Vegan Bodybuilding & Fitness

Weight lifting machines, the chest press and other things, sometimes a hotly debated topic on if they do any good and if they really work.

I was wondering if any of the guys (or women) here use them to any effects? Some times I do use the chest press machine when the usual bench press area is being used and I don't want to wait in line for my turn.

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"Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard." - Tim Notke
"Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm." - Sir Winston Churchill

I use them on rare occasions, they're not always bad as a secondary exercise, but if you're after the best results, you'll want to focus primarily on free weight movements first. Neglecting the stabilizer muscles by putting too much focus on machines tends to create weak spots in the chain, so use machines sparingly, and always after your main lifts have been done!

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"A 'hardgainer' is merely someone who hasn't bothered to try enough different training methods to learn what is actually right for their own damned body." - anonymous

Mm I've been lifting a bit for a while with no real gains in mass, strength yes so time to really take it seriously.

Anyway, I'm not focusing on machines really, just that I don't want to wait and extra 20 minutes for the bench to be free.. Come to think of it I could just do it with Dumbbells if the bar is in heavy use.

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"Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard." - Tim Notke
"Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm." - Sir Winston Churchill

Definitely go for dumbbells over machines, that's the way to do it!

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"A 'hardgainer' is merely someone who hasn't bothered to try enough different training methods to learn what is actually right for their own damned body." - anonymous

When you say that you are not making "gainz in mass", what are you basing that off of? If you are getting stronger you have to be making mass gainz. There is no way for you to get stronger without adding some degree of muscle to your body. Some people might have much denser muscle fibers, where as some others might appear to be growing by leaps and bounds, but if both individualizes are getting stronger then they are both growing muscle. I've only studied human physiology at a very basic level, so I don't necessarily understand all the components that go into one verses the other, but I think strength is a much better indicator of muscle growth than the mirror. Body weight and appearance leave a lot of variables, especially when adding just 2 or 3 pounds of lean muscle can be a massive undertaking.

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Justin Morgan

http://www.youtube.com/user/RawVegaCaliBB

Oh, but I agree that bench press and dumbbells are way better than machines. I wonder what the differences between dumbbells verses barbell presses would be though.

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Justin Morgan

http://www.youtube.com/user/RawVegaCaliBB

I too use machines rarely. Only when stuck in a hotel that only has them, or if I have an injury I am working through. My favorite device is the Jungle Gym XT, because it does help to develop all those stabilizer muscles, and they are small enough to take on trips. If you can do 50 pushups on the floor, you might only be able to to 15 on the Jungle Gym XT.

I use machines in my workouts but as ve said only after I've finished my main lifts using free weights, it's nice to get a pump from the lat pulldown machine after finishing my pull ups for example.
I have used them quite recently due to not having a spotter, felt it would be safer and better than not working out at all, I'm not one of those people who would be confident enough to ask a stranger or trainer at the gym to spot me ahha

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http://www.facebook.com/ross.d.cosgrove

This is true, but you CAN add mass without increasing size much, because there are two ways to add strength. One is to increase the number of fibers in a muscle, 'growing' it, and another is to increase teh fiber density, which would not 'grow' it. Your strength goes up in both cases but you will only see large size gains if you are increasing the total number of fibers, not the fiber density.

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Learning how to be compassionate, gain wisdom, and love life.

I did kind of point that out. But I went and asked my physiology professor about muscle fibers/growth, and her response was

"Muscle growth is complex and is still not fully understood but it is believed that the number of muscle fibers is fixed and they increase in size with exercise."

So I'm not arguing or disagreeing with you except about the statement,

And for that matter I wasn't entirely sure either which is why I asked my teacher.

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Justin Morgan

http://www.youtube.com/user/RawVegaCaliBB