Ab Exercises/Getting that 6-pack

[sublime]

*Squats and other core exercises WILL indeed have a great impact on overall musculature and will, in fact, help build other muscle, ie. arms from squats.

cool. the more you read on about the anotomy of the body and how muscles respond to intense stress, the more you will realized exercises like the bicep curl and tricep extension are a waste of time. the general theme will ALWAYS be:

Adding more weight to the bar (or more reps, progressive load is the key) and moving as much weight as possible over the greatest ROM possible. squats and deadlifts are the two most effective ways of doing this, with the overhead press and bench pree a distant 3rd.

[jakethebake]

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i more than GENERALLY like you [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

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is there something we don't know about the two of you?

[sublime]

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i more than GENERALLY like you [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

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is there something we don't know about the two of you?

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haha, naw but i genrally like everyone. alobar has been around a while is all.

[Edge34]

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*Squats and other core exercises WILL indeed have a great impact on overall musculature and will, in fact, help build other muscle, ie. arms from squats.

cool. the more you read on about the anotomy of the body and how muscles respond to intense stress, the more you will realized exercises like the bicep curl and tricep extension are a waste of time. the general theme will ALWAYS be:

Adding more weight to the bar (or more reps, progressive load is the key) and moving as much weight as possible over the greatest ROM possible. squats and deadlifts are the two most effective ways of doing this, with the overhead press and bench pree a distant 3rd.

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I'm going to be taking a sports kinesiology class this semester, so I assume whatever we've discussed here will be talked about much more in there. However, I still don't see how the biceps curls and triceps extensions are total bunk. I think we're most likely looking at different purposes for the lifting. You can build mass through core exercises with little side work, I will grant you that, but I don't see how so many people can still advocate these isolation exercises if scientific research says they're a waste. I guess to get big, you could do the core, but for that extra cut, you're going to need to isolate? This one I admit I'm not sure on, I'm just trying to make sense of it all...

[sublime]

I will grant you that, but I don't see how so many people can still advocate these isolation exercises if scientific research says they're a waste. I guess to get big, you could do the core, but for that extra cut, you're going to need to isolate? This one I admit I'm not sure on, I'm just trying to make sense of it all...

Maybe a 'waste' is to strong, just really not needed. 99% focus needs to be give to Squats/deads/bench/chins etc. The problem is most trainees dont do that. They assume that the the secondary exercise are as important as the core ones, when in actuallity its not even close (like comparing AA vs 89o)

If your doing sqauts etc, balls to the wall to FAIL (cant go anymore) you dont have the need (nor should you have the desire) to go rack up a bar and do curls and tricep extensions. You should want to sit down and catch your breathe and go home.

If you focus on getting to squatting 500lbs, Deadlifting 400, and benching 300 your arms will most definitly be as big as nature will allow them to be, they cant help it.

As for why its assumed by the workout community that curls/tricep extensions are needed, most of it is fueled by the people who recommned this sort of stuff being genetic freaks of nature AND drug induced. they are trying to sell books and products, and telling people that 3 exercises will make you enormous if you do them till you feel like you cant anymore, kinda kills thier industry.

whats sexier? a workout of squats/deads/bench press for two sets to fail, 45 minutes in the gym once or twice a week, or some complex 10 exercise system with a ctacy name like "pyramid technique training" designed to make you look like arnold?

i recommend you read stuart mcroberts book, Beyond Brawn. you can get it here: Hardgainer Its geared towards drug free training, and is probably the best health book written in our lifetimes.

[ChicagoTroy]

Fork curls. You have to do fewer of them.

If the plan is just visible abs, any exercise that increases resting tension will make them stand out more. None of them will reduce fat around your waist. That's called spot reducing and it's a myth that every sports scientist knows is B.S.

Reduce calories or exercise more.

[Blarg]

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If you are working that hard before a weight training session, that is probably why you see no benefits from it. Doing 45 minutes of cardio, and depleting your muscles of glycogen before a workout, is probably why you have shown no results. You havent backed up any statements with research, like sublime has. Only to say that the [censored] mags you read say its true, while even mens health doesnt say its true. Im not saying cardio is bad, its not, but its neither the best nor the quickest way to having a great physique.

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wow, way to prove my point about reading comprehension. I never said I wasnt seeing results, and I never quoted a magazine as a source (or even mentioned a magazine). As for research, you havent supplied any either. But if you really wanna prove me wrong, go research how many calories a pound of muscle burns in a day, and how many pounds of muscle a year the average adult male can put on, then go find out how many calories are in a pound of fat. I'm betting once you do that tho, you'll realize my point.

Anyway, I'm done with this whole convo, because i've degraded to pointless dickwaving and arguing with posters I generally like.

Alobar out

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Cardio has plenty of benefit, but it still releases next to no growth hormones. Growth hormones help burn fat all by themselves.

Whether or not you add any muscle.

The truth is, cardio can make you extremely skinny, though what's left will be great muscle, though not necessarily very strong muscle. But super lean. However, unless you're genetically very gifted, it won't put on much muscle, and will actually inhibit the growth of muscle mass by turning muscle fibers from fast-twitch to slow-twitch, which has less potential for growth in size. Aside from which, it will tend to eat up muscle there is faster than it can be replaced.

That change of muscle, lack of muscle gain, and loss of existing muscle CANNOT help in the quest to lose weight. If you want to show your abs, you are extremely well served first by not losing the muscle you have, and then by gaining new muscle.

The new muscle itself will not give you a six-pack by itself, but then again, for most of us by far, neither will anything else but diet, not exercise.

But the PROCESS of getting the new muscle will release growth hormone that helps burn off fat. That's something aerobics will not do, because only subjecting the body to severe resistance triggers significant growth hormone release. Run 20 miles and you'll probably be real skinny. Squat 20 heavy squats and you won't be skinny. Your body won't allow it.

So lifting heavy helps get you to the six-pack stage, and once you're there, the extra muscle helps keep you there.

You'll still need proper diet to get the six-pack no matter which path you take. Cardio is still excellent exercise. But if you want to get to the six-pack stage, you'll be much better served by making heavy lifting part of your routine than by relying on cardio alone.

[Blarg]

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*Squats and other core exercises WILL indeed have a great impact on overall musculature and will, in fact, help build other muscle, ie. arms from squats.

cool. the more you read on about the anotomy of the body and how muscles respond to intense stress, the more you will realized exercises like the bicep curl and tricep extension are a waste of time. the general theme will ALWAYS be:

Adding more weight to the bar (or more reps, progressive load is the key) and moving as much weight as possible over the greatest ROM possible. squats and deadlifts are the two most effective ways of doing this, with the overhead press and bench pree a distant 3rd.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm going to be taking a sports kinesiology class this semester, so I assume whatever we've discussed here will be talked about much more in there. However, I still don't see how the biceps curls and triceps extensions are total bunk. I think we're most likely looking at different purposes for the lifting. You can build mass through core exercises with little side work, I will grant you that, but I don't see how so many people can still advocate these isolation exercises if scientific research says they're a waste. I guess to get big, you could do the core, but for that extra cut, you're going to need to isolate? This one I admit I'm not sure on, I'm just trying to make sense of it all...

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The thing is, the fitness industry, and an industry it is, has been strongly influenced by bodybuilding, which was brought into prominence by Joe Weider and his magazines and the bodybuilders in his stable, like Schwarzenegger.

Who better to believe on bodybuilding than world class bodybuilders? And what they say is isolate, isolate, isolate, and do many many repetitions per set, many many sets.

The thing is, those dudes are on steroids! Yes, almost all of them. Always have been. And the dudes of today take even more of them, on more prolonged cycles.

For them, you can do eight different exercises for the biceps alone, and spend three hours per work-out in the gym, and then do that kind of thing later in the day all over again, six days a week. Steroids give them vastly improved recovery that you or I(assuming we are steroid free) simply don't come anywhere near, as well as the ability to grow that we simply don't have.

America has generations of people raised on bodybuilding routines that serve mostly to injure or overtrain anyone not on roids. Drug-free lifters do much better if they rest more and train less. They don't need 8 bicep exercises, and not only don't they benefit from them, they break down more muscle than they're usually able to replace unless they're big winners in the genetic lottery. And even then, they would simply get more bang for the buck by getting in and out of the gym in an hour or less, just a few times a week.

There was a good article a couple of weeks ago about this over at www.t-nation.com. It definitely described me as a kid -- faithfully reading Joe Wieder's muscle mags, lifting like crazy, eating almost insane amounts per day, and staying unbelievably skinny and weak as my reward. Which I inevitably tried to fix by doing even MORE work -- MORE isolation to "blast" my biceps and smaller muscles, just like Arnold and Colombu and Sergio and Ferrigno. It was a ridiculous, self-defeating process.

But hell, it sold magazines. And it's still selling them decades later.

What a truly monumental waste of time and effort those magazines and their routines produced. Not to mention an emotional investment in results that never came. I wish I had known then that more volume is not better, and just to concentrate on a few big lifts, lift them very heavy, and keep isolation exercises to a minimum.