Hi everybody
My name is Todd, I'm nearly 18 years old, I'm a junior in high school and I've been lifting since freshmen year. I've found that lifting is really about the only thing I cared about over these past few years. I plan to make a living off of it in some way, but I don't know what yet or how. Anyways, I feel that I have a decent foundation in bodybuilding knowledge. I've read quite a bit about it and I'm confident that I know more than your common joe, but of course I'm no pro. However, I know next to nothing about nutrition. I eat a lot of everything. The only guideline I try to follow that I know is at least a lb of protein for every lb of body weight. I don't eat breakfast, I know I need to and I try to eat less more.
For my goals,
Arnold sums up everything I want to look like. Put my head on his body and you got what I'm aiming to achieve, physically. As of now, I have not been thinking about competing as I'm still building up. I guess once I start getting to where I want to be I might think about competing.
My training is pretty inconsistent though. I lift mostly at school. I have a weight training class and we lift 3 days a week, MWF. I work hard when I'm in there, but in this past year I let my ego take over a little and I wanted to become a bench monster aiming to bench 300 this year. I'm not too far off from that, my max was 255 last time I did it about a month ago, but I'm stronger than that now. I have some equipment at home to lift. I have a Bodysolid multistation machine that my parents bought my freshmen year and I used that religously for the first 5 months then I slumped off for a few months. Last summer I bought a 300lb olympic freeweight set from Sports Authority. I think that's my best investment thus far. I also bought a bench that can decline, flat, and incline. It has a leg curl/leg extension attachment and a preacher curl attachment, but my arms are too long to use the preacher curl attachment. I wish I was more educated when I bought the bench because it's not a very good bench for serious lifting. The stays are too close together which prohibits me from taking my usual wide grip. However, since I mostly lift at school it's not much of a problem. I'm just about your typical gym rat. I focus more on chest and arms than legs and back. My arms and chest have seen the most improvement than anything because I'm the most consistent with them.
The good news is that in this past week I've changed my attitude. I've cut out soda from my diet, I'm starting to squat again and I want to add more exercises for muscle groups. I always have known that I was skimping out, but I wasn't that serious. I'm sorry that I can't provide pictures right now, but I can tell you, my back and legs are my most pathetic areas that need training especially my back.
Here is a run down of what I was doing before.
Monday:
Flat bench: 4-5 sets of 5 taking the last set to failure.
Squats: 3 sets of 5-10 reps
Power cleans: 3 sets of 5
Tuesday: off
Wednesday:
Lat pull: 3-4 sets of 8-12
Standing Bicep Curls:3-4 sets of 5-8 reps
Hammer curls: 1-3 sets
laying curls from lat tower: 3 sets of 5-8reps
forearm work both supinated and pronated: 3 sets to failure
Thursday: off
Friday:
Close-grip Bench:3 sets 8-10reps
Pushdowns: 3 set of 8-10 reps
Overall, that's a pretty pathetic workout, but I did bust my butt doing it. Not everything was set in stone. I never really had a set schedule for what I wanted to do in the past two years. The first 5 months that I talked about earlier when I worked out at home I did a much more ranged base for exercises on the bodysolid, but I didn't do much weight and all the sets/reps for each exercise were pretty much the same. I couldn't do much for legs or chest though using it as i could get much out of the machine bench and all I had was a standing leg curl and a seated leg ext. on it. I love the leg curl and leg ext it has though.
I'm almost done!!!
Here is the measurements I have taken over the course of working out. These are flexed measurements.
Starting Measurements: 15 years old
Chest:38
Thighs:22
Calves:15
Arms:13
Waist:32
Weight:165lbs
Height:6'2
16 - 3/12/02
Chest:41
Thighs:24.5
Calves:16
Arms:15
Waist:34
Weight:196lbs
Height:6'2
17 - 1/20/03
Chest:44.5
Thighs:25.5
Calves:16.7
Arms:15.6
Waist:39.7
Weight:220lbs
Height:6'2
17 - 3/12/03
Chest:44.5
Thighs:26
Calves:16.8
Arms:16
Waist:39
Weight:233lbs
Heigh:6'2
Some of the measurements might be off a few centimeters or so as I might not have correctly been measuring, but I tried to stay in the belly area of the muscle.
Thanks for taking the time to read all of this. It was probably boring, but I'm serious about making it in this sport for myself and to help others. Like I said at the top, it's about the only thing that makes me happy, I'm always thinking about it, and it's the only thing I've stuck with so far.
From reading around on these forums for the past few days I can tell their is some very educated, caring, and helpful people here that I hope I can share friendship. It's nice to get outside help from seasoned lifters and I hope I can return the favor.
Thanks again!
Todd
My name is Todd, I'm nearly 18 years old, I'm a junior in high school and I've been lifting since freshmen year. I've found that lifting is really about the only thing I cared about over these past few years. I plan to make a living off of it in some way, but I don't know what yet or how. Anyways, I feel that I have a decent foundation in bodybuilding knowledge. I've read quite a bit about it and I'm confident that I know more than your common joe, but of course I'm no pro. However, I know next to nothing about nutrition. I eat a lot of everything. The only guideline I try to follow that I know is at least a lb of protein for every lb of body weight. I don't eat breakfast, I know I need to and I try to eat less more.
For my goals,
Arnold sums up everything I want to look like. Put my head on his body and you got what I'm aiming to achieve, physically. As of now, I have not been thinking about competing as I'm still building up. I guess once I start getting to where I want to be I might think about competing.
My training is pretty inconsistent though. I lift mostly at school. I have a weight training class and we lift 3 days a week, MWF. I work hard when I'm in there, but in this past year I let my ego take over a little and I wanted to become a bench monster aiming to bench 300 this year. I'm not too far off from that, my max was 255 last time I did it about a month ago, but I'm stronger than that now. I have some equipment at home to lift. I have a Bodysolid multistation machine that my parents bought my freshmen year and I used that religously for the first 5 months then I slumped off for a few months. Last summer I bought a 300lb olympic freeweight set from Sports Authority. I think that's my best investment thus far. I also bought a bench that can decline, flat, and incline. It has a leg curl/leg extension attachment and a preacher curl attachment, but my arms are too long to use the preacher curl attachment. I wish I was more educated when I bought the bench because it's not a very good bench for serious lifting. The stays are too close together which prohibits me from taking my usual wide grip. However, since I mostly lift at school it's not much of a problem. I'm just about your typical gym rat. I focus more on chest and arms than legs and back. My arms and chest have seen the most improvement than anything because I'm the most consistent with them.
The good news is that in this past week I've changed my attitude. I've cut out soda from my diet, I'm starting to squat again and I want to add more exercises for muscle groups. I always have known that I was skimping out, but I wasn't that serious. I'm sorry that I can't provide pictures right now, but I can tell you, my back and legs are my most pathetic areas that need training especially my back.
Here is a run down of what I was doing before.
Monday:
Flat bench: 4-5 sets of 5 taking the last set to failure.
Squats: 3 sets of 5-10 reps
Power cleans: 3 sets of 5
Tuesday: off
Wednesday:
Lat pull: 3-4 sets of 8-12
Standing Bicep Curls:3-4 sets of 5-8 reps
Hammer curls: 1-3 sets
laying curls from lat tower: 3 sets of 5-8reps
forearm work both supinated and pronated: 3 sets to failure
Thursday: off
Friday:
Close-grip Bench:3 sets 8-10reps
Pushdowns: 3 set of 8-10 reps
Overall, that's a pretty pathetic workout, but I did bust my butt doing it. Not everything was set in stone. I never really had a set schedule for what I wanted to do in the past two years. The first 5 months that I talked about earlier when I worked out at home I did a much more ranged base for exercises on the bodysolid, but I didn't do much weight and all the sets/reps for each exercise were pretty much the same. I couldn't do much for legs or chest though using it as i could get much out of the machine bench and all I had was a standing leg curl and a seated leg ext. on it. I love the leg curl and leg ext it has though.
I'm almost done!!!
Here is the measurements I have taken over the course of working out. These are flexed measurements.
Starting Measurements: 15 years old
Chest:38
Thighs:22
Calves:15
Arms:13
Waist:32
Weight:165lbs
Height:6'2
16 - 3/12/02
Chest:41
Thighs:24.5
Calves:16
Arms:15
Waist:34
Weight:196lbs
Height:6'2
17 - 1/20/03
Chest:44.5
Thighs:25.5
Calves:16.7
Arms:15.6
Waist:39.7
Weight:220lbs
Height:6'2
17 - 3/12/03
Chest:44.5
Thighs:26
Calves:16.8
Arms:16
Waist:39
Weight:233lbs
Heigh:6'2
Some of the measurements might be off a few centimeters or so as I might not have correctly been measuring, but I tried to stay in the belly area of the muscle.
Thanks for taking the time to read all of this. It was probably boring, but I'm serious about making it in this sport for myself and to help others. Like I said at the top, it's about the only thing that makes me happy, I'm always thinking about it, and it's the only thing I've stuck with so far.
From reading around on these forums for the past few days I can tell their is some very educated, caring, and helpful people here that I hope I can share friendship. It's nice to get outside help from seasoned lifters and I hope I can return the favor.
Thanks again!
Todd
You should not skip breakfast, when you awake you have basically been fasting for 8 or more hours, you need food!