Vegan Bodybuilding & Fitness

woke up at 12..
ate at 1 weetabix with banana,soymilk
apple at 3

didnt get to work out much because was busy with some work..
did some squats with 30 lbs, about 40 or so
also did about 40 or so situps..

lately been feeling a bit sluggish with the workouts, why is this so?

When do you do the workouts? What do you eat before you workout, and how long before is it that you eat? Do you just workout at home? Do you have anything else going on whilst you workout - music, TV etc? Do you have goals for each workout, or week-by-week etc? Do you keep track of your personal bests?

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I think food consumption is key to this. I generally do not eat anything more than maybe a protein shake or bar before a workout. I think some cereal probably wont way you down. May have to do with sleep.

I usually do the workouts right after i eat which is usually right after i wake up. maybe a half hour after waking up i eat some cereal, and then i begin to exercise.

while i exercise i usually listen to an internet talk radio health show.

as far as goals, i usually try and split it up to my upper body on mondays and thursdays and my lower body on tuesdays and fridays. I don't know if what im doing is right though, so im always wondering if i should be doing what im doing, cuz i got nothing to compare it to.

how long should the workouts be? I don't really have a set timeframe.

I think it's good that you do something to occupy you while you work out, listening to the radio.

I think that perhaps eating and then instantly working out maybe isn't the best idea. Perhaps eat and then work out about 30 minutes later? When I used to go to the gym regularly at university, I would wake up, eat a bowl of oats, then walk to the gym straight away, but the gym was like 20 minutes walk. So that worked out pretty good, I usually had enough energy.

I don't know if there is an optimum time to spend working out. I often hear that it should be between 45-60 minutes. I normally hear that it shouldn't be more than 60. But a shorter workout is still valuable.

What I mean about goals, is that it's good to have a particular thing you're aiming for, either overall, or per exercise. When I am doing the exercise bike at the gym, I often feel like stopping because it's just boring, but then I remind myself 'damn it, you need to do this to lose weight'. And that kind of refuels me for a bit. Same thing happens if I am tired sometimes, I might have got to 6 reps on something, and I feel tired, but then I kind of kick myself up the arse and say 'You can get more, you just want a break' and I get a couple more. If I had no goals, then I'd see no need to push myself a little harder, so I think the long-term goals are good.

The other type of goal is like aiming for a particular rep count or weight to lift, keeping track of how much you've done. Say you do, I dunno, 50 squats in a set or something. I think it's a really good thing to make a note of that, and then next time you come to do squats, try to beat that. It stretches your limits which is always good, but it also provides motivation, because you'll be thinking 'okay I feel tired, but I know I can do more than this'. Even if you then fail and stop at 35 or something, you can wait and then do another 15 to make up, and then try again next time etc. It can motivate you to stay consistent.

splitting the body up like you're doing sounds good to me

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Hi Kon,

I am going to give you my thoughts regarding your training and eating and why you might be feeling tired at the moment.

I think that you might be tired because you train, but do not eat like someone who trains. You only eat three times a day (and very little in each sittin). You really need to eat every three hours at the very least, two is better. Aim for 6 meals in the day, each one 400-500cal on average. It is unlikely that you will have much energy for lifting/progression unless you eat considerably more. I appreciate that you may not be hungry, but ask anyone who is bulking how often they are hungry...

For your training:

I would advise against training soon after waking. Leave it at least three hours, and preferably 4 before training. The reason for this is that the blood sugar is low - you will feel sluggish. Plus from an injury prevention point of view regarding your back, it takes several hours for your synovial fluid in your spine to disapate from your lower back. The more fluid is there, the higher the pressure, and the higher the risk of injury.

I would also more or less completely change your training. At the moment you are doing too much in the way of isolation stuff, which will cause you to grow more slowly. I also think that a general increase in volume will speed things up. Something like this would be great:

Train with two different workout days. One upper body day, and one lower body day. Train every other day, with a maximum of two rest days.

Upper body:

Standing barbell shoulder press - 3x8
Barbell bench press - 3x8
Bent over barbell rows - 4x8
Chins (or assisted chins) - if you can do 5 as a maximum, do 4sets of 3reps, and then gradually build up.
Barbell curl - 2x8
Close grip bench - 2x8

Lower body:

Barbell back squats - 4x8
Barbell front squat - 2x8
Deadlift - 4x6
Calf raises - 3x15
Ab work


Don't go to failure on any of the sets. On the 8 rep sets you should always feel that you have 9-10reps in there, and 7-8 for the 6's on deadlifts. Gradually increase the weight as your strength goes up. Stick with the routine for 8 weeks or so and then change it around a bit.

Jonathan

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Squat
Press
Eat
Repeat

listen to jonathan

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thanks for the replies
this has given me alot to think about.
I will try to adapt my execises to your suggestions jonathan, and ill also watch how exercising at a different time feels as well as eating.
If i notice anything interesting, ill report it here..
I dont have a barbell or a chinup bar, but i can improvise..?
would lifting something heavy in the same kind of motions as a barbell be just as good even if it isnt a barbell that you're lifting?

Without a barbell you will struggle with squats and deadlifts. All I can suggest is just deadlifting the dumbells and squatting with dumbells to your side.

As regards not having a chin up bar, just do two extra sets of bent over rows.

Jonathan

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Squat
Press
Eat
Repeat

If you can't do chinups combine rows with triceps pullovers. I'd suggest triceps pullovers for Jonathan also if he hasn't tried them.

chinup bars are really cheap dude, or is the problem that you can't install one? They don't take up any room, you just need a doorframe, and then you screw in the supports at the side. The door can still open and close fine, it's only the supports which stay there. Then when you want to do some chinups, you put the bar in place using the supports, and then when you're done you take it down, shimple.

Or you can go to a park or something? Use a climbing frame, or the kids' swings, they are normally low enough to grab for chinups. Plus you'll scare away the kids which is a bonus.

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ha, that last sentence made me laugh, richard..
i enjoy doing chinups, ill see what i can do..
today(erm yesterday i guess, man i must get to sleep earlier,but my work wont allow it for another couple months or so..) i did some exercises as suggested by jonathan for the upperbody, minus the chinups..
i found shoulderpresses more difficult than i imagined them to be and found my arms getting quite tired, which feels good.
when i got to curls, i lifted 30lb instead of the 25lb i normally do, but i was only able to do 1 set with right arm, and had to strain alot. I dunno if it was because i was exerciseing my arms before doing curls which warmed me up or if i am getting stronger(i use to not be able to lift 30lb at all). when i use to do curls, they were first thing id do.. so i dunno if that makes a difference.

yesterday i tried the lower body workouts, but i think i need to add more weight..
today i tried 30lb arm curls first, and managed to do 5 full motions with right arm, my left arm is weaker..

my wrists started to get sore dureing the exercizes, is this bad?

yesterday and today I found my legs to be sore.
I dont know why they are.. maybe the exercizes i began doing suggested by jonathan were because of it.. perhaps it is a step in the right direction..
today was lwoer body day, im alternating every week day and resting on weekends.

I think the more i eat, the hungrier i get. When you start eating alot, the body adapts to your habit, and then when you aren't eating, it says "hey i thought you were eating alot, so lets eat something"..

It's because you up your metabolism by eating more frequently. It's a bit hard to get into the whole "eating more", though you seem to be doing it just fine.

I too enjoyed Richard's last line.

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