Thread: Increasing Strength gradually

Change up your routine, your in a plateau (sp?), and it sucks that you waited 5 months to say something. Hows the diet? Are you training hard or like a girl?
If you have been training to failure alot stop for a while. Post your routine, and get your diet critiqued in diet section.

Are you gaining weight? No weight = no muslce = not much strength gain. You have to eat, eat, and eat. Are you taking in at least 1 gram of protein per lb of body weight or at least close? 4k-6k calories a day my friend. Your a bigger guy so you could go even higher.

i train hard, especially when coming to a chest/ tricep workout. Im doing a split routine, mostly based on cowpimps sticky.

Originally Posted by JordanMang

Are you gaining weight? No weight = no muslce = not much strength gain. You have to eat, eat, and eat. Are you taking in at least 1 gram of protein per lb of body weight or at least close? 4k-6k calories a day my friend. Your a bigger guy so you could go even higher.

That much food is not nessacary for strength gains.

Originally Posted by mike456

That much food is not nessacary for strength gains.

For any kind of real strength gains yes it is. Especially for his size. My brother is 6'0, 185, and he eats 3000-3500 for maitenance and this still leaves him hungry at times. I take in 4,000-6000 a day and I don't gain weight at all.

Its a bit hard for me to get in that many clean calories a day. But im already big, and have a good bout of bf on me, so i dont really stack up on calories.

post up your whole routine bud. maybe theres a problem in it ....man but its mostly diet haha i gotta tell you before i started my bulking i could only bench 185 for 5-6reps and now i'm doing 225 for 5-6reps and before my incline was barely 135 for a few reps and now its 185 for 5-6easy reps.

Man you gotta love a great diet and hard work it really pays off

You don't really have to gain weight to gain strength... I'm only ~6lbs heavier than I was a year ago (yes my BF% is lower however), but I'm a hell of a lot stronger than I was a year ago... I'm also stronger now than I was at my heaviest bodyweight. There is a lot more to account for strength than sheer muscle mass. It sounds like you need to vary up your training styles, you've probably been doing the same things for too long.

Ive definitely been doing the same thing for too long. Although recently i have been changing it up in terms of a few exercises.

try to do stuf in the 3-6 rep range. i usually never go over 8 reps and i usually dont go to 8 either lol. go as heavy as you can. bust your balls. that last rep you better be yelling

Originally Posted by YSK

Ive definitely been doing the same thing for too long. Although recently i have been changing it up in terms of a few exercises.

changing exercises aint really gonna do shit for a plateau

you have to change intensity, volume, frequency

post your routine so we can help you out better.

Originally Posted by mike456

changing exercises aint really gonna do shit for a plateau

you have to change intensity, volume, frequency

post your routine so we can help you out better.

That's exactly what changing an exercise is. If I do heavy bench for 6 months and hit a plateau, and then I go to lighter weight and higher rep I have changed the excercise in it's essence. Cycling excercises does help.

OK this is kinda long.
Weekends Off (just cardio soccer, some runnning etc)

Mon -Chest/Tri
Tuesday - Back/Minimal Bicep work
Wednesday - Off
Thursday - Shoulder/Traps
Friday - Chest/Tri OR Legs every other friday
Most exercises i do are in the 8-10 rep range
Chest / Tri
4 X Flat DB benchpress
3 X Incline DB Benchpress
3 X Cable flies OR Flat bench flies
3 X Skullcrushers
3 X weighted Bench dips

Back / Bicep
3 X DB rows
3 X Seated cable rows
4 X Lat pull downs
3 X Close grip pull downs
3 X Reverse Flies
4 X Hammer and normal dumbell curls

Shoulder / Traps
4 X Military press
3 X lateral raise
3 X front raise
4 X Barbell shrugs

Legs
4 X Squats
3 X Calf raises
3 X leg extensions

Thats basically what i do, sometimes i do switch things up a bit. Now that i actually look at my routine, seems like im doing too much....

squats? deads?

IMO that workout sucks. oh btw i just noticed u had squats lol

yeah ive only gotten parts of it critiqued.

goals? whynot try push-legs-pull for awhile and see how that goes?

hmm....i guess this proves how bad i am at training but how would a routine such as that layout? in terms of exercises.

push(chest,shoulders,triceps)
legs-well your legs lol
pull(back,biceps)

somethinglike this

push- 4x5-8
benchpress
inclinepress
militarypress
dips


legs 4x5-8
squats
sld's
leg ext.
calf raises

pull-4x5-8
bentover rows
wide grip pullups
one arm rows
chinups

simple maybe mike has a better one tho haha

but try to eat alot haha like i said in a previous post. the best gains of my life has beenon this bulk. before this clean bulk i was prolly gettin around 140-150g. of protein and now i'm getting over 300g. and same w/carbs and stuff haha

im just worried that if i eat a lot that it'll turn into more fat, i dont care if i get heavier from muscle.

just try to eat clean foods. if you eat good then you prolly wont put on abunch of fat man. it would be mostly muscle.

well its 2:22am and its time for sleep. night and i just ate my dad's sub haha hes gonna kill me :P

You should try to go to a 3 day push/pull/legs or full body program for a change. Just stick to the basics. For example for shoulders just do overhead presses (forget the front and side raises). You don't need cg pulldowns as well as lat pull downs. Also, I would ditch the leg extensions do front squats or step-ups for a change. I would cut out 1/4 of the exercises you have and just keep it really simple. And where are the: Deadlifts, SLRDL's? Those are your meat and potatoes.
Also, when was the last time you took a week off? You may just be burnt out if you train hard in the gym 4 days a week plus all your other activities.

ive never taken more than a week off for about 6 months now........excuse my ignoreance, but what is a SLRDL's?