Thoughts for you Body Builders or Gym Rats

Most guys in the age range of 18-25 focus on what when they go to the gym?  You guessed it size and trying to get as strong as possible.  I recently received a few emails and questions about body building splits and push and pull workouts.  I recently got a client who was a Cross-Fit master and killed most of their circuits on  a weekly schedule.  The problem this athlete was having was with back pain and shoulder restriction because of the great demand on the Olympic Lifts (love them) and crazy workouts (love them also).  The problem this athlete also enduring was the inability to gain size and trying to complete the workouts while in pain.  First, Cross-Fit workouts are great but not for everyone and aren't really specific to the demands of sport.  I wanted to give you some advice on what has worked for me and also some other performance coaches.  Here are a few questions to think about.  Remember I'm a performance coach not a body builder.

1.  Splits are best?  Chest on Mondays and Back on Tuesdays and Legs on Wed. correct?

2.  I can isolate my push days and give them 1 day of rest and this will help me grow?

3.  Your body needs more weight to grow and get stronger?

I don't think I know all the answers but like I said I wanted to shed some light on a few ideas to help you with your basic program design.  Your body is connected and when does it grow?  At rest so if you could look inside your body you would see the body is connected kinda like a big tangled up string so you can't really isolate muscles doing basic lifts.  If you could hit your chest and back 2 or 3 X week wouldn't it have more time to grow?  Try push and pull workouts and then legs on a different daysto allow you to work your muscles more but also give them more time to grow while resting and allowing the fibers to grow after the break down in the workouts.  Let us look at the basic bent over DB row.  Say you don't use a bench or even if you do your legs are stabilizing you and your back and core are keeping your from going into flexion. So you want to isolate your lats or back muscles if you really doing a lot more then just a pull exercise.  Your body is connected and you can hit a lot more muscles and not really have them as prime movers.  I'm not saying stop doing Chest Mondays but often the simple body building splits aren't enough and I think they can get kinda boring.  You spend 45 minutes doing all  chest why not try back exercises as your active rest then that gives you a day or more to let them rest and grow.  You hit legs and work on your flexibility the next day and your ready to go for another Wed. of push and pull workouts.  If you not a big leg guy, most aren't in the 18-25 age do some single leg rows or standing cable presses to get your legs some work while focusing on those beach muscles.  Here are a few tips to help you strength body builder guys.

1.  Use 1 or 2 machine exercises to focus more on your beach muscles but then use DB or cable systems in a standing position to focus more on ground contact and posture.
2.  Add your flexibility for your hips and thoracic region between your upper body sets as an active rest.
3.  Don't limit yourself with the add more weight try you body weight and try higher reps to bring your workouts to another level. 
4.  Try negatives and isometric holds with your work weight and get more fibers to work instead of adding more weight to the barbell squat.  Try single leg squats to save your back and get a killer leg workout.

I know the typical guy gets to the point where they aren't gaining size and strength and wonder why?  Try a few of these and see what happens I'm sure you will like the results.  Thanks for reading guys.

Coach B Meyer
www.bmeyertraining.com

                                                Fabio or Josh?




 

Photo Shoot Advice For Predator Girls

Advice from Captain Danielle Orlando Magic Dancer
-she has done over 10 photo shoots for magazines and Magic
-everybody has a different body type but here are some simple advice she learned from others and from years of doing this

1.  Carb deplete- eat plenty of proteins and vegs. no breads, sugars, and sweets (helps water weight not diet to live by but good for photo shoot)
2.  Tan- sublime by L'oreal or spray tan-tanning helps show off natural muscle tone and physique (sublime at night before bed then shower in AM)
3.  SLEEP- Rest your body and your face look more refreshed.  Don't party the night before or anytime this week.
4.  Water-  drink plenty of water M-Th helps flush system and makes skin look fresh and glowing (keep pee white/clear)  Friday and Saturday dehydrate a little show off muscle tone drink only water the entire week no crystal light or G2 and NO SODA
5.  ALCOHOL- none the entire week and treat yourself to 1 glass to red wine (21 and over girls from Coach B LOL) Friday night before bed
6.  No late snacking good to live by.  Eat only protein later in day for photo shoot.  Try eating 3-4 hours before bed and lettuce wraps with your vegs are good (not tasting).
7.  Cardio-  Intervals get it in 2 X a day sweaty workouts.  Quick jog sprints, J rope.  Coach B workouts and then extra credit after.

RELAX and have fun! Nothing will deliver a worse photo shoot than you being nervous and self conscious.   Your all gorgeous and amazing women have a blast (Captain Danielle)  Practice in the mirror and see where you look the best.

Hope this helps girls.

Coach B Meyer
www.bmeyertraining.com
 

Have 30 minutes ?

Short on time and not sure what to do?  Lost in the weight room or at the gym?  I know a lot depends on your goals but if you want a quick strength fat burning workout try this.  B Meyer Training made simple.  No equipment needed perform in your living room or on a field or court.

Quick Dynamic Warm up 10-15 minutes
Quick Warm up

Lower Body Perform for 3 rounds
Elevated Lunge hop holds 3 sec.

1.  Push up walks 3 rounds
Perform push up walk with arms and legs perform push up repeat 12-15 reps

2.  X Y supermans for 3 rounds 30 seconds directly after push ups

3.  Jump rope 1 minute or use line if you don't have equipment (jump back and forth over line or side to side)

4.  Repeat for 3 rounds no rest and end with full court jogs or sprints.  If using basketball court try and do 10 length in under or about 1 minute in time.  10X up and back =1 set try for 3-4 sets resting 2-3 minutes between sets.

No excuses and short on time get a quick workout with purpose don't waste time walking on the treadmill.  Best of luck.  Coach B Meyer

Advice on Eating

I have the great pleasure of training a lot of top female athletes and a lot of professional dance teams the past years.  A question I often get from the girls is about what should I eat Coach B?  This is a pretty big topic to discuss and I didn't go to school for this but did take some classes in the subject and wanted to give you all some basic advice on eating pre and post and meals.  Not everything works for everyone because everyone is made different.  Just because a book says its healthy it all depends on what else your eating that day and when you eating it.  Don't make things 2 difficult!!!!!!!!!!!

1.  Get in a habit or routine of what you eat during the week.  Try the 80% percent rule of habit and treat yourself the other 20%.  When I say treat this means slightly off your normal eating diet.  A diet is your way of eating not a low carb no this or that diet.
2.  If you can't stay with the eating habits you currently have then find something that works for you in life not for two weeks of starving yourself.  Start a new habit and make baby steps on change.
3.  Rotate the same 10-12 meals that are simple and work throughout the week.  If you can get a cook that is even better but I can't afford one yet so I stick with the simple 10-12 meal rotation during the week.
4.  When you go out to eat add and delete what you want don't get butter on your vegetables ask for them plain and add your own to the meal.  Get butter on the side and make the meal what you want not what the place is offering if the meal doesn't fit your needs.  If you don't know how they cook it ask and be specific but not annoying its fine your paying the bill after all.
5.  Bring snacks where ever you go.  Muscle Milk light, cheerios/soy nuts mix, or luna bars are all suggestions.  Low fat chocolate milk is a great cheap post workout drink or snack.
6.  One of my favorite snacks or desserts is low fat vanilla yogurt with Cake Batter Muscle Milk mixed into my yogurt you can't get much better then that.
7.  Eat 30 minutes after you done working out with a small meal to fuel those muscles you just worked out.
8.  Post some ideas on facebook to me or the girls I would be happy to learn and see what you think are good snacks during the day and why?

Where to Start With High School Teams

I recently had a great talk with a high level high school basketball Coach in Florida about training his team.  The thing that always come to the front is what to do in the weight room?  When to do the strength and what exercises to do?  When thinking about large groups you have to remember you want the learning curve to be small and sometimes stupid simple is the answer.  Why spend 20 plus minutes teaching Olympics lifts when the athletes are movers and not weight lifters?  Yes, I understand the importance of those lifts in a program but you have limited time and they can wait till weight lifting class to learn those important lifts.  What about ankle and hip flexibility training?  Why are we doing so many crunches and barbell squats when the athletes have little spine stabilization in the first place.  Enough facts now lets look at some ideas you can use in your programs with groups.

1.  Start with movement and flexibility training barefoot
2.  Use Functional Power instead of Olympic Lifts in most situations
3.  Teach body weight first and single leg strength
4.  Avoid loading the spine in the beginning of progressions
5.  Use little to no machines in most program designs
6.  Make the atmosphere fun and challenging
7.  Don't spend time testing in the bench and squat in most situations
8.  Use isometrics and eccentric training for strength progressions
9.  Educate the team as they train with why they are doing this part of the progression
10. Before they go into season (2-3 weeks out) the workout might look like this.
-Movement and Activation  10 minutes
-Strength 1-2 exercises
-Power 1-2 exercises
-Active Rest flex. and core