So, here we go:

#1 Dumbbell flyes

This exercise is great isolation for pectorals and it preserves triceps for the subsequent exercise. This exercise will make your chest look wider. Remember that you should use spotter when performing this exercise because you can get some  serious rotator cuff injuries if you don’t.

#2 Cable crossover

This exercise is excellent for finishing your chest training routine. It will give great pump and an extra push to your muscle, like saying “cmon’ let’s grow!”! Try to perform this exercise slowly, you don’t need heavy weight to get the results in this exercise.

#3 Incline dumbbell/barbell press

No, this is not the same as bench press, bench press doesn’t work out the upper pecs efficiently enough. If you want big, gladiator-like pecs you have to do one of these.

#4 Decline  dumbbell/barbell press

Pretty much the same, gives definition to pecs, works the lower region. If you want to build serious chest you have to split your chest workout in 3 parts – upper, middle, lower chest. This is the basic exercise for lower part of pecs.

#5 Posing??!!

Well this won’t really be a muscle building exercise, this will be… posing! Yes, you heard me right – posing. When you work out you should remember that posing is important not only for competing bodybuilders but for everyone. While posing you squeeze your muscles, the same as lifting, the only difference is that you squeeze the muscle parts you want to develop more, therefore you can add the desired shape to your muscles!
Stay tuned for more muscle building exercise tops! This was just the first edition. Come back for more…!

You can lose your muscle mass!

Yes, sounds scary. You go to gym to build muscle mass, not to lose it. But this is what happens when you overtrain – your muscle do not recover.Take a rest at least one day between your workout sessions and get enough proteins (about 30-35 grams per each meal). Of course, vitamins, and other nutritional supplements are important too. But proteins are the building blocks of muscle.

Overtraining decreases the level of testosterone in your body!

This is painful too. Here is what happens – you overtrain your body and it has to recover. If it doesn’t get enough nutritional supplements, it have to use something else. And this is where you lose your muscle mass. And not only that. You can lose your testosterone – your main male hormone – level. Testosterone is a creation and building hormone. But if your body is focused on recovery, it totally forgets to keep up your testosterone level.

Damaged immune system

Muscle building hurts immune system by general. It weakens your body workout after workout and then recovers. This is why vitamins are so vital here – to strengthen your immune system. If you get a flu – you’re out of gym for at least 1 week and you lose a lot of water and strength by that time. But if you overtrain – you lose your immune system abilities by at least 200%, so your body is like a broken fortress – every one can get in.

So keep in mind – the line between great workout and “too hard” one is pretty thin. No one better than you can feel your body. Train hard, rest good and build a body you’ve always wanted!

Isolation exercises

Isolation exercises work only one muscle or muscle group at the time.We usually perform these exercises with weight machines at the gym. The idea here is that you go from one machine to other to work all your muscle groups. But in the past these machines were basically used for rehab centers to correct some specific muscle weaknesses and to cover from injuries.

Why should we do isolation exercises

This “isolation” thing can come real handy for you. This is great for strength training for some specific muscle. If you want to get more strength to your biceps, you isolate all the other muscle “from work” and all concentration to lift that weight goes to biceps. Also isolation exercises can give you some really good muscle pump for specific muscle. You want a big biceps for the summer season? Go for it with bicep curl isolation exercises.

Compound exercises

Compound exercises use free weights. That way you can involve more muscle groups and all these important small muscle groups in one exercise. This helps to workout your full body a lot more faster, prevents from different muscle injuries, improves coordination and balance. All these small muscle groups give a fantastic boost in overall strength training.

Conclusion

For as well as we need a balanced diet, we need a balanced training program. Most of the bodybuilders use compound exercises and finish with isolated ones.

The Mighty Biceps, few golden tips to get them

•    First thing I would like to mention (no not the curls or anything similar – forget it!) close grip chin up. I mention this first because of a reason – you can lift a lot more weight than doing curls or anything else + you can’t cheat so much. This exercise creates high level of neuromuscular activation which leads to great muscle development. This is quite uncomfortable exercise for some people, but just remember about the beach…
•    Ok, next will be old and boring barbell curl. But hey, it’s not forgotten because of 1 reason – this is the greatest isolation exercise for biceps EVER.
•    Dumbbell curls- this is nearly equivalent to barbell curls so you can chose one of them. But there is one “+” for this exercise – you can switch to alternate curls when you can’t lift another one rep, so you can cheat out some more reps.
•    Incline dumbbell curl – ads some stretch to your biceps, this makes the blood to flow more to your biceps therefore increasing the biceps growth and recovery rate.
•    Hammer curl – develops the brachialis muscle too. This muscle makes your arms look bigger and more impressive! Adds great deal of mass and thickness to the upper arm. (One of my favorite exercises ever).
Ok, I hope you understood the basics of building big biceps now. Let’s jump straight to the… to the… ABS, “The six pack”! Now I will list down some tips to help you get your six pack fairly easy.  ABS guide will be more based on dieting and planning than exercising.

How to get your six-pack?

•    Plan your diet! This is vital! 70% people fail here… wrong plan and you can say goodbye to your summer six pack. List down such things as where you are going, how you are going to get there, and when you are going to get there. Just take blank paper, pen and sit down, list it all on paper and think of it as your goal.
•    Eat your breakfast! Breakfast is the most important meal – I mean it! If you will skip breakfast, your body will think something like this: ’’oh my god! Something bad has happened and I must stack on my energy reserve (fat) because I will have to starve!’’ and this happens every morning – stacking up… Research shows that most of the overweight people skip breakfast.
•    Don’t forget about protein and the ‘’right’’ carbs. Protein will keep your sugar level stable, this will help you to abstain from snacking all the time. Protein is most important in breakfast. And carbs, your body needs carbs to function properly. Avoid simple carbs – eat plenty of fibrous carbs. You will consume less calories and lose your belly fat in no time + there are also many health benefits such as cancer and heart attack prevention.
•    Drink plenty of water.
•    Exercise your ABS  not only with crunches but do about 6 different exercises and switch them from time to time. You can find plenty of exercises on bodybuilding.com so start sweating!

But try not to work out your abs so hard that you can’t even move next day… do it moderate and you will kick the beach after some time!
Stick with this and you will get ABS and blasting biceps! Stick to your goals, NEVER EVER GIVE UP… NEVER!!! You have your goals – don’t cheat on them… don’t… Good luck with your training diet and everyday life!

Barbell curl

This is the right technique to do Barbell Curl:
1.    Start in a standing position with your feet shoulder width apart and your knees relaxed.
2.    Grab a barbell with underhand grip – shoulder width apart.
3.    Stand upright and let the bar hang in front of your thighs.
4.    Bend at your elbows to curl the bar to shoulder level.
5.    Pause momentarily at this top position.
6.    Slowly lower the bar back to the starting position.

Video:

Start working! Grab this from www.top-muscle.com for free and get some serious gains!

Remember to always start your workouts with some warm up exercises and stretching. This is vital for great progress and muscle gains!

(Exercise, sets, repetitions*)

Day 1 (Chest/Triceps/Shoulders):

• Bench Press 4 x 12,10,8

• Dumbbell presses on incline bench 2 x 12,10

• Standing barbell military presses 2 x 12,10

• Lateral dumbbell deltoid raises 3 x 15,12,12

• Cable crossover flies 3 x 12,10,8

• Dips 3 x 10,8,6

• Tricep V-bar pushdowns 2 x 12,10,8

• Skullcrushers with EZ-bar 3 x 10,8,6

Day 3 (Back/Biceps/Forearms):

• Deadlifts 4 x 15,12,10,8

• Lat pulls 3 x 12,10,8

• Dumbbell rows 3 x 12,10,8

• Chins 3 x max, 12, 10

• Preacher curls with EZ-bar 2 x 12,10

• Seated dumbbell hammer curls 3 x 10,8,6

• Reverse Barbell Curl 2 x 12,max

• Dumbbell Lying Pronation 3 x 15,12,10

Day 5 (Legs/ABS):

• Squats 4 x 12,10,10,8

• Leg presses 3 x 10,8,6

• Leg extension machine 3 x 10,8,6

• Lying Leg Curls 3 x 12,10,8

• Standing Calf Raises (Machine) 3 x 15,12,10

• ABS Machine 3 x 12,10,8

• Crunches 3 x 15,12,10

• Reverse Crunches 2 x 12,10

Stay focused on your goals – gaining mass and strength. Eat 4-5 complex meals a day, use supplements – protein (or weight gainer if you are a hard gainer), vitamins, creatine.

* We will improve our exercise database! But for now, if you don’t know how to perform some exercises, search the web.

Good luck!