phatguerilla Member

I appreciate that and although I'm not doing exams I'm in a similarly stressful period in my education. However you have to think about what comes next, if you get into Medical school the work, exams, hours are all going to be even more stressful. Do you plan to take breaks from your new eating habits then? Perhaps it is…

Surely the exams are the greater stressor and you should work on reducing their impact on your life, rather than removing the thing that should be having a positive impact on your life?

The first week after bumping your calories down can be difficult. Depending on how you were eating previously you might be able to make some changes to increase the amount of food volume you have per day which might help you feel fuller. That's one of the reasons bodybuilders stereotypically exist on chicken and broccoli.

I don't generally ask people to unrack their weights in the gym as its a lost cause, but no a please wasn't necessary, its a common courtesy to unrack your weights and only ****heads don't do it.

I've changed my hairstyle and clothes as I lost weight so I do occasionally get people/family members saying things like 'you look well', 'I didn't recognise you', etc - comments that are based on a combination of factors. The more blatant amongst them will say I've lost weight or some variant. I still have a way to go but…

Probably enjoy front squats the most, then high bar back squats are second best. While people do front squats as a quad exercise they are equally if not moreso an upper back lift so ye might find that to be the limiting factor.

training for half marathon....30 day shred... these things are not compatible. Apart from that you might be overtraining (well from the description of fatigue you almost certainly are) which means you either need to increase your calories or decrease your weekly mileage or both.

Maybe you mean during a slow jog they're not used much but in so that's not really true, every step you take your hamstrings are pushing you forward/pushing the ground away. It should be fairly basic that all legs muscles are involved in running to some extent. OP warm up properly, walk/jog/run when appropriate and don't…

Is it the same weight/sets/reps/lift in each case?

Shaking where? I'd assume hands after a deadlift? Either way shaking would suggest using a maximal weight which stressed the CNS. The disadvantage of doing this often would be becoming fatigued 'overtraining' and quickly going backwards in your training.

Do whatever leg exercises you can do without hurting as well as cardio and any one armed version of upper body lifts you can do without hurting (ie one armed rows, shoulder press, curls, etc). There's evidence that suggests this will help maintain strength in both sides of the body while injured.

Leg raises predominantly activate the hip flexors anyways they're not particularly effective.

Deads and squats are going to show the most discrepancy between bb and db. The bb rotates, and using two hands to grip it will help prevent it moving out of your hand, especially if you use a mixed grip. Also you have to reach further down for the dumbbells, they often have poorer knurling, etc etc. If you have to use only…

The lats are not really the primary muscle targeted by a one arm db row, its mainly the upper back - traps, rear delts and rhomboids. If you're not used to activating those muscles then it can be hard to feel something specific happening. There's a few things that can be done to improve rows depending on what's wrong or…

Starting strength/stronglifts that focus solely on the 'big' compound lifts tend to ignore certain muscles unless a person is a particular build. While in theory a oh pressing and benching should be enough for pecs shoulders and triceps this isn't the case for many, perhaps most individuals. Same with upper back or…

This idea of doing SS or similar to 'prime' your body for size gains is just as much broscience as the bro-iest of splits. A well designed split can increase strength and size just as well as SS can, especially if well chosen isolation exercises help improve strength on compounds.

Agree with the op beginner strength programs are fine for what they are but many people here take them as the be all and end all. The solution to every training programme is do your compounds. However it is equally likely that if you're not seeing the results you want from compounds you need to change your programme and…

I don't understand this mid session heart rate thing if you're heart rate is dropping while lifting (machines or free weight) then realistically the weight isn't heavy enough or you're taking too long between sets.

Can you tell us more about your macros, daily calories, exercise etc? Are you trying to lose weight or maintain? no hate I'm just super curious I'm currently eating roughly 40/40/20 c/p/f macros, 2200-2400 calories, I can't imagine adding more carbs without dropping protein significantly or adding a lot of exercise. At the…

Most days I'm on 200g carbs or less and it feels like a lot, not sure how I'd even mange to eat 400g of carbs unless it was a blow out situation.

4lbs a month is 48lbs a year - the vast vast majority of that is going to be fat gain. That's unnecessary and frankly counter productive. The op gained 2.5lb in the last month, if they gain another 5lb the following 8 weeks there's really no reason to increase calories until that slows down. The op has not given a full…

Despite the fact that there are still so many functional fitness zealots around there's nothing wrong with isolation exercises especially if a muscle isn't growing. A combination of 20 rep squats, a hearty calorie surplus and well applied isolation would do wonders. How many days a week are you training legs op? If that's…

Haven't tried them yet but bulkpowders have a protein flapjack that looks pretty good, probably going to buy a box or two next time I order protein as an alternative to shakes. Otherwise amazon as people have suggested or maybe discount-supplements.co.uk will have something you like.

1. The scoop is probably buried in the powder unless its one of the few brands that make you buy one separately. 2. Don't use volume measurements, why complicate things when you already know the serving/calories in grams.

There are plenty of pictures and reports of crossfitters training heavy as possible, doing lifts like kipping chins and snatches while heavily (as in a few days prior to birth) pregnant, so I can't see why the first few months would be dangerous at all. Obviously some people have differing opinions of what can/should be…

you really should think about it, there's a huge difference between squatting while passively engaging your core and actively bracing your abs, back and glutes.

Its not a dumb question but its a dumb statement on his part, if a person is lifting at 90% capacity for instance with less than bodyweight then they're expending as much energy as they can. So long as you keep progressively increasing the weight or the reps or sets used then you'll be fine, whether you lift above or below…

Squats will just add to the hip flexor work. Assuming you know the couch stretch for them? If that's not cutting it then I would see a physio of some form tbh before adding compound lifts. In the mean time leg curl machine should be a solid option for hamstrings without challenging anything else.

Doing lunges with a long stride targets the hams and glutes more and a short stride (inch or two ahead of the knee that is close to the ground) targets the quads more. Front squats are also good, and close stance leg press should also help. Some people say turning to toes out somewhat on the press or squat targets the…

There's some serious tommie tough guy stuff going on in that thread....