Than how do I start off? How much resistance should I add on? When do I know I should add more weight?
[quote]subflood wrote:
Than how do I start off? How much resistance should I add on? When do I know I should add more weight?[/quote]
Did you read these posts that Fonebone linked to yet?
http://www.T-Nation.com/readTopic.do?id=550116
http://www.T-Nation.com/readTopic.do?id=640350
Read, learn, lift, eat, sleep, repeat.
The articles here are better than asking in an open forum where anyone can answer and cause confusion. There are many advanced, and good posters here, but why take the chance?
You can also go into the locker rooms of any of the authors on this site to ask more specific questions, just get a little background through the articles before asking them something:
The authors are all here to help, where just some of the posters here are.
You can also ask questions in the articles themselves if the question is specific to the article.
[quote]subflood wrote:
As far as dropping the weight used just to get 2 more reps, clearly someone has confused you. The goal is to get stronger, not just to do a set number of reps. In other words, it makes no sense at all to drop the weight used simply because you lifted it 6 times instead of 8.
Than how do I start off? How much resistance should I add on? When do I know I should add more weight?[/quote]
You’ll have to excuse me, but I have a hard time understanding your state of confusion. I remember being a beginner and walking into a gym for the first time and feeling small as hell. I remember competing with other guys as far as who could bench more. I never asked, “where do I start?”. The reason is, you start wherever you start at. If that weight is too light and you aren’t breaking a sweat, you add more weight. If the weight is too heavy and you can’t even do one rep, then you drop the weight. I never would have done a weight for six reps and thought I needed to drop the weight just to get 8 reps. That makes no sense. I would have kept at that weight until I was able to get it up for more reps. Once that weight became easier, I would then go up in weight again. This shit isn’t rocket science.
Ok, I went to read some of the articles you guys linked to and decided to design my own program using this page as my guide: http://www.T-Nation.com/readTopic.do?id=459411
My goals are to focus on increasing strength and muscle size evenly and therefore decided to go with 5 set x 5 reps.
I’m still however confused at setting the load. Should I stay at 80% of max RM load for 4 sets and then increase the load to make my final set the hardest but still possible? Like I said I want to get a balance between hypertrophy and strength.
Like Prof X said, just adjust based on your performance. When you are first starting out, it takes you a while to learn your body (hell, people who have been training for 10 years are probably still learning things about themselves). So if you are trying to get 5x5, throw a weight that you think might be good and see how that works. If you get 2 or 3 sets of 5 and can’t quite get 5 reps for the last 2 or 3 sets, keep the weight the same until you can get 5x5. If you can’t even get 1 set of 5, drop the weight a little bit. If you get 5 full sets of 5, do more weight the next time.
I will say this, as a beginning trainer, you will be better to error on the side of trying to push yourself too hard- providing you keep your form right. As a broad generalization, beginners need to learn how to push themselves harder and advanced athletes need to learn how to back off better.
On a final note, don’t be so worried about making your first few workouts perfect. Everybody’s first few workouts suck because you have no clue how to lift. The key is to just make each workout better than the last.
I know you are taking shit for the pathetic weights you are using, but just use that as motivation. What will really be pathetic is if you are still benching the same weight in 6 months. Then you will deserve the ridicule!
[quote]subflood wrote:
Ok, I went to read some of the articles you guys linked to and decided to design my own program using this page as my guide: http://www.T-Nation.com/readTopic.do?id=459411
My goals are to focus on increasing strength and muscle size evenly and therefore decided to go with 5 set x 5 reps.
I’m still however confused at setting the load. Should I stay at 80% of max RM load for 4 sets and then increase the load to make my final set the hardest but still possible? Like I said I want to get a balance between hypertrophy and strength.
[/quote]
Jesus. Man, it’s not that complicated. Just lift the weight you’re at until it’s easier, then add weight. And by easier, I mean easier by the next session not the same workout.
At this stage you don’t need to be worrying about percentages or anything.
-Firepluug
Lifting the same weight for 1.5 week is NOT a plateau.
How many BP sessions do you have each week?