How to Calculate the Amount of Fat You Need to Lose to See Your Abs

Have you ever wondered what your body fat percentage is or how much fat you need to lose to start seeing your abs?

I want to share with you a simple way to determine how much body fat you need to lose to get ripped abs, or achieve any body fat percentage goal, for that matter.

Knowing when your abs will be visible for all to admire isn’t an exact science. As a general rule, men will have visible abs at 10-15% body fat and women at 15-18%.

In order to determine how much fat you’ll need to lose to meet this criteria you’ll obviously first need to figure out how much fat you’re starting with. Read More

Frequent Eating Myth Debunked

Have you been spending half your life planning and preparing to eat every 3 hours because you believe frequent eating will enhance your fat loss by speeding up your metabolism and/or prevent your body from storing additional body fat?

Eating frequent meals can be an acceptable nutritional approach, but such a diet should never be followed for reasons of metabolic enhancement (I’ll dig deeper on the myth of frequent eating enhancing the metabolism in just a moment).

Where did the belief that frequent eating enhances fat loss come from?

Science confirms that when the body consumes food it must expend additional energy to digest the food that’s been ingested, thus superficially enhancing its metabolic rate. The additional energy output required for digestion will vary depending on the macronutrients that have been consumed. Read More

Not Feeling It In Your Chest When Bench Pressing? Here’s the Fix…

I remember when I was new to weight training and no matter how many sets (or how many reps) I performed, after a round of bench pressing my chest never felt like it was bearing the brunt of the stimulation.

Most of the time my triceps would feel tighter and have a better pump than my pecs. Since I didn’t know any better, I just assumed this was normal.

Over the years, as I’ve continued to work on perfecting my bench pressing form, this problem has been corrected. Make no mistake, if you aren’t feeling your chest muscles engaged to a high degree while bench pressing it isn’t serving its purpose and your chest development will inevitably fall behind. Read More

Nutrition Tracking: Run Your Nutrition, Don’t Let It Run You

Ask the average person how many calories they’re consuming on a daily basis and you’re likely to be given a look of bewilderment.

If you want to end the conversation, just ask them to give their daily macronutrient totals.

Most people have absolutely zero idea how much they’re eating or what basic nutrients they’re feeding their bodies.

Let’s be honest.

Nutrition tracking is about as much fun as jabbing yourself in the eye with a dull pencil.

It sucks! Read More

How to Know When It’s Time to Add Weight to the Bar

In my last posting I explained the importance of lifting explosively. If you didn’t read it yet, you’ll want to click here to catch up before you continue reading on.

All caught up? Good.

Now that you know about my paradigm shift away from training to complete failure – and understand the reasons why I’ve changed my philosophies – I’d like to address a logical question that people who’re accustomed to lifting to failure inevitably ask.

When lifting to failure, determining when it’s time to add a little more weight to the bar is fairly easy.

As soon as you can perform more than your targeted number of reps you know it’s time to slide another couple plates on the bar.

When lifting sub-maximally with explosive movements, however, this isn’t as straightforward and there’s a certain amount of subjective conjecture involved. Read More

Lifting Explosively: Why You Should Worry About Lifting Too Heavy, Too Fast

If you’re serious about packing slabs of muscle on your frame you’re going to have to work hard at lifting heavier weights.

There’s just no way around it. Muscles require progressive overload to grow. If you don’t get this concept right you might as well give up trying to get jacked because it just isn’t going to happen for you.

Like anything else, though, there are inherent risks to taking this concept too far, too fast.

In our quest to get bigger and stronger it can be tempting to stack a few more plates on the bar when we really aren’t ready for it. I get when there’s a smokin’ hot girl working out in your vicinity you’re going to want to impress her with feats of strength.

But, I can promise you that leaving the gym with a cranked back and staying small and scrawny isn’t going to help you get any dates. So don’t be stupid. Read More

The Best Bodybuilding Quotes of All Time

I don’t know about you, but I love reading a good quote, especially of the bodybuilding variety.

Over the years I’ve come across dozens and dozens of great quotes that have inspired me, given me perspective, made me laugh and added value to my life. Some were deemed worthy for a “share” on my Facebook page and others were noted to be posted on the wall of the gym I hope to open in the near future.

I thought I’d spend a few moments today sharing some of my favorites.

Here is my list of the best bodybuilding quotes of all time… Read More

Next Page »