Maximizing Your Workout

Some times you may workout and it seems like you just aren't getting anywhere. Realisticly, you may not be wasting your time, you just aren't maximizing your workout in a way that will increase the potential of muscle growth.

You know the feeling of soreness that you get when you haven't worked out for a while? You know that you got a good workout when you can't move your arms the next day. Right? You don't always get that sore feeling after every workout and you may from time to time wonder if you are actually building muscle.

There are ways that you can change your routine to increase the effectiveness of your workout. If you have read any articles or talked to anyone about working out, you probably have heard several ways that you should work out. Less weight and more sets. More weight and fewer sets. Rest 2-3 days between muscle groups, and so on. The list of workout methods never ends. With all the new and so called improved ab exercises, it is easy to see how one may get confused.

I will include a few tips below that I have found helpful. But first I want to give an example of how muscles get bigger from exercise.

Imagine you have a 20 horse that you use to pull some very heavy wagons. However you can only hook up 6 horses at a time. Let's say you hook up six and work then until they are tired. Then you let them rest and have them haul the load further until they are tired again. At that point you decide to take the 2 tiredest horses and let the rest and replace them with 2 fresh horses. Now this method may seem to work but which horses are getting stronger. You will have 6 strong horses, 2 pretty good horses, and the rest will be worthless. So, from hear on out, which horses will yo uuse to pull you load?

Think of the muscle fibers working the same way. You only work part of them and let them rest and then work them again. Doing this doesn't allow all of the fibers to get a complete workout. Now let's change the way we exercise. Pick a weight that will allow you to do 5-6 reps. Rest for 60-90 seconds then do the same weight again and try to ger 2-3 reps. When you begin to barely get the second one, then drop the weight on the next set. this allows all the fibers to be worked. One your main horses are still tired, you are forced to use the others to keep the load moving. This also helps you to change between less weight and more reps to more weight and less reps and more weight.

- Don't let your ego ruin your workout. Forget about who is watching you and how much weight you are doing.

- Don't rest more than 60-90 seconds between sets.

- Never workout on an empty stomach. You need the energy to keep going.

- Change your routine. Including your exercise. Yes you need to abandon even your favorite exercise occassionaly.

- Make the best of it. We don't always have 2-3 hours everyday to workout. If you only have 15-20 minutes, do something. You are atleast burning calories.

- If you feel that you aren't building muscle or burning fat anymore, change your workout or diet.