I'm going to dive in at the deep end here and start a journal for all to see and critique, which is quite scary really!

First some stats - I'm 168cm and weigh 60.5kg (at the beginning of the year i was 66kg). Somehow in the last 5-6 years weight started creeping on, and when I got to 66kg at the end of last year I decided it was time to do something about it, as I'd gone up by 11kg in 5 years. I've never had my body fat measured - but I've ordered a Tanita scale which I'm hoping will arrive this week, so I'll find that out very soon.

I generally go to the gym 5 days a week, Monday to Friday. My gym is in town, but I live slightly out of town, and the commute is really too time consuming on weekends (I don't drive), so I go hard during the week and rest on weekends.

I don't really have a standard workout - it's changed every month since I started in Feb. My initial focus has been on triceps. I've always had pretty decent biceps (well, you know, relatively speaking!), but I had never been able to see any hint of triceps under the flabbage. I guess genetics has a lot to do with which bits are easier to improve, and both my mother and sister have heavy kind of flabby arms too, so I have to work double hard in that area.

I've been going hard on triceps the last few months, and I've been really pleased with the results so far (but a long way to go!). But I think perhaps I might have been overtraining, especially with triceps, in my eagerness to see results - maybe you can give me some comments on what I've been doing.

A typical week's workout for me has been upper body one day, then lower body the next, a cardio day (due to tired muscles!), then repeat (this last month I've been doing mostly 5x5 sets, and the couple of months before I was doing 4x8):

Day 1 - upper body
Several tricep excercises (about 4) including...
Tricep extensions (those ones with a dumbell behind your head) 10kg
Tricep kickbacks 6kg
Arm extension 25-30kg
Seated dips 79kg
Tricep pulldowns 20kg
Dip assist 15kg

Then a bunch of other upper body excercises (if i can't fit them in on Day 1, I'll do the rest on Day 4)
Chin assist 15-20kg
Arm curlss 15-20kg
Bicep curls (dumbell) 7kg
Bicep curls EZ bar 5kg
Standing shouldper press 9kg
Shoulder press (machine) 25kg
Lat pulldowns 35-40kg
Chest press 12kg dumbells

Day 2 - Legs
Smith squats 50kg
Leg extension 63kg
Leg press (I was doing 138kg but I think my form was iffy so i've dropped it down to 115kg for the moment)
Leg curls (lying) 30-35kg
Leg curls (seated) 47kg

5 mins of abs at the end

Day 3
Usually my muscles are pretty sore on a Wednesday, so I take it a bit easy and usually leave the weights and just do a bit of light cardio for half an hour or so. I'll generally do a bit of ab work on Day 3 too.

Day 4 - Upper body
Triceps - about 4 of the ones listed above
Other upper body - whatever I haven't fit in on Day 1

Day 5 - Lower body
Repeat of Day 2


So I think I might be doing things wrong, in terms of doing more or less the same thing twice a week, and overworking one area (triceps) and the expense of other areas. I think I need to just do something more like:
Day 1 - triceps
Day 2 - legs
Day 3 - cardio/abs
Day 4 - um, maybe chest and back?
Day 5 - biceps?

I'm not really sure what the right order of doing things is though, so would love any advice.

I also need to find more excercises to do for shoulders, chest and back. I guess I should add in some dead lifts for a start. Again - any hints on good excercises to add for those areas would be great!

Amazing Race is starting soon, so I'll go now and will post my diet info tomorrow (if I'm brave enough to admit to it!).

um sum common combos are

Chillicat wrote:Day 1 - triceps and chest
Day 2 - legs
Day 3 - cardio/abs
Day 4 - biceps and back?
Day 5 - shoulders or cardio?

and order doesnt matter to much, just so long as the part ur training isnt still sore from a previous workout

yea hit arms straight after back, if not doing them in the same session try for maxim time gape as your arms still work very hard during back work outs.

Nice start to the journal...

About toning the triceps - while hitting them hard with a good exercise programme will tone them, sadly (since spot reduction's a myth) the only way to expose that toned muscle is to reduce overall bodyfat. A balanced programme, covering all the muscle groups, will do that.

Your programme looks like it covers the basics (neat SM squats with 50kg, that's awesome) - but a lot will depend on your diet, and also how much cardio you do. Incidentally, cardio works best after weights - although if your day 3 is just cardio-then-abs, it's probably not going to hurt.

If you were looking for suggestions on a good four-day split (leaving Weds for cardio), a four-day split for someone with your eight-and-half years of previous experience might go like this:

A. Chest-triceps (so, three chest, such as a barbell bench press, a fly and maybe pec dec or an incline press, and three triceps from your list)

B. Back-biceps (lat pull-downs or chin-ups, deadlifts, and a row (bent-over, db, or t-bar), then essentially three curl variations, like EZ curl, preacher machine curl, seated hammer curl, etc)

C. Legs (quads, hams, calves - so Leg extension to warm up, squats, presses or lunges, then lying or seated curls, stiffleg deadlifts, and standing or seated calf raise)

D. Shoulders-Abs (shoulder press or clean-and-press, side raises, rear delt work, shrugs, and three abs to try to hit obliques and upper-lower abs).

It would probably be better to avoid doing chest and back the same day, which is why it's quite common to split arms across two days. Chest and back are both bigger muscle groups, hence the big-plus-little split. A routine like that would work equally well with anything from 5x5 thru three sets of 12-15 - as long as the intensity's up there - as 1day says, feeling muscle soreness is one pointer to that.

This site has some good suggestions on exercises to add in, often with illustrations.

Just my 2c worth, there'll be more advice from more experienced folks, i'm sure.

Thanks for the tips guys!

Today I did triceps and chest:
Tricep extensions 10kg 5x5
Tricep kickbacks 6kg 5x5
Seated dip 79kg 5x5
Tricep press ups - just 5

Chest press with 2x12kg dbs on swiss ball 4x8
Flys with dbs on swiss ball 5x5 (first time doing these so spent all my time working out which weight I should use - started with 5kg, then 6kg, then 7kg then 8kg)
Regular press ups - just 10

My food today has been:
1: 20g sultana bran with plain yogurt and a scoop of protein powder
2: small tin tuna, apple, mandarin
3: protein shake
4: small tin tuna, apple, mandarin
5: half a tortilla with peanut butter (yum!!)
6: stir fry pork and veges and a few noodles

I know I probably shouldn't be having sultana bran because of all the sugar, but I'm not sure what else is good in a cereal. I notice a lot of you guys have oats - but that needs to be cooked doesn't it? I'm kind of up and out the door asap in the mornings (don't really want to have to get up earlier than 6am!!) so I guess I'm a bit of a convenience eater when it comes to brekkie.

That's a fairly typical day's food for me on a Monday to Friday. I'm fairly disciplined and routined when I have work to go to. Weekends are another story though, but I'm working on cleaning that up a bit, including cutting way back on alcohol (which is what has contributed to most of my 5kg loss this year!).

Yep Oats is magic. Can you eat at work? Have access to a microwave? Two minutes nuked (with some egg whites) is all it needs.

Yep, got microwave at work. And I've just found some oats in the cupboard so I'll have to try them.

I saw in another thread that you can just have them with boiling water? That wouldn't take me any extra time in the morning, so maybe I'll try that too. Do you just soak them for a bit, then chuck some milk on them? And protein powder?

Yep definitely. Its a bit chewier but some people here actually prefer it that way

chewy sounds great! I've put it out for tomorrow's brekkie so I don't forget (I tend to be a bit on autopilot in the mornings), so I'll try it and let you know what I think.

Yep, i make up a protein shake with water, let the oats soak while I get ready, 1m30 in the microwave and they're ready to eat. Low-GI, so comparatively slow acting - and convenient. I take oats in a clic-clac and some protein to work, it's amazing how quickly you can get it ready to eat.

The diet looks quite good, altho some folks would say a last protein meal last thing - casein, but any protein powder's good - would be worth considering. The goal's to give the body protein thru the night to avoid muscle breakdown, especially if your workouts are after work.

Thanks, that's good to know. I'm sure I could find a way to put a bit more protein in before bed - maybe some yogurt with protein powder?

I just have oats with cold water and let them soak but Im a little strange anyways.

You should probably do your chest exercises before your tricep exercises that way you will be able to lift more weight and get more reps out.

You could always have some low fat cottage cheese before bed or make a casein shake.

Chillicat wrote:Thanks, that's good to know. I'm sure I could find a way to put a bit more protein in before bed - maybe some yogurt with protein powder?

GA beat me to it - cottage cheese is another alternative for that last meal of the day.

GreekAdonis wrote:I just have oats with cold water and let them soak but Im a little strange anyways.

You should probably do your chest exercises before your tricep exercises that way you will be able to lift more weight and get more reps out.

You could always have some low fat cottage cheese before bed or make a casein shake.

Oh yeah, I should have put the order I did the excercises in. I actually did do the chest press and flys first - just copied it on here from my pre-printed list. Then I did the triceps. Did both sets of press ups at the end though (hence not many!). I'll put them in order in future (more or less!).

Cottage cheese is a good idea. I'm a cheese addict (the bad kind), but if I can't have real cheese before bed, then at least I can have a kind of cheese!

Hey I chuck my cottage cheese in the blender with some chocolate protein powder or even some nesquik. I call it chocolate cheese! Tastes pretty good!

Hmmm, cottage cheese with choc protein powder - I'm not sure if I'm brave enough to try that one!

But as for the oats - yum! Just soaked them in boiling water before my shower, and so they were all ready for me when I got out. Delicious - but I think I had too much as my stomach feels pretty heavy right now - so less for me tomorrow!

I forgot to say ysterday that I excercised extreme self control yesterday morning. My office moved, and yesterday was our first day in our new building, so we had a morning tea. In the past, I've been a bit of a human vacuum cleaner when it comes to free food (I blame it on spending 8 years as a poor traveller, then another 8 years as a poor student, always having to make the $$ stretch as far as they can go). But yesterday I didn't touch a thing.

Usually they at least have fruit or something healthy, but yesterday it was all ginger slice, muffins and white bread sandwiches. I felt very virtuous!

Well done Work morning teas are the hardest I find. And when you're not eating you have to put up with the whole "why aren't you eating anything" or "are you dieting?"

So good on you

Yeah true, especially when you nip off and grab a tin of tuna to munch on instead! Ah well, I don't really care what they think!

Edit, because apparently I can't spell!

Today I worked my legs - quads, hamstrings and calves:

Smith squats 50kg 4x5, 53kg 1x5
Calf raises 10kg 1.5, 20kg 4x5
Seated leg press 115kg 1x5, 124kg 4x5
Lying leg curls 30kg 1x5, 35kg 4x5
Leg extension 63kg 5x5

I also did 5 mins of calf raises on a step - I've been neglecting calves recently, so time to work them again

Also did 5 mins of abs, but then realised after I'd left the gym that I should probably have included some glutes as well, as I've also been neglecting the old butt.

As for food:

I took the advice given and had some protein last night before bed, some yogurt and protein powder.

Today I had:
1. Oats with protein powder and a bit of yogurt (too many oats - less tomorrow!)
2. Small tin of tuna, apple, mandarin
3. Protein shake, apple, mandarin
4. Half a tortilla with peanut butter (post workout snack on the way home for dinner)
5. Chicken and rice with peanut butter dish - yum!
And I'll have some more yogurt and PP before bed.

I'm half a tin of tuna down on what I had yesterday because of the large oaty breakfast - I couldn't eat for ages after that, so there just wasn't time for another tuna meal.

Tomorrow is another challenge day - meeting a friend who's over from Oz for a few days at a pub. I don't really know what alternatives to alcohol there are at pubs that are any good - so I'll probably just have a water. It's funny when women who are known as drinkers don't drink when you see them at a pub - automatic assumption is that you're pregnant!

teamfatboy wrote:This site has some good suggestions on exercises to add in, often with illustrations.

Thanks heaps for this - it'll be very useful, as I've got a few body parts where I currently only have about 2-3 excercises, so it'll be great to help me build that up a bit. Will also help me with the names of some of the things I'm doing but don't have a clue what it's called!