Best Home Gym

May 9, 2012

Due to working hours and having a son I decided to create myself a home gym and it is the best decision I ever made. Unlike working out at a gym; there is no queuing at a machine, no one trying to do “a set inbetween”, no wiping left off sweat off the equipment, no traveling time and I can work out when ever I want. There are a few negatives I suppose, unfortunately I haven’t got a swimming pool or a sauna but the positives make up the negatives. On top of this my home gym had paid for itself after two months, now I don’t have an expensive gym membership to pay.

So what home gym equipment do you need?

(Just in case you didn’t know where to buy them from, I’ve added some Amazon links.)

 

A pull up bar, forget bicep curls pull ups will grow your biceps and will probably grow them quicker as you are less likely to overwork them. Pull ups are also a great exercise for your laterals.

A bench, I don’t see how any weekly workout routine can be completed without one. So get yourself a bench.

A locking weight bar.

Some weights. With these items your gym is complete, more weight will be added over time but no other equipment is needed.

Basic workout routine to complete with these weights.

I’ll go into this very quickly, however I will post a full guide later, for now though the workout routine will follow this (note the days can be changed depending on your schedule, however make sure a days gap is left between each workout):

Monday – Deadlift – 2 sets of 4/5 reps, Pull-ups (weighted if possible, if you cant do a pull up use a chair to help you) 3 sets of 8 reps.

Wednesday – Benchpress – 2 sets of 4/5 reps, Military press – 2 sets of 4/5 reps.

Friday – Squat – 2 sets of 4/5 reps, Powerclean-  2 sets of 4/5 reps.

Brad Pitt Fight Club Workout

Brad Pitt Fight Club Workout:

Brad Pitt used a split strength training routine, where he focused on just one muscle group each day.

He performed 3 sets per exercise and used 60 second rest periods in between sets.

Brad Pitt reportedly used a weight that would allow for 15 reps with proper form, where failure would be reached on the last repetition (body weight exercises were done for slightly more reps, however).

He lifted 4 days in a row and then performed 2 days of cardio work, before resting for one day and repeating the weekly cycle.

Monday – Chest

3 – 75 push ups

3 – bench press – 25, 15, 8 reps (165, 195, 225)

3 – nautilus press (80, 100, 130)

3 – incline press (80, 100, 130)

3 – pec deck machine (60, 70, 80)

Tuesday – Back

3 – 25 pull ups

3 – seated rows (75, 80, 85)

3 – lat pull downs (135, 150, 165)

3 – t bar rows (80, 95, 110)

Wednesday – Shoulders

3 – arnold press (55, 55, 55)

3 – laterals (30, 30, 30)

3 – front raises (25, 25, 25)

Thursday – Biceps & Triceps

3 – preacher curl machine (60, 80, 95)

3 – ez curls cable (50, 65, 80)

3 – hammer curls (30, 45, 55)

3 – push downs (70, 85, 100)

Friday – Cardio

Treadmill – 60 minutes at 80-90% MHR

Saturday – Cardio

Treadmill – 60 minutes at 80-90% MHR

Sunday – Rest

Rest Day

Brad Pitt Fight Club Diet:

Breakfast

6 eggs, 6 whites, 7 yellow and 75g of oatmeal with raisins. Occasionally Pitt would replace the eggs with a Protein Shake if his schedule was tight.

Midmorning snack

Tinned Tuna in Wholewheat Pitta Breads

Lunch

2 x Chicken Breasts, 75-100g Brown Rice or Pasta and green veggies

Mid-afternoon snack [Pre-Workout]

protein bar or Whey Protein Shake and a Banana

Post Workout

Whey Protein Shake and a Banana

Dinner

Grilled fish or chicken, brown rice or pasta, vegetables, and salad.

Evening Snack

Casein Protein Shake Protein shake or Low Fat Cottage Cheese (Slow Release Protein)

My Thoughts on the Brad Pitt Fight Club Diet and Work Out Plan

The first thing to note about this plan is that it is a cutting plan and not a bulking plan. For the film fight club Brad Pitt was reportedly at 5-6% body fat, which gave him the apperance of actually being bigger than he actually was.

Secondly this diet plan relied very strictly on the 6 meals a day idea of diet. A lot of people still heavily rely on the 6 meals a day as the best was to lose weight, and also build muscle, however I disagree. Intermitten Fasting is shown to be a lot more effective for most people and is a lot easier to stick to. However I the foods in the diet plan are a good thing to follow, they are a good mix of healthy fats, carbs and protein so for anyone seriously wanting to lose weight I strongly suggest these are the foods on your shopping list.

Finally the workout plan, again this is a standard split training exercise however in this case it is used with high repitions for weight loss. Again I do not really support this type of work out plan, unless you have been training for many years and have reached a plateu. Most people, men and women, will see better weight loss from a heavy lifting routine.

You will get lean if you follow this plan, purely from the fact you will be burning more calories than you are taking in, however for me there are better plans out there.

 

Top Secret Fat Loss Secret

So you’re still searching for that top secret fat loss secret; well is it a hidden herb, is it a trick your grandmother knew years ago, is it a secret food that will make you burn fat, is it colonic irrigation, is it an exercise that takes two minutes to do every day or is it a magic potion which costs thousands of pounds (or dollars) to buy?

Enough suspense should I stop making you wait for the top secret fat loss secret?

Well I could but I want to discuss the last one more. Ok I may of exaggerated the thousands of pounds/dollars to buy this secret however the truth is it wont come cheap (except on here, don’t worry I will reveal it). This secret is spread about every where on the internet, I bet if you search today there will be an advert waiting to sell you it. This secret defiantly works for what it is intended to do…more on that later.

So what is the top secret fat loss secret, enough waiting…

Well the truth is there isn’t one, except maybe eating less and exercising more (bit disappointed?). The problem is in our busy society, the same society which leads us to believe if we want something we can have it now with very little work, we are constantly looking for that one secret that will make our goals easy. Don’t get me wrong, supplements can help with weight loss, however there is not a secret supplement, herb or simple exercise that will make you drop fat instantly. Fat loss should be seen as a goal that won’t happen overnight but will happen with enough work and a bit of strictness on your diet. Your fat wasn’t put on overnight so don’t believe it will fall off overnight either.

 

But I said earlier that the top secret fat loss secret works for what is intended to do…

I did, however the top secret fat loss secret was never designed for you to lose fat it was designed to make you buy the product that someone was selling…if it sounds to good to be true, it usually is.

“What is the Fastest Way to Lose Weight?”

May 8, 2012

Well that is a question asked by everyone who has wanted to lose weight. No one wants to go on a diet for months at a time, however this generally leads to a crash diet which allows us to lose half a stone in a month but at the end of the month, or if we are being really good at the end of the second month, we give up; we cant handle starving ourselves any more and end up pigging out which leads to putting on more weight than we started the diet at.

So what is the fastest way to lose weight?

The fastest way is the way that allows us to save as much muscle as possible but losing fat as quickly as possible and yes women I am including you in this when I say you don’t want to lose muscle. There are a few reasons for this, firstly if you are losing muscle then you are not eating enough to stop your body going into starvation. A starvation diet tends to lead to the body craving food, which makes it difficult for you to say no to that slice of cake. It also means when you start eating again your body will not replace the muscle it has lost, it will replace the fat instead and more. Secondly muscle burns calories at rest, fat doesn’t, therefore the more muscle you have the more calories you can eat.

But again I can hear you ask “what is the fastest way to lose weight?”

Well your body needs food to work however too much food and you put on fat, too little food and you end up feeling tiered, starving and ultimately burn muscle rather than the fat you actually want to burn. You therefore need to eat the correct calorie deficit, by doing this your weight loss can be quick and more importantly permanent. Unlike a crash diet you can and will lose the weight permanently if you eat sensible, however you can also have a treat now and again. I actually recommend you have a treat once a week, by allowing yourself this you will not feel guilty. The problem with feeling guilty is lot of people will eat the wrong, then give up for that day meaning the 200 extra calories they consumed in their “treat” ends up turning into an extra 2000 calories as they give up for that day. Therefore have a treat, once a week, but limit yourself to just that treat, no guilt and no weight gain.

To summaries what is the fastest way to lose weight?

• Don’t crash diet, you want to lose fat not muscle
• Don’t starve yourself, eat enough calories to leave a sensible deficit
• Have a treat once a week

Lose Belly Fat

The first thing you need to realise is that you can not spot train fat, therefore you can not choose where you will lose fat from. Doing 100 sit ups a day will not make you lose belly fat. Want some proof, have you ever seen a person with a fat bum, fat face, fat arms and fat legs but with a six pack? Now we have that out of the way we can look at how you can actually lose belly fat.

How to really lose belly fat?

Well the only way to lose belly fat is to decrease your overall body fat level, which doesn’t need to be as difficult as it sounds. Basically start eating better and do some exercise. Some hard work and diet restriction will work wonders for slimming down your belly. So what do we recommend:

Remove sugary food from your diet.

The single worst food in the mondern diet is sugar; sucrose, high fructose corn syrup and glucose are the things causing you to put on weight. Forget the brain washing you have received about how saturated fats will make you fat the truth is it is sugar. Sugar is not needed in any diet, the human body coped fine for thousands of years before sugar was added to the diet, the incidence of heart disease was also a lot less before sugar was added to the diet as well but more on that later. If you take anything from this guide, make sure it is the fact that you need to cut down on your sugar intake if not remove it completely. Sugar causing the insulin in your body to spike, which causes calories to be stored as fat in the body and once the spike has started to decrease the crash from sugar will make you crave more. Cut sugar out of your diet for one week and I can almost garantee you will have lost a few pounds your first week.

Resistance Training

Resistance training burns more calories than cardio, we therefore recommend everyone does 3 weight training sessions a week. If you are lifting weights whilst on a calories restricted diet you will not add muscles however you will burn a lot of fat. Lifting weights not only burns calories whilst performing the exerices, your muscles also burn calories repairing themselves once the exercise is completed. Also try and do full body exercises whilst lifting weights to burn the most calories, therefore squats, dead lifts and the good old bench press are your best exercises to focus on.

So how to really lose belly fat?

Eat less and exercise more!

How to Lose Fat

Fat loss is quite a controversial subject, with many people having different opinions on what is the best way. Well truthfully there is no one way for everyone to lose weight and what works for one person might not work for you. However there are lots of different plans and things you can do to help you lose weight and some pretty simple rules to follow to make sure you lose weight quickly, consistently and easily.

 

Lets look at how to lose fat

 

Firstly, to lose fat you need to eat less calories than you are burning on a daily basis. You can lose fat just by eating chocolate, you would just need to make sure the total overall calories you eat is less than the number you burn. I really do not recommend just eating chocolate though, although you will lose fat it would be extremely difficult as the sugar rush and crash would cause you to be hungry a lot of the time and your body would also be crying out for nutrients which would again cause you to be hungry. So what you need to remember from this is as long as calories in are less than calories out you will lose fat.

 

So how can we make this happen. Well there are two things to do, eat less and work more. When I say eat less, you do not need to starve yourself if what your weight is currently stable and not increasing then you need to eat a round 500 calories less than what you currently eat. How can you do this? Well cut that morning cake out or eat slightly smaller portions. The biggest mistake a lot of people make is they go on a diet and suddenly change all of their eating habits. They cut all the unhealthy food that they like out and start eating healthy food, which ultimately makes them crave the food they want and after a week or two they go back to their old habits or they reach their target weight then go back to their old habits and end up weighing more.

 

The Solution…

 

The solution to this is just eat a bit less of what you currently eat, you wont crave the bad food and wont fall off your diet. I’m not saying you shouldn’t eat healthier food but that should be a life style change not a weight loss plan! So the other thing you can do is to work more, personally I enjoy going to the gym but most people get a gym membership, go two or three times then give up which just means you are wasting money. So what can you do to work more? Well if you enjoy going to the gym, then get a membership, if you enjoy swimming then go swimming a few times a week however if you are only doing these to lose weight you may burn out quite quickly. Why not look at what you do in a day and see how small things could burn a lot more calories. As an example, if you work in an office why not print to the printer on the other side of the office and walk over there all day or why not walk to the shop instead of taking the car. There are loads of little things you can do on a day to day basis that wont seem like much at the time but will greatly increase the amount of calories you burn in a day.