No Need Fitness: Tempe

Five Minute plank. :)

The core Challenges :)

The Shoulder Press

The next part of the lift is basically a standing shoulder press . In a regular shoulder press you don’t want to get your legs involved at all.
In this case, using your legs is part of the exercise. Going from the front squat to the press should be one fluid motion.
When you get the bar over your head, make sure you bring your head through so that your biceps are right by your ears. Don’t let the bar float away from you to the front or the back. It should be directly over your head.
As you lower the bar back down to the starting position on your front rack, absorb the weight of the bar into the next front squat. That will prevent bar from slamming down on your shoulders and your spine getting a nice shock.

Repeat this cycle 3 times a day and start seeing results in just weeks.

The Front Rack

This is the starting position of the thruster. You want your upper arm parallel with the floor. Your elbows should be bent and your fingers are stretched backwards, tucked under the bar. If you keep your elbows up, your anterior deltoids should create a nice shelf for the bar to sit on.

Beginners say:

“I want to gain 20 pounds of muscle and start eating healthier.”
“I want to lose 15 pounds of fat and cut all carbs.”
“I want to workout 6 times a week and start running every morning at 6am.”

Tackling a mammoth goal all at once leads to failure: you’ll exhaust your limited amount of time, willpower, and energy. You’ll also frustrate yourself because it takes so long to achieve.

Instead, break that massive goal into smaller, easier steps:

“I’m going to switch from machines to free weights to build more muscle and strength.”
“I’m going to increase the weight on my squat by five pounds each time.”
“I’m going to eat at least 150 grams of protein every day.”

These are all simple habits you can measure, use to build confidence, and get you closer to your overarching goal.

Take your pick.

THE COMPLETE 4-WEEK BEGINNER'S WORKOUT PROGRAM

In the realm of fitness, three-month programs dominate the landscape. You’ve even seen plenty of them in this magazine over the years. Are they effective? Absolutely. But we’re going to let you in on an interesting secret: It doesn’t necessary take eight or 12 weeks to get your feet wet in the gym. Not that you’ll be a seasoned vet after four weeks, but if you can just get that first month under your belt, you’ll get yourself over the proverbial hump where so many fail and give up, and set the stage for a lifetime of gains.

Let’s just call this the accelerated beginner’s guide to bodybuilding. In this plan, your first month of training will be demanding, but not so demanding as to cause injury (or worse yet, burnout), and progressive in the sense that each week you’ll graduate to different exercises, higher volume, more intensity or all of the above. After four weeks you’ll not only be ready for the next challenge but you’ll have built a significant amount of quality muscle. In other words, one month from now you’ll look significantly better with your shirt off than you look now. (How’s that for results?)

This program isn’t just for the true beginner who has never touched a weight before; it’s also suitable for anyone who has taken an extended leave of absence from training. How long has it been since you went to the gym regularly? Six months? A year? Five years? No worries: The following routines will get you back on track in — you guessed it — just four short weeks. Let’s get to work.

WEEK 1: WHOLE IN ONE
You’ll begin the program with a full-body training split, meaning you’ll train all major bodyparts in each workout (as opposed to “splitting up” your training). Train three days this first week, performing just one exercise per bodypart in each session. It’s important that you have a day of rest between each workout to allow your body to recover; this makes training Monday, Wednesday and Friday — with Saturday and Sunday being rest days — a good approach.

The exercises listed in Week 1 are a collection of basic moves that, while also used by advanced lifters, we feel are suitable for the beginner as well. Notice we’re not starting you off with only machine exercises; a handful of free-weight movements are present right off the bat. Reason being, these are the exercises you need to master for long-term gains in muscular size and strength, so you may as well start learning them now. Carefully read all exercise descriptions, starting on page, before attempting them yourself.

In Week 1 you’ll perform three sets of every exercise per workout, which over the course of the week adds up to nine sets total for each bodypart, a good starting volume for your purposes. With the exception of crunches for abs, you’ll do 8–12 reps per set. This rep scheme is widely considered ideal for achieving gains in muscle size (the scientific term is hypertrophy) and is commonly employed by amateur and pro bodybuilders alike.

Notice in the workouts below that your first set calls for eight reps, your second set 10 reps and your third set 12. This is referred to in bodybuilding circles as a “reverse pyramid” (a standard pyramid goes from higher to lower reps), where you decrease the weight each set to complete the higher rep count. For example, if on your first set of lat pulldowns you used 140 pounds for eight reps, try using 120 or 130 pounds on set two and 100–120 pounds on set three.

Be honest with yourself about how much effort you’re putting in. You can’t expect the best results if you know your not putting forth your best effort.

If you're a fan of bodybuilding I'm sure you've seen pictures of the various champions of our sport, and how different all of their arms look. Basically all IFBB pros have absolutely huge arms, but it is amazing how uniquely all of them are shaped. Some guys have extreme peaks on their biceps, while others have more length and/or roundness. Many pros have biceps or triceps that are rather short, inserting well before they reach the elbow, while others have muscle bellies with seemingly no end. Look at photos of Coleman vs. Levrone, Arnold vs. Lou, or Kai vs. Wolf, and you will see six pairs of utterly massive, but yet completely different looking arms.

The question is, did all of these unique shapes come about from various training techniques or special exercises, or are they simply a function of genetics? The answer is, “a little of one and a lot of the other.” Yes, the role of genetics is huge, as we can do nothing about how our muscles insert, nor how they are shaped (for the most part). However, what we can do is utilize certain exercises that either target a specific “head” of a muscle, or create the illusion that you have enhanced a specific portion of a muscle. In other words, while we cannot alter the genetic map for specific muscles, we can change the overall look of the landscape by throwing a little extra dirt on just the right spots.