Advice Please

beardedwarriortx

Ok, I am a former soldier and a lifetime gym rat (more or less) and I have ALWAYS ALWAYS done lifting then cardio. So i join this new gym because they will let my 10 year old workout (it is da bomb diggity bomb working out with my son!!!!!!) and the the lady who runs the joint gives him 8 free one hour sessions with a personal trainer. See it never hurts to hit on people in charge! Sometimes ya get free crap and a bonus later on (chicka chicka boom boom). Anyway this PT tells my son cardio then lift. I totally disagree and do the opposite with him (pediatrician approved lifting 10-20% of his total body weight). Opinions???

wolfsbayne

I've always read to lift then cardio because you'll need it for your worksets.

beardedwarriortx

Ive always lifted first because it made my body work harder during cardio afterwards.

wolfsbayne

I don't do cardio on my lift days at all. I'm doing the Stronglifts 5x5 and I just do my warm up sets. Sometimes on my rest days, I'll do cardio. I'm in no way experienced enough to tell you what you should do, just that most of the people that lift weights on here don't ever do cardio.

Stripeness

One school of thought is that your cardio is a warm-up. Which doesn't hurt anything if you're not going for huge lift sets.

Conversely, doing it the other way around within the pediatrician's weight recs won't hurt anything either.

(Personally, I've been doing lift/cardio if doing both on same day for the last 10 years, but I lift *heavy*...but being raised with the cardio/lift format didn't keep me from hitting a bench press PR of 230)

Happy lifting with your sprog!

steve_mfp

I've always done a mild cardio warm-up to get the sweat and blood flowing. Then do some dynamic stretching.

Currently Defranco's agile 8

http://www.t-nation.com/training/defranco-agile-8

Then hit the weights and then cardio.

Personally i don't want cardio to deplete my glucose and glycogen levels. I prefer to have that fuel for my lifts.

Also i never do heavy cardio the day before leg day.

However, my gym focus is on strength training not endurance currently.

silver_arrow3

My trainer told me never to do more than five minutes of cardio before lifting and that it should only be for a quick warm up. Any hardcore cardio I choose to do should be done after any lifting sessions so that all of my strength goes into the lifting and my muscles aren't tired from anything else.

_firecracker_

The only time I can see doing cardio, as it's been mentioned, is for a possible light warm up. My thinking would be to save the real cardio for last....energy won't get wasted on it and lifts will be more productive. Lifting days are for lifting.