Well, if you are like me the first time you tried a beginner workout, you're
biting at the bit to see if this stuff is actually going to work. It will.
Guaranteed. I have trained many beginners using the exact same stuff I am
showing you and they have all done very well. Having said that now you're
probably even more pumped to get going and workout! First, there are a couple
of things as a beginner that I would like you to do before you even begin
to step foot into the gym, these will pay dividends for you later.
1. Get your body fat checked
2. Measure all your body parts (biceps, calves, chest, etc)
3. Buy the food you are going to need
4. Have a clear and defined goal of why you are beginning to go to the gym
and what you are trying to accomplish once you get there. Put this on the
first page of your training notebook. As a beginner, momentum is your biggest
friend and you need to remind yourself why you are beginning this over and
over until its habit.
5. Believe in yourself. Know, without a doubt, that whatever someone else
has achieved, you too are capable of getting the same results if you put in
the same amount of discipline and effort. You may be just a beginner, but
what you accomplish from here on in the gym is only up to you and the amount
of effort you put into it.
Body fat check - Most gyms will do this for you, and some
will do it for free. If you can't get a gym to do it and you don't want to
pay a trainer to do it, then you can buy devices at fitness stores that will
take a measurement for you. Some of these are more accurate than others but
at least you will have an idea of where your starting point is as a beginner.
The reason you want to do this is because you can lose weight but it might
be muscle if you are missing a piece of the puzzle. Also, sometimes beginners
gain weight and freak out. If you check your body fat and your percentage
has gone down then your weight gain has been muscle and you should be stoked
because now you will have a better shape and a higher metabolism. Scales are
o.k., but they don't tell you where the change in bodyweight came from so
keep that in mind.
Measure your body parts - Get a plain old tape that a seamstress
would use (not a carpenters tape!) and get measurements for all your body
parts. Make little notes as to what side of the body it was and if you can
find a land mark like a freckle or scar then you will be more accurate when
you come back to do it again. You want to do this because then you will know
if something grows quick (and you can be excited) or if you may need to put
more effort into a body part that is lagging (in this case, cash in on that
determination!).
Bottom line is that if you don't do these two things as a beginner, you wont
be able to appreciate the differences you have caused to your body. The other
is that it gives you some solid figures to brag about!
Have a clear goal as a beginner - Lifting weights and watching your
food intake is not without its trials. When you do anything that takes you
out of your comfort zone, you had better have a good reason why you are doing
it. In order to do your best at anything you really have to want it. You must
have something that will drive you when your motivation wanes as a beginner.
Believe - Have you ever gotten ready for something and had
that feeling that no matter what happens you are going to succeed at it? What
happened? You probably got what you wanted right? Well, the same thing applies
here. The body cannot achieve anything that the mind thinks is impossible.
Did you know that when people under hypnosis touched an ice cube that they
were told was a hot piece of steel they actually developed a blister? This
just goes to show the power of belief and that whether you think you can or
can't, your going to be right! "As a man thinketh so shall he be!"
THE BASICS OF WORKING OUT AND YOUR BEGINNER ROUTINE
As a beginner your body develops to the needs put on it, chances are that
your body right now is a finely tuned machine for TV. watching! So what we
need to do is get it ready to train without causing your body to say "nope,
don't think so pal" in the form of an injury. Basically we are going to get
your beginner butt to the gym and get used to the routine of getting out of
the house a couple of days a week to workout.
Most beginners can handle a three-day a week commitment to workout, and really
that's all that is needed to make most of the changes for the majority of
people. Monday, Wednesday and Friday with the weekends off is usually convenient
for beginners. It doesn't really matter as long as it is three non-consecutive
days. Then we go and train the whole body on each of these days with a one
exercise per body part workout. Now its always smart to warm up before exercise
so we do five to ten minutes of any cardio machine to get the blood flowing.
This gives the heart a heads up to what's coming!! Then we go on to the routine,
and finally the 20 to 30 minute fat loss cardio. So to take care of everything,
you're looking at an hour to an hour and a half if you're taking your time
as a beginner.
Sets and Reps For the Beginner
Beginners ask what is a set? A set is made of a bunch of reps done in a row,
followed by a rest of usually a minute or two. Soooo, what is a rep? The rep
is short for repetition. Or, how many times you raise and lower the weight
in a row. So if you sat down and picked up a weight and put it down 12 times
in a row, you just did one set of 12 reps! Clear it up a little? O.K., now
it's written a little different when you see it in a workout. The number of
sets comes first and then the number of reps per set. So to tell a beginner
to do three sets of twelve reps it would look like this, (3x12). Sometimes
you see this 3x10, 8, and 6. This means you do three sets in total but one
at 10 reps the next at 8 reps and the last set at 6 reps, all spaced out by
your determined rest period. Now I know some people are going, duh, I knew
that! But it never hurts to explain. This is to help you get to the gym with
a beginner workout.
Beginner Cardio Workout
Cardio is short for cardiovascular, and this is where you burn off some extra
calories for fat loss or train the old ticker to work more efficiently so
you wont have a heart attack when your kid jumps out of the bath tub as your
sitting on the can! What determines how intensely you do your cardio as a
beginner depends on the goal that you are training for. A lower heart rate
is more for fat loss, while a higher heart rate works the ticker. I'll tell
you how to do this later. Just remember that I'm keeping this simple so we
can get going.
Now, for the actual workout. You could start right off and
do a billion sets to try to look like Mr. Olympia, but chances are you'll
have to call in sick the next day due to chronic " I can't moveness". So as
a beginner what you do is start off with one set for each of the exercises
during week one and two. Now, the only scientific proof for this method of
mine I can offer is that if you don't listen, you'll be as stiff as molasses
in January. Weeks three and four, you bump it up to two sets for each exercise.
Don't worry we are going to stop this at three sets when you start your second
month of training.
How Much Weight Should A Beginner Use?
The most popular question I hate to hear! How should I know? I don't know
how strong you are as a beginner! Seriously though, this is why the slow build
up in the levels of volume in the routine. The first couple of weeks as a
beginner are for experimentation. On Monday for example, you would pick a
ridiculously light weight and do your exercises. That was easy, you think.
The next time in however, you take another guess at what you should try, something
just a little heavier. Doing it this way you actually get six workouts in
before you should have found a challenging weight, sooner is better though.
On week three when you start doing multiple sets, do both sets with the same
weight. Eventually you will be doing three sets with the same weight, for
the same reps. This is when it is time to nudge your weight up a bit. Now
remember, I said nudge, not use the whole stack plus little children for extra
weight.
There is no time frame to get to the point of all three sets for the same
reps as a beginner, just keep putting in time until it happens. This is where
it could get a little confusing if you weren't the smart, good looking, intelligent
person you are! (Never hurts to get a pat on the back right?) If you were
doing 3 sets of twelve reps (we are) and you added some weight, you would
probably get fewer reps than before because it's heavier now. This is O.K.
because you just stick with it until you get back to twelve reps. So, this
is what it looks like. You were doing three sets of twelve with 100 pounds.
Now on set one you use 105 pounds and get ten reps, that's cool. Next week
eleven reps, right? When you hit twelve again, you up the weight again! When
the other sets become easy, you adjust the weight for them too.
Soon your weights look like this 110 pounds for 12 reps, 110 pounds for 10
reps, and 105 for twelve reps. Next week it should be 115 for 10, 110 for
11, and 110 for 10. Now can you imagine explaining this every hour on the
hour to someone new? Thus the motivation for the book Fat To Fit.,
where this excerpt came from.
So the bottom line is that the weight you use as a beginner should be determined
by the amount of reps you are going to do. The correct weight for you to use
on a set of twelve reps is the weight that causes you to not be able to do
another rep in good form after twelve reps.
When calculating up your weights when you record them in your book a lot of
people are unsure about the weights of bars, machines and pulleys and how
to figure it into their total weight lifted when they write it down. My way
may not be the "right way" but it's the standard I have used for years and
as long as you stay with it as your "chalk line" that's all you need.
The big, long, straight bar, or "Olympic bar" is 45 pounds. The short crooked "e-z curl bar" is 15 pounds. Now where the guesswork comes in is with machines and pulleys.
All I do to keep things simple is to count only the weight I put on the
machine (not the weight of the machine itself because machines are all different,
especially smith machines) or go by what the numbers on the stack say. After
all, the only thing that matters as a beginner is that you make a progression
from what you have previously recorded as your weight in your journal. The
only time you might run into trouble is if you tell some big guy that you
bench 300 pounds but leave out the fact that it was on the smith machine!
(Because the bar is always lighter than the free version.)
Can I Start My Beginner Workout Yet?
This is a routine for the beginners who say, "I'd like to lose the spare tire
and maybe add a bit of muscle. I don't want to look like those guys in the
magazine though!" Actually, all beginners should start off the same way regardless
of their goals. You have to give the body a warning of what is coming. A whole
body workout is the nuts and bolts of all training routines. What we do is
take one exercise for each body part and do three sets of 15 reps with it.
Now on week one, you may find that three sets is too much. This depends on
the shape you are in. A nice way to tippy-toe into this is to do 1 set of
everything for week 1, two sets of everything for weeks two and three. Finish
it of by getting in all three sets by the end of the month. By the time month
two has started, you should be doing three sets of 15 for every muscle group
on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The routine is followed by 20 to 30 minutes
of your preferred cardio.
Wait there is still more stuff to get a handle on as a beginner! I hope I
get all your questions answered here, but I always get surprised by a new
one.
Beginner Rest Between Sets
I see folks (mostly beginners) always chatting to friends or answering their
cell phones. This is a waste of everyone's time. At the start of these routines,
two minutes between sets is O.K., until you get accustomed, but never longer
unless you are on a specific power routine. If I can breath normally after
45 seconds, I'll start the next set, if not, I give myself up to a minute
and 30 seconds. Of course there is always a balance, so don't go lower than
45 seconds because if you can start before that, you were probably slacking
on the effort of the first set!
Your Beginner Max Heart Rate
Here is how you gauge your progress on the cardio as a beginner. Take 220
minus your age and multiply it by 60%. That's a great place to start. What
you have here is 60% of your maximum heart rate. Let's say your 40. 220-40=
180 (your max heart rate). 180x 60%=108. So there you are on the bike pedaling
away, reach down to your wrist, find your pulse for 30 seconds, and multiply
it by two. If you came up with 115 slow it down a little and vice versa.
Beginner Warm-up! For all routines, it is wise and advisable
to never rush into a workout without doing some sort of general whole body
warm-up. This could be as simple as 10 minutes of low intensity cardio on
your favorite machine just to get the blood flowing. Follow that up with some
general stretching to get rid of any kinks and then off you go!
Muscular Adaptation
3 day a week, full body routine
Weeks 1-4
Squats 1-3 sets for 15 reps
Bench Press 1-3 sets for 15 reps
Dumbbell Shoulder Presses 1-3 sets for 15 reps
Machine Row 1-3 sets for 15 reps
Barbell Curls 1-3 sets for 15 reps
Triceps Push Downs 1-3 sets for 15 reps
Calf raises (standing) 1-3 sets for 15 reps
Crunches-Abs 1-3 sets for 15 reps
Now, you can stay on this routine or any routine for that matter for more
than four weeks if it keeps on producing results. If things start to get stagnant
however, even though you are giving all the details your every ounce of effort,
then its time to take a look at your next routine.
You can find the next routine in my beginner workout book.
If you need more help as a beginner getting started at the gym, setting up
a program, or figuring out how to eat, it will show you what you need to achieve your physical goals.
Ray Burton
I.S.S.A. certified fitness trainer
Owner of Buildingbodies Calgary Personal Training
