I Failed Very Quickly
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Last night my back stopped aching. Lats, shoulders etc all were fine. So I thought I'd get back on Bodylastics and get more workouts in.
Lately I've been surfing bodybuilding sites. No, I don't want to look like Arnold Shwarzenegger. I just need to find the right info for building muscles. In the past, I understood that muscles need to rest after working out, and the period of rest is 48 hours.
However, it seems that info might have been incorrect. The websites I saw a couple of days back advocate 5 to 7 days of rest, and it's not just coming from 1 website. So I guess there must be some truth in it.
They said, although you exercise each body part "once a week" for maximal effect, it doesn't mean you workout once a week. You can still workout 3 or 4 times a week but each time you do one or 2 body parts. That way, you will complete a "full body" workout once a week, and each part rests 5 to 7 days.
Also, they advocate the HIT philosophy - High Intensity Training. In simple terms, work your muscles to failure, that's how you force them to grow. Don't need to spend hours too, as long as you achieve muscle fatigue on your workouts, you have achieved "HIT". So with this newfound information, I worked on the triceps and biceps, and a little on the legs.
I plan to do full leg workouts on Friday (now that I'm not drinking regularly anymore on Fridays). So, I pull out the Bodylastics kit, hooked the black and blue bands on (for a total of 42 pounds weight, or roughly 18.5kg) and did bicep curls.
I had planned to do 3 sets of 8.
I never completed my 3rd set.
Man, I have never reached failure that quick before. I love it! On my 4th or 5th rep in my 3rd set, I just couldn't pull anymore.
You can't really compare Isometric workouts (on the Steel Bow) to Bodylastics, since Isometrics are "push and hold" workouts. There's no "failure" to be reached. You just pull or push on the device, hold it, then release slowly and repeat for the required number of reps or sets. Well technically you can reach "failure" on the Steel Bow, if you continue to push (or pull) until you tremble. However the Steel Bow guides advises to use only 70% of your maximum strength, and hold only for 10 seconds. You can actually complete a full body workout on the Steel Bow in under 20 mins, trust me. I once completed a full body workout just watching Maggi And Me on TV with about 5 to 10 mins to spare, and it's a half-hour show!
And, as previous entries have testified, Steel Bow (and Isometrics) work. I couldn't do a single push-up before, now I can do over 20, and this was even before I got my Bodylastics kit. I had gone from 82kgs to 75kgs using just the Steel Bow and its workout chart. As of December 2007, I had completely stopped all the "mindless cardio" workouts too.
What I'm going to do now, is to run another experiment. For the next month, ie Feb 2008, I'm only going to use Bodylastics and its workout plans. No cardio. Let's see how much weight I lose, or whether I gain muscle mass. Hence tonight I will have to do some benchmarking, like doing pushups till I fail. In March or so I'll check and see if I had progressed.
Lately I've been surfing bodybuilding sites. No, I don't want to look like Arnold Shwarzenegger. I just need to find the right info for building muscles. In the past, I understood that muscles need to rest after working out, and the period of rest is 48 hours.
However, it seems that info might have been incorrect. The websites I saw a couple of days back advocate 5 to 7 days of rest, and it's not just coming from 1 website. So I guess there must be some truth in it.
They said, although you exercise each body part "once a week" for maximal effect, it doesn't mean you workout once a week. You can still workout 3 or 4 times a week but each time you do one or 2 body parts. That way, you will complete a "full body" workout once a week, and each part rests 5 to 7 days.
Also, they advocate the HIT philosophy - High Intensity Training. In simple terms, work your muscles to failure, that's how you force them to grow. Don't need to spend hours too, as long as you achieve muscle fatigue on your workouts, you have achieved "HIT". So with this newfound information, I worked on the triceps and biceps, and a little on the legs.
I plan to do full leg workouts on Friday (now that I'm not drinking regularly anymore on Fridays). So, I pull out the Bodylastics kit, hooked the black and blue bands on (for a total of 42 pounds weight, or roughly 18.5kg) and did bicep curls.
I had planned to do 3 sets of 8.
I never completed my 3rd set.
Man, I have never reached failure that quick before. I love it! On my 4th or 5th rep in my 3rd set, I just couldn't pull anymore.
You can't really compare Isometric workouts (on the Steel Bow) to Bodylastics, since Isometrics are "push and hold" workouts. There's no "failure" to be reached. You just pull or push on the device, hold it, then release slowly and repeat for the required number of reps or sets. Well technically you can reach "failure" on the Steel Bow, if you continue to push (or pull) until you tremble. However the Steel Bow guides advises to use only 70% of your maximum strength, and hold only for 10 seconds. You can actually complete a full body workout on the Steel Bow in under 20 mins, trust me. I once completed a full body workout just watching Maggi And Me on TV with about 5 to 10 mins to spare, and it's a half-hour show!
And, as previous entries have testified, Steel Bow (and Isometrics) work. I couldn't do a single push-up before, now I can do over 20, and this was even before I got my Bodylastics kit. I had gone from 82kgs to 75kgs using just the Steel Bow and its workout chart. As of December 2007, I had completely stopped all the "mindless cardio" workouts too.
What I'm going to do now, is to run another experiment. For the next month, ie Feb 2008, I'm only going to use Bodylastics and its workout plans. No cardio. Let's see how much weight I lose, or whether I gain muscle mass. Hence tonight I will have to do some benchmarking, like doing pushups till I fail. In March or so I'll check and see if I had progressed.
Labels: Bodylastics, Steel Bow, workout
