Health Articles for Bodybuilding

Motivation is one of the most important things when it comes to gaining weight and muscle building, I would say – the most important. Without motivation your  training process will be boring and unsuccessful.

There are lots of ways to get motivated  and stay motivated. I will list down the most effective and popular, just to help you achieve your goals!

So, Let’s go:

• Music – this is probably the most popular way to stay motivated. But you should not chose some pop or r’n'b music… this just sucks for bodybuilding, weightlifting and similar sports.. you need something aggressive, you need power, you need RAGE! To get these things done, you should listen to something alternative (like Metallica, Dope ) or rap with powerful beats. This will definitely help!

• Anger – this is powerfull.. this is outrageous!!! When you are angry you can generate a lot more power! Before doing some hardcore squats you should get angry… think of something you love and then imagine that it is taken away..! You can squat heavy.. no – you can SQUAT HEAVY!

These were the in-gym motivation types but there are some deeper motivations too. Anger and music gets you motivated for a little period of time, but you need general motivation too..

• PRO – just watch how pro athletes do their  thing and think of it as “I can do the same! I am NOT worse.. in fact I am better than him – I WILL DO BETTER”. Think of those pro’s as your idols … and time after time just watch some movie or pictures with them. This will keep you motivated

• Encouragement– encouragement helps a lot. Tell someone about your goals. Do not be ashame! Speak with people about your trainings and you will want to go to gym day after day.

Good luck! And remember to stay motivated!

Tired of reading crappy ”do this, eat that articles”? Well this article won’t be the usual yadda yadda article. I will write only things that matter. First thing -  I want you to do is look at your current diet plan. Count how many calories come from fat, protein and carbs. Analyze your diet. Because I will show you how to eat the right way, maybe you won’t even need to change a lot!

This diet will be for those who want to increase lean body mass without gaining too much fat. This can even cut down some percents of your body fat!
Meal 1
7:00 – 30 grams of whey protein with water (drinking with milk will result in more fat in your diet), this will load your body with protein after the night. After some 20-30 minutes you should eat an omlette with bread and juice (try not to drink coffee because it dehydrates your body)
Meal 2
10:00 – one portion of gainer (at least 40 grams of protein), same thing with milk as in breakfast. Eat some fruit with this meal too (bananas, apples or something like that)
Meal 3
13:00 – 150 to 200 grams of lean meat (skinless chicken or tuna) with brown rice and some salad (type of salat depend how many extra fat are you ready to gain with this diet) + big fruit
Meal 4
16:00 – one portion of gainer with creatine. And any type of fast carbs (biscuits, apples …) if workout comes after this meal.
WORKOUT DAY
Meal 5
18:00 – post workout shake (including at least 40 grams of protein). 0.6..0.8 grams of dextrose per 1 kilo of bodyweight. 5 grams of creatine.
Meal 6
19:00 – now we are starting to reduce the carbs because it is evening, body wont be able to burn them before sleep – extra fat. So skinless chicken or tuna (other lean beef will do the job too) some brown rice and veggies.
Meal 7
22:00 – 30 grams of protein but now only and ONLY with water.
Meal 8
xx.xx – you can take casein protein right before you go to sleep, this way you will feed you muscles all night and wont wake up so hungry.

This is just and example (working example though) of and muscle building diet. You can eat pasta sometimes instead of rice (pasta stacks up more fat). You can vary with this diet but stick to the high protein intake.

First thing you need in order to Gain Weight is the right Diet or atleast some ideas how to make one. You have to understand that diet does not mean eating less! Diet is special eating habits that are used to reach exact goals! In this time the goal will be weight gaining. To gain weight, you should find out your body type. Each body type needs different approach. In this tutorial we will give you basic directions for each body type.

To bulk up you must eat, if you care more about fat - eat less food that contains fat (burgers, crisps etc.), but fat is not always a bad thing… to stay simple - fat is energy, our body uses fat as fuel, if the fuel is more than we can use, it gets stuck in the fuel cistern. It is as simple as that.

Of course none of us wants to stay fat - we just want to get bigger, to bulk up. So what we should do:

• Try to eat more fat in morning than evening because we don’t use fat in night.

• Eat carbohydrates, they can dissolve into fat or into musscles(proteins)

• Proteins are good but not essential in bulking

You are not oblige to brake your everyday eating habits, just eat more and you will succeed in your bulking process.
Eat 5-6 meals per day. Do not get overeated each time - eat just not to stay hungry.
Rest, rest. REST! Sleep a lot. Sleep when you can, sleep when you want and when not -just sleep.
Stay possitive… it is importatnt if you want to reach your goals, build your mass and muscles!
About supplements:
Gainers, Creatine, BCAA.

You should just eat a lot and sleep. Supplements are not primary, but you will reach your goals faster with them. Supplements listed above are excellent choice. Use them and rest a lot - it is the key.

Don’t forget about the right weight gain  training program!

There are some exercises that are more dangerous than others. If you are a beginner (without a personal trainer) you should avoid them. Not only exercises are dangerous – your attitude to training and sport is more dangerous. There are some things that you should bare in mind when training, when dieting, when trying to build muscle. All of these things I will list down you should know as ABC.
1)Hard cardio (aerobic) can stimulate heart attack. I won’t say that you shouldn’t do cardio! Not at all. But you shouldn’t force your body, you should feel the line when your body starts to damage itself. But heart attacks does happen, even to famous athletes.

2)Improper technique on bench press. You can black out because of improper breathing – this can happen because you need to generate a lot of power and your brain can run out of oxygen giving it to muscles ( and other reasons on this one ). If there are no spotters – I hope you are lucky. People die from this time to time… breathe properly.

3)Bad attitude – acting foolish. If you want to be clown – go and scare kids on streets or whatever. You have NOTHING to do at gym. IF you lift – lift hard and concentrated. Another thing is that some people don’t take weight lifting seriously – they don’t warm up properly etc. but you should warm up and do everything right just like in the army! If you can’t do some exercise properly – replace it with some that you can. If you will act foolish you will hurt yourself badly and you can’t blame the weights about it – blame you and your attitude!

4)Don’t think of lifting as ”Little is good – more must be better!” no no no. You shouldn’t exercise too often (3 days a week is ok), you shouldn’t exercise too long (45-90 minutes is enough). Exercising with the right frequency will help you prevent injuries and over-training that can have some serious consequences. Even your immune system is wakened if you train too often and too long. You should avoid some dangerous exercises such as - behind-the-neck presses, behind-the-neck pull-downs, and squats in a Smith machine, or dips with weight hung around your waist.

5)Imbalanced weight training. If you want to build muscles and put on weight you must do it everywhere on your body equally, if you train quads, you must train hamstrings too, if you train ABS you must do some back exercises too. This can cause bad posture and even some really bad consequences. Follow only expert designed training program, even if your friend seems hell of a smartass…

6)Improper technique – this is a killer one! For example bouncing weight of your chest while doing bench press. Or bouncing the weight up while performing squats – this means a blown out knee! Injuries will haunt you all of the time, so better do everything clean.

7)Don’t lift too heavy – leave your ego outside gym. If you can’t lift it properly – don’t lift it.

8)Momentum. Every and each one of the serious athletes out there will laugh at you if you will use momentum while performing exercises. Perfect speed, technique = perfect results = perfect muscles.

You need not only to work hard, you need to work smart! You can’t use only your muscles – you must use your biggest muscles – brain. Good luck in building muscles and putting on some serious and lean mass.

Squat is a push type exercise that a lot of people avoid. But it is must-have basic exercise, especially for gaining weight and muscle mass! Some would even say “train your legs if you want to get big arms!” and I almost agree with this, because you can not build unlimited mass and gain weight on the upper body only – you must build strong body in general! Remember that.

In this article I will tell you some basics about squatting and technique.

The main muscles worked in squat are quadriceps, but squat also trains glutes, hamstrings and calves, and muscles in lower back. A squat also gives a great testosterone boost! That is because almost all of the body works when you try to stand straight with a heavy bar on your shoulders. Also squats help for better posture. So who wants to gain some serious weight, be strong, well-built and self confident?! As I thought – all of us, so read further and I will explain the basics to start squatting without injuries.
The Right Squat

At the beginning we will learn how to squat with an empty barbell. Sounds funny, but it would not be funny if you failed your squat with a really heavy bar… so let us learn the basics and then move on to the Big Things. So, place your barbell little bit lower than your shoulders are so that you can easily get it out the rack holding the bar on your shoulders. So step under the bar and place the bar on the top of your shoulders (do NOT place the bar on your neck… it can end really bad…) If the bar feels really uncomfortable you can put a towel under it, but you will get used to the bar as you squat more. Another thing – stay PERFECTLY at the centre of bar… or else you will lift more weight with one leg and this will cause misbalance, and you can end up with some injuries. When you have done all of this, grab the bar with your hands – try to keep your hands about twice as shoulder width wide. If you will hold the hand too close it will add extra stress to your shoulders. As you squat keep your feet flat on the ground, if you will struggle, you can fall down with the bar on your shoulders – that is really OUCH! Keep this all in mind and keep your back straight when you squat, look forward, not on the ground – this will also help you to keep your back straight which is very important. If you will keep all these things in head, your squat should be flawless and weight gain a lot more impressive.

For the beginning we will give you some gym training tips, stick with them and you will succeed in the ultimate fight with your so-hated extra weight.

The first thing you need to do is to perform a lot of endurance exercises ( like running, cycling, swimming etc. ). You need to do them regularly.. It is very important to lose some extra pounds.. and it is not so hard.. You just need to stick with your routine!

Training Day
Start your training with a light warm-up exercise – 10 minutes of endurance exercises (you can chose them, but the most effective is running).

Exercise (repetitions)	Set1	Set2	Set3	Set4
Barbell Incline Bench Press (10-20)				XXX
Dumbell Lunges (15-35)
Superman (20-30)				XXX
Glute Kickback (20-30)				XXX
Bench Dips (10-12)			XXX	XXX
Hammer Curl (6-10)			XXX	XXX
Air Bike (20-40)
Alternate Heel Touchers (25-35)
Ankle Circles (20-30)				XXX

*XXX – off sets

This is a one day training program. As a starter, you should go to gym for about 3 times a week.

But remember to perform the exercises with LIGHT weight, due to the  safety and effectiveness of exercises. If the exercises seem too though for  you, just drop down on weights or repetitions.

If you don’t know how to perform some of the exercises, just search the Web.

Also in addition to training program, you can use some muscle building supplements, like whey proteins, or try out some fat burners.
Good luck, and don’t go too heavy!

It is very popular to say that fat loss for women is nearly impossible. ”You will have to sacrifice everything, you just have to lose that belly fat.” But is it so? Of course not. This is a myth made up by those women who gave up, by those who find it difficult to take care of themselves, their own health and beauty.. but you are not like them!

Ok – for women it is harder to lose weight than men, because of these physiological differences. But this is possible and it is far away from impossible, and you can do it if you want! You can make men to scream for your sexy belly! Further in text I will describe why women usually fail in the process. This will give you chance to learn from others and make your way to flat belly a lot easier.

Well there are three main reasons why women usually fail. First-failure to plan and get knowledge, second-failure to keep up with the plan, third-losing weight for someone else not for themselves. If you have failed, think over why did that happen and I’m quite sure that it will be one of the reasons listed above:

1) Failure to get knowledge

You must study, study about fat loss, about your body and most important – start from the basics, and try to do it by yourself or well known specialists, because there are a lot of ‘’specialists” out there who offer their help (expensive), but they don’t really know what they are talking about. A lot better way to lose weight is searching for some friends of yours, who have succeeded in losing weight and carefully listen to them. Their experience can help… no it WILL help in your journey.

2) Failure to plan

If you want to succeed you must prepare for the battle with fat! No one have won the fight just with good luck. Don’t do as 90% of the women does – find some woman magazine, see a diet, jump on it and wait for results… this works in very rare situations ONLY. Don’t believe to those magazines, they are made because of money and that is what they need – woman buying them, they don’t care about your fat or anything else. Keep that in mind. If your successive friends (those who really lost some weight) has some diet and workout plans – perfect! Take them and maybe modify them a bit just to make sure that they will work 100% for you! There are no universal fat loss recipes, so you should stick with the basics and modify only specific things in your diet/workout.

3) YOU Don’t REALLY Want To Lose Weight.

Many woman just have a dream of flat belly and sexy butt.. but that is only a dream! You must have a strong determination to lose weight! You must think of it, not as “I want to lose weight(fat)..” but as  “I MUST lose that weight(fat)!” The first sentence sounds as “I want a candy..” So remember – strong… I mean, STRONG, determination is what really matters!

In this first edition of Top Muscle Building Exercises I will talk about chest exercises. Sorry for not starting with the so called muscle building exercise No. 1. Bench Press. I will start out with dumbbell flyes instead. But I still think that bench press is the best muscle building exercise for chest, it just gets boring to read every article about chest exercises that starts with bench press, so I will exclude BP from this article – you can read about BP in our site (Bench Press from Techniques to myths) if you want to.
So, here we go:

#1 Dumbbell flyes

This exercise is great isolation for pectorals and it preserves triceps for the subsequent exercise. This exercise will make your chest look wider. Remember that you should use spotter when performing this exercise because you can get some  serious rotator cuff injuries if you don’t.

#2 Cable crossover

This exercise is excellent for finishing your chest training routine. It will give great pump and an extra push to your muscle, like saying “cmon’ let’s grow!”! Try to perform this exercise slowly, you don’t need heavy weight to get the results in this exercise.

#3 Incline dumbbell/barbell press

No, this is not the same as bench press, bench press doesn’t work out the upper pecs efficiently enough. If you want big, gladiator-like pecs you have to do one of these.

#4 Decline  dumbbell/barbell press

Pretty much the same, gives definition to pecs, works the lower region. If you want to build serious chest you have to split your chest workout in 3 parts – upper, middle, lower chest. This is the basic exercise for lower part of pecs.

#5 Posing??!!

Well this won’t really be a muscle building exercise, this will be… posing! Yes, you heard me right – posing. When you work out you should remember that posing is important not only for competing bodybuilders but for everyone. While posing you squeeze your muscles, the same as lifting, the only difference is that you squeeze the muscle parts you want to develop more, therefore you can add the desired shape to your muscles!

Stay tuned for more muscle building exercise tops! This was just the first edition. Come back for more…!