Health and fitness thread

[TheBig3]

Originally Posted by BTown

I'm 17, probably like 5'8 or 9 and weigh around 115-120. i wanna get jacked. I eat a lot of garbage and don't exercise much. I've been attempting to do 3 sets of ten push ups and 2 or 3 minute long slants before bed.
how can i expedite my process of getting ripped?

I wanted to respond to this for two reasons:

1. I was you at one point. Weight, height, the whole thing...

2. The advice in this thread has been down-right ghastly.

You're what they call a "hard-gainer" in weight-lifting terms. In short it means two things:

1. eat a **** load of protein. And not healthy protein, bacon, hamburg, steak. I saw someone say in this thread "fat becomes muscle." That never happens. Fat is stored energy. If you want to remove it, you need to work beyond standard exercise level you'd normally see in a given day.

2. You want a high weight-to-rep's ratio. If you want to tone, its light weight and high reps. To bulk up you want to have enough weight on the bar so you can only do 4-6 reps. Suffice it to say, you really need a spotter.

When I worked out like a fiend, i'd have a spotter lift just enough so that I could move the bar. This was often done with two index fingers. Doing this means you're working up to the point of muscle failure. You're only being spotted for

a. movement, you do need to rack the bar at some point and..

b. for full muscle targeting. The motion you move it in should always be full so as to not tear undeveloped muscle and to get a full workout.

If you're concerned about my credentials, I've worked at a gym since I was 16 and I'm now 28. I've been working out since I was a kid because my father was a fitness nut who also thought I needed to prepare myself for fights. (he's a corrections officer and he's tapped - it is what it is.) I've spoken to physical therapists, yoga teachers, personal trainers, fitness directors, and dietitians. I've read lifting magazines and I've talked to every gym rat who walked through the door.