How to Build More Muscle & Lose More Fat by Changing Your Training Variables

Anyone who has worked out regularly for any length of time knows that the human body quickly adapts to just about any exercise routine you can throw at it. Once that happens, muscle building and fat loss progress can slow dramatically. Here's a great article about changing up your "training variables" in order to stay on the fast track to creating a great-looking body...

Build Muscle and Lose Fat Easier by Manipulating Your Training Variables!

By Mike Geary

Everyone will inadvertently hit a frustrating plateau in their training at one time or another. You're cruising along for a while, gaining strength, losing fat, looking better, and then all of the sudden it hits. Suddenly, you find yourself even weaker than before on your lifts, or you find that you've gained back a couple of pounds. It happens to everyone. Most of the time, these plateaus occur because people rarely change their training variables over time. Many people stick to the same types of exercises for the same basic sets and reps and rest periods with the same boring cardio routine. Well, I hope to open your mind and bring some creativity to your workouts with this article!

There are many ways that you can strategically modify your training variables to assure that you maximize your fat loss and/or muscle building response to exercise. Most people only think about changing their sets and reps performed, if they even think about changing their routine at all. However, other variables that can dramatically affect your results are changing the order of exercises (sequence), exercise grouping (super-setting, circuit training, tri-sets, etc.), exercise type (multi-joint or single joint, free-weight or machine based), the number of exercises per workout, the amount of resistance, the time under tension, the base of stability (standing, seated, on stability ball, one-legged, etc.), the volume of work (sets x reps x distance moved), rest periods between sets, repetition speed, range of motion, exercise angle (inclined, flat, declined, bent over, upright, etc), training duration per workout, and training frequency per week.

Sounds like a lot of different training aspects to consider in order to obtain the best results from your workouts, doesn't it? Well, that's where a knowledgeable personal trainer can make sense of all of this for you to make sure that your training doesn't get stale. Below are a few examples to get your mind working to come up with more creative and result producing workouts.

Most people stick to workouts where they do something along the lines of 3 sets of 10-12 reps per exercise, with 2-3 minutes rest between sets. Booooorrrrring! Here are a few examples of different methods to spice up your routine.

•Try 10 sets of 3, with only 20 seconds rest between sets.

•Try using a heavier weight and complete 6 sets of 6 reps, doing a 3 minute treadmill sprint between each weight lifting set.

•Try using a near maximum weight and do 10 sets of 1 rep, with 30 seconds rest between sets.

•Try using a lighter than normal weight and do 1 set of 50 reps for each exercise

•Try a workout based on only one full body exercise, such as barbell clean & presses or dumbbell squat & presses, and do nothing but that exercise for an intense 20 minutes.

•Try a workout based on all bodyweight exercises such as pushups, pull-ups, chin-ups, dips, bodyweight squats, lunges, etc.

•Try a circuit of 12 different exercises covering the entire body without any rest between exercises.

•Try that same 12 exercise circuit on your subsequent workout, but do the entire circuit in the reverse order.

•Try your usual exercises at a faster repetition speed on one workout and then at a super-slow speed on your next workout.

•Try completing five 30 minute workouts one week, followed by three 1-hr workouts the next week.

•Try doing drop sets of all of your exercises, where you drop the weight between each set and keep doing repetitions without any rest until complete muscular fatigue (usually about 5-6 sets in a row).

There are many more ways to continue to change your training variables. I hope this article gave you some ideas on methods for you to take your body to the next level.

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About the Author

Michael Geary is a nationally dual certified personal trainer (NCSF-CPT, AFAA-CPT), and author of The Truth about Six Pack Abs. Visit TruthAboutAbs.com to receive your own personalized metabolic rate calculator as well as 4 of my secret hard-body workout routines - both FREE.

Tags: Mike Geary, build muscle, lose fat, fitness training, weight loss plateau, strength training

Functional Exercise for Optimum Fitness

I'm a huge believer in working out to develop "functional" fitness and strength. This can only happen if forget about weight machines and focus instead on bodyweight movements as well as free weight exercises. Here's a great article about functional exercise that goes into more detail...

Functional Exercise That Makes Sense
By Ben Greenfield

Many people spend the majority of their workout time building non-functional muscles that rely on hinges and bolts to function properly. That's right - I'm talking about working out on weight machines. Weight machines have a strong application towards:

1) helping to provide stability and support for a weak muscle (i.e., just starting into an exercise routine or coming off a long break);

2) helping to provide a safe motion when balance is a factor (i.e., individuals with neuromuscular deficits);

3) assisting in fitness maintainance during an injury (i.e., performing leg extensions when rehabilitating a sprained ankle).

The rest of the time, people who work out on weight machines are simply building muscle that has no significant functional application. By this, I mean that none of the small, stabilizing muscles have to work to support the major muscle groups that are exerted during a repetition on a weight machine, because the machine is providing the stabilization. Therefore, the major muscle groups are strengthened, but when an individual is no longer supported by the weight machine, they simply have a muscle that can provide a strong contraction with little to no support from the other stabilizing muscles. While this is completely counterproductive for an athlete, it can also cause injury to the average fitness enthusiast.

Take, for example, the machine shoulder press, an exercise in which you sit your butt in a back-supported chair and press overhead two handles attached to a lever. Normally, in an everday situation, if you were to press a weight overhead, or exert a force in that direction, you would not be in a seated position and the item you are pressing overhead (i.e., a milk crate, a child, a basketball, etc.) would not be supported by a lever. Furthermore, the machine moves straight up and down, whereas a free object moves in countless planes of motion (i.e., up and down, side to side, around, etc.). The absence of multiple ranges or planes of motion basically means that you are getting a very strong contraction from the deltoid (the main "overhead presser"), while completely ignoring the rotational muscles (i.e., the rotator cuff), the stabilizing muscles (i.e., the neck), and the supporting muscles (i.e. the feet, legs, hips, torso, etc.). So let's say you're out playing catch and throw a baseball. The deltoid is able to produce a very strong force, but if the rotator cuff, or other supporting muscles such as the low back, are not in the same shape, you're either going to tear your rotator cuff or throw your low back out. And that, my friends, is why weight machines can often cause more harm than good (not to mention the fact that they burn up to 1/4 the calories of the exercises I'm going to talk about next).

I'd like to briefly introduce you to functional exercises, the alternative to working out with machines. The best way to think about functional exercises is to picture the primal man or woman (we're talking caveman type). Functional movement patterns simulate many of the same movements our "primal ancestors" would have had to perform in order to survive in an unpredictable environment, whether tracking a wild animal (or being chased by one!), lifting objects such as logs and rocks, or fighting via swinging, throwing, and pulling (such as a bow). Let's split these functional movement patterns into seven basic types.

-Squatting: Involves bending at the knees and the hips, while keeping the back straight, and lifting a weight from the ground or pushing a weight that is placed on the back or chest. Imagine your primal ancestors squatting down and lifting a heavy rock to dig for grubs, or using the legs and hips to lift a heavy log up onto a primal structure. Exercise examples: Barbell or Dumbbell Squat, Squat to Press.

-Bending: Involves flexing and extending at the waist, preferably in a standing position. Often, this type of movement would have been combined with a squatting, lifting, or rotating motion, such as hoisting a heavy rock out of a field. Exercise examples: Medicine Ball Overhead or Side Throw, Deadlifts.

-Lunging: Involves stepping forward with just one leg, and bending that leg down. This motion would have been used for either traversing terrain (i.e., carrying hunted game over a log), or stepping into a throw (such as hoisting a spear). Exercise examples: Walking Lunge, Barbell or Dumbbell Weighted Lunge, Medicine Ball Lunge with Twist.

-Pushing: Involves using the arms, chest, and shoulders to force a weight out and away or up from the body, an action that might have been used, for example, when herding animals, pushing a plow, or hoisting a weight overhead. Exercise examples: Standing Cable Chest Press, Push-up, Standing Dumbbell Shoulder Press.

-Pulling: Involves using the arms, chest, and shoulders, as well as the legs, to drag or pull a weight towards the body. This type of motion would have been used to pull heavy game animals, row a watercraft, pull a bow, or quickly pull onto a tree branch for safety. Exercise examples: Standing High, Mid, and Low Cable Rows, Pull-ups.

-Twisting: Involves turning and rotating with the torso to apply a force, and would have usually been combined with most of the other primal movement patterns for actions such as pulling, pushing, or lunging. For instance, a twist combine with a lunge and push would comprise a throwing motion, such as hoisting an object like a spear or heavy rock. Exercise examples: Medicine Ball Throws, Cable Torso Twists, Medicine Ball Woodchoppers.

-Gait: Involves moving over terrain, whether walking, jogging, or sprinting. This action would often have been interspersed with other movement patterns, such as walking to track a wild animal, sprinting to hunt it down, then twisting, lunging, and pushing to throw or thrust a weapon. Exercise examples: Sprint to Medicine Ball Throw, Dumbbell Lift and Press to Power Skip.

As you can see, there are countless ways that these movement patterns could be combined to design a workout routine, but there are only a few *optimum* choices. A personal trainer is equipped with the knowledge to put these movement patterns together into a routine that allows for the ideal balance between muscle groups, efficient caloric burning, fat utilization, and metabolic boosting, and injury avoidance. Imagine how much fitter you could be by incorporating all these patterns into your routine, while only using weight machines now and then for some of the reasons mentioned in the beginning of this article.

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About the Author

Head trainer Ben Greenfield runs the online training website Pacific Elite Fitness, and holds Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Sport Science and Exercise Physiology, as well as certifications from the National Strength and Conditioning Association as a Personal Trainer and Strength and Conditioning Coach (NSCA-CPT & CSCS). For over 6 years, Ben has coached and trained professional, collegiate, and recreational athletes, and helped hundreds of individuals achieve their personal fitness goals. For more information on online personal training and fitness, contact Ben at elite@pacificfit.net

Tags: functional fitness, exercise, free weights, weight machines, workout equipment, strength, muscle