Weight Lifting

[mattsbelly 76]

Any one lifting weights to bulk? My weight hasn't changed in 3 months despite my killer workouts. Wondering if I am putting on muscle and losing weight. If anyone has experience please let me know.

[sanks51 214]

I'm lifting weights.. My weight has slowed down, but I've had a bit of a food wobble the past month or so.. So it could be attributed to that.. Haven't weighed for about 8 days or so but would be interested as I've upped my weights the past week.

[music1618 879]

I am weight training at the moment. My weight is fluctuates between 5-10 pounds every month. It depends on what weights I am doing and how much cardio I do each week. What I have really noticed is that my shape has changed.

[aroundhky 1,174]

I lift 5-6 days a week. I did make a last ditch effort to make my weight goal back over the summer and really had to watch my cals/carbs to do so and made it back in late August. It (215) was a little lighter than I prefer, so I started heading back to my "in the zone weight", which is the mid-220's and I just made it back to there. I hope it was muscle weight I added back on.......

I do feel stronger at this weight than I did at 215.

Are you getting in a little extra Protein and complex carbs?

[Fiddleman 4,376]

If you find out the secret, please share!!

I lift 5 days a week, rotating through different cross fit type skill lifts from day to day. One day it will be deadlifts, another day it will be bench presses, another day it will be front squats and another day it will be over head pushes. And so on. These lifts are heavy, low rep (5-10), about 5-7 rounds and may be anywhere from 70% to PR. It really depends what we are trying to do on a given day. Not every day is a PR day. During our met con workouts, we will do high rep lighter lifts like thrusters @ 95 or power cleans @ 125 and so on. These will be anywhere from 15 rep up to 50 or even 75 rep. Again, it depends on the work out. We did some back squats earlier this week (Wednesday) and my hammies are still sore today. I hope this soreness is going to pay off.

Neither the heavy lifts @ lower rep or lighter lifts @ high rep are causing bulk. I try and eat between 30-50 G Protein a meal up to 7-8 meals a day. My body remains about same body composition in last few months, low body fat, 5 lbs under center bmi for my height. I am pretty comfortable with this reality of not being able to bulk past my current efforts (may be genetics or it might be the met cons), but it would be nice to see more bulk. Still playing around in my head with the trade offs of being a good all around athlete or with wanting to focus more on strength.

There are disadvantages to being really strong in a bulky way. I do met cons with a guy who can do 400 lb back squats (he is screaming when he does it, lol) and my back squats are at about 270, but his general athletic abilities absolutely tank when he does the met cons. He really suffers in the amount of perceived work it looks like he does and he is 5-15 minutes slower than others. For example, today, we did 3 rounds (35 rep, 25 rep and 15 rep) of wall ball lunges (20 lb), power cleans (95 lb), over head squats (95 lb) and kettle bell swings (53 lb). A hard workout. His time was 30 minutes. Most finished in about 18-22 minutes (mine was 20:35).

Again, I do not believe a person can be both super strong and super good / fast at functional training required of a met con. I may be wrong. What do others think about this?

As an aside, I was watching man of steel specials today and they had a little segment on their workouts. Superman started at 235 lb and worked up to 450 lbs on his deadlifts !! The functional training these actors had to do for the movie are fairly intense. It would be awesome to have access to their coach.

[erp 2,016]

Any one lifting weights to bulk? My weight hasn't changed in 3 months despite my killer workouts. Wondering if I am putting on muscle and losing weight. If anyone has experience please let me know.

I weight train 3 days a week. I have slowed drastically in my weight loss but I have gained 4 lbs of muscle in 3 months. My body fat has dropped 8%. Track your body fat and muscle mass.

[mattsbelly 76]

Good tip on the body fat. I just want to see the scale move.

[aroundhky 1,174]

Good tip on the body fat. I just want to see the scale move.

That's certainly understandable given the fact that we've been programmed to define our fitness/health/etc by a number on a scale. And to me, there is SOME validity to a weight scale as it is A tool of measurement. I was the same way for a while and consumed/worried briefly with the number on the scale. Then I realized that I kind of had to choose and couldn't have it both ways. I couldn't have a really low number on the scale AND be as strong/muscular as I wanted to be. It's just a matter of goals or personal choice. There's really no wrong choice in my opinion. Being strong and lifting was/is my top priority (after getting blood pressure/cholesterol in check), even if it means the weight scale doesn't move as much as I wish it would. In the end, keeping my strength with regular workouts is worth it to me, especially if the body fat number goes down....the scale staying the same is ok with me.