Mr. Universe Lee Labrada
The goal is to maximize the amount of work (read "stress") you place on a muscle group, during the shortest amount of training time possible. Workouts should not take more than 30-45 minutes.
Your workouts should create sufficient stress on the muscle group that you are training so that the muscle group will respond in kind through the adaptation process to create new muscle growth.
Beginners who are just getting started in bodybuilding require very little stimulation in order to achieve gains in strength and muscle size. As a beginner's body adapts to workouts however, changes need to be implemented to keep progress from coming to a halt. Bodybuilding is an endless cycle of "stress, adapt; stress adapt." In other words, during training you place a stress on the muscle. You put a load on the muscles that they temporarily cannot accommodate. In response, your body grows additional muscle tissue i.e., it adapts.
If progress comes to a halt, we call this "hitting a plateau." A training plateau is a point at which no further progress can be made without a change in training. Breaking through a training plateau and continuing to make progress is a simple matter of changing the quality or quantity of your training.
If you have hit a plateau recently, here are several things to consider in order to push through the plateau and continue to make progress.
Lee Labrada's Plateau Busting Tips
Over-training is one of the most common causes of hitting a plateau in your physical development. The first thing you should do if your progress comes to a halt is to rule out the possibility that you are over-trained. How do you know if you are over-trained? Here are some symptoms to look for: aching muscles and joints, frequent colds or illness, low energy and motivation, and sleeplessness. If you are over-training, the remedy is to take a couple of days off to allow the body to completely rejuvenate itself and then ease back into training. This works wonders!
Perform a different variation of the exercises that you normally do for a muscle group. For instance, when training my shoulders, I like to perform my shoulder presses with a straight bar. For variation, I may substitute dumbbell shoulder presses for this movement. As a simple a change as this may appear, it will place a different stress on the shoulder muscles and could help help me break through a plateau in shoulder development. The second shoulder exercise would normally be lateral dumbbell raises. Instead of performing lateral raises with a set of dumbbells as I normally would, I could do the equivalent exercise with a low cable. The idea is to vary the exercise enough to place a novel stress on the targeted muscle group. Variety in exercises not only helps you to keep the muscles growing, but it will keep your interest fresh. As they say, variety is the spice of life!
Change the stress that is applied on a muscle group by changing the amount of weight used on an exercise. This will impact the number of repetitions that you can perform. I normally recommend no more than 8-10 repetitions per set, utilizing a heavy weight and carrying the muscular group to failure (i.e., the point at which you cannot perform another unassisted repetition.) Decreasing the weight that you use in your exercises by as much as 20% on every third or fourth workout will allow you to perform more repetitions on each set, before reaching muscular failure. For example, let's say that I normally perform eight reps in the bench press with 300 lbs. on my maximum set. On a third or fourth chest workout, I will decrease the weight I use to 240 lbs., which enables me to perform 15 repetitions. This higher repetition scheme taxes different elements of the muscle and can stimulate new growth.
Change the order in which you perform exercises. Coming back to the example of the shoulders, if I normally start with some sort of pressing movement such as the military press (or the dumbbell press), followed by a lateral exercise (shoulder laterals), I will flip-flop them. In other words, I will start with laterals first, then follow that with the pressing exercise. Changing the order of exercises once again varies the stress. Performing isolation exercises (exercises that isolate the target muscle group and usually only involve one joint) such as the shoulder laterals first "pre-fatigues" or "pre-exhausts" the muscle group. Then the muscle group is "overloaded" by the compound exercise (exercise that involves not only the target muscle group, but adjacent muscle groups, and involves more than one joint) which in this case is the shoulder press. Other days, I choose to do the compound exercise first, using as much weight as possible. Each regimen has its distinct benefits.
Use forced repetitions. Forced repetitions (or assisted repetitions) are one of my favorite training tools. Once you have reached the point of failure on a set (the point at which you cannot perform another unassisted repetition) your partner assists you in performing another 1-2 repetitions. Your partner should only give you enough assistance to keep the weight moving. Once he has helped you to raise the weight, you should lower the weight under your own control. These are called "forced reps." A tremendous amount of muscle intensity can be generated using forced reps so they must be used sparingly, and I recommend that beginners stay away from them completely until they have at least 6 months of training invested. I typically use forced reps only on the last set of an exercise, and then only when I am in a high intensity training phase. Don't overdo forced reps as they will quickly lead to over-training.
By the way, make sure that your bodybilding deit will support your training. If you are not getting adequate nutrition and protein intake, your training is for naught.
If progress comes to a halt, we call this "hitting a plateau." A training plateau is a point at which no further progress can be made without a change in training. Breaking through a training plateau and continuing to make progress is a simple matter of changing the quality or quantity of your training.
If you have hit a plateau recently, here are several things to consider in order to push through the plateau and continue to make progress.
Lee Labrada's Plateau Busting Tips
Over-training is one of the most common causes of hitting a plateau in your physical development. The first thing you should do if your progress comes to a halt is to rule out the possibility that you are over-trained. How do you know if you are over-trained? Here are some symptoms to look for: aching muscles and joints, frequent colds or illness, low energy and motivation, and sleeplessness. If you are over-training, the remedy is to take a couple of days off to allow the body to completely rejuvenate itself and then ease back into training. This works wonders!
Perform a different variation of the exercises that you normally do for a muscle group. For instance, when training my shoulders, I like to perform my shoulder presses with a straight bar. For variation, I may substitute dumbbell shoulder presses for this movement. As a simple a change as this may appear, it will place a different stress on the shoulder muscles and could help help me break through a plateau in shoulder development. The second shoulder exercise would normally be lateral dumbbell raises. Instead of performing lateral raises with a set of dumbbells as I normally would, I could do the equivalent exercise with a low cable. The idea is to vary the exercise enough to place a novel stress on the targeted muscle group. Variety in exercises not only helps you to keep the muscles growing, but it will keep your interest fresh. As they say, variety is the spice of life!
Change the stress that is applied on a muscle group by changing the amount of weight used on an exercise. This will impact the number of repetitions that you can perform. I normally recommend no more than 8-10 repetitions per set, utilizing a heavy weight and carrying the muscular group to failure (i.e., the point at which you cannot perform another unassisted repetition.) Decreasing the weight that you use in your exercises by as much as 20% on every third or fourth workout will allow you to perform more repetitions on each set, before reaching muscular failure. For example, let's say that I normally perform eight reps in the bench press with 300 lbs. on my maximum set. On a third or fourth chest workout, I will decrease the weight I use to 240 lbs., which enables me to perform 15 repetitions. This higher repetition scheme taxes different elements of the muscle and can stimulate new growth.
Change the order in which you perform exercises. Coming back to the example of the shoulders, if I normally start with some sort of pressing movement such as the military press (or the dumbbell press), followed by a lateral exercise (shoulder laterals), I will flip-flop them. In other words, I will start with laterals first, then follow that with the pressing exercise. Changing the order of exercises once again varies the stress. Performing isolation exercises (exercises that isolate the target muscle group and usually only involve one joint) such as the shoulder laterals first "pre-fatigues" or "pre-exhausts" the muscle group. Then the muscle group is "overloaded" by the compound exercise (exercise that involves not only the target muscle group, but adjacent muscle groups, and involves more than one joint) which in this case is the shoulder press. Other days, I choose to do the compound exercise first, using as much weight as possible. Each regimen has its distinct benefits.
Use forced repetitions. Forced repetitions (or assisted repetitions) are one of my favorite training tools. Once you have reached the point of failure on a set (the point at which you cannot perform another unassisted repetition) your partner assists you in performing another 1-2 repetitions. Your partner should only give you enough assistance to keep the weight moving. Once he has helped you to raise the weight, you should lower the weight under your own control. These are called "forced reps." A tremendous amount of muscle intensity can be generated using forced reps so they must be used sparingly, and I recommend that beginners stay away from them completely until they have at least 6 months of training invested. I typically use forced reps only on the last set of an exercise, and then only when I am in a high intensity training phase. Don't overdo forced reps as they will quickly lead to over-training.
By the way, make sure that your bodybilding deit will support your training. If you are not getting adequate nutrition and protein intake, your training is for naught.
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