Introduction and some questions

M

Minime

New Member
Hey everybody! I've been hanging around for about six months here, tried to join several times, but somehow got kicked out every time (don't really mind that - as much as I enjoy reading excellent posts from the fine people here, I also hate spammers et. al, so having a rigorous "form check" on everyone trying to join is just great). Now, fiiiinally i get to post though!

A brief intro of who I am perhaps:
Currently at the humble age of 21, studying macroeconomic theory and living with my girlfriend in a 13 square m room in a student corridor.

I grew up being a tiny, tiny kid. Even though I have always felt a little bit shy about my body, the first real blow to my self esteem was when I got rejected from military service (even though its actually compulsory here in Sweden) because I was too skinny, at 183 cm and 53 kg. When I later was rejected from becoming a blood donor becase the syringe wouldn't fit in my thin arms, and I heard a rumour going on that I was anorectic (which I wasn't - I have always been eating like a horse), I decided to do something about my weight. I tried a little bit of this and a little bit of that, gained about 5 kg's, but then stopped growing completely. It wasn't until september last year that a friend of mine (who I feel I owe somewhere around 12-15 kg's of solid mass) told me about HST, that things really started happening in my mirror. So, I did my first vanilla-cycle before christmas, gained an astonishing 10 kg (22 lbs), even though I had to stop after the first week of 5's. Lost half of it during my first SD (can you imagine losing weight over christmas? What kind of a raging metabolism does that?) but easily gained it back in the next cycle. So now I'm just finishing my third cycle, currently at 73 kg's (with just a little bit too much of BF for me too like it - but remember, I used to look and feel like Gollum). This weekend I met a couple of friends who have been travelling the world for six months. They couldn't believe their eyes, said I look completely different. I love it.

So, a great big thank you to everyone on this forum for giving me the inspiration, and most importantly, the science, to achieve this. If any of you should ever come by sweden, just PM me and I'll invite you over for a big juicy steak.
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Now for my three questions:

1. My shoulders are growing like crazy, but my arms seem to be lagging. I tried adding iso's for this cycle, but they still are not growing nearly as fast as the rest of my body. It's really starting to look disproportionate (is that the word?). What could I be doing wrong?

2. I love the deadlifts more than anything - although I do them widestanced, which feels better for my back. My glutes are getting toooo big, I'm even getting striations back there (soon I have an ass you might mistake for my girlfriend's
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). Could the sumo stance be to blame for this?

3. Lately (last two months or so) I've been feeling very, very tired. Even though I've never been much of a morning-person, I can barely get out of my bed without 12-14 hours of sleep now. Signs of CNS-burnout? An infection lurking in the background? Maybe I should take a longer SD when this cycle is finished?


Also, here is my routine and diet guidelines
(A/B split)
Deadlift / Squat
Incline dumbbell press / Dip
Chinup / Standing dumbbell row
Overhead dumbbell press (standing)
EZ bar bicep curl
Side bends (to get rid of my female-looking waist)

Since I'm a student, food has to be cheap. This means that my diet consists almost entirely of the following:

Milk (1,5-2 litres daily), Oats, Flaxseed oil, Eggs, Whey, Carrots, Broccoli and Bananas. Sometimes (every other day) I'll have a large chicken meal or fried ground meat with rice or potatoes. I'm aiming at 3500-4000 kcal per day, which is very rarely a problem to reach, I'm usually in excess of that. I also take Kre-Alkalyn (regular monohydrate makes my stomach really upset - I also find that I drown in sweat when I sleep everytime I try it. Perhaps my dosage is too high?).


Again, thanks to all the fine people on the forum, have a great next workout!

/Minime
 
You might need to focus on your arms. In my experience small muscles like arms, need heavy direct work but not alot of volume. 3 sets tops for each biceps and triceps. Make sure to use an exercise that really straind the target muscle. Curls and overhead triceps extensions are a good pair.

Deadlifts build strong hips, and a big ass! Many bodybuilders don't do deadlifts, they are not mandatory. The only problem is you'll need several exercises to substitute them. One for legs, one for lower back, one for traps.

As far as sleeping a lot. I get that too, I think training for hypertrophy is very demanding and if you need a lot of sleep, its a good sign you are GROWING!
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Good luck.
 
What a great story, Minime.
It sounds like your genetics are still fighting you. Some things will equalize more as you grow, like arms catching up. For now, the overhead presses might not be your best friend, since you allready have shoulders dwarfing the arms. Benching might be a good idea for you, and switching to pullups instead of chins might give the lats a boost, making the butt look smaller by comparison. Skullcrushers or pressdowns would help the arms a lot, being as 2/3 of the arms are triceps.
For some of us, doing waist exersizes actually increases the size of the waist, so diet is the better way to lose there. Your squats are allready working the abs, and we've found out these last few years that spot reduction is a myth. You're probably just putting more muscle on there under the fat. Blooop.
After a few cycles, you may want to study the "Simplify and Win" thread, but for now, you probably should get in good shape for the heavy work later on. It worked for me.
Welcome to our world man! Put up a pic for the curious?
 
Thanks for the good (and fast!) replies!

Skullcrushers are a little bit difficult for me because of an old shoulder injury (tried them and failed - badly), but I'll definitly add the pressdowns. As for the waist, i actually indend to increase its size - by female I meant thin, like a wasp. I realize it could be misinterpreted, but my BF is around 10%, which feels unusual for me. Anyway, my obliques are now on par with my other abs, so I won't include the sidebends for the next cycle.

I did read the Simplify and Win-thread and actually considered doing something like this
Deadlift / Squat
Rows / Pullups
Bench / Dip
but it gave me around 30 minutes in the gym, and I love to work out, so adding two or three more just felt right.

Sure, I'll have my gf take a nice picture. Just gotta wait for her to wake up
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Thanks again!
/Minime
 
I studied economics in college. I still do. Its interesting stuff, and it comes in handy. That's another way of saying its useful. I'm curious to know if our economics educations are radically different. Most of my macro economics classes revolved around inflation, banking, and the LSIM framework developed from John Maynard Keynes. The Austrian school was mentioned but it was never presented in its entirety. The professors focused entirely on the Capitalist system. While socialist systems were mentioned they were categorized as being command economies, the mention of which amounted to sacrilege.

I liked the simplify and win routine you posted. Since you like being in the gym go ahead and try some external rotation work. What about calves? I didn't see any calf work in your initial post. As for those stubborn arms, try reverse curls to get the brachialis that sits below the bicep (works even better if you can get your elbows up high on a bench or machine), as well as incline dumbell curls (try using an offset grip and supinating them as well). Do curls after the rows/pullups of course. Reverse curls and incline dumbells have always served me well. Perhaps you will find them useful too.

As for that deadlift, yeah I think the sumo stance may do it for you. Deep squats also activate the glutes really hard. Do you see a common factor? Low stances get the glutes going. If you can do the deadlift with a narrow stance I would, even if I had to drop some weight. If your back problem is not originating in the spine, if it is muscular in nature, you may just need to strengthen it. Good Mornings do well for this as do reverse hypers (if you are so lucky to have access to an RH machine). Good Mornings also build the hamstrings nicely. If you can correct your back problem then you may be able to do snatch grip deadlifts. Even better, snatch grip deadlifts off a platform. There are few things I have encountered in my training that make such a difference that I am stunned with disbelief. Snatch grip deads are one of them. They add muscle to the trap's like you wouldn't believe.

For the curious forum lurkers, with a snatch (or wide) grip the distance between your shoulder and the bar is decreased. In other words your back is more horizontal during the initial pull from the ground. As a result your scapular retractors, including the middle traps, must isometrically contract to maintain the position of your shoulder blades. Imagine doing an isometric bent over row with the same weight you deadlift with - that's what snatch grip deads equate to. If you elevate your feet you have to bend over even further which just increases the effect. If you love getting sore the snatch grip may be that special lift just for you. I get deeply, tremendously sore in my middle traps within 2 hrs of doing the lift and I have to use a topical cream in order to function for the rest of the day. I do my deadlifts Max-Stim style: 20 reps, 1-3 second rest between reps using a 10RM load.
 
Glad you joind the forum.  What you're doing is working well, so not much should be adjusted.  Like others have mentioned, if your shoulders are growing easier than some other muscle groups, you probably don't need to focus on them directly.  They are already activated quite heavily during bench (especially incline) and some other movements.  I have a pretty flabby ***, so I can't help there...but I would definitely say DO NOT discontinue Deads or Squats based on the opinions of those here and what I am currently reading in Starting Strength.

I would recommend a full blood panel to make sure nothing is wrong.  Sometimes excess sleep can actually make you more tired...I don't recommend any more than 10 hours.  Like I said, go to a doctor to be sure!

Arms, arms.  I like what previous posters have mentioned.  Chins will activate your biceps more than pullups, which is something to consider as well.  Personally, incline DB curls with a good stretch work the best for me, as do standing DB curls.  EZ bars are not that efficient at working the bicep, so if I straight bar is uncomfortable, go to DB's.  Now, the EZ bar would work well for the Skullz though, and should alleviate some of the wrist pain.  Dips are probably the best compound with high tricep activation...a narrower grip will focus more on them I believe.

If your arms are lagging, I truly believe you need to isolate them several times a week at the END of your workout. Like Sci said, 3 working sets for bicep & tricep is all that is necessary...I also like to burn my bi's out at the very end with some light weight for reps to build some endurance. Good luck!!
 
dumb question alert !!!
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difference between chins and pullups?? are chins with an underhand grip and pullups a wide overhand grip??
 
Chins are a supinated grip and pullups pronated. You do chins where you're most comfortable, and pullups with both wide or narrow grip. Narrow grip will give more ROM to the lats. There is an old myth that wide grip develops wide lats, but look at what the lats have to do for you to attain a narrow grip. Using both is better, but to choose one or the other, I'd go for narrow.
Chins activate the biceps to a fair degree, but not as much as curls.
 
Deadlift / Squat
Rows / Pullups
Bench / Dip
chins / b-o-r
hammer-curls
tri-pressdowns
add these if you need to do more,and as soflsun said working the brachialis will make the arms look bigger,i think hammers are better than reverse curls because they allow more weight,also what quadman said tris are the bigger part of the arm if you cant do skullcrushers pressdowns are
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QuantumPositron: It seems the economic education is pretty similar over here. We don't go into any great detail regarding any of the different schools, at least not for now. Traditional keynesian policy is regarded as quite obsolete as well as the Chicago school, and the Austrian school is also out of fashion. Inflation, banking and unemployment are the main areas of focus. When it comes to capitalism vs. socialism, it's a little bit more complicated. We don't deal at all with the command economies, but the swedish socialdemocratic welfare state was for most of the post-WW2 1900:eds seen as a viable and vigorous alternative "in between" capitalism and soviet communism. This means we give quite a lot of focus to the characteristics of the welfare state, as it was back then and how it is changing with the membership in the European Union. So regulations of the financial and labor markets, unions (about 85% of the swedish work force is organized) and taxes/public sector (free schools, healthcare, insurance against unemployment etc) are covered. I really enjoy my economics studies, even though I myself belong more to the radical school (neokeynesian, marxist etc) which is almost completely neglected at my university. It's funny how Keynes is thought of as old fashioned and obsolete when the economy is booming, but whenever there is a major recession lurking, everyone suddenly remembers that "In the long run, the market forces can reach an equilibrium, but in the long run, we're all dead", and goes running back to "The general theory of Emplyment, Interest and Money". Don't you think?

Well well, enough with the economics, this is a lifting forum =)


I'll go get myself a copy of Starting Strength to work on my deadlift form. The reason regular narrow-stanced deadlifts strain my back is probably because of bad form. Good tip on the snatch grip, I personally think large traps look absolutely fantastic, so I'll definitly try that out. Also, i did try doing reverse curls during my second cycle. Didn't really do much of a difference unfortunately, but then I also did just one set last in my workout, and often skipped it if I was approaching the 60 minute limit.


soflsun: (odd nick by the way, what does it mean?) I'll call up my doctor to get my bloodwork done, sounds like a great idea. Just to be sure.


faz: Your extension of the short A/B split looks good. I'm assuming b-o-r means bent over rows. In fact, that might just be my next cycle right there.


Thanks a lot guys!

/Minime
 
Hey Minime,

Great gains so far.

I agree with QP about the deads. Usually Sumo style are better suited to tall folks as they reduce the distance you have to lift the weight and allow a more upright stance. If you are short then you want the range of motion you'll get from regular stance deads. If you switch, don't rush to use the same loads that you have been using for Sumos. Get your form down and then build the loads up again.

For your thighs try a combo of back squats and front squats to go with your deads. Once you have your form down for front squats there is something a bit special about them. you will find that because your stance is more upright you will be hitting your quads harder while your glutes and lower back will get a bit of a break. Do try to learn to back squat with the bar lower on your back (over your scapular spine) rather than high on your traps.
 
<div>
(Minime @ Apr. 14 2008,7:41)</div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">the first real blow to my self esteem was when I got rejected from military service (even though its actually compulsory here in Sweden) because I was too skinny, at 183 cm and 53 kg.

(... but remember, I used to look and feel like Gollum).</div>
At last, a guy about my size! My experience was different from yours in that the U.S. Army was more than happy to take me -- short and small and all. Because of my diminutive size, I had the opportunity to visit the Viet Cong right down in their tunnels. Sometimes being not so big is an advantage!

Eat all you want and more, yet you still don't grow... Welcome to HST where all that changes.

We remembers, Gollum, that deadlifts are precious. We likes 'em! They makes us grow...
 
(faz: Your extension of the short A/B split looks good. I'm assuming b-o-r means bent over rows. In fact, that might just be my next cycle right there.)

bent-over-rows correct.
it looks a
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workout that way you have a vertical and horizontal pull good luck
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lol: I wouldn't say I'm exceptionally tall, but not exactly short either. 183 cm, or 6'0''. Despite that though, I sort of have the build of a tall person. I'll start doing them narrow-stanced anyway, I want to get as much work off my glutes as possible.

TunnelRat: Tough stuff. Hence the nick, i guess?
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Yeeeessss, indeed we liiikesss them, they are our favouritesssss... I actually just now stuffed myself with a big pizza, filled with tons of greasy kebab and liberally sprinkled with garlic mayo. And about two hours ago I had a double quarter pounder with cheese over at McDonalds. Healthy living. Fortunately, I don't eat this crappy everyday (can't afford it. When I finish my education and get a nice, well paid job, I'll be stuffing steaks down my throat 24/7
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)
 
Your first post had us thinking you were some tiny little guy, not to mention the moniker. You're taller than me!
Ain't you just precious!
 
Sorry about that. Never said I was short though, 183 cm was there in the first post.
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Tall or not, pre-HST I was 57 kg or so (about 125 lbs), at a BMI of 17. The stories (blood donorship, military etc) are all true. The point was sort of that thanks to HST, I no longer have to live with that.
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About the nickname: i tried about five others before, but this one was the one with which I finally got to post. The other users got erased.
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<div></div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE"> Despite that though, I sort of have the build of a tall person. I'll start doing them narrow-stanced anyway, I want to get as much work off my glutes as possible.</div>

I am 6 foot 5 and I use the narrow stance...because that's just the way I am. Did I mention the Snatch Grip? Oh, ok.

<div></div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">i did try doing reverse curls during my second cycle. Didn't really do much of a difference unfortunately</div>

Indeed. They only work for me if I get my upper arms at angle of 90+ degrees to my chest. This requires a curling machine, preferably with a flat pad. The reason for the angle is because at 90+ degrees the biceps are shortened at their origins thus becoming actively insufficient. Then when you pronate the wrists the biceps becomes even weaker. The end result is increased focus on the brachialis. Doing these isometrically can help as well, as the brachialis tends to be used more during isometrics and less during dynamic movements.

I suppose Keynes is a standard in all economics coursework. As for schools of thought, did/will you take any classes in economic doctrines and their histories? The school I went to is one of the few left in the U.S. that offers the course and I enjoyed it immensely. We read Keynes, Marx, and Smith of course. But also Veblen, Hume, Ricardo, and Bentham - who's remains are still included in the U. of London's board meetings as per his agreement. Also covered were contemporary lines of economic thought, particularly one Amartya Sen of South Africa. As for the Austrian school, my banking professor was big into Rothbard and his prolific essays criticizing government for deflating the currency. The Ludwig von Mises Institute keeps his writings and many more on their website.
 
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