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As a computer guy that sits all day I get intrigued everytime I read an article like this. I am always looking at these top 5 kind of lists not for all of the content but mostly for the little nuggets of info you can get from them. The guys at LifeHack.org have a list of some exercises that you should not do if you are at a deskbound job. Here is a list of the exercises

• Leg Extensions
• Military Press
• Situps
• Bench Presses
• Leg Extensions

These are all very good exercises and I think for all people it is good to do each of these exercises…well except maybe situps (do crunches instead). I do think that this is great info so go ahead and read the article and see what you think. Post back here with comments too.

Getting bigger muscles is the top priority of anyone working out with weights. Lets look at how your muscles get bigger and then you can figure out what it will take for you to increase your muscle gains.

Muscle hypertrophy

Muscle hypertrophy is when your muscles cells get thicker. You muscle cells will thicken but not lengthen and it is still up in the air as to whether your muscles cell will actually split or divide to get larger. The best way to cause muscle hypertrophy is to put pressure on your muscles so that they expect to need to push more weight.

Another form of muscle building is Muscle Hyperplasia and this is the actual splitting of muscle cells. Anyone that has seen a giant bodybuilder has to wonder if we all have the same number of cells

Resistance training

Resistance training is doing weights. It is just about that simple. What you really want is to make yourself stronger by making your body more able to handle heavier and heavier weight for at least four reps. Power lifters as you have probably seen in the Olympics are not the biggest guys and that is because their goal is to lift the most weight for exactly one rep. To fool your muscles into thinking that they have to be able to lift more weight they will need to do a few reps at the higher weight. Your body will then get used to this higher weight by increading the strength of the individual muscle cells

How big should your workout be?

There are many strategies to get stronger and the idea behind all of these strategies is to be able to lift more weight for a few reps a month from now then your are doing now. You have a few options and they are these

• Number of reps per set
• Number of sets per exercise
• Number of exercises per muscle group
• Amount of rest between workouts

All of these parameters are a little too much to cover in this article so I will cover them later but for now just think about how you are structuring your workouts and frequency of workouts.

I hope that this info helps you understand how to get bigger and better at working out I hope you that if you have any questions then you can of course leave comments here as well.

Well I have to preface this post with a warning that what I am about to write about is a high fat high calories snack that anyone trying lose weight will want to always avoid.

Okay, Peanuts and raisins. This is a great snack for people that have trouble gaining weight and people that are tying to bulk up. I know that most people are not too interested in bulking up, instead they will want to lose weight. I remember back a few years working out a lot with weights and having friends that could not gain muscle trying anything to get the calories needed. Read the rest of this entry »

Over the years I have seen a lot of flimsy ideas of how to get a set of six pack abs. The most common scams are special machines that will do it and sometimes some kind of drink. I remember at one point Slim Fast seemed to be showing chubby people suddenly spawning a set of six pack abs.

Anyway I wanted to put this notion to rest that there is some magic to getting a six pack. Sure there is some genetics involved in sculpting perfect abs but the two most important factors are diet and exercise.

What? Did you think there was a shortcut?

Six Pack Abs Diet

The diet part is fairly simple; you need to drop any extra fat. You have probably heard this before but there is no such thing as spot reduction when you are losing weight. You will lose weight proportionately, generally, as you lose weight. What you may find is that you have a large stomach and if that is the case of course you will lose that fat faster than you lose the fat on your legs but that is just because that is where the fat deposits will be easiest for your body to use.
Read the rest of this entry »

I have been working out off and on since I was 15 years old and one of the problems with the whole bodybuilding industry is that it is based on vanity a lot more then it is based on fitness.

I still remember when I was 20 and smoking and going into a bar and a fellow weightlifter told me that bodybuilders don’t smoke they just drink. Well going out boozing is not a picture of fitness to me anymore but the bodybuilding industry is built on vanity just as it has been for many many years.

I found the following interesting article at Intersportswire.

Thirty-five years ago the term “body building “ was synonymous with fitness. But in 2008 these terms are mutually exclusive. If your personal trainer is a bodybuilder, you should move on. Read the rest of this entry »