The Infonian

Testosterone is a hormone produced by the adrenal gland in both males and females. As we age, testosterone production slows down and the body has a decrease in the amount of free testosterone that is available in the bloodstream. These reduced levels of testosterone can cause a variety of problems including hair loss, irritability, growth of unwanted body hair in women, a reduced libido, and the inability to maintain all of your muscle mass. If you want to counteract some of these problems, there are several ways to increase your testosterone levels naturally so that you can look and feel better. Raising your testosterone levels can happen if you eat the right kinds of foods. Studies have shown that the proteins in eggs and whey allow the adrenal glands to keep the levels of testosterone in the body steady. Eating fruits and vegetables can also have a positive effect on the levels of testosterone in your body. Because fat contains enzymes that convert testosterone to estrogen, having a lot of fat on your body increases your chances for developing low testosterone levels. Eating fruits and vegetables can help you lose fat and also develop a stronger immune system. Eating meat can also help you to raise your testosterone levels. In a research study, one group of participants ate a vegetarian diet while others ate a diet of meat. Those who ate the meat diet experienced an increase in their testosterone levels. The protein in nuts can also be very beneficial for raising your testosterone levels. Studies have shown that nuts, particularly peanuts, can raise testosterone levels better than other foods.

Weight bearing exercises are also an excellent way to help increase the levels of testosterone in your body. Instead of training one or two of your small muscles, you should concentrate on training large muscle groups to get the maximum effect of these exercises on your testosterone levels. When you are doing these exercises, doing a heavy workload can also maximize the benefits of this type of exercise when it comes to increasing your testosterone levels. Instead of doing many repetitions with a low amount of weight, do five repetitions with a weight that is difficult for you to lift. Working large muscles groups by using a heavy workload has been shown to help with your efforts to increase testosterone levels in your body.

Several ways of increasing your testosterone levels are actually very common-sense approaches to health and wellness. One method of increasing your levels is to limit the amount of alcohol you consume. Consuming alcohol makes your body slow down its production of testosterone and other hormones because it is busy processing the alcohol to clear it out of your system. Another method of raising your levels is to get enough sleep at night. Scientific research shows that people who get a good night’s sleep are able to maintain higher testosterone levels than those who are sleep-deprived. If your levels are low, try changing your sleeping habits to get a better night’s sleep. Following all of these natural methods of increasing your testosterone can raise your levels and make you look and feel better.

Mike Westerdal is the owner of www.criticalbench.com . Visit his site to receive two free PDF reports entitled, “31 Days To Bigger Arms” and “Boosting Testosterone Levels for Big Muscle Gains.”

Author: Mike Westerdal

There has always been a debate on whether or not performing a single rep during your workout is a good idea. Many people think that if you want to know how much you can lift for one rep you can simply look it up in a chart and avoid any chance of injury. Others feel that there simply is no reason to max out. I’ve heard people say that you should worry about perfect form and measure your success based on the way you look, not how much weight you are pushing. Granted, if you are a bodybuilder you may not need to do singles but for the rest of us inserting singles in a program can be helpful for various reasons. In fact I swear by them.

Let’s face it everyone that lifts weights can’t help but talk about it. Just the fact that you’re bigger than most people you socialize with or meet will often spark a conversation on the topic. Whether your buddy lifts or knows nothing about it you are likely to be asked the question, “How much can you bench press?” Are you going to reply, I can do 315 lbs for 6 repetitions? It just doesn’t paint the same picture as saying I put up 365 lbs. Maybe you could care less what people think and the bragging rights don’t matter to you. However if you are a powerlifter or an Olympic lifter you will be tested with a one-rep max. Most high school and college football programs test their players with a one-rep max as well. If you don’t practice the one rep lift how will you be prepared?

If somebody asks you what you bench press, you could always give them a projected max based on what the chart says right? Not necessarily. One of the most important reasons for doing singles is to break past barriers. Using our previous example, if you do 315 lbs for 6 reps you should be able to get a one-rep max of 365 lbs. This is not always the case. People set up limits in their minds that are tough to overcome. I swear I have seen people do 295 lbs for three reps but they just can’t get 300 lbs. This has nothing to do with strength. This has to do with mental barriers and confidence issues. I personally would not tell someone my one rep max based on reps. If I know that I have never benched that weight than I just can’t take credit for it based on a chart. Performing a single lift in the bench is a great way to build confidence. Nothing feels better than actually beating your personal best. If you keep doing singles you will break past sticking points and barriers that you have set for yourself. If you have a goal of benching 300 or 400 lbs the numbers can be very difficult to prepare for when you don’t practice singles. Working your way up with singles will give you the confidence you need to reach your goals.

Many bodybuilders concentrate on their form and don’t care about how much their max is. Lifting singles can actually help your form. When you are performing a one-rep max you have to have perfect form or you will not complete the lift successfully. When you are using lighter weight and doing many reps there is a lot of room for cheating and bad form. You can still complete the lift with sub par form by using other muscles to help. But, when you are maxing out you have only one chance to press the weight and to do so you need absolutely perfect form. You have to be mentally prepared and your groove has to be precise. There is no room for being sloppy. Before you start working out with singles it’s a good idea to practice strict form with higher reps first. Developing perfect technique is the key to a heavy single. If you are lifting 275 with careless technique for five reps you won’t be able to do a single of any significance. Build a base and let your body adjust to the heavier workloads. For 2 weeks lift with reps of five. After you have finished this stage you can progress and do sets of 3 reps. Now your form should be down and you have should have adjusted to lifting heavier weights. You can now insert singles to your routine that will help you in your quest for a big bench.

Exploit your weak areas with a single. Like I mentioned before there is more room for error when doing sets with higher reps. You may not be able to determine what aspect of the bench needs work. When you max out you will tend to see where you fell short. This is great for evaluating what area needs improvement. Maybe you couldn’t lock out and you know that you need to work harder on your triceps. Lifting is all trial and error and the single is an effective way to measure your progress and assess what needs to be changed to break the stalemate.

Singles will help you develop a different kind of strength compared to lifting higher reps. When you lift heavy weights you bring your attachments into the lift. Tendons and ligaments are often the key to unlocking your potential. If you are constantly lifting with higher reps you don’t activate your attachments. Functional strength lies in not in the muscles but in your tendons and ligaments. You’ve heard the expression that you are only as strong as your weakest link. Lifting heavier weight will strengthen your weakest link, which may not be getting the attention it so desperately deserves.

To follow are some tips for a successful single. Proper warm up is essential to prevent a tear. At the same time there is a balance between warming up and tiring yourself out. I recommend the following before doing a single.

Warm up set of 10 reps with a very light weight.

Set of 5-6 reps.

Set of 2-3 with a heavier weight.

Set for 1 rep with a weight closer to your max.

Perform your single.

Some experts think that when performing a single you need a shorter rest period between sets because the progression of sets in warm up is shorter than in your normal workout. Powerlifters will assume that because they are dealing with heavier weights they need a longer rest period between sets. I recommend waiting until you have completely returned to your normal breathing pace. Once this has happened get yourself mentally prepared and than it’s time for another set. Don’t wait so long that you get tight. Let somebody else do a set, get a drink of water and visualize your next lift. Performing a back off set at the end of your single lift will help you preserve the workload. It will also give you the pump that you are looking for.

Follow this advice and you can incorporate singles into your program. Doing them once a month is a good starting point but as you become more experienced it is okay to do them more often. Everyone is different so try for yourself and let singles help you build confidence, strengthen your attachments, exploit your weak point, develop perfect form, and break past your personal barriers.

Mike Westerdal is the owner of www.criticalbench.com Visit his site to receive two free PDF reports entitled, “31 Days To Bigger Arms” and “Boosting Testosterone Levels for Big Muscle Gains.”

Author: Mike Westerdal

This article will assume that you are trying to increase your strength. If you go to the gym to stay in shape, maintain your strength, or even worse, to avoid getting fat, than don’t waste your time reading this. However, if you set your goals for yourself, have an open mind and want to get bigger and stronger than read on.

Negatives can be applied to any exercise to help shock your muscles. They are specifically included in the Critical Bench Program to help you increase your bench press. First lets review what exactly a negative is making sure everybody is on the same page. Using the bench press as an example let’s review a negative set. You will load the bar with a weight that is about 40 lbs heavier than your one rep max. (If you don’t know your one rep max you can look it up on this chart: http://www.criticalbench.com/chart.htm) Three spotters will be needed. The most important spotter is the one that stands behind you because he will keep his hands on the bar throughout the entire lift. The two remaining spotters will stand on opposite ends of the bar. Of course you will need a lift off unless you plan on turning negatives into a positively bad idea. You will now begin to lower the weight as slowly as positive. At first you’ll do fine, but about half way down you’ll feel like you are trying to stop the weight from falling. Once the bar touches your chest all three spotters lift the weight to the lockout position where you start again. When you are lifting poundage this heavy only a few reps will be possible so don’t feel discouraged.

Okay so why in the world would you want to do this? Won’t you look like an idiot in the gym when three people have to pull the weight off your chest? People have even said that the exercise is just an ego booster and doesn’t do much for you. Some clowns might even say that you are cheating! Well don’t believe any of it. Luckily, I’m here to tell you why negatives are so important.

1. Heavy Negatives Overload the Muscles

Most of us will agree that singles help improve strength because you overload your muscles will heavy poundage that your body is not used to. Based on the same principle, if you do negative sets with even more than your max weight you will overload your muscles even further.

2. Conditioning Your Body

Let me give you a few examples of this. A basketball player who is shooting jump shots while he is wearing ankle weights. A swimmer who does laps wearing pants and a t-shirt. A football player preparing for camp by running in the middle of the afternoon during a 90-degree summer day. A sprinter that runs with a parachute tied to his back. How about a powerlifter that does negatives with a weight that is much heavier than his one rep max. Are you beginning to see the correlation? When you run in 90-degree weather, practice in 80-degree heat doesn’t seem so bad. When you shot jump shots with ankle weights, you feel pretty light and explosive when you take them off. When it is time to unload in each situation the body can perform better because it has been strengthened by the overload. You get the point. Let’s say your goal is to bench 400 lbs. If you’ve never tried it, the initial shock might surprise you. If you’ve felt the weight of 450 lbs and done negative sets with it, your mind and your muscles will be preconditioned to handle the 400 you were aiming for. You’ve felt heavier weight, making this weight seem lighter. Your muscles need to feel the shock of heavy weight to prepare for a max. So why not take it to the extreme?

3. The Challenge

If your training lacks intensity I’d like to see you have the courage to take this exercise lightly. Actually I wouldn’t, but don’t worry about it because it’s not possible anyhow. Your heart will begin racing, and you will be pumped with adrenaline. Not to mention the fact that you have three people watching you. You’ll be ready to perform, because there is no other choice. This is more weight than you’ve ever lifted in your life, so you will get psyched up for the big challenge. As mentioned earlier, some people call negatives ego boosters. They are partially correct. It does feel good to load the bar with the heavy poundage. Whipping out a few reps will definitely give you confidence when it’s time to max out for real. The only difference will be you’ve felt heavier.

4. Letting It Down Slow

Still not convinced? Let me pull out the textbook for you. The eccentric phase is the opposite of the contraction. For the bench press it is the lowering of the weight. Many bodybuilders treat this phase as an after thought, which they shouldn’t because it is very important. Research confirms that the eccentric component of a lift may be more important than the concentric phase for promoting muscle growth. One study showed that, when compared to normal weight training, concentric-only training required twice as many repetitions to produce similar results. With normal weight training, during an eccentric contraction (negative) you lower the same weight with fewer muscle fibers, and that means that each fiber involved has to sustain greater force.

5. Get The Last Laugh

We all know variety is important as well. If you haven’t done heavy negatives before than give them a try. It may be just what your muscles are screaming for. If you get funny looks at the gym, don’t worry about it. You’re not there to impress anybody; you’re there to get stronger. The only person you have to look at in the mirror is yourself. The weights will always weigh the same so you can’t compete with them. You may want to practice negatives with lighter weight before you jump right into this. Round up a couple buddies and show them why heavy negatives are positively a good idea.

Mike Westerdal is the owner of www.criticalbench.com . Visit his site to receive two free PDF reports entitled, “31 Days To Bigger Arms” and “Boosting Testosterone Levels for Big Muscle Gains.”

Author: Mike Westerdal

Then you’re probably determined to get one. It’s that same determination that will be your struggle. The more you want it, the harder you want to work and the longer you want to stay in the gym. This is going to lead to overtraining which will stunt any strength gains you’ve made and delay any dreams of an even bigger bench.

How do you know if you’re at risk of overtraining? If you feel run down after a workout, notice that you aren’t making any gains, you always do forced reps, you’re not getting enough rest, your diet stinks, you have a bad attitude or you aren’t motivated you’re probably overtraining. Insomnia is another big sign. Put it this way, if a weight continually feels heavier than normal, chances are you haven’t gotten weaker, you just haven’t recovered from previous workouts.

There are three distinct stages of metabolism. The first is a state of equilibrium easily described as the fully recovered state where energy is neither being depleted and tissue is not being damaged or repaired. The second stage is catabolism. Catabolism is the stage you are in during a workout. Energy is being depleted and muscle tissue is being damaged. Your goals should be to keep catabolism in the gym, but many people that overtrain keep this stage going long after their workouts end and lose hard-earned muscle tissue to help the recovery. Finally the stage that usually doesn’t get much of a chance to kick in before we’re back in the gym for another session. The third stage is anabolism where energy is restored and tissue damage is being repaired. So after you lift you want to heal and reach a state of homeostasis, but instead many of us are back in the gym tearing our muscles and using energy when we haven’t even let the muscle fully recover from the previous workout. Never lift a muscle group that is still sore. I know it’s difficult but sometimes more isn’t better.

There is always the urge to overtrain thinking that if we just work harder the gains will come. How do we resist the urge? First off lets think, quality not quantity. If you lift each muscle group only once a week and spend less than 1 hr in the gym you’re on the right path. Although you don’t have to spend a lot of time in the gym the time spent must be intense. Every single exercise and rep should be performed with a passion and you will accomplish more in 45 minutes than most people do in two hours. If you are truly pushing yourself you should be exhausted at the end of the workout. After tearing your body apart, do you think it’s going to be ready to do it again in two to three days? I think not, try at least a week.

So all you benchers out there if you’re lifting heavy, workout after workout make sure that the reason you hit a plateau is not that you are trying too often. Let your body recover, heal, and grow before you start ripping it up again. When you hit each body part several times a week you don’t really try as hard because you know you’ll get another shot at it in a week. When you only lift each body part once per week you develop a sense of urgency. You know you better lift hard because you won’t get another chance to train it again for a week. Then as the week passes by you find yourself looking forward to your next chest day. Anyone that thinks they might be overtraining take a couple of days off and go back to the gym revived and motivated with the determination to train smarter and harder.

Author: Mike Westerdal

Dumbbells are one of the most useful and versatile pieces of exercise equipment you can own. They can be used to effectively train any body part and are ideal for anyone, regardless of skill level, age, training capacity or fitness goals. A good set of dumbbells is just about all you need to achieve your fitness goals in the privacy and comfort of your own home. They offer significant cost savings over a gym membership-plus you don’t have to waste time and gas getting there. And with dumbbells there’s no need to spend thousands of dollars on fancy, hi-tech fitness machines advertised on television or magazines.

In shopping for dumbbells you’ve got to do it right. It’s easy to wind up spending a lot more money on dumbbells than necessary so your homework and don’t get ripped off.

In the past, dumbbells were basically little more than metal bars with a couple of iron weights attached to the sides. Functional yes, but the old-style dumbbells were not particularly well-suited for the average home gym. Not only were they unsightly, but storage was often a problem and they were also prone to rolling around and just generally getting in the way. Today though, there are a wide variety of styles, shapes and weights.

First off, dumbbells today are available with both fixed and variable weights. The variable varieties have a clamp or screw-type fixture on the ends of the bar to hold the weights in place. Variable-style dumbbells typically support up to about 50 pounds, making them ideal for the person with somewhat aggressive fitness goals. For the beginner or persons who are primarily looking to tone their bodies or maybe just lose a few pounds, fixed-weight dumbbells may be the best route to go.

Fixed-weight dumbbells are available in a broad range of styles-and colors too. The weights are usually hex- or octagon shaped to reduce the chances that they’ll roll around. Also, in many of the varieties developed specifically for the home, the weights are covered in rubber or vinyl, which considerably lowers the risk of damaging your floor or furniture when you set them down.

For the person frequently on the go who wants to be able to workout in the hotel room, aqua dumbbells may be the right piece of equipment for you. When empty, these innovative dumbbells weigh just a few ounces, take up minimal space and fit easily into a briefcase or duffel bag. To use them, you just fill them up with water and you’re all set to work out. They range in weight up to a maximum of about 16 pounds.

Before rushing out and buying a set of dumbbells, take time to think about your goals, where you’ll be working out and where you’ll be storing them-especially if you live in a condominium or apartment with limited space.

If general fitness or toning up is your goal then you won’t want a lot of weight-up to about 12 pounds for women and maybe up to 20 pounds for men. You’ll want a few different increments of weight though so you can vary your workouts. For women and older folks two-pound increments are ideal-for men, five-pound increments should work well.

So once you’ve made those decisions you can embark on a quest for the right dumbbells for you. My first rule of thumb is this: Keep it simple. Start small, establish a foundation and upgrade from there if necessary.

You might consider buying your first set of dumbbells used. There are plenty of people out there who bought nice dumbbells only to have them being used as doorstops six months later. Take advantage of their lack of commitment and enjoy the savings.

Depending on the style, quantity and where you buy them, a new set of dumbbells can cost anywhere from $1 per pound up to about $2.50 per pound. Sometimes you can find bargains online, but keep in mind weights can be costly to ship. We’ve seen some competitive prices at an equipment site called TheBenchPress.com. There is a link on the left hand navigation column entitled, “Dumbbells”. It’s worth comparing prices before purchasing.

On the other hand, a used set of dumbbells might run from as little as 25 cents a pound up to maybe 50 cents a pound. You can find really good deals on used dumbbells by scanning classified ads. If there are any stores in your area that sell used fitness equipment you should check them out as well-don’t forget thrift shops and garage sales too.

Now you’re equipped with the basic information you need to go about setting up your own home gym with dumbbells that are right for your needs and goals-and without getting ripped off. Stay tuned for the next lesson were we’ll reveal the best space saving dumbbell set around!

Author: Mike Westerdal