The key to power bodybuilding

You must learn to hide your weaknesses, always, and highlight your strengths, always!

Build Your Shoulders

Shoulder strength has been an elite goal since man first hurled a stone.

Work Hard.

The secret to big and consistent bodybuilding training gains is to do it all well...

Bodybuilding tips are really necessary?

It's a question that any bodybuilder will definitely answer with “yes”

marți, 19 martie 2013

Myths about ABS

Well defined abs is the dream of many. And the harder it is to achieve, the more it wants. Abs fascinates, attracts attention and is a matter of pride. Yes, there are people who do not need to exert much effort to show off their cubes on the beach, but in most cases it is a long and laborious work.
Let’s dispel the myths that can prevent you from achieving the goal:
1. Number of packs = number of muscles
Rectus abdominis – that is the muscle that it is divided into packs with horizontal and vertical tendons. The amount and form of packs is determined by genetics, and to change anything hardly anyone can.
2. Many reps = perfect abs
In fact, it is not true. If you do many reps, then, after reducing the percentage of body fat, you will just see a flat abdomen. But for the packs to become packs you need to work with additional weight performing 8-12 reps, the situation is the same as with other muscles.
3. Daily workouts = well defined abs
Abdominal muscles are the same as all other muscles. And they also needs time to recover. You have to work intensively on the abdominal muscles to three times a week.
4. Crunches = best exercise for the abs
In fact, for the abdominal region there are a huge amount of exercises. You need to choose those that are right for you, under which you feel fine work of the target muscle. And do not forget that all the exercises to be performed with perfect technique.
5. Perseverance in training = well defined abs
You should remember that till in the abdominal region exist excess fat you can not see packs. But strength training alone is not enough. Fat is removed by diet and cardio training.
6. Side bends = well defined abs
In fact, the side bends is not the best exercise for the abdominal muscles. This movement involves primarily the obliques, strengthening and enhancing them. And that leads to a small, but still expanding waistline. Are you sure that your plans include this?
7. Many reps + daily workout = well defined abs
Remember once and for all, that the local fat loss does not exist. In order to get 6 packs you need a certain time to keep a strict diet and perform daily aerobic exercise (running, walking, biking). Gradually reducing the amount of body fat to 10%, you will see your packs, but if you want to watch them in a relaxed state, you will have to work more, and reduce the amount of fat to 6%.
The longer the process of losing weight and lower percentage of fat is in your body, the harder is to reduce fat. But, if you have the willpower and perseverance, the result will not let you wait and you will get the dream – perfect and well defined packs.

Athletes’ healthy appetite

Did you know that the appetite – it is one of the best indicators of productivity of your training. If at the end of training, you are ready to swallow an elephant, everything is going to plan. But if you have no appetite, then probably you didn’t work enough or poorly recovered. After a good workout, your appetite may last for two or three days. Try to explain this to your relatives, who surprised and wary watch over how much you eat.
Unfortunately, not enough intensive and effective training does not increase appetite, it remains at the same level, or even begins to melt with your muscles. If growth and constant progress is important to you , do not let the state of hunger, because then the body begins to feed on itself and all your efforts will be in vain. Be sure to follow the rules of nutrition before and after training.An hour before a workout is better to drink nutritious cocktail that is quickly absorbed and does not cause heaviness in the stomach, but the best square meal two hours before your workout. And immediately after training, you need to drink a cocktail, to provide the body with necessary at this time proteins and carbohydrates.

luni, 18 martie 2013

Pre Workout Supplement - Good or Not?


This post is going to be talking about how a pre workout supplement can help you get better workouts. Having recently started using Jack3d (a pre-workout), im going to talk about the pros and cons of my experience with it.

Kevin Lavrone Twisting

Ok first off, the energy boost is definetly there. Aftre 30 minutes of drinking, you feel a rush in your head, feel an increased sense of concentration, increased strength, and euphoria. During the workout, i also noticed i was getting better pumps. Another good point when talking about Jack3d is that it contains a lot less ingredients when compared to another pre workout supplement. This also means it containss no (or very little) fillers, which means ingredients that are added just to increase the selling price. Speaking of price, Jack3d has an average price of 28$, easily making it the cheapest pre workout supplementaround.
In terms of negative effects, the major one you want to take care of is to access your tolerance. You should start off with one scoop, and then slowly increase. The reason for this is that if you take a dose that is too strong for your body, you will "crash" after the effect has worn off and feel really terrible. Another thing you should be aware of is that your body will quickly build tolerance to this product, so you should always cycle it.

So, to recap:

Pros:
  • Increased Energy
  • Increased Focus
  • Bigger pumps
  • More strength
  • Dirt cheap

Cons:
  • Tolerance increases rapidly
  • Can cause crashes

You can get your own pre workout supplement tub here:

USPlabs Jack3d - 250 Grams - Sour Cherry - Exclusive Flavor!
USPlabs Jack3d - 250 Grams - Sour Cherry - Exclusive Flavor!
" Tired of being tired Stop sleep walking through your workouts with Jack3d! A new innovation in preworkouts! With unbeatable pumps, and energy, nothing compares to USPlabs Jack3d!"

BPI Sports Recognized as GNC Brand of the Year


Congratulations to BPI Sports - GNC's Brand of the Year!
Key attributes for GNC's brand of the year award include top notch innovation, extremely competitive products, quality formulations, and top selling products.
Below is a list of all 2012 awards selected by GNC from GNC.com:
It’s red carpet season and we’re joining in here at GNC. Every year we honor select vendors with the GNC Vendor awards. Typically these awards are given out at the Arnold Sports Festival, but this year we couldn’t wait any longer to announce the winners. Put on your best dress, take your seats, and get your acceptance speech ready. Drumroll please!
Rising Star award
This is given annually to emerging brand that has demonstrated strong sales growth in a short time period. They fully support GNC customers in regards to favorable promotional activity and programs and show significant growth potential.
MusclePharmSports Winner: MusclePharm
MusclePharm is an outstanding vendor for GNC making many high quality products our customers love. They focus on products for active lifestyles and you can’t miss their packaging with the unmistakable green dominating their section in GNC.  Some of their popular products at GNC include AssaultCombat Powder, and Bullet Proof.

HNSWellness Winner: Healthy Natural Systems
Healthy Natural Systems products have been extremely popular since coming to GNC. They make a variety of energy & endurance products along with diet products. Some of their top selling items at GNC are Raspberry Ketone with Green Coffee Bean Raspberry Ketone3x Triple Strength, and Garcinia Cambogia Extract. 

Outstanding Partnership
This award is given annually to vendor partners that consistently support current and new store programs. They deliver important meaningful sales to the category and add value to GNC from a brand standpoint and from a customer shopping experience perspective.
CellucorSports Winner: Cellucor
Cellucor is an extremely popular brand and make a variety of products that sports nutrition fans love. They have been a wonderful partner in 2012 and we look forward to a continued outstanding relationship with them in 2013. Just a few of the popular products from Cellucor at GNC include C4 ExtremeNO3 Chrome, and P6 Extreme.

Wellness Winner: Rightway Nutrition
Rightway Nutrition has been an outstanding partner in 2012 and has added great value to GNC and from a shopping experience.  Their top products include Pure Green Coffee Bean Extract,Superfruit Fat Burner, and Raspberry Ketones 

Best Product Innovation
Several aspects make this award winner impressive given the requirement to outperform competitors. Those aspects include successfully bringing a product into a mature, competitive category. Other aspects include quickly establishing the product with effective marketing, sampling, and trial drivers and finally becoming a best-selling new product.
Super_HDSports Winner: Cellucor Super-HD
Cellucor  Super-HD was released to huge fanfare in 2012 and has been a steady hit since its initial launch. Super- HD is a high definition agent. It features iFAS503TM, which promotes energy & focus.

Wellness Winner: Anatabloc
Anatabloc is an extremely popular and highly reviewed product. There are over 145 ratings of this product on GNC.com with an average rating of 4.5 out of 5. Anatbloc is intended for anti-inflammatory support.

Best Protein Bar
In the ultra-competitive bar category, success requires ongoing, consistent sampling and grass roots efforts, both inside/outside of GNC stores. This brand sustains key programs such as consumer sampling, strong promotional activity, and employee sampling and engagement. Finally, the winner brings innovation and of course, offers tremendous taste along with healthy nutritional support.
QuestWinner: Quest Bar
With so many different types of bars on the market this is an extremely competitive category.Quest Bar features a wide variety of great tasting flavors with a clean nutritional profile. Some of their most popular flavors at GNC are Chocolate BrownieBanana Nut Muffin, and Apple Pie.

Brand of the Year
Key attributes for our brand of the year award include top notch innovation, extremely competitive products, quality formulations, and top selling products.
2012_Brand_Of_The_Year-BPI 
Sports Winner: BPI  Sports
BPI had an amazing year at GNC. Their product innovation and speed to market have been outstanding and helped boost them to high heights at GNC this year. Their popular products include STIM-ELITEPUMP-HD, and BUILD-HD. They’ve also participated in customer giveaways, athlete appearances, store takeovers, and given away a lot of free samples to GNC customers. Finally they have been outstanding partners in every aspect of the business in 2012!

The Benefits of Working Out with Caffeine


The most popular use of caffeine is to increase mental alertness during drowsiness or weakness by stimulating the central nervous system. It is readily absorbed into the bloodstream and can remain in the body for three to five hours. Caffeine has numerous performance enhancement effects, includingimproved muscle contractability, increased time to exhaustion, improved concentration, enhanced alertness, and reduced fatigue. What most people don’t know is that it can also increase muscle pumps! Caffeine acts directly on the endothelial cell, stimulating the production of nitric oxide. Nitric oxide is a gas molecule secreted by the inner lining of your blood vessels, the production of nitric oxide helps the muscle layer of blood vessels to relax and dilate and improves blood flow to exercising muscles. Scientists in Japan investigated the effects of acute caffeine consumption on blood vessel function in healthy young men. Subjects received 300mg of caffeine or a placebo and then had their forearm blood flow response measured. Scientists observed that those in the caffeine group experienced increased forearm blood flow due to an increase in nitric oxide production compared with those who had a placebo. Another study reviewed the literature regarding the impact of caffeine consumption on vascular health. They discovered that caffeine consumption increases the production of the nitric oxide synthase enzyme, which converts the amino acid L-arginine into nitric oxide. Caffeine also increases the force of the muscle contractions by influencing calcium kinetics and the sodium-potassium pump activity in the exercising muscle. If you are looking for good caffeine-based product to increase pumps, try Animal Rage.
REFERENCE: Umemura T, Am J Cardiol., 98(11):1538-41, 2006 Dec 1; Epub 2006 Oct 16.

The Coolest Exercise You Haven't Done

The Coolest Exercise You Haven't Done

You haven't seen this movement anywhere else
Posted Date: February 19, 2013
Unless you've worked out with fitness experts David Jack and Jeremy Frisch before, there's almost no chance you've seen this week's exercise. It's called the "swiper," because, well, that's what they decided on when they created it. But you'll understand their inspiration once you see it in action. It's designed to strengthen your core and improve the way your body moves, making you more athletic and resistant to injury. 

It's great as a warmup, as part of a fast-moving metabolic circuit, or when paired with a heavy strength exercise. Plus, it's seriously fun to do. Watch the video below to see how to do swipers with perfect form.
 
If you want to chisel your abs, sculpt your arms, and build every muscle in your body, then be sure to check out The NEW Spartacus Workout on DVD!

Blast Your Upper Back

Try this new, challenging variation of one of our favorite upper-body exercises
By Amy Rushlow, Posted Date: March 5, 2013
How do top trainers come up with the crazy new exercises we bring to you in our Exercise of the Week newsletter? There are many methods, but sometimes it’s pretty simple: They get bored.

That’s what happened to Jeremy Frisch, U.S.A.W, creator of the 24-Hour Arms workout, with his athletes and the inverted row.

The inverted row is a favorite exercise among fitness experts because it strengthens the often-neglected muscles in your rear shoulders and upper back. “But after a while, we were looking for something to change it up, because you just get sick of doing the same thing,” Frisch says. 

Frisch’s upgrade? The side-to-side inverted row. Watch the video below to see how to do it.


Just like a traditional inverted row, the side-to-side inverted row works your upper back and rear deltoids—but it adds a new challenge that cranks up the intensity. “When our athletes who can do the inverted row starting doing the side-to-side version, it was a new challenge,” Frisch says. “They really had to work hard to achieve the full range of motion.”