep.
email is jogogoman@hotmail.com if you have questions. There is a lot of information on how to do these lifts if you just google.
Here are some tips. Start slow, do about 2-3 sets of each exercise, and about 10-15 reps per set. Here's a site with good info: