Soul Splint

Jealous. I strained something in the arch of my left foot several months ago during a sprint and it has yet to go away, despite me taking it easy on leg exercises that place stress on it. There's really nothing to replace all out sprints for all the muscles they hit. And it is sometimes funny to see the alarmed looks on people's faces as you blur down the road, especially if you live in a subdivision...

Well, you can't turn existing weight into muscle. But the presence of more muscle helps your body to burn more calories while at rest, so putting muscle on actually can be a good thing for guys who are looking to slim down. I guarantee that if you address your diet and lift heavy weights, the overall effect (at least at first) will be a slimming one, especially for guys who were not that active beforehand. @zircon: Muchos respect for your effort; many people give up quickly when they first start doing that. But as you said, it can be really enlightening to see just how much you are actually eating in a day. You'll be seeing some serious changes!

Woooooooooot!

Win. Have to tell you guys, I recently was privy to a training/eating schedule distributed by a "personal trainer" who apparently has helped many people get into competition shape. The plan was called "16-day shred," and the amount of crap and broscience on it was staggering. These included, but were not limited to: Making sure to eat every 2-3 hours to increase metabolism Rep ranges that never go below 12 (I'm guessing to achieve "tone") Squats on the Smith Machine (actually specified, for no reason, and I know for a fact the client has no injury requiring Smith Squats) Carb-heavy breakfasts, no identifiable reason (also gives no relation to time of training sessions, which is IMO the only viable reason to have a meal above 40-50% carb) The best part? This "PT" charges people $180 for this plan. I think it's time to change careers.

They should be getting stronger in the long run, but you may have accumulated some inflammation through increased recent activity. You may want to try staying off of them (exercise-wise) for a week or so, or better yet, talk to a physical therapist. Typically though, a week off with some ibuprofen fixes problems like this for me.

It's cool ; speaking for myself, I enjoy helping others out with fitness, and I suspect others in here feel the same way. The exercise you're describing sounds like a variant of a flat leg raise, but it may not be in the database on Fitocracy. You may want to just track it as a flat straight or flat bent leg raise, then make a note in your tracking of exactly what you're doing.

Yay, four plates on T-Bar rows today, for medium reps. I really, really wish other parts of my body would progress as quickly as my back has been. #WhereMyChesticles

There are tons of variations on squats you can try. Jumping lunges will primarily target your quads and glutes, so you could throw in some front squats and goblet squats to hit both of those areas pretty well. Youtube them to check out proper form. I know you don't have access to weights, but even holding some random object that weighs 5-10 pounds while doing these will really boost your results

Well, it may be a Smith Machine, but the weight would still probably shoot my spine through my ass, so kudos there anyway. Random progress report on me: about six months ago, I tried to do an L-sit chinup, and couldn't quite get it. Today, I randomly decided to try again (at the end of my workout, mind you) and did SEVEN with full ROM. All ur gold starz r belong 2 me.

You found him! And two other random dudes standing really close to him...I mean his arms.

Definitely more muscular now than I was last year. Plan to continue. Yo Rock, where you at?!

If they are still on there, Banjo-Kazooie and Banjo-Tooie. Because because. Not indies, but definitely close to the era you requested. If you want to go a bit more modern, I had a lot of fun with Torchlight.

What do you mean by actual and effective?

Heh, yeah, I'm a wee bit more stretched out. To me it looks like your fat intake may be a little low, and for me, bumping up my fat consumption made some very noticable differences. You're getting some saturated fats in cheese, eggs, beef and pork, but you definitely appear to be lacking in your unsaturated fats. Avocados, nuts, seeds, fatty fish, etc. And if you're doing all the other things right, as you say you are, then it's time to start exploring other options such as High-Intensity Interval Training (especially sprints) and perhaps Intermittent Fasting (which has also helped me).

Not quite 6'3.

That is called the pallof press; it's good for isolating your obliques, although it's more effective if you have your arms extended. Guize! My first three-plate deadlift yesterday! Three reps; the last rep I rounded a bit, but I'm counting it. It's my right as a former skinny bastard.

Well, what's your bodyfat percentage like? If it's fairly low (10 or lower), then it may that you just don't have much core muscle. There's a billion good ways to work your core, but it's probably best that we first correctly identify what's holding you back right now. Would you be up to posting some stuff to help us help you, such as a sample of your daily diet or physique photos? And by the way, it is entirely possibly that you are simply the victim of less-than-stellar genetics. It is for this reason that regardless of how hard I try, I will never have a well-developed chest. Shoulders, arms, back, legs, core, all good, but I will be forever boobless compared to other physiques.

You cannot spot reduce fat. Despite what infomercials or training programs might try to tell you about toning certain muscles (by toning they mean building that muscle and reducing the fat around it), it's just not true. All the fat on your body is lost at the same rate, and you drop fat by burning more calories than you consume. Because you're a beginner, I would recommend googling TDEE to find out what your Total Daily Energy Expenditure number is--the number of calories you generally burn in one day. Then, for a couple of days, count your calorie intake (just google your food + the word calories and it will come up) to get an idea of how many calories you're generally taking in compared to your TDEE. Then, aim to consume 300-500 less calories per day than your TDEE. Although you don't like strength training, the more lean muscle you have, the more fat your body burns at rest, so please give some more serious thought to doing more resistance/strength training. It would also be beneficial to you to try and aim for certain macros in your eating. Macros refers to the percentage of protein, carbs, and fats your calories are coming from. For fat loss, I typically aim for about 40% protein, 30% carbs, and 30% fat, but you may want to tweak those. Feel free to PM me if you have questions or want more info. I'm sure OA, XPRT, Argle (and possibly Ecto, if he's around) can chime in with more info as well.

Argle, feel free to hate this guy too. That is just ridiculous for less than 2 months training. I would be proud to get a clean set of 10 on 200 pounds right now, and I've been training squats for...a while. Seriously good job. You gotta post some pics of your first four-plate squat.

Yeah, you'll be fine; adjusting the volume but keeping the weight is definitely the way to go. Hey, save all your hate for OA, man. I'm an ectomorph like three generations back:cry:. That's why even with such a low bf% I just look like a mesomorph who's been playing around in the gym for a few months, when in reality I've been training hard for quite a while now and eating super clean to boot. It will take me being in single digit bodyfat with a weight of 190 or better before I really start to look like a gym rat.

My scale and the hydrostatic test both put me at 179.6 pounds during the day I was tested (at 7.6% bf). My strength changes were kind of weird during my cut; I continued to progress upward on several lifts such as pull-ups, chin-ups and dips (I didn't lose enough bodyweight to offset the weight I added on these exercises, so I definitely got stronger on these), but I lost strength on squats and bench. OHP and rows seemed to go up and down week to week. However, I definitely felt weaker on some days, even though my lifts may not have shown it. Getting through that is more of a mental thing for me. I can't believe you're at 11.2% That just goes to show how different body types can be I guess, as I think we look pretty similar in terms of definition.

Holy balls. I had my bodyfat tested in a hydrostatic lab today. I was assuming that my scale was doing a mostly accurate job of measuring me, due the numbers seeming to match pretty closely with my appearance and what I though it should be. My scale measured me at 11.4% bodyfat this morning. The hydrostatic test put me at 7.6%. This means that my muscle volume is significantly lower than I thought, which is actually a good thing, as my appearance has been leading me to believe it was higher than it actually is. All of this boils down to the fact that I AM COMING OFF MY CUT AND EATING ALL THE THINGS. Well, all the good things anyway. My brain and my stomach instantly realized this when she told me the number, so it was all I could do not to sprint out of there partially-naked to the nearest Chipotle.

Wow, that's doing some serious hauling. Congrats!

Welcome! Don't forget your bro badge at the front entrance Kidding aside, your question really comes down to how you're feeling during your workout. Are you hungry and just distracted by it, or are you flagging during the workout because your energy levels are low? If the former, it's absolutely fine to power through and chow down after; your gains are going to be most affected by the total number of calories you take in during the day. However, if you're really struggling with the workout because you feel weak from lack of energy, then you should definitely eat beforehand. Training in a fasted state is perfectly fine as long as you have the energy to do so, but if you don't, it can easily be a wasted workout because you just can't move the metal the way you need to. I could also recommend that you give a pre-workout a shot, but because you train in the evening, that would probably be a bad idea (it would probably keep you awake the whole night). You'll find lots of scrawny and former scrawny guys in here, so feel free to ask about anything.