Nutrition What you do in the weight room and how hard you work out is only part of the equation. You have to take care of your body in order to gain muscle. Getting plenty of good clean protein and carbs is important. Carbs are your fuel for energy and proteins are the building blocks of muscle. Supplements can be very effective. 1. Whey protein. This is the most important supplement and the only one that is really absolutely necessary. There are other ones that are important and help but this is the most important. It is digested quickly and get’s to the muscles right away to replenish. Take about 25 grams immediately post work out. Most servings will be 1 scoop, which will usually be in that 17-‐26 grams range. 2. Creatine. There are 4 types of creatine: monohydrate, kre-‐alkalyn (ph adjusted which is 40% more absorptive than monohydrate), ethyl ester (ester molecule attached, also 40% more), creatine HCL (70% better) Creatine will help put on muscle and increase recovery time so you can lift more sooner. I notice increases in strength when I take creatine. I would recommend creatine HCL since it’s the most absorptive. Monohydrate can cause bloating and you have to drink a lot of water with it so I wouldn’t be as prone to take that. 3. BCAAs. All muscle is made up of proteins which are made up of amino acids. There are 3 types of amino acids called branch chain amino acids, which are particularly vital in gaining muscle. You can mix bcaa’s in water and take during your workout. 4. Glutamine. This is an amino acid that can be taken during your workout as well. Similar to bcaa’s it is an important amino acid in muscle growth and recovery. 5. Multi Vitamin. A good vitamin will just provide you with vitamins and nutrients important to your body’s function and will help promote health and strength. 6. Casein Protein. This is the protein found in milk. It is slow digesting protein that you can take at night. It will provide a constant stream of protein to your muscles as you sleep to promote growth. Workout There are all sorts of objectives here and much could be written. Three important lifts are bench, squats, and clean and press. These are all multi-‐joint lifts, which add strength in important areas applicable to sports. To gain muscle you have to do high weight and reps of about 8-‐10. There are all sorts of variations with sets and what not, but it is good to warm up properly to get up to high weight and to go hard and then do drop sets. You can “pyramid” it so you are going up and then down in weight and reps. At the top of the pyramid you can only get about 2-‐3 reps. Bench-‐ different bench workouts that can be done: for an example on bench (I’m not sure what you do on bench but here is a hypothetical workout, just for the idea)
Warm up set: 115 x 10 135 x 10 155 x 8 175x 5 185 x 3 155 x 8 Other good bench workouts are doing negative eccentric sets. Where you do a little more weight than you would normally do. You take it down on a 5 second count nice and slow and you have a spotter pull it up. You can do cluster building where you take a weight you could normally do about 7 or 8 reps of and you do 10 reps by taking small 12 second rests. So you do 5 reps and re-‐rack for 12 sec, 3 reps and re-‐rack/ rest, then 2 reps. Your body barely registers the rest so it is like you are doing 10 reps of a weight you normally couldn’t do 10 times. Matching muscle groups: I have found it best to match synergistic muscle groups so doing back and biceps together and doing triceps, shoulders, and chest together. You can also do opposing muscle groups like pairing chest with back. To not wear out one muscle group you can circuit the different exercises. So after doing shoulder press for example, you can then do tri’s, and then bench. If you’re really trying to get a good bench workout though then don’t do anything else in between as it will tire out your muscles and may prevent you from getting high weight on bench. So there are different options and variations for working out as you can see, and many can be effective. A potential workout could look something like this: Chest • • •
Bench press (cluster build, and negatives) (flat, incline, and decline) Dumbbell press Fly’s
Shoulders • • •
Shoulder Press bar/ dumbbell Lateral and horizontal raise Clean and press
Triceps • • •
Rope pulldowns Dips Skull crushers
•
Close grip bench
Abs • • • • •
Weighted sit ups on decline bench Leg swings Plank Leg lift On incline bench grab seat behind and raise knees to chest
Mix in 1 or 2 sets of pullups for variation And with something like that I may do more bench press like 5 or 6 sets where each one of the tricep workouts I’m doing 2 or 3 sets of 10 reps. It just depends what you are going for and typically bigger muscle groups you can do more of, and when doing bench press you are working your triceps too. You can do similar workouts for your lower body. Strengthening your legs and core are key. Squats are great and really are a full body exercise. When you squat you want your butt to be out a bit kind of like you are going to sit down, and you want to drive through your heels, and do not allow your knees to go over your toes. You can do front squats too where you balance the bar on the front of your chest. This will allow you to go lower, having a bigger range of motion and will also bring your core and back muscles stabilizing the bar into play more. With front squats your knees will go over your toes. Running-‐ running is key to any athlete. Being in better shape is a part of your identity as an athlete that can be gained through conditioning and will give you such an edge. You can have all the skill in the world but when you get fatigued and can no longer utilize that skill it is no good. Mixing up running workouts can be beneficial to keep in shape and also increase speed. Running 4-‐5 miles 3-‐4 times a week is good. Doing long slow runs is good for conditioning. Also doing a very fast timed mile is good. Working on speed doing 40, 60, 100 yard sprints is good. An example of a track workout could be: Run a warm up mile and stretch out well. Then as fast as you can for each, with breaks in between: 1600 800 400 100
Another good workout is see how many sub 6 minute miles you can do in a row with 3 minutes rest in between each one. For a 6 min mile, you want 1:30, 400 splits.