Hi EC, Ok I'd like some opinions on these things if anyone has any idea what's going on. First off - Muscles. I've been doing weight lifting lately as I feel I'm too weak, I started about a week ago, laying on the floor pushing a heavy weight up then down, up then down etc. At first I could do 20 in a row, later during the week I could do 30, and I noticed my arms were noticably bigger than when I started. Now, I struggle to do 10-15 and my arms appear to have shrunk, only very slightly bigger than when I first started, have I pulled something in my arm? It doesn't hurt or anything... It just feels weak. Second - Sweating While playing games as of today for the first time I have come across this - I was not hot AT ALL yet was sweating a huge amount, more than I usually do when I actually am hot. This is probably nothing but what can cause this? I was not hot in the slightest, not cold but definitely not hot.
You gotta let your muscles rest. I think the usual schedule to build strength is to lift 2-3 times a week, not sure about all this though. Also if your just trying to build strength I heard you should be doing more reps and less weight, Opposite if your trying to gain muscles. I don't know what you've been doing or for how long but you gotta start slow and work your way up. No clue about your second question. Sorry if I wasn't much help, Not a real expert on these things but I did read up on it awhile back. Kind of.
You won't be able to see any noticeable increase in muscle size after a week. What you are describing is called the 'pump', where your muscles are engorged as they are being used. It is only temporary and they will go back to normal size shortly after you stop exercising. As Subwoofer said you are feeling weak because your muscles are tired and are trying to repair themselves after the workout - it is this repair that leads to increased size and strength. If you exercise while they are still repairing then you never give them a chance to repair, so you'll see little progress. A good guideline is to have a full week of rest before working out a particular muscle again - so if you did arms on Monday, wait until the next Monday before doing arms again. You can exercise other parts of your body on the other days between then. This is only a guideline though, the rest period can be shorter depending on what exercise you are doing and how intense it is. If your muscles are still sore though, then it is definitely too early to exercise them again. The good news is that, if your muscles do feel tired, you're exercising them effectively. You can read more about it on the Wikipedia article: Delayed onset muscle soreness - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (DOMS does seem to go away for most people after a while, so it isn't the only indicator of a good workout, but if you do have it...) Muscle size and strength are pretty much directly correlated, so if you want to increase your strength then you'll have to increase your size. That means high weight with low reps. High reps with less weight will improve your endurance but your strength won't be increasing a great deal. If you are just beginning then you should probably start off focusing on endurance and getting some baseline fitness before increasing the weight too much. I don't know anything about sweating either, sorry.
Great information thanks Ridiculous! A question - How long should I work out in the day during the week? I was doing about 20 mins workout 3 times a day for about 3 days-ish, should I do like 1-2 hours one day a week? Will my muscles feel perfectly fine after the 1 week wait?
You probably wouldn't have to wait for a full week, seeing as you're just beginning so won't be working at maximum intensity. See how long it takes for the soreness to go away, and then give it an extra day or two and that should be long enough. This may only end up being 4 days or so. That's a difficult question to answer . Everyone is an individual and can handle different things, so you'll probably have to just go and try and figure out what works for you and your schedule. However, some general advice: When you are doing resistance exercise, you want to have as much energy as possible so you can get the most out of the workout. This pretty much means just doing one session a day. If you do more than this, during the second and third workout sessions you'll be operating at a less than optimal level, which will reduce how effective those sessions are - plus this has the added effect of preventing your body from being able to rest after the first workout. However if you can't separate these onto different days for whatever reason, then it's probably better to do them on the same day rather than just skipping one of them. My routine is (which I'm not suggesting you should follow, by the way): Monday: core Tuesday: biceps and forearms Wednesday: legs and butt Thursday: chest and triceps Friday: shoulders and back where each session takes about 20-30 minutes, and then that's all I do for the day. If I'm pressed for time I can bump them onto the weekend, or join two into one day (e.g. do 20 minutes of core followed by 20 minutes of biceps on Monday, then nothing on Tuesday). For you, you can combine these by doing compound exercises. For example you could cover shoulders, chest and triceps in one exercise by doing pushups. Compound exercises are great for beginners as they exercise a wide range of muscles and bring them all up to standard, rather than focusing on a specific muscle which can lead to injuries if it gets out of balance with the rest of your body. General advice is to spread it out as much a possible so you can give your body as much time to recover as you can. The recovery period is where the progress comes from!
Hmm ok thanks. Also butt exercises? What does that do? Can it make your butt bigger? If so what do you do? :lol: What do you do for shoulder exercises too? I wouldn't mind broader shoulders.
Yes . I find lunges target my butt pretty well. Shoulder press and side raises for shoulders, however I wouldn't recommended these unless you are using low weight. Pullups are a good compound exercise that target shoulders, which you could try.
I suggest you talk to a personal trainer at your gym. He can help you set up a training program that suits your body and needs. He knows exactly which exercises will get you the results you want and how many times/with what weight you have to do that to get the best and healthiest result. (which takes time, by the way; don't hope for fast results!)
I've been weight training for a few years. Every one in a while I have to take a break. I will find that after a while I get into what I call "Oh this is so heavy" mode. When that happens I take a few days off. A lot of it is in your mind, you just get burned out and need a break. I can't do lunges as my back is still healing. They thought me a few new exercises at physical therapy. These are a couple of good glute ones. Leg Lift Exercise Guide and Video Butt Lift (Bridge) Exercise Guide and Video
You said when playing games you were sweating, we're talking physical activity games? or Video games? I have to ask because if it's physical activities it's quite clear why you were sweating. Even if you weren't feeling hot, your body releases sweat as a way to cool you off. You don't have to FEEL hot for your body to still be hot. Remember that your body heat isn't something that just stays at 98.6 degrees at all times, physical activity exerts your body causing it to heat up, this heat is then regulated by your body through the release of sweat from your body. So just because you didn't feel hot like on a hot summer's day does not mean your body wasn't hot.
I believed all my teenage life believing that as true xD oh well. Thanks! (!) ---------- Post added 8th Apr 2012 at 08:24 PM ---------- :eek: You're so tall
