Off court training

[Rob ITST]

Here's some real advice:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGBQVg1G ... e=youtu.be

[L Sanchez MD]

Here's some real advice:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGBQVg1G ... e=youtu.be

[Coolhand Texas]

hey al, i have one question about your routine. I noticed you wanted to keep the reps low.

for me i do high reps with lower weight to avoid bulk. wouldn't this be the best for tennis as you would be lean muscle?

as for bench press i would do 4 sets.
1st= 15 reps
2nd= 20 reps
3rd= 25 reps
4th= 10 reps

[djarvik]

Bulking up is done in the kitchen, not gym.

There is an initial spurt of muscle growth with anyone who never goes to the gym and starts going on a regular basis. At that time, reps, exercises and food and rest are irrelevant. You will drop a bit of water first 2-3 weeks and then will start gaining muscles for a few month to almost a year (in some cases). Then you will hit a "wall". From there, you need to go to the "kitchen" if you want results.

10-15 Higher reps build mostly endurance.
5-10 Medium rep build endurance and strength.
1-5 Low reps build mostly strength.

For tennis, you need a bit of both, but in case of Tom, he asked for gaining strength without gym experience, this to me places him in medium rep category. Power-lifting is almost useless for tennis, muscle endurance is better built on the court as it will be built at the same time as muscle memory.

From personal experience, when it comes to bulking up, cutting and even building endurance - exercise is a only a small part of the what you need to do. The other parts are kitchen and the bed. I have always been rather fit and on the lean side. I am 6'2 and my weight was as low as 155lbs and as high as 190lbs. Now I am at 175lbs. I think I feel my best right around 175. Extra muscle weight make me slower and puts pressure on by bad knee.

Flexibility especially in your hips and lower back is a must for tennis btw. I suggest to devote to this as much time as you can. There are stretch exercises that can be done anywhere and it will only take a few minutes. Important to remember to warn up for a stretch and never do it as the first thing when getting to the gym or court, this is how people get injuries. Stretching is best done after the activity. If you have no time, a fast paced walk for a bout 5 minutes should give you enough warm up before the stretch.

[djarvik]

hey al, i have one question about your routine. I noticed you wanted to keep the reps low.

for me i do high reps with lower weight to avoid bulk. wouldn't this be the best for tennis as you would be lean muscle?

as for bench press i would do 4 sets.
1st= 15 reps
2nd= 20 reps
3rd= 25 reps
4th= 10 reps

...another thing to remember: Don't count, or rather forget the count once you cross 5. Concentrate on the last rep, which should always fail - if you are working out with a partner, or almost fail if you are working out alone. If you going to concentrate on numbers, you going to have a false sense of accomplishment and that halts the development.

BTW - judging by the video and your description, you are in great shape and basically "sports" active almost all the time. I was just like you. Wait. Things will change. Of course if you will become a Pro athlete they will change to a different direction all together.

I remember going to high-school and then college only to skip all of my classes to play Basketball, tennis, soccer....anything. Then the school would be over, I would go home, change, and go hit the gym. Then in the evening I would go out for some more basketball. Come home, change, go out to a cub or whatever, come home like at 3 am go to bed only to wake up at 7-8 and start the whole thing over. It seemed like I had an endless supply of energy and I thought it would never end. Boy was I wrong.

[Rob ITST]

...another thing to remember: Don't count, or rather forget the count once you cross 5. Concentrate on the last rep, which should always fail - if you are working out with a partner, or almost fail if you are working out alone. If you going to concentrate on numbers, you going to have a false sense of accomplishment and that halts the development.

Great advice. If you count, you'll usually get to a certain number and stop there.

I always found it hard not to count, since counting was part of the rhythm. So, I'd count random numbers - 1, 5, 9, 3, 12, 2, 8, 4,...... try to lose track of how many reps you've done.

[Coolhand Texas]

djarvik- I am not looking forward to that day. hope it stays at bay for awhile


rob- i hope you were not counting out loud, people might have thought you were psycho

[Rob ITST]

Sometimes I'll count 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1...... then people just think I'm stupid.

[TomBs]

There is an initial spurt of muscle growth with anyone who never goes to the gym and starts going on a regular basis. At that time, reps, exercises and food and rest are irrelevant. You will drop a bit of water first 2-3 weeks and then will start gaining muscles for a few month to almost a year (in some cases). Then you will hit a "wall". From there, you need to go to the "kitchen" if you want results.

10-15 Higher reps build mostly endurance.
5-10 Medium rep build endurance and strength.
1-5 Low reps build mostly strength.

For tennis, you need a bit of both, but in case of Tom, he asked for gaining strength without gym experience, this to me places him in medium rep category. Power-lifting is almost useless for tennis, muscle endurance is better built on the court as it will be built at the same time as muscle memory.

From personal experience, when it comes to bulking up, cutting and even building endurance - exercise is a only a small part of the what you need to do. The other parts are kitchen and the bed. I have always been rather fit and on the lean side. I am 6'2 and my weight was as low as 155lbs and as high as 190lbs. Now I am at 175lbs. I think I feel my best right around 175. Extra muscle weight make me slower and puts pressure on by bad knee.

Flexibility especially in your hips and lower back is a must for tennis btw. I suggest to devote to this as much time as you can. There are stretch exercises that can be done anywhere and it will only take a few minutes. Important to remember to warn up for a stretch and never do it as the first thing when getting to the gym or court, this is how people get injuries. Stretching is best done after the activity. If you have no time, a fast paced walk for a bout 5 minutes should give you enough warm up before the stretch.

Well, I actually do have some gym experience, haven't been since a year or so though. Probably went 2 years, but not too regular, I lack the discipline for that. Would do 8-12 reps on most machines available, giving quite a complete workout. Wouldn't do a shoulder press though, since I noticed that was quite bad in combination with tennis.
5'9 here, 150-155lbs. I'd say 165 would be good for me.

On the

From personal experience, when it comes to bulking up, cutting and even building endurance - exercise is a only a small part of the what you need to do. The other parts are kitchen and the bed.

Don't you think rest is important as well?

[djarvik]

Well, I actually do have some gym experience, haven't been since a year or so though. Probably went 2 years, but not too regular, I lack the discipline for that. Would do 8-12 reps on most machines available, giving quite a complete workout. Wouldn't do a shoulder press though, since I noticed that was quite bad in combination with tennis.
5'9 here, 150-155lbs. I'd say 165 would be good for me.

Yeah, discipline is what it is all about. If you had your "virgin" few years in the gym, then you likely maxed out on the "beginners gains". It also means that your muscle fibers store that state you achieved within 2 years and you can get back to that state quite fast. Then you need discipline again. That is why I am a big advocate of simplicity and hate numbers, minutes, reps, days etc. Don't keep count of anything. Some people go nuts with the regiment, Every Monday - legs, Tuesday chest and triceps, Wednesdays back and biceps...Then, when they miss a day they go crazy, it messes up everything etc. I prefer to do one day exercise followed by a day of rest. If I had 2-3 days of rest - so be it. Your discipline is best exercised during workout, with your food and sleep, not how much and on what days you exercise.

As for shoulders. These are actually rather small muscle group. Not only it is small group it is also active in every exercise you do for upper body. Even if you isolate some muscles, you still get the shoulders engaged a bit. Shoulders have 3 different "heads". The front, the middle and the back. They all work together, in conjunction to allow you to smoothly rotate and move your arms. For tennis, the front should bares the most load for strength, the middle bares the most load for endurance, and if you have one handed backhand that the back shoulder is your strength as well.

I have nothing against the shoulder presses, but prefer other exercises. They feel better, are less prone to injury and allow you to isolate specific shoulder heads.

Until you are proficient in pushups and chinups, I would not even suggest you do ANY shoulder exercises. By proficient I mean you can to a slow paced 12+ chinups x3 without failing or near failing and you can perform the same with advanced pushups. These two exercises give a great workout to your shoulders, more then you need for tennis, they are simple, fast and effective. If you do however want to add some shoulder exercises, I suggest you do that when you are ready to split your muscle groups. Front arm raises while sitting down are great isolators for the front shoulder and bent over dumbbell raises are great for the back shoulder.

On the

From personal experience, when it comes to bulking up, cutting and even building endurance - exercise is a only a small part of the what you need to do. The other parts are kitchen and the bed.

Don't you think rest is important as well?

Rest is very important. Over-training is THE #1 reason why people don't progress. Its tricky, because some people don't see progress and attribute it to lack of training and go train more, a vicious cycle. Rest and food is likely more important then training itself.

Don't confuse rest after workout with rest during workout. During workout you want as short of the rest as possible. You want to give yourself just enough time to recover and catch your breath and not a millisecond more.

[TomBs]

Meant something different, but sarcasm is difficult in writing
Yeah, I know rest is important, I never went 2 consecutive days to the gym just for that reason.

I'm also on the food dept. right now, as I can quite easily gain there. In addition to that the exercises at home. I already sleep a hell of a lot

[djarvik]

It flew right by me. Sorry.