plateau

[engleangle Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close engleangle]

hey everyone I've been lifting for a little while and i have seemed to hit an all over weight plateau. i stopped at 175x8 on bench, 30 pounds curling, lunges so on so forth ya get the idea. ive changed up my routine but still cant overcome it any advice? im 6'1" and 166 pounds if that helps any. i used to be able to lift more before my ab injury. but that was awhile back

[RockstarParkingDude Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close RockstarParkingDude]

often times the cause of a plateau is not that the major muscles aren't strong enough. it is more likely that your smaller stabilizing muscles cannot handle the heavier weight. working your rotator cuff muscles will help your bench, working your lower back will help your squat, working the sides of the calves will help the dead lift, etc. work on your smaller muscles as it is more likely that they are your limiting factor.

also, your diet may be causing your plateau.

[engleangle Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close engleangle]

well i believe i eat pretty well but what are some exercises to do to work out the stabilizing muscles?

[RockstarParkingDude Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close RockstarParkingDude]

well, you can do lots of things to work stabilizing muscles, but anything that keeps you off balance is good. try pushups with your feet on a big ab training ball, or your feet on a bench and hands on the ball. try benching with chains holding kettel balls instead of plates. to work the stabilizers in your legs yoga would be great, and actually would help your squat. work your chest with dumbells and kettel balls as much as possible to help your bench. think outside the standard exercises to break through plateaus.

[engleangle Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close engleangle]

alright cool that makes sense man. ive also started back on multivitamins, creatine and protein. plus ive been eatting more nutritionally fuller then what i used to eat.

[Erebus197 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Erebus197]

All of Rockstar's advice is good. Another point to make is make sure you are training to failure. If your body can still complete the set, it has less reason to get stronger than if you actually fail and prove you need to be made stronger. Get yourself a spotter so you don't hurt yourself while really pushing. Also for stuff like curls you can do good form curls until failure then do cheat curls to get the weight up and slowly lower the weight to work the negative portion of the lift. This goes for many exercise. I also started finishing my workouts with going to a machine of the most basic exercise of the group (shoulder press, bench press, curl, etc) and use a moderate weight and just pump out weights until I cannot do more.

I think a combination of this and Rockstar's advice and you should break through your plateau. I saw the chain and kettleball trick recently on youtube and it seems interesting but is not probably possible if you go to a 'name brand' gym as I have not seen chains at them (24 hour at least).

[engleangle Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close engleangle]

yeah that sounds good. well i don't workout at a gym but i was bought a bench set, pull up /leg lift combo thing i can get chain for the bench and kettle balls. just need the money. I've added some of the stabilizer muscle exercises that i can do for now and will add different ones once i get more equipment. next workout ons add your advice to go to complete failure if possible. whole problem with that is everytime my friend says he wants to workout we do and he just doesn't do anything and it brings my focus down tremendously. :/

[Erebus197 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Erebus197]

I have that problem too with my partner sometimes. Except he tempts me with basketball to end early, which is hard to say no too:P You just have to be a little more independant about your workouts so you don't rely on him to focus. Think of him as a tool haha.

[engleangle Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close engleangle]

hahaha true. but he is a tool in ever sense of the word hahaha. but alright ill give it a go thanks!!

[Martyparty Member Find all posts View Profile Close Martyparty]

work with 65-75% of your 1rm(one rep max) 8-12 reps 3-4 sets and the lifting tempo should be 2-0-2 so two seconds on the lifting portion, no pause and two seconds on the negative, that will induce muscular hypertrophy which in turn will make your muscles grow therefore you will be stronger. Dont train to failure, al that does is anhilate your muscle which will retard recovery.overtraining isnt a good thing to do so just work with intensity and push yourself but not beyond what your capable of. form is much more important than weight.since you sustained an ab injury your core may need some rehab, pm if you want some exercises to help you with that because your core is the foundation, a strong core= strong body. also if your trying to build muscle overall train using squats, deadlits, bench press. alll these exercises build your whole body versus isolated body part training.make sure to eat enough, and you should be taking in glutamine, and bcaas after your workouts. i reccomend aftershock orange avalanche as a postworkout drink it has all the essentials you need to build muscle...since your supplementing with creatine always remember to cylce off for 4 weeks after every eight weeks. be weary that shit will pickle your organs haha it does make you stronger however you should know that fluid displacement between muscle is what makes you appear swoll, your not actually building more muscle mass.

[engleangle Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close engleangle]

yeah im going to be cyclin my supplements i just bought some NO2 and glutamine. im cycling my creatine and glutamine since they dont like each other from what i hear. i have broke past my plateau now thankfully and yeah id appreciate more ab workouts. i do the typical crunches, weighted leg lifts, and whatever you call those when you are in the crunched position and you hold a weight and tap the floor on each side of you. (very technical i know) ive been doing some shrugs also. the creatine has helped a good amount. im taking creatine hydrochloride. not mono like i used to. and im taking 5g of that a day. ive been incorporating higher reps in my workout and trying to balance everything out.

[somebodyelse Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close somebodyelse]

Those crunch floor taps are called "Mason Twists"

Bad ass workout.

[RockstarParkingDude Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close RockstarParkingDude]

if you have a pullup bar, is it bolted into the wall? i got one from walmart for like 40 bucks, golds gym pullup pushup something or other... i literally screwed it into one of my doors. when i wasn't going to the actual gym, i'd hang off the pullup bar - upside down - and do my ab work. you can get a serious ab workout in like 3 minutes, especially if you grab a 10 pound plate and do em.

if you have a half medicine ball and a barbell, do pushups with the bar balanced on the ball. the wobbliness is killer for stabilizers and you don't have to buy chains.

[engleangle Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close engleangle]

hmm interesting i have a pull up bar its on the back side of the leg lifting thing. then its got a place for pushups on the bottom. I've also started doing inclinced bench. not military press. and thanks somebodyelse i never knew what they were called