Newbie

[Bracket4503]

Hey i'm pretty new to weight lifting...well make that very new. My parents bought me a Golds Gym weight set for christmas because i want to get in shape. Well i've read just about every bodybuilding.com article available and am more lost than ever. One guy says this is how to do it...another says something else....its very confusing, but let me give you a little background about myself. I am 17, 5'11, 152 lbs. When i was 13 i had a herniated disk in my lower back and i had surgery to correct the problem. Before this i had never done any weight lifting in my life. So before i got my weight bench i was doing mainly push ups and just curls. Now i've been working on a full body program. I also have access to the local colleges weight room and my high school weight room but i prefer to do all i can at my home.(I do all my leg stuff at either the college or the high school). Well today i started a new routine, which mixed one of Ian Kings workout. What i want to do is put on some mass...and just be better physically fit and not look so small.
I am very weak for where i feel i should be.


Seeing that im a beginner i have read that it is best to do Upper body and lower body...each twice a week...here's my schedule

Upper
Lower
Off
Upper
Lower
Off off

and here's the program i did for today in chronological order:
Triceps:
Overhead tricep extension(1 set)
Close grip bench press (1 set)
Skull crusher (1 set)
Biceps: Incline curl(1 set)
Preacher curl (1 set)
Standing curl (1 set)
Back:
Chin ups (10)
Pull ups (10)
Lat pulldown (2 sets)
Seated rows (2 sets)(using the low pulley on the weight bench)
Shoulder Press: (2 sets/8 reps)
Chest: (2 sets/increasing weight/10 reps/8 reps)
Pushups(with feet elevated)-burned out

and I plan to do lower body tommorow..i haven't finished devising my plan yet..i have never really worked on lower body...except lately i have been doing step ups with dumbells in my hand to try to get some stength in my legs...so i'm not sure what i should do....start with body weight squats? I'm scared to do weighted squats due to my back...so should i do leg press?

And another thing....My upper back seems to be alot weaker then my chest area and front deltoids...which i feel is creating bad posture...how should i go about fixing this.

Any suggestions or advice would be appreciated. Thats all i can think of for right now.

Thanks
Kyle

[Bracket4503]

just saw that another user has the name BB..and is from texas...just wanted to mention that we are not the same person...Might be a good idea if an Admin can change my Handle...So people dont think we're just the same person asking question after question.

[Jean-Paul]

You can change your "publically displayed name" any time you want. Just go to your profile and you can change it to anything that is not already being used.

Welcome to the forum! [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Bracket4503]

Thanks.

[Genius]

I like the upper body/lower body split program, I am on the same thing. However, I see a few things that could use a little tweaking. You are new to lifting, so you should be doing compound movements. Compound movements are exersizes that work many different muscle groups at one time. You are capable of lifting more weight on compound movements than you are on isolation exersizes. You have 3 different exersizes JUST for your biceps! There really is no need for all of these exersizes at this early stage in your lifting. In fact, since you are new you may even want to shy away from isolating your biceps until you have made some gains in other areas. The same thing bugs me about the triceps. You do not need all of the different exersizes to work the triceps fully. I can see what you are attempting to do. You are attempting to work the muscles from every possible angle, and there really is no need at this period in time of your recently spawned lifting program to do this. You really only need a handful of exersizes to get a good workout. So, I personally suggest cutting the exersizes down a bit, the sets look good per body part though. As for the lower body,

Legs
Squatsx6
Deadliftsx6
Goodmorningsx6

[bryanc]

I'm going to go against the grain here and suggest you continue doing whole body workouts due to your training history. You've been weightlifting for 2 months (perhaps less). Your primary focus should be on developing near-perfect lifting technique on major lifts and building a solid strength foundation.

Most of the adaptations you will be experiencing for the next few months will be neural in nature, and these neural adaptations (basically, your nerves are learning how to recruit more muscle fibres) should have occurred before you really attack anything large (like large volumes or specialized training).

Split programs are essentially higher volume programs--you don't have time to do all of the exercises/sets for all of your body parts so you split them up. So the question then becomes, "Why would you need to do that many exercises/sets?" And the answer to that question is, "Because the existing workload (pre-splitting) is not sufficient to cause the adaptations I'm trying to cause (like increased strength and hypertrophy)" If your existing workload is sufficient to cause strength and hypertrophic adaptations, then there is no need to change to the higher volume workload that is present in a split program; in fact, it could be detrimental because you and your muscles are not yet accustomed to the existing workload and you're increasing it before your nerves are ready for it.

Or, maybe I'm not making any sense.

[DKing]

I agree with BryanC. Any new lifter I have started, I have started them with a full body workout. I wish I would have done it myself. They can be extremely effective, and I think it teaches a lifter to work all muscles pretty evenly and that tons of arm work isn't needed. I still go back to full body workouts occasionally.

Danny

[Bracket4503]

Hey thanks for all the advice.

another question...
Should i go all the way down to my chest on my bench presses? I've heard this can be detrimental to my shoulders, so instead i should put a board of some type on my chest to lower it to...any opinions?

[Genius]

No, go all the way down. I agree with the other two on the full body too, but I also agree with myself. You can do either way, just make sure you keep your exersizes mainly to the big 5.
scott

[Bracket4503]

Thanks for the help guys. I think im going to get a personal trainer to help me with form and stuff. Whats the going rate? Thanks

Kyle