If you are serious, get a food scale and weigh everything.  It’s not that you have to track forever, because I know it is tedious, but that you have to develop awareness.  You may think that a giant bowl of chips is a serving, when a serving is a handful.  You may also not know that your bowl is giant.

The pleasure of eating

Eating should be a pleasure.  Dieting is not an excuse to exercise your masochistic tendencies, rather, it should make you lose fat, as painlessly as possible. Unfortunately for many people fast food is one of their biggest indulgences. I had a client recently casually report eating a chipotle burrito, which he thought was at least a healthy alternative. After the total calories were tallied in it was a staggering 2100! I showed him the errors of his ways and now he can indulge without the consequences.

Fast Food Reloaded

We selected five popular fast food joints, scoured their menus, weighed the options and found the best selections. Obviously you will need more or less calories based on your diets so work that portion control. We tried to get the most protein while minimizing fat and carbs while at the same time getting the most nutrition.

Chipotle

With chipotle you can use this nifty calculator. Goal is to get a balanced meal and maximum amount of proteins while keeping the calories low. Start with a bowl if you’ll want guacamole or extra sauces, otherwise you could go for the hard tacos. Add either pinto or black beans, since unlike rice they have more protein and are lower GI. The meat choices are pretty much the same so get what you like. The Salsas are pretty low in calorie (15-20-40) so go hog wild. Be careful with the extras -guacamole, cheese, sour cream- as adding all three will bump you up another 375 calories. Chips, as usual, are terrible at 570 calories 73g carbs and 27g fat.

Our Choice

Burrito Bol

Black Beans
120 kcal
23g carbs
7g protein

Steak
190 kcal
7g fat
2g carbs
30g protein

Tomato and Hot Salsas
60 kcal
12g carbs
3g protein

Guacamole
150kcal
13g fat
8g carbs
2g protein

Total
520 kcal
22g fat
45g carbs
42g protein

KFC

So they are healthening it up a bit themselves, with the new Kentucky Grilled, and 395 calories for $3.95.  It’s not bad, if fast food were your only option.  But if you’ve got a kitchen, there’s no reason not to make a tasty Kentucky feast of your own. You can’t go wrong with the Kentucky Grilled but if you don’t want to die from rabbit starvation, get a side dish along with it. Any of the side dishes should be ok as long as you stick to one.

Our Choice

2 breast + 1 drumstick
430 kcal
80g protein
0g carbs

Mashed Potatoes (No gravy)
100 kcal
16g carbs

Green Beans
25 kcal
5g Carbs

Total:
555 Calories
82g protein
21g carbs

Burger King

BK was really a tough one. All the burgers were loaded with carbs and fat and it was difficult getting close to 50g protein without breaking 800kcal. Your best bet is to stick with the tendergrill chicken sandwich with an extra chicken breast or two. Getting it with mustard instead of mayo will save you 100 calories. And if you want to cut the carbs in half throw away half the bun.

A proper burger

Our Choice:

Tender Grill Chicken Sandwich
No Mayo
With Mustard
Extra Chicken Breast, Tomatoes and Onions
530 kcal
15g fat
57g carbs
43g protein

Skip the fries and dessert and drink water. If you must, opt for diet coke or if you REALLY need it get 3/4th diet coke and 1/4th regular as a last alternative.

McDonald’s

We found better choices at McDonald’s; their menu seemed more balanced. We skipped the beef burgers because they’re pretty low on protein for the calorie buck. The chicken sandwiches are better, with the grilled chicken classic leading the way with 420kcal, 10g fat, 51g carb and 32 g protein. If you pull the double breast and no mayo all on one bun trick, as with BK, you can get even better numbers. In the end we were drawn to the salads with the impressive “Premium Bacon Ranch Salad with Grilled Chicken” 260 calories, 9g fat, 12g carbs, and a staggering 33g of protein. Although the total calorie is low it allows for wiggle room if we want a side dish or dressing. A double order of chicken brings up the protein even more making the salad even more filling.

Only post-workout drink you need

Our Choice:

Premium Bacon Ranch Salad with Grilled Chicken (double order meat)
312 calories (estimated)
9g fats
12g carbs
46g Protein

+Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing
40 calories

Total
352
12g fat
16g carbs
46g protein

Subway

The supposed king of the healthy fast food surprising has some pretty calorie dense options. The good thing about subway is the customizability of each item. You get to choose everything and watch it being made so there shouldn’t be too many hidden ingredients. Maxing out in a meal can bring your calories above 2000 easily. A footlong with double meat, double cheese, and a variety of sauces, mayo, chips and a drink will do that. Stick to a 6″ or a wrap or even make your own salad and skip the starch vehicle all together. Go for lean but substantial meats such as chicken breast, roast beef, or even the subway club. Get double meat to bring up the protein, giving you a more filling sandwich that is still nutritionally sound. The breads are almost the same but we recommend the ’9-grain wheat bread’ for its lowest calorie (210) and lowest GI.

The cheeses are pretty much all the same, so if you need it, go with your favorite. Sub out mayo for light mayo or even better skip it all together and get some mustard. Sauces can be ok but if you already stacked with cheese/mayo consider skipping them. Your best bet is the fat free honey mustard or fat free sweet onion.

Make sure to stack a mountain of veggies (Read our Codex Of Leanness for more info) and opt for water instead of soda (or get diet) and no chips.

Swole Jared

Our Pick

Roast Beef (Double Meat)
230kcal
8g fat
0g carbs
40g protein

6″ Wheat Bread
200 kcal
2.5g fat
40g carbs
8g protein

Cheddar Cheese
40 kcal
3g fat
0
2g protein

Veggies + Water
approximately 0 kcal

Total
470 kcal
13.5g fat
40g carbs
50g protein

The double meat and the veggies make this sandwich especially filling and nutritious.

Note on Caffeinated Beverages

Soda is single handedly responsible for a large part of the obesity problem. It is used for hydration, taste, energy, digestion aid and everything in between. Ridding yourself of a soda addiction is three fold: combating the caffeine and sugar addiction and finding another source of hydration. Water takes care of the second part REALLY well. As for the caffeine, get your boost from coffee or tea or, hell, even caffeine pills: somewhere where that jolt doesn’t come with 14 tsp of sugar. Eating proper meals will help stave off the sugar addiction.

Here are some comparisons:

• 12 oz coca cola: 140kcal, 39g sugar
• 12 oz coffee w/ 1 fl oz half and half: 40kcal, 0g sugar
• 12 oz coffee w/ 2 tsp sugar: 30kcal, 8g sugar
• 12 oz coffee w/ 1 fl oz half and half AND 2 tsp sugar: 70kcal, 8g sugar

And here is a flexible recipe: (and perfect pre- or post-workout!)

Protein frap

12 oz cold coffee
30g whey (usually 1 scoop)
1 c milk (use whichever fat content suits your macros/goals)
1 c. ice, or less, depending on your blender’s abilities

Blend and serve!

Conclusion

Hopefully now you are better prepared to fight the fast food menace. Remember, fixing your diet isn’t about the perfect macro-split or eating clean all the time, it’s about better choices. So switching to diet coke alone might put you at a caloric deficit and on the road to weightloss. Beyond that, realize that change happens gradually, don’t force a lifestyle on yourself that will make you miserable and set you up for failure. Take your current lifestyle and work on improving it, soon enough you will notice that you have achieved your goals painlessly.

Hard Truths that Set You Free: Fast Food Reloaded is a post from: theSwole

SPT will offer a convenient, affordable and personalized training service. It’s easy for some people who have the time to research and -like me- through trial and error figure stuff out, for others who do not have the luxury of time, things are more difficult. Others, try as they might, never seem to find what works for them. But what we do at SPT is get results. We put together a comprehensive plan that covers everything, from diet to training to rest. Whether your goal is fat loss, muscle gain, some combination of both, or whatever, I personally will guide you through the movements, explaining what to do and when, show you what to eat, and how to rest.

At the same time SPT is about preparing you to be self-sufficient. As you know from our articles, I always prefer to explain the reasoning behind each method, so as to give everyone the tools to understand and shape their own programs. Now with the personalized programs I craft, clients learn diet and training concepts, form and technique, and different management tools. SPT is not meant as a crutch but as a launching pad to propel you forward.

On top of all this we provide you with packages that are constantly updated, a convenient mini-e-book on dieting and training 101, grocery lists and recipes. Whatever program you choose, you will have access to these packages and future revisions.

In closing, I want to thank everyone who has helped theSwole thus far, and as we become ever more robust and cutting edge. Please give the new site a visit and pass it on to whomever you think might benefit. You can check out our:

• Packages
• Testimonials
• Or directly Contact Us

Thank you for your time.

A New Page: SPT Personal Training is a post from: theSwole

Learning to lift is difficult, especially online where often you have to struggle with words and descriptions and maybe you’re lucky if you can find a short blurry video to be your walking stick. But one thing that is neglected in most explanations is tempo, simply put, the rhythm to which you lift.  It might seem insignificant but in reality tempo plays a bigger role in shaping a program than the actual rep and set structure. Tempo is part of your training already–you most likely lift at different speeds in different exercises–but you might ask what benefit can be reaped by further understanding this concept. To begin with, increased strength, better muscular development, greater CNS stimulation, in short, getting an effective workout hangs in the balance.

Tempo is commonly divided into 3 phases:

• the negative, or eccentric phase, where you are controlling the bar as gravity pulls it (bar going towards your chest on bench, bar going away from your body on bent over rows)

• the pause at the ‘bottom’, this is where you switch from the negative to the positive
• the positive, or concentric phase, where you are moving the bar, i.e. doing the actual work where the muscles are contracting (bar away from chest on bench, bar coming towards you on rows)

Some take into account a fourth phase which would be the ‘lockout’ or top of the lift.

So what does it all mean

First and foremost, tempo will affect time under tension. Lets take the example of Joe who benches with a 101 tempo, which means he takes one second on the negative, no pause, and one second on the way up. That’s 2 seconds to perform each rep. If he does 10 reps that’s 20 seconds of work. Now change his tempo to 301 and the same 10 reps will take 40 seconds. We just effectively doubled the amount of time during which his muscles are under tension, greatly increasing intensity without changing the weight, sets or reps.

Quality work when you only have PVC pipe to work with

Tempo isn’t just about doing more, but doing better. Slowing down the negative phase forces the lifter to improve control and awareness which can in turn help form and understanding of the movement.

The Slow Negative

This little trick is a cornerstone of bodybuilding, popularized by Mike Mentzer and more recently by Dante in his infamous Doggcrapp protocol. Slowing negatives focuses on the eccentric phase. Tempo ranges here vary from 201 to 501, sometimes adding a pause at the bottom and slowing down the positive to two seconds. The idea is control: minimize momentum and stretch the fascia. These are concepts further discussed in our article on the DC program.

An added benefit of training with negatives is that you are, in effect, stronger than in the positive.  You can use more weight on the negatives and also come closer to failure since you are resisting rather than doing. Yet it’s an effective method for building strength, for example, the use of negative pull-ups as a stepping stone to regular pull-ups.  Since it’s easier to hold on and lower a weight slowly than it is to bring it up, it is possible to reach a CNS activation threshold that is simply not possible otherwise.

Make it hurt

I recommend negatives for pressing movements such as bench and triceps. Negatives can also be done easily with hammer strength and cable movements. Biceps and forearm movements, as well as calves and any isolation exercise can benefit from slow negatives.

Negatives are impossible to do and not recommended on explosive lifts, like cleans and Olympic lifts. Even with bent over rows, I do not recommend slowing the negative. Same goes for squats and deadlifts, although stiff-legged deadlifts and leg presses can benefit.

The Pause

Pauses have been popularized by a range of strength training and power lifting routines. The idea behind them is pausing at the bottom part of the lift, for example, where the bar rests on the floor for deadlifts or on the chest for bench. The pause causes the muscle to lose part of the tension which would otherwise aid the lifter, like a tight rubber band wanting release. For strength training, try a tempo of 110 or 220. As you can see, this emphasizes a fast (110) or slow negative (220) and maximum explosion for the positive. The point of the pause is to develop maximum acceleration from a dead stop, something that traditional training programs usually neglect.

Not this type of pause

“Deloading”  is an extended pause in which the lifter relaxes at the bottom position, thereby releasing all tension. This requires the muscle to generate even more power on every positive. Deloading is only possible for movements which allow for resting the weight, such as box squats,  deadlift, or rack/board presses for bench.

Another use for the pause is to target weak points in a lift. Set up the lift to limit range of motion with the weak point at the bottom of the movement. Pause with each rep. For example, pin press and rack pulls make use of this technique. The lifter may only be able to lift a fraction of his regular weight, but all the emphasis will go to the weak point, strengthening it and improving the main lift.

Pauses aren’t simply for powerlifting and strength training, they can aid in hypertrophy; the pause can require a large amount of isometric work (i.e. muscle length does not change), generating a great deal of muscle fibre and CNS stimulation.

Pauses are great for a lot of exercises, but work especially well for large movements, such as deadlifts, bench, and squats. They can also be used for isolation, although I only recommend them for cable movements for triceps or delts. For biceps, calves, and traps they can be performed on almost any movement.

The Positive

The positive is what makes you mentally say the next number in your set sequence. It’s seen as the main part of the lift, after all, each rep requires the completion of a positive. So, what variations are there on the positive? Tempos will vary. For hypertrophy a 1-2 second positive is sufficient, maybe 3 if you are feeling adventurous. As for strength training, since the goal is the amount of weight moved, it’s always best to aim for the fastest positive possible. This will vary a lot from one exercise to the next, but for maximum strength, acceleration must also be maximized and time under tension minimized. The less time you spend working the more work you can do, the more weight you can lift.

Branch Warren always lifts explosively

Positive tempo varies from lift to lift. Deadlifts will have a different tempo than barbell rows, which will have a different tempo than bench. Another important piece is the exercise medium; machines and cable devices carry a lot of momentum, which is going to exponentially lower stimulation.  This is not good for hypertrophy. The same goes for the smith machine.

La Fin

In conclusion, tempo is a fundamental of lifting and one of those things that haven’t translated well through the internet. It’s really one of the secrets that changes a lift from mediocre to monstrous. Experiment with tempo, see what offers the best stimulation and gives the best result.  But don’t overdo it, negatives can be taxing, and focusing on one part while neglecting others is a sure way to fudge things up.

That's all, folks

Fast vs Slow: Tempo demystified is a post from: theSwole

For looking lean, diet is the only answer. If you’re diet is out of line, I don’t care how hard you train, you’ll only ever get part way there. Diet is also one of the greatest sources of confusion. It doesn’t help that mainstream diet advice promotes processed crap and foments protein-phobia. Even when you do get good advice, breaking old dietary habits and embracing new ‘foods’ (or lack of food) can be a great challenge. But the surprising thing I’ve noticed is that whether you stick to a diet or not often makes a whole lot more difference than what diet you choose. In the end, if you can’t stick to the diet, it doesn’t matter whether the diet would be effective or not. But the great thing about a good diet is not just the results, but that it is formulated to be easier to stick to from the get go. So this article, we’re going to look at some of the dietary mistakes people make that doom them to failure from the start. Now if you have no idea where to start I always recommend checking out Codex of Leanness and then going through our different diet articles. Otherwise, read on for some tips and tricks that can mean the difference between a flat belly, and going up a few sizes.

Fat Attack Freak Out

Here’s the typical situation a lot of people find themselves in:

• Realize extreme discontent with body
• Freak out and begin overzealous diet
• A couple of days (or weeks at best) later, glycogen levels have dropped and blood sugar is low
• Cave a little to epic cravings, which gives way to epic binge
• Regain all lost “weight” plus more
• Continue in this cycle of shame, frustration and self-hate, concluding leanness and control are impossible

It’s quite easy to think you can survive on less calories than a baby when you just came off a 4000 kcal meal, which is when most people decide to change their ways.  But avoiding starvation is key to avoiding binges and backlash fat gain. First things first, you don’t need to cut a ton of calories to burn fat. Remember when you ate everything in front of you, did little-to-no exercise and at worst maybe slowly gained weight? Now with exercise and a few less binges you should, in the worst case, maintain your current weight. Your body doesn’t like extremes; think what happens when you jump into a cold shower: it’s pretty much intolerable.  Now if you start with warm water and slowly make it colder, you’ll barely feel the change.

Lesson: Make small changes on a daily basis–cut some sauce here, a slice of bread there.  Focus on making healthier choices in general.

Not part of the "small changes" plan

Calories don’t count, right?

A lot of people say that calories don’t matter as long as you’re eating the right foods.  This is kind of misleading, because calories do matter, it’s just that when eating right, most people are incapable of calorie surplus. Many will even “naturally” lost fat simply by increasing protein and veg intake, and decreasing junk food, simple carbs, empty cals, etc.  But this article is for difficult losers.  So first, clean up your diet, eat about 40% of your calories from protein, take green vegetables at every meal, and don’t eat “crap.” But if that doesn’t make you lose, or if loss stalls, take stock of calorie intake.  Just because you are eating clean doesn’t mean you can eat as much as you want.  Fat loss is difficult for most people.  Eating clean is just meant to make it a bit easier and healthier.

Lesson: Eating clean is not a license to overeat

Fat loss for the lazy, busy & poor

“I need a huge kitchen and expensive ingredients to spend hours making healthy foods palatable!” That’s patently false, it’s true that it helps if you know how to cook but you can live off convenience food and still eat well. I prefer that most of your diet come from whole, unprocessed foods, but in reality some people find it hard to manage. First off, an apple or some carrot sticks fit that definition, and they don’t take any time to prepare. Whole wheat couscous and Kraft Mac & cheese both come in a box.  One is clean, and also easier to prepare.
Most people already know that buying in bulk saves a ton.  Choose unseasoned meat, like chicken breasts, and add some frozen veggies.  You can toss those two into a pot with a few spices, and with minimal accompaniments, create everything from fajitas to fake Chinese or a hearty, country-style stew.

In a real bind, you can also get takeout if you learn how to do it smart. Look for protein-heavy foods with no breading and light dressing, paired with veggies. Be wary of breads, pastas and dressings, even though they have their place, they are very far from being a staple. Avoid breaded items and anything labeled “fried.” For example, you can get the grilled chicken sandwich from burger king, ask for double meat, and easy on the mayo, take the top bun off and you have a reasonable sandwich. Subway offers salads to which you can add as much meat as you want.  Use only half a packet of dressing and that’s a decent choice.  There is also the new “Kentucky Grilled.”  If you’re near a supermarket, pick up a rotisserie chicken and a bag of salad mix. Nab a roll or some salad dressing from the deli, and you’re good to go.  In fact, you could feed a small family on that.

McConfit made from fries and McNuggets

The most important part is to skip side orders like fries or onion rings since (as most people already know!) they contain huge amounts of empty calories. The same goes for soda, but if you find it impossible to resist the urge, drink diet. In the worst case, mix 1/4 regular with the rest die, so you get the same taste for a fraction of the calories. Also, be wary of salads.  What should be healthful and diet-friendly often comes smothered in hundreds of calories worth of dressing and other red flags like croutons, fried wontons and bacon bits.

Lesson: You can eat fast food but learn to make good choices that fit into your meal plan.

A lesson for the tasteless

Almost every person who is seriously overweight or obese has a disdain for green veggies, plain, unprocessed meat and other healthy foods. After years and years of habitual binging on sugar and additive-drowned foods, they literally have desensitized their taste buds. Even a lot of individuals that qualify for healthy body weight have trouble eating without a soda, or some sort of heavy dressing. It only takes a couple of days/weeks but your body will adjust and you will start actually tasting, and believe me, food will taste completely different. Being able to taste more can actually help you to achieve satiety sooner and eat less.

Evil Broccoli

Lesson: Train your taste buds not just your guns

A good diet takes into account real life and is one you can maintain for a long time. Losing weight doesn’t mean you need to achieve the discipline of a Tibetan monk or bear the hunger pangs of a mountain plane crash survivor.  A good diet should feel challenging but doable. Make small changes but listen to your body.  If you feel starved then you probably are. On the flip side, just because something has ‘diet’ written all over it doesn’t give you carte blanche to eat it all day. Find a balance, but most importantly, experiment and find what works for you.

Dirty Diet Tricks is a post from: theSwole

One notion that many trainees fail to understand is the synergy between different parts of their lives and the impact of that on overall results.

Synergy is when two or more parts work together to produce a greater result than each individually. You’ve heard the saying “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” Unlike a barbell’s weight which does equal the sum of its parts synergistic ‘elements’ produce non-linear results.

How does all this relate to your training? Well the results you get are a product of your entire lifestyle, not just your training or diet. Working with clients, my job mostly consists of troubleshooting someone’s current lifestyle.  To get results in the gym and in the mirror, I have to look at all different parts of their daily habits. Is the person eating enough, sleeping enough, what are they eating and when, how are they training and when. All these things have to be taken into account since all of these effect one another. Take someone with impeccable training and eating, yet who sleeps only 5 hours a night; you will quickly find this someone stagnating, overtraining and simply feeling like crap. I’ll show you some key things I look for to improve the end-result.

Training

Results and progress occur primarily outside the gym. What does it mean that the time inside the gym battling the weight is not the time when your body is changing? The goal of training is to start a reaction, or simply, a signal for growth. That’s why it’s important to balance your serious training with serious recovery methods.  You want to stress the muscle then back off and let it do its work. This concept is very similar to pruning a plant– a destructive or catabolic act spurs growth and rejuvenation.

In a strict sense it’s very difficult to overtrain just from exercise. Some athletes train for hours every single day.  This is even true for some Powerlifters and Strongmen. It is, however, quite easy to overtrain if you aren’t sleeping or eating enough.

So sound routines aside some mistakes that lead people to overtrain:

Maxing too much

Just stop it, checking your 1RM every week is a great way to see your max drop week after week, but other than that, it’s worthless. Stop trying to take the same test every day and instead focus on studying. As a beginner it is easy to fall into this trap since one is unable to cause enough muscle damage and CNS stress for over-training to occur.  However, once the newbie gains level off, employing a proper periodization scheme becomes essential for progress.

Not Part of your daily routine

Not enough time between body parts

Growth, conditioning and strength development happen outside the gym. Your arms will grow slower (if at all) if they are trained everyday. Smart training is about utilizing exercise as much as necessary in order to maximize results. That’s why an advanced lifter is going to max out once every 8 weeks, for example, or train a body part twice or sometimes just once a week. These guys would love to do bench 7 days a week if they would achieve progress from that, but the reality is proper rest is going to be key for maximum results.

Signal Strength: Strong

Improper form

Even though it’s not literally overtraining, wrong form is going to cause injury and fatigue. For example, benching with elbows flared will put strain on and even cause damage to the rotator cuffs.  It may initially create a mirage of progress, but you will quickly find yourself unable to bench.

A lot of people dismiss form, a mistake I’ve made in the past. I couldn’t put my ego aside for a couple of sessions while I dropped the weight and worked on form. The only time I started working on form was when I got injured and was unable to lift for months. Had I wised up before the injury, I would have quickly realized how much better gains I would have made with proper form.

What a world record lift looks like

If you’re still not convinced look no further than Olympic lifters. Some of them are barely teens yet can clean and jerk over 240lbs. That’s more than what a lot of people can squat! Their strength comes from utilizing technique, maximizing leverage and engaging all their muscles. Technique is key.

Diet

Your body is really good at taking the garbage you put into it and turning it into useful tissue. Let’s get one thing out of the way, a high calorie diet is conducive to strength and muscle gain. At the end of the day calories are key, the more you eat the stronger you get, the faster you recover and the bigger you get. But straight “mass gain” is not what you want. You want to balance gains while staying lean, and prioritize lean muscle gain. Some, if not most of you want to lose fat at the same time! So we need to find a way to walk the razor edge.

Protein

Protein is your new favorite macro nutrient. It’s filling, used to create muscle tissue, and is made up of essential amino acids that your body needs. If you aren’t convinced that protein is going to stave off fat, then examine the phenomenon of Rabbit Starvation:

Rabbit starvation is the form of acute malnutrition caused by excess consumption of any lean meat (e.g. rabbit) coupled with a lack of other sources of nutrients usually in combination with other stressors, such as severe cold or dry environment.

Lean meat, being mostly protein, must be broken down into amino acids and then converted into glucose (via gluconeogenesis) to be used as an energy source. Although this process takes time, it can be done quickly enough to meet most of the energy requirements of an active person. However, sufficient calories cannot be consumed to meet the added requirements to generate body heat in a cold climate. After the body’s energy reserves (fat) are depleted, the energy requirements to sustain basic life processes are not met.[1]

Obviously you are going to have a balanced diet but this shows that protein is very difficult to use as an ‘energy’ source which is going to work great when you are trying to preserve muscle and lose fat.

Carb timing

When trying to control bodyfat, carbs can be compared to the gas you use in your car. Imagine if your car started storing gas that sat unused for too long. Let’s say you filled up your car at night and in the morning, you notice the car has stored that gas and the tank is now empty. This is exactly what the body does with excess calories: either they are used or stored. Carb timing is like pouring in gas while the car is using it. In other words, you do not want this energy source to be sitting doing nothing for too long since that’s when it gets stored as fat.

Feed the muscle, starve the fat

On the other hand, I personally have had great success drinking a carb drink such as juice or Gatorade while training. I imagine it’s not only the immediate sugar from the drink that helps but it triggers a response from the body to give up its fuel, since it’s being replenished.

The body is very stubborn with its resources, so carb timing is going to be a great way to trick your body to power you through brutal training sessions then cut off the carbs and go into fat burning mode all throughout the day. It’s like having your protein bar and eating it too.

Rest

Sleep is one of those things that no one seems to talk about. Why is sleep so important? Well, consider this, not sleeping enough is going to affect these things (and more):

Tissue rejuvenation and wound healing: Obviously you’re not injured, but training causes trauma to the muscles, tendons and joints that need to heal. Muscle anabolism is in fact healing and growth.

Growth Hormone, Testosterone and other hormones are effected by how much you sleep. If you aren’t getting enough sleep, all those are going to drop. So optimal sleep is going to be equivalent to jumping on a steroid cycle.

“The metabolic phase during sleep is anabolic; anabolic hormones such as growth hormones (as mentioned above) are secreted preferentially during sleep.”[1]

I recommend getting at least 8 hours of sleep every night. Make sure to consume a high protein/mid fat meal before sleeping. Insomnia and not sleeping enough are one of the main causes of overtraining. This is one of the easiest things to fix which in turn will yield some of the greatest results.

If you have trouble sleeping, I recommend taking Melatonin, 1-6mgs about an hour or two before your bed time. Anti-histamines such as Benadryl also work, I recommend a 50-75mg dose.

Training is not limited to the gym or the kitchen but rather a complicated relationship of all these things, and to maximize your results you must understand how to control them and make them work for you. At first it might seem like a daunting challenge but just as your results are stagnating because of bad synergists once you control them these same synergists will work for you, magnifying your results exponentially.

_[1]Wikipedia

The Overtrained, Underfed Insomniac is a post from: theSwole

“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single set.”

– Swole tzu

Next Stop: Swole

I know that you don’t come to TheSwole for clichés, but we use them in every article anyway. The topic today is that thousand mile finish line, the spot on top of a summit waiting to receive a flag, that fat bench, or just a big swole bicep. None of these things start with anything spectacular, in fact they begin with something ordinary and tame. What portends a difference, though, is focus in a single direction. They all require continuity and work towards a goal, and a mindset to see that through. So, in an effort to help you help your body get stronger, bigger and better conditioned, I’ll once again spill the magic beans on some weight lifting secrets.

Progressive Loading

Progressive Loading is the concept of, well, progression. With lifting you have training days, sessions, sets, reps, and finally, weight used. All these are different ways to improve in, and, in other words, progress. The more you progress with the weights the stronger, faster, leaner, and bigger you get. Progressive loading is about getting steady progress. We’re not interested in how much you can max once a month, but in how it went last time and how can you improve today. That doesn’t mean you max out every work-out, but that in every session you see some mark of improvement, be it one more rep over last time you used that weight, one more set, or even the same numbers with better form. This is why I believe determination is the quintessential part of training.  Put your mind to the iron and the iron will bend; but a defeated mentality, cynicism, and lack of heart will get you nowhere.

Ronnie hitting some intense focused reps.

Set Structure:

With progressive loading you are progressing, but the body likes to resist, adapt, and find ways to negate your training. You will quickly find straight sets and a static rep range insufficient. The key to successful training is to incorporate a variety of set types and rep ranges, as well as targeting specific range of motion.

Drop-sets

Drop-sets are one of the greatest mass and strength builders. They are also a strong weapon in your arsenal for broad-spectrum training. You see you have 2 major types of muscle fibre. Type I (slow twitch) is used for endurance and type II (fast twitch) is used for strength and explosiveness. Within the fast twitch fibres there are three different types of fibers that get engaged when put under stress, type A engage immediately and exhaust within 2-4 seconds, type B 4-6 seconds, type C 6+ seconds. For example, a person can lift 80 lbs 6 times, while he can lift 100lbs 3 times. This is due to the strength threshold each muscle type has.

Here’s how drop sets help you engage all of them. First you are going to begin by loading a weight you can do for 3-4 reps, the 4th rep should be very close to failure, then you are going to drop the weight by about 25% and again go to failure, which should be another 4-5 reps, finally dropping the weight by 30% and exhausting the muscle. When doing drop sets it’s very important to do ‘clean’ reps, i.e. don’t cheat on form.

Here’s an example of a drop set on bench press:

225 x 4

170 x 5-6

120 x 8

I only recommend doing drop-sets with a good spotter or in a power-cage if you are going with free weights. Otherwise use the smith machine or hammer strength.

Rest-Pause

RP sets have really been popularized by DoggCrapp and his eponymous, advanced, bodybuilding routine. The concept is to perform a single set of a specified rep range, for example between 11 and 16. You will do this by dividing that into 3 ‘mini-sets’. For example, begin with a weight you can use for 7-8 reps, really focusing on individual reps and approaching failure at the 6-7th rep. Then, rest for 30-40 seconds while taking really deep breaths and hammer the same weight again. Hopefully you can get 4-6 reps. Repeat, hoping for 2-3.

RP sets should really only be used when you have quite a bit of experience training, as a beginner is not able to judge his abilities to the extent that he could take full advantage of them. Another thing to note is that RP sets are going to take a heavy toll on you, so don’t count them as ‘just another set.’ In reality they are more like 3-4 heavy sets when done right.

Chest Flys

Super-Sets

One of the best known set structures, the superset is a simple concept: stack two exercises together and perform one after the other. Some people recommend using exercises with target muscle agonists (eg. bench paired with tricep extension), whereas others recommend targeting antagonists (eg. bicep/tricep). I’m not a big believer in super-sets but I can see their benefit mostly on accessory work. Near the end of your session, you can, for example, do dumbbell shoulder press and then right away move to side raises. This really is the same concept as drop-sets; you are trying to fully exhaust the muscle.

Cluster-Sets

Cluster-Sets should really be reserved for the very experienced as they are complicated, difficult and requiring of an experienced spotter. The idea of CS is to cram as much heavy reps as possible into the shortest possible time in order develop athletes who are strong yet well conditioned. The concept is very similar to rest-pause training except it also incorporates the drop-set. There are different levels of cluster training and they must be periodized because of the great stress they are going to have on the CNS. The trainee would start with 80-85% of their 1RM or 5RM, so for example if your max is 300lbs, start with 255. The goal is to get 10 reps here, so the trainee would perform 5 reps with the 255 then rack the weight. Rest for 10-15 seconds, perform 2-3 more reps, rest for 10-15 seconds and perform another 2-3 more reps.

CSs should only be performed periodically, allowing a couple of weeks rest between CS cycles. If you are trying to fit this into your powerlifting routine, use it on the Max Effort (Strength day).

Rep Structure:

Rep structure is defined by tempo, which is the time it takes to perform the positive (eccentric) and negative (concentric) portion of the lift. Also take into account whether there is a static hold at the top or a pause at the bottom. It’s important to understand that different rep tempos are going to produce significantly different results and the trainee should understand the differences in order to maximize his or her goals.

Explosive Positive

This is pretty much universal to all programs. A positive should be performed as an explosion which fully engages muscles and CNS.  Make sure in particular to use explosive positive on Max Effort days on which you would do any type of max since you want to generate the most power. The tempo for an explosive positive is usually between 1-2 seconds.

The father of the controlled negative

Controlled Negative

The popular controlled negative aims to control the weight as it comes down. This concept is particularly important to the DoggCrapp style of training, and generally any kind of weight training involving free weights/barbells is going to involve some type of controlled negative.  Just think of how important it is to be in control of the weight during the the “squating down” portion of the squat, or when bringing the bar down to the chest during bench.  Incorporating controlled negatives will teach you how to control the weight as it comes down and properly ‘load’ the weight into the muscles so you get a good reflex back up at the positive.  Controlled negatives vary in tempo, but generally take 3-4 seconds, depending on the movement. Ideally you should feel as though you are resisting gravity rather than actually working to stop it.

Controlled Positive

This is the opposite of a controlled negative.  Controlled positives are usually discouraged, especially for athletes. But for bodybuilders they can be a great asset as they increase the time the muscle is under pressure as well as stretching of the muscle. These are going to really aid in hypertrophy, but if you are after strength gains then forget about this completely.

Conclusion

You should experiment with these different techniques and find what helps you the most. One important thing to note is that when you switch to a new form of training it will take your body some time to adapt, generally from couple of days to a week or two. After the initial adaptation you should start seeing progress again. Try one or two methods mentioned above and tell me how that works for you:

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He repped WHAT with his set?! is a post from: theSwole

As some of you may know I didn’t start training here in our beloved USA. My journey began in a more third world type country. One distinction between gyms here and over there is that there were absolutely no chains or large commercial gyms, every single gym with few exceptions was founded by either a famed bodybuilder or had one managing it. Gyms were basements of dumbbells, barbells and racks, not a woman in sight and shirts were discouraged. Yeah sounds pretty homoerotic so far, but the point I’m driving at is that everyone and I do mean everyone, without exception followed the same routine:

Chest/bi, shoulders/tricep, back/traps, legs (optional).

I never knew anyone who deviated from this program but I saw drastically different results so obviously a routine by itself doesn’t tell us much on how effective training is.  I want to go a bit beyond that and try to get at what DOES make a program work.

A friend of mine recently told me “there are no shortcuts”. It’s such a cliché thing to say but it struck me differently.  I thought how all of us are trying to get results while trying our damn hardest to avoid the obvious. Want to lose weight? Take a thermogenic! Want to gain some size? Take your weightgainer. People justifying binge eating by ‘being on a bulk’. You know what a good workout looks like, you know how to lose weight and how to get stronger and bigger but hell that shit is hard, instead you want to mix your creatin-bcaa-gummiworm-betaalanine blend and hope that shit works.

Are you warming up before you start training?

Everyone starts their training with their favorite exercise, usually that’s bench. They go in, do a single warm-up set, then hit their 3 ‘heavy’ sets, wondering why they felt so weak and why their shoulder hurts so fucking much. I know it’s annoying, I know it takes a bit of time, I know you are afraid it will soak up your energy but your muscles won’t work if they aren’t getting a decent blood flow and your CNS won’t work if you don’t wake it the fuck up with a proper warm up. Do some steady state cardio on a bike or whatever for 5-10 minutes, get your heart rate up a bit, do some bodyweight squats if you want then start loading up the weight. Make sure to get ‘heavy’ warm-ups versus just going in with the bar then immediately loading up to 85% 1RM. A proper warm-up prepares the muscles and joints but doesn’t take a toll on your energy or strength. Make sure you do not do any kind of static stretching as that will weaken your muscles, instead you can do dynamic stretches.

Do you sweat when training?

This varies based on many factors but sweat is evidence that your muscles are working hard and your body needs to cool down. Breaking a sweat in an intense workout is a sure sign that you are working hard. If you aren’t, vary your workout up a bit, lower rest on some sets and do more volume, while other sets increase rest and do more weight.  Not sweating also means you do far too many isolation movements which recruit a tiny amount of muscle.  Add in some compound exercises to ensure a proper session. Now I’m not talking about ‘feel the burn’ or some shit but just pushing 5 x 5 on bench with some heavy weights should make you at least break a sweat.

Not this sweating

Do what you’re not doing

You lift heavy? Add in some volume. Doing volume? Lift heavier. Isolation add Compound and vice versa. Easiest way to fix your program is to do something you aren’t doing at the moment. But my program is the best! Well then you shouldn’t be reading this article. CNS fatigue can happen when you aren’t varying up your training or when you aren’t resting enough among other reasons. While at the same time sometimes you may not see results because you aren’t training enough or hard enough. Now you CAN figure out what you’re doing wrong but in the mean time do something different and it’s guaranteed to improve SOMETHING.

Measure yourself to verify results

Trying to gain weight? Use a tape measure.  Trying to lose weight?  Use a tape measure.  You see, folks, all too often we step one morning on the scale, the thing hasn’t budged, and we feel tears streaming down our cheeks all day.  Hell, all week, even.  Now why do we hinge all that on the scale?  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: don’t believe that lying, cheatin scale.  Use the tape measure. Why? Because bodyweight is composed of many parts from water, to the food you are digesting, to muscles and fat. So a 10lb loss isn’t really significant if it just means you have no food in you and lost some water weight. Couple of lbs of fat make a big difference in how you look, measure your waist/stomach/thighs/chest/arms.

When measuring for muscle growth make sure you are being consistent. Use references where you measure whether it’s the peak of the bicep or the quad at its thickest point. Take into account how you are flexing which is how all muscles should be measured. Don’t just measure once a month instead, measure weekly and look for the trend. Remember muscle size can be dependent on how hydrated the muscle is, how much glycogen it has, and how much blood is going through it. After training the muscle will be pumped and bigger so take that into account.

Train for today, and also next year

Remember when you first started training and you envisioned next week you will start getting Dorian’s back, Ronnie’s arms and Dexter’s waist only to be disappointed that you just looked almost the same. Obviously you’ve calmed down since, you lowered your expectation but weight training really can be likened to a marathon, it takes a long. Fucking. Time. On the other hand it takes less than what you think, let me run you some math here. Lets say you are now 195lbs @ 5’11 14% bodyfat. Pretty much average in all respects, now you trained for a couple of years lets imagine you really put things into overdrive and on average started gaining 1lbs of muscle a week. Within a year if you didn’t lose or gain fat, you would weigh 243 @ 5’11 and 11% bodyfat, now that’s MASSIVE. Obviously you aren’t going to consistently gain a pound of muscle each week but if you are trying your hardest day to day, week to week, even though you aren’t turning into a monster overnight, you will turn into one in months.

Same goes for dieting, put together a goal weight you want to reach, see how much weight you need to lose each week -realistically 2 or 3 lbs MAX- and start working towards it. The longer you give yourself time to reach that goal the better you look when you get there. This means don’t do a crash diet, since that most likely will crash your muscles in the process and get you nowhere.  Plan a reasonable training regime so that by the time Sue gets married in three months, you look swole, not like a ragged over-trained stagnating lump of blubber on an endless rebound.

Harden the fuck up

HTFU isn’t about acquiring an IQ of a pre-historic troglodyte and going in trying to test what is stronger, your tendons or the ever increasing weight on the barbell. It’s about reaching your potential and training within your limits. It’s about slowly pushing yourself and improving more and more everyday so that one day you do become a human forklift with a shredded 8 pack.

Conclusion

In the end you change your habits and get a chance to test yourself. Does the new change bring about good results? Do you need to re-consider your methods? Sometimes we get too attached to our routines and refuse to re-think them, even if we’ve been stagnant for the last 8 months. So take a break and put a twist on your training. Get swolin!

The New Deal is a post from: theSwole

Anyone trying to get in shape or take their training to another level will find themselves surrounded by ads, products and programs all promising either a ripped, athletic, toned* physique or a massive swole lump of veins. But even beyond infomercials a lot of seemingly advanced sites *ahm tnation ahm* seem to throw around perfect diets and routines. German Volume TRAINING, max swole, anabolic diet etc. It’s unfortunate so many people get caught up in this mass-psychosis, hell you might be on a similar program right now. What’s the answer? What IS optimal training?

Back to the Basics

Answer: There is no such thing as optimal training. It’s not the routine that makes the individual but the individual who makes the routine. A routine is simply a blueprint to follow; giving a blueprint to a bunch of retards will result in a pile of indiscernible mess.  The fundamentals are such: the harder you work the better your results are. Its so mind- numbingly simple yet very few people seem to get it. If there is one thing I’d ask of anyone it is to get good working sets. You look at successful lifters from all disciplines and you see this one thing in common. You can do drop sets and pyramid structure, high rep and low rep,  slow negative, fast negative or fast positive whatever, as long as you are doing work, putting your muscular and nervous system under stress, you will get results.

Let me expand a little bit on ‘work’ because I see two types of failed individuals:

Mr. PR

Case:

Mr Pr. steps into the gym, usually neglecting any form of warm-up lest he get seen with lesser weights, accompanying him a spotter with an affinity for sharing. Mr. Pr doesn’t give a shit about form and his spotter cares too much to let him do a single rep by himself, the whole workout is performed assisted with the spotter acting as a quasi-smith machine that automatically removes 30-50lbs on request. I suspect Mr. Pr and his partner are short on time because they attempt to maximize every second by performing multiple simultaneous exercises both using the same barbell. Deadlifts are out of the question since no one has discovered how to spot on them.  When confronted  to do one rep on his own with the same weight that he would pump, spotted, for 14 reps, he wouldn’t be able to. Mr. Pr almost becomes part of the décor at the gym as years and years go by and he looks exactly the same as the first day you walked in and he was struggling to bench 195.

Solution:

Mr Pr needs to increase his soy intake tenfold and calm the fuck down. Some people think if they move more weight one way or another they get stronger. Decreasing ROM further and further and having your spotter help with his pinky isn’t going to make you any stronger, in fact you’re shooting yourself in the foot as you will simply stagnate or have very little progress, on top of that increasing your chance of injury since you work with weights that are too heavy with tendons and muscles that are too weak.

If your max on bench is 185, then that’s what you can bench, even with 4 guys to help you get 500lbs, you still can only bench 185.  The faster you come to terms with it and stop being in denial about yourself, the faster you can actually progress. Everybody is just watching too many videos and looking at too many pictures of the genetic elite who have gone through years and sometimes decades of training and had rivers of exogenous testosterone passed through their blood. Drop the weight, get good reps in, have a spotter help you for the last 1 or two reps and then you can actually work with heavy weight without making yourself look like an idiot.

The Liface

Case:

Who? Well here you have the opposite of Mr Pr, this guy wants to get everything perfect, you will almost always see him training by himself. His natural testosterone level is lower than that of a castrated lab mouse, and it shows. I can only classify his training as mechanical. Explosive training? Forget about it, this is about concentration. He focuses on every rep, trying to perform it with utter perfection, maintaining his tempo adagio from start to finish. He writes down everything, plugs them into spreadsheets and bar graphs, recording each week’s slope. It’s unfortunate that his Microsoft office skills are the only thing he succeeds to hypertrophy.

Advanced Training

Often we see this individual getting frustrated with the lack of results, looking everywhere except his actual training. In his mind training is a theoretical field which is to be mastered on paper and is comparable to quantum-physics. The Liface has a deep understanding of supplements which offers another avenue for more tinkering when the results stagnate indefinitely.

Solution:

500mg a day of harden the fuck up. I advise drenching all of his research and various supplements accumulated over the years in gasoline (or Spike) and burning them on a pyre. This one is more difficult to fix than Mr Pr since he lacks the actual enthusiasm to train. The only solution is being sent to a Bulgarian Olympic academy where failing to meet PRs is rewarded by lashing.

Conclusion

Please don’t be like these two specimens. It’s sometimes hard to find a good balance, between obsession with ever-increasing weights and obsession with winning St. Rippetoe’s award for elite form. Simply put, you must learn to maximize weight while maintaining a basic integrity of form.  To assure this, mix different sets together and have some days where you would max or just go heavy, and other days where the emphasis is less on PRS AT ALL COST but to train as hard as you can without having to sacrifice your form or sets.

Optimal Training is a post from: theSwole

Let me first say I’m not religious in the least but sometimes we relate to fiery verses from different books. A lot of people walk into different gyms, for many it’s simply an excess they indulge in periodically. They revel in the novelty, those first days they show unparallel dedication, their eyes fixed on unachievable goals; usually this day happens to be January first. You see them when your lonely squat rack is now filled with a group of eager bicep-aficionados who are using the safety bars to support 56.5lbs after they had finished catabolizing their biceps.  The dumbbell rack now stands busier than a Costco’s checkout in a recession, not because everyone is rushing to utilize the equipment but rather as it is the spot where the light casts down the most vascularizing of shadows and the 125lb dumbbells offers a fearsome foreground.

Two weeks in, the winds start blowing, and the chaff starts to whisk away leaving behind an aggregate of individuals who cannot leave, ones who are anchored by the same weights that they move. They pound away day after day, always throwing the weight against gravity only for it fall back again. They cannot leave because this place of training has filled a hole; it defines them, without it they find themselves incomplete. These aren’t your pilgrims who visit this temple yearly, or monthly nor they are your weekend warriors, these are the ones who need to train, who need to put on more and more weight, those are the ones who get hurt doing something and then jump back in over and over, and over.

Disciplines that we do not practice seem immensely complex on the outside; we look at those individuals who practice something we do not know as a step lower than magicians. They perform voodoo on a daily basis, diagnosing out of thin air, fixing what seemed to be impossible, making you lose weight when you tried so hard. Once you enter their sphere and begin to see you realize that it’s not so mysterious after all, in fact, often times it’s quite simple: the majority of people never come to this step. Even right now you have a fitness culture where ‘spot reduction’ is the norm, low fat diets are the solution, and weight training is an exotic macho ritual that turns ordinary people into Ronnie Colemans. What I want to introduce is a shift towards things that fundamentally work, the only thing I care about is the end result, and the road that leads there is the right one.

Bookmark this site, updates are coming very quickly.

Separating the wheat from the chaff is a post from: theSwole

Our objective is a departure from these notions,  our aim is to give tools and ideas instead of programs and plans. More often then not a plan is followed closely but the intention of it is missed, and understandably so as the majority of trainers and instructors want to stand on the high ground of knowledge. Imagine if a personal trainer told you all you need to know on your first day, would you still dish out the large fees  for nothing more than a glorified spotter?

In the coming days more articles will be written, and slowly the site should take shape.

No fish, just lifting is a post from: theSwole