Stop with strength/weight-training, how fast do you lose strength?

There is no need to loose your strength gains if you go atleast once a week even when you are focusing on cycling. My personal experience when I once gave up weights entirely for two months and focused on cycling was a loss of about 30%. It took me about one month to get the numbers back up.

I do not know what type of strength you are looking for but based upon your numbers you are not going heavy enough. You should not be getting more than 10 reps out of set. I usually would do atleast 80-90% of my 1RM. It is good once in a while to switch up and shock the muscles with like 50% of 1RM and more reps but at that point you should be shooting for 20 reps or more.

One other alternative you can try if you want to go lighter is to do atleast a 3-10 sec count up and down when lowering and raising the weights...not the usual power reps of 1-3 sec burst up and down.

-Js

PaulMD said:

Cycling season is nearby :-) I have to pick up my cycling after I have done a mix of strength-training with weights (3x/week: mondag, wednesday and friday) and indoor cycling (2x/week: saturday and sunday). I focussed mostly on strength training because I don't do road races and wanted to improve my biggest weakness: overall stength.

My FTP dropped from 280 to 270 watts during this winter (4 months) and my TSS is stable at 30. But my strength improved every week. Week after week I could add more weights to the barbell or dumbell.😄 My 90 degree squats improved from 12x30kg to 12x80kg. My benchpress from 10x25 to 12x45kg. Dumbell curls from 12x7kg to 12x15kg. This progress was also the reason I have been motivated the whole winter. But now the cycling season is nearby and I have to spend more time on the bike.

I see that most cyclist who do strength training in the winter just stop with it when they have to cycle more. My concern is: how fast do you lose the strength you gained during the winter? I don't want to lose all I have build up the last 4 months.

I think that I will focus for the next 4 weeks at strength training (I want to set some records with my benchpress and squat) and after that I will start with a hardcore cycling.program (5x/week) and quit the strength program.

What are your experiences?

30% in two months :eek:
I wish I never discovered weight training, haha. How on earth do I have to combine it🙄

What should I expect for reduction in 7 months? I plan to cycle 4-5 times / week from march to september, so there's no time for another training. It's difficult. Weight training is boring, but you can get addicted easily.

For me there is a very small change in weights when I change my workout from 12 reps to 6 reps. My 1RM is relatively low or my 80-90% of 1RM is relative high 😎 Probably I am a slow-twitch type without fast-twitch fibers. I can benchpress12x45kg but I can't bench 50kg once.:o

PaulMD said:

How on earth do I have to combine it?

You can take up something where the conventional wisdom is that you need lots of gym time to compete well: sprinting on the track.

Paul,

It is really not that hard to work in weight training when also training for cycling. Let me give you some of my insights and you can take with it as you may...

Most guys who do endurance training do the 4/5 days a week and the usual days off are Monday and Friday....also most not all also have a recovery week where they are really not pushing themselves that hard on the bike.

Very easy than...I do my weight training on Wed and Saturday because time wise that is what works for me and on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday I cycle. Yes on Saturday I hit both types of training but give myself Monday and Friday for recovery...when big races are coming up you could turn it to one day a week weight training. Power training on the bike has made Saturdays possible as I can get a great workout in 90 minutes but when the wife gives me the time I will do a 3 hour ride. Also the rest week on the bike can you give the option to go even a bit harder that week on the weights as you are not doing as much cycling.

Now keeping your strength...let me give you my secret. DO NOT LOOSE MUSCLE WHEN CYCLE TRAINING!! Meaning the key is body fat %. During the time I lose 30% of my strength was also when I stopped eating and my weight with down about 5-10 pounds but I was already at 10% bodyfat so my body had no choice but to take away muscle. Most cyclist eat like cheerleaders because they want that watts/kg to go higher and higher...I understand why and it makes sense but if you loose muscle you will probably loos power. The key is bodyfat %....during this time I want mine to be about 15-20% and than as I get closer to race season or contest, go down to 10% or lower and hopefully no loss in muscle. This can be seen in my performance on the bike and weights....

Next as far as your weight training...you do need to go heavy but that is relative to your mass. I do not know it but there are charts that will give you an idea what should be heavy or light for you given your weight. Next let me tell you one thing alll weightlifters know who have lifted for a while...all your strength comes from your back specifically your shoulder blades. Stronger the back, the stronger you will do every other exercise...I have seen guys who are 175 pounds but strong backs who can do one arm chinups weights down with 150 lbs for 5 reps. I have seen a 4-11 vegetarian 42 year old woman deadlift 250 lbs with no trouble perfect form because she always works her back.

Keep to the holy three exercises...squat, deadlift, bench (or dumbells)...the rest is all gravy. Always start your workout with one of these three. I have trained guys with your issue of can do 12 reps at X weight but X weight + Y can not do 1 rep. As I posted before go with the 5-10sec lower and raise of the weight. Count 1001, 1002, 1003 and when you hit 1010 you arms are full extended and back down the same idea....it will work. Next week add 5lbs and try again...if you can not do it drop your weight by 30% and start again.

Weight training and power training on the bike actually have one common underpinning...to force your body to adapt you have to shock it. This 20 minute intervals at 80%-90% ftp is no different than lifting 80-90% of your 1RM. If you think about 1RM = FTP in the weight training world. You than just have to play with it where cadence and reps can be used in a similar fashion. They will never equal but some days you have high cadence/low gears or high reps/low weights and other low cadence/high gears or low reps/heavy weight.

It can work as it has worked for me....

-Js

PaulMD said:

30% in two months :eek:
I wish I never discovered weight training, haha. How on earth do I have to combine it🙄

What should I expect for reduction in 7 months? I plan to cycle 4-5 times / week from march to september, so there's no time for another training. It's difficult. Weight training is boring, but you can get addicted easily.

For me there is a very small change in weights when I change my workout from 12 reps to 6 reps. My 1RM is relatively low or my 80-90% of 1RM is relative high 😎 Probably I am a slow-twitch type without fast-twitch fibers. I can benchpress12x45kg but I can't bench 50kg once.:o

PaulMD said:

30% in two months :eek:
I wish I never discovered weight training, haha. How on earth do I have to combine it🙄

What should I expect for reduction in 7 months? I plan to cycle 4-5 times / week from march to september, so there's no time for another training. It's difficult. Weight training is boring, but you can get addicted easily.

For me there is a very small change in weights when I change my workout from 12 reps to 6 reps. My 1RM is relatively low or my 80-90% of 1RM is relative high 😎 Probably I am a slow-twitch type without fast-twitch fibers. I can benchpress12x45kg but I can't bench 50kg once.:o

The only think I would add to JS's comments is that chin ups are always a great benchmark as to what real strength you are losing. If you can usually knock off 15 and you now struggle with 10, you know that you are losing real strength, even relative to weight loss. And, it proves true the addage that the back is king for upper body and the legs feed the body. I don't squat as much since I started my own personal power quest, but heavy benches (multiple sets of low reps 3-6), chin ups, and dead lifts are the mainstay of my program. I also like heavy shoulder work in the form of lateral raises ov presses and shrugs. These exercises can be done in a short and brutal session a few days a week and you won't lose a thing. I always try and make sure that I do 100 chin ups a week no matter what. It won't hurt your cycling or build unnecessary mass but it will make you silly strong.

I get lazy about hitting the weights during the summer because I have so much to do, and I rarely lift beyond early June. Similar to what jsirabella posted, I concentrate on squats, deadlifts and benchpress, with some assistive work as well, i.e. good mornings, glute-ham raises and belt squats, mainly. My bench drops dramatically between June and November when I find myself lifting again, but my squat and deadlift stays right up there.

My PR squat back in January '07 was 440# after a good long warm up and I'm within 20# of that now. I would recommend anyone that lifts and cycles, or for that matter engages in any other sport that rewards leg strength, to look into box squats. I've developed more explosive power and pushed my absolute strength much further than I expected to since I've switched almost entirely to accomodating/progressive resistance lifts. I'm much faster on the bike now as well.

Paul, folks have already put in some good tips.

I wanted to just add again that "strength" training has a little bit different picture than your current training style.

Doing higher rep sets (10, 12 or 15) are fine for warming up, but if you want explosive strength you will want to get into that 80 to 95% range to increase strength. If you are benching you may want a reliable training partner or someone in the gym that you can trust to properly spot you on the heavy sets. When I trained for strength we would work up to doing triples (sets of 3 reps) with our near max during the last few weeks of the cycle period. I would also do some things like fleshbroiler mentioned as we would pyramid back down and do rest / pause sets with lighter weights (maybe 65% of max).

On bench the rest/ pause you will slowly with good form lower the bar to your chest and hold it without letting the weight rest on your rib cage, count a couple of seconds and then press back up. Repeat that for 6 to 8 reps.

On Squats I did that as well and it is similar to doing box squats without a box or bench. Or you can do box squats as long as you do not bounce or hit the bench hard. If you do you will run a risk of hurting your back.

What ever you do do not sacrifice form over moving up in weight. You must always stay in control, but sometimes that staying in control and moving up in weight requires a really good spotter. I got hurt really bad a long time ago when I had 3 guys spotting me on a maximum squat (common practice in powerlifting to have 3 spotters). One guy on the side touched the bar when I was coming back up and I ended up with a back injury that took several weeks to heal.

Paul,

I want to second what felt_rider said. Safety comes first and foremost especially as you get older and loose flexability. I have a tendency to be a loner in the gym so I will use alot of equipment which will give me plenty of outs if I have a problem. For instance, weight belt, smith machine, hammer machines, dumbbells (can easily throw them off to the side), max rack, recently just bought these dumbbell hooks which allow me to place the dumbbells on a smith machine bar so I do not have to heave the dumbbells back into position which allows me to go heavier and safer.

There is no more helpless and dumb feeling in the world when you are on a flat bench and the arms give and the weights are laying on your chest and there is no way they will lift. It has happened to me...it took about 10 minutes before I finally gave up on my pride and asked for assistance...

Also to add, "forced reps", I do not like them. I have done them but do not like them. This is where I have gotten injured for a week or two. Listen to your body, if it feels this is the last clean rep than stop and wait for another day.

-Js

Remember there is a difference between a powerlifter and bodybuilder...I have seen guys with great physiques and really IMHO do not go that heavy. They just have great form and know how to isolate the proper muscles. That can take years to learn as for eveyone as soon as it gets heavy, drop the form and just heave...not good.

If you notice powerlifters are just huge guys(genetics) with little body symetry. My friend at work is 295 lbs but he is a well built 295 lbs, he just has the genetics. He has a huge back and chest, short stocky legs, all the weight lifitng in the world will not get my frame that large...your bone structure is genetics and not much you can do but you can definitely go well beyond what you think you can do.

PaulMD said:

30% in two months :eek:
I wish I never discovered weight training, haha. How on earth do I have to combine it🙄

What should I expect for reduction in 7 months? I plan to cycle 4-5 times / week from march to september, so there's no time for another training. It's difficult. Weight training is boring, but you can get addicted easily.

For me there is a very small change in weights when I change my workout from 12 reps to 6 reps. My 1RM is relatively low or my 80-90% of 1RM is relative high 😎 Probably I am a slow-twitch type without fast-twitch fibers. I can benchpress12x45kg but I can't bench 50kg once.:o

PaulMD said:

What are your experiences?

In the offseason, I do a 12 week weightlifting based build for my legs with very light riding.

After the 12 weeks, I then go once a week to maintain what I had built during those 12 weeks. Last season, my coach had me stop lifting after base training. I lost that weight training based strength super fast. I went back in a couple months later and had lost everything!

This season I am lifting once a week no matter what during the season. I am 32 years old and this honestly helps me recover quicker than rest.

I do a low rep, high weight maintenance. 4x4 reps for leg press, quads & hammies. 4x8 on the calves. This is enough to maintain your strength but not totally destroy your legs with high reps.

Hi all, thanks for the information and great insights.

I realise that I have to focus. For sports: cycling comes first and after that comes strength training.

After reading the above information I realise that I have to do some maintenance. So I will try to do strength training once or twice a week and maybe integrate it with a cycling training.

My strength training regime during the winter was:
Monday: Back, abdomen and biceps.
Wednesday: Legs
Friday: Chest, Shoulders and triceps.
I do my training at home and I do mostly base exercises with barbells or dumbells in my powerrack. All series were maximal and performed till failure. When I could do 12 reps with an exercise, the next serie was with more weight so I could only do it 6-8x.

The most important problem I experience with strength training and cycling is the pain in my legs after the squats. When I do my squats on wednesday I have sore legs on thursday and friday. On saturday I can still feel that my legs are sore on the bike.

Should I just do 8 reps at 85-90% of my 1RM? because I can do 90% of my 1RM more than 10 times so 8 reps is not a maximal workout. But that sub maximal effort makes it easier to do all the other workouts also.What do you all think about:

Mo: rest
Tu: Cycling L4
We: Cycling L3
Th: Strength (total body):
[indent]leg:squats (2 sets)
chest:benchpress (2 sets)
shoulders: barbell behind neck press (2 sets)
back: cable seated row (2 sets), Cable Rear Pulldown widegrip (2 sets)
abdomen: crunches (2-4 sets)
[/indent]Fr: rest
Sa: Cycling L3 + strength (biceps en triceps with dumbell curls)
Su: Cycling L2 + strength when not done on saturday (biceps and triceps)

Paul, there will always be a lot of opinions on this subject. I can present mine and other can present theirs, but the best thing that I suggest is to go with your described plan for a period of time and see how that works for maintaining some of the strength gains.

This does show the weakness of cross training and why I have been in agreement with ric and others about sports specificity for those who desire to step up in competition even though I am an advocate for resistance training. There is a struggle of time and in that time the human body can only recover from just so much. One can become a distraction to the other and that will lead to mediocre training in both rather than exceling at one. However, for some of us we still chose to try to balance this because we are not competitors. I suffer the same thing. I train my legs on Tuesday and my last intense day on the spin bike on Wednesday. Thursday and Friday I taper back to active recovery so that I have something for my long distance ride on Saturday. I find at times my legs are still sore from leg training on Tuesday, but I do try to stretch a little on Thursday and Friday after the active recovery and that seems to help aleviate some of the tight feeling.

Going back to your schedule, I am not sure if the arangment will help and if so maybe only a small degree. If it is so small that it may be nothing but a pure distraction to your cycling gains kind of like the old "no man's land" type of thing. Not hard enough to stimulate strength gains and yet a little so that your body still has to recuperate. The amount maybe so insignificant that it may not matter so it is hard to tell if it would be a distraction. For me I have to have at least 5 sets just to warm up to get into that 80-95% range to be counted as strength training, but that is me.

Here is my routine, but again this is my individual preference to maintaining my cross fit goals.

Monday: Spin Bike 45 min. high intensity / Chest 15 to 20 sets
Tuesday: Spin Bike 40 min. 2x20 SST / Legs 15 to 20 sets
Wednesday: Spin Bike 45 min. high intensity / Back 15 to 20 sets
Thursday: Spin Bike 40 min. low intensity / stretch / Shoulders 15 to 20 sets
Friday: Spin Bike 20 min. low intensity / stretch / Biceps 15 sets Triceps 15 sets
Saturday: 3 1/2 to 4 hour "spirited" road ride
Sunday: 2 hour spirited road ride if I don't have any family obligations.

I have been personally surprised on how well I have progressed in my aerobic conditioning with the combined resistance training and cycling, but I also realize my cycling would dramatically increase even more if I have cycling specific training. My strength has declined compared to the old days when I would spend almost two hours just training legs. In those days we would take ample rest between our near max sets or to prepare for sets of triples. I simply don't have the time these days to focus on that type of dedicated strength training and I have had a lot of issues in the last few years with muscle strains and fascia tears with the heavier weight.

I guess those old days of heavy weight are gone for me. 🙁

I don't know if there is anything useful in my writing here that you can glean. Again a lot of this is personal goals and expectations and there are a lot of opinions and mine is just one of those.

I think you kind of answered your own question with your first statement that cycling is more important to you than strength training. I also want to clarify strength training and bodybuilding are two different things, IMHO. I am actually most interested in a transformation of my body which means a very holistic approach...not just training but recovery, diet and supps.

I find the biggest problem with cycling and strength training is not to go into a catabolic state from the great amount of cycling you are doing. This IMHO can only be done with proper diet, supps and recovery. In simple language....I EAT!! I mean I EAT!! 6-8 meals a day, 3-4 protein shakes and/or protein bars and plenty of supps...including glutamine, BCAA, arginine, ZMA and some other gems to help to keep my T-levels and GH on the up because as you pass 40 these two very important levels will drop. I find I never catch colds...and I believe it will help me live longer.

This leads up to your schedule and leg issue...

I like you schedule but since you are not interested in strength training the same way as cycling let me suggest the following...

1) Do not do seperate workouts for your bi's and tri's. Only do that when you are in the mood and have the time. The compound exercises of squat, bench and deadlift will workout these muscles more than enough.

2) If squats are giving you trouble with your legs, try changing to front squat or jump squat. For both these squats you will have to go much lighter and the jump squat is very good for producing power. Or even try half squats...no law against, cycling is your first love.

3) Take supps and eat, I mean glutamine, BCAA and protein drinks are a minimum and try to take in enough protein where 1lb = 1gram of protein. One supp you should look into is supercirrus...very good for joints and legs. Eat more of clean foods like vegs, chicken and other clean meals in smaller portions throughout the day. Food makes a body feel good.

4) If all this does not help your legs, do squats every other week.

5) Do not waste your time with L2 rides...just rest. This is MHO. Keep shocking your body and rest more. I know weightlifters who come to the gym rack up the weights and do their 1RM on each exercise and go home. They get huge...they though have no definition as they are not interested in it.

6) Almost forgot, I always warm up with a 20 minute ride on an ERG at like 100 watts to get the blood flowing into the body. You may want to try it.

I have seen felt_riders schedule and he has many combo days. I have to admit I am not an advocate of combo days and only do it because I have to. So my schedule this time of the year is

Monday - Rest/stretch
Tuesday - 90 min intense cycling
Wed - Weight Training - Heavy Back or Chest in the range of 20 sets or more
Thursday - 90 min intense cycling
Friday - Rest/stretch
Sat - Weight training - Heavy Back or Chest in the range of 20 sets or more/90 min intense cycling or 3 Hour Ride
Sun - 3 Hour Ride

How about legs...well that gets worked in every other week. Also deadlifts does work your legs if done correctly. I am also a big believer in core strength so between each set I will do a different type of ab exercise on Wed, Sat...I do listen to my body so if I feel slugish on the bike, I will rest more. BTW, stretching is not suppose to be too easy...it should almost feel like a workout in itself. I believe my schedule gives me enuf recovery time and if I did more combo days it would just not happen as much as my body needs.

I also believe that you should have light weeks and heavy weeks...shock the body. Something I read about and trying is to after a heavy chest day for example go next workout and do a couple light chest exercise to get more blood into the damaged areas for healing. I have seen great results from it.

Everyone has a different body and what works for felt_rider or kopride will not work for me and vice-versus. You will only learn through trial and error and that takes time and dedication. Similar to how certain stacks and diets will produce very different results combined with different training methods.

I hope this helps you out...I tried to be direct with my answer...I always tell people try different methods as it makes it more fun....in the end it is not the watts or pump that matters it is the journey.

-Js

PS When you are not doing so well on the bike you can think of some of the benfits of strength training...

[img]media-blasters.comhotmuscle.jpgOpen ↗[/img]

Oh Well can not insert image...

Just look up Jamie Eason...

PaulMD said:

Hi all, thanks for the information and great insights.

I realise that I have to focus. For sports: cycling comes first and after that comes strength training.

After reading the above information I realise that I have to do some maintenance. So I will try to do strength training once or twice a week and maybe integrate it with a cycling training.

My strength training regime during the winter was:
Monday: Back, abdomen and biceps.
Wednesday: Legs
Friday: Chest, Shoulders and triceps.
I do my training at home and I do mostly base exercises with barbells or dumbells in my powerrack. All series were maximal and performed till failure. When I could do 12 reps with an exercise, the next serie was with more weight so I could only do it 6-8x.

The most important problem I experience with strength training and cycling is the pain in my legs after the squats. When I do my squats on wednesday I have sore legs on thursday and friday. On saturday I can still feel that my legs are sore on the bike.

Should I just do 8 reps at 85-90% of my 1RM? because I can do 90% of my 1RM more than 10 times so 8 reps is not a maximal workout. But that sub maximal effort makes it easier to do all the other workouts also.What do you all think about:

Mo: rest
Tu: Cycling L4
We: Cycling L3
Th: Strength (total body):[indent]leg:squats (2 sets)
chest:benchpress (2 sets)
shoulders: barbell behind neck press (2 sets)
back: cable seated row (2 sets), Cable Rear Pulldown widegrip (2 sets)
abdomen: crunches (2-4 sets)
[/indent]Fr: rest
Sa: Cycling L3 + strength (biceps en triceps with dumbell curls)
Su: Cycling L2 + strength when not done on saturday (biceps and triceps)

jsirabella said:

In simple language....I EAT!! I mean I EAT!! 6-8 meals a day, 3-4 protein shakes and/or protein bars and plenty of supps...including glutamine, BCAA, arginine, ZMA and some other gems to help to keep my T-levels and GH on the up because as you pass 40 these two very important levels will drop. I find I never catch colds...and I believe it will help me live longer.

3) Take supps and eat, I mean glutamine, BCAA and protein drinks are a minimum and try to take in enough protein where 1lb = 1gram of protein. One supp you should look into is supercirrus...very good for joints and legs. Eat more of clean foods like vegs, chicken and other clean meals in smaller portions throughout the day. Food makes a body feel good.

...

My only quibble with JS is that the food supplement industry should be examined with a high degree of skepticism and caution. I know many of the execs of the industry personally and professionally. Some of them have criminal convictions for fraud and drug trafficking. Quality control is poor. There is a great deal of initial spiking with illegal [censored] while the product catches on to make people think that the product is effective. The FDA is notoriously lax in monitoring the industry.

There is some good stuff out there and JS may be lucky that he only encountering the quality products. You need to do your research very carefully and choose only high quality products from high quality producers. After having a very close eye as to how the industry works, I must confess, as a relative insider, that I don't touch even the so called quality stuff. It does mean that diet and basic nutrition becomes even more important, but I think that the marginal benefits of even the quality products are outweighed by the risk of some of the [censored]. These names, companies and trade dress get sold and changed around very quickly. Stuff that has been good for years gets sold to a new owner, or production gets shipped overseas.

If I remember you are a lawyer...correct (??) nd repped some of these guys.

If I had to try and get all my nutrient needs espcially protein strictly through food it would be almost impossible. I understand though that the supp industry does not have the same scrutiny that others but you can say this for just about everything as you never knew what that chicken ate or what chemicals they used to keep those veggies growing.

I will admit I am no insider and will default to you on that but protein drinks and aminos should be common supplements form big companies like BSN or ON. Now I admit there are some from small companies that make crazy claims...

I usually though check places and sites like t-nation or bodybuilding.com and check for what experience others have had...in anycase kopride is right that you have to be careful.

I would like one day for you to dish all the dirt one day with names!!

-Js

kopride said:

My only quibble with JS is that the food supplement industry should be examined with a high degree of skepticism and caution. I know many of the execs of the industry personally and professionally. Some of them have criminal convictions for fraud and drug trafficking. Quality control is poor. There is a great deal of initial spiking with illegal [censored] while the product catches on to make people think that the product is effective. The FDA is notoriously lax in monitoring the industry.

There is some good stuff out there and JS may be lucky that he only encountering the quality products. You need to do your research very carefully and choose only high quality products from high quality producers. After having a very close eye as to how the industry works, I must confess, as a relative insider, that I don't touch even the so called quality stuff. It does mean that diet and basic nutrition becomes even more important, but I think that the marginal benefits of even the quality products are outweighed by the risk of some of the [censored]. These names, companies and trade dress get sold and changed around very quickly. Stuff that has been good for years gets sold to a new owner, or production gets shipped overseas.

jsirabella said:

If I remember you are a lawyer...correct (??) nd repped some of these guys.

If I had to try and get all my nutrient needs espcially protein strictly through food it would be almost impossible. I understand though that the supp industry does not have the same scrutiny that others but you can say this for just about everything as you never knew what that chicken ate or what chemicals they used to keep those veggies growing.

I will admit I am no insider and will default to you on that but protein drinks and aminos should be common supplements form big companies like BSN or ON. Now I admit there are some from small companies that make crazy claims...

I usually though check places and sites like t-nation or bodybuilding.com and check for what experience others have had...in anycase kopride is right that you have to be careful.

I would like one day for you to dish all the dirt one day with names!!

-Js

I can't dish for obvious reasons (attorney client privilege). But, as an example, a story involving another defendant was an ad that featured an endorsment from a very attractive physician that was identified as "First Name" "Last Name", MD. She was a former Playboy model who had obtained an MD degree from a unaccredited medical school, but had no real medical license. She touted the research the company had performed to develop the product

kopride said:

I can't dish for obvious reasons (attorney client privilege).

Again, not my client, but if you check this link, these are fairly typical of the players in the food supplement industry. BTW, ephedra is not really that harmful (any more than caffiene or nicotene, and the hype is mostly from the trial lawyer's bar, but this is typical of the guys mixing and compounding these supplements. The more benevolent players are "crystal and new age types," very little science, and very little quality control. Stick with Tofu and non fat cottage cheese for protein

signonsandiego.com20030720 9999 mz1b20metabo.htmlOpen ↗

Thanks, the squats every other week suggestion sounds very good. I read somewhere (no reference, sorry) that after a maximal workout the muscle needs 5-10 days to grow and that with one heavy training / 2 weeks it was possible to grow and to get stronger.

About nutrition and supplements: I have learned a lot professionally and personally about it. I work as a medical doctor at a intensive care for newborns. The newborns grow very fast (or better: have to grow very fast) and we give them special nutritions.

Getting enough quality proteins from a normal diet is very difficult when you want to eat 2 gram of protein / 1 kg of body-mass. With a special diet it is possible but it isn't a lot of fun. I use protein shakes to get easily quality proteins. Whey has a good mixture of amino-acids and is rich of BCAA's. The protein contains the quality amino-acids we need and is relatively easy to digest. I use whey from EAS and use a small amount before and after my training. Sometimes I use it to get extra proteins after diner or lunch when it was a low-protein meal.

The next 4 weeks I am trying creatine as a supplement. After that I will start with my new program: a mixture of all information posted here. A lot of SST, some L4 and some strength work.

I understand you can not name names. But I do have to admit cottage cheese is the most amazing food when it comes to quality protein and low calorie in-take. The only problem is after a while you just can not keep coming up with new ways to serve it....[img]cyclingforums.comsmile.gifOpen ↗[/img]

kopride said:

Again, not my client, but if you check this link, these are fairly typical of the players in the food supplement industry. BTW, ephedra is not really that harmful (any more than caffiene or nicotene, and the hype is mostly from the trial lawyer's bar, but this is typical of the guys mixing and compounding these supplements. The more benevolent players are "crystal and new age types," very little science, and very little quality control. Stick with Tofu and non fat cottage cheese for protein

signonsandiego.com20030720 9999 mz1b20metabo.htmlOpen ↗

You must be referring to Mike Mentzer. I always loved his writing as he was controversial but to me he was a genius in so many ways because he made it simple and told you the truth.

He did recommend 10 days for more experienced weight lifters to recover as you want the body to over compensate for the strain of the high intensity workout but for beginners to intermediate it was more like 4 days. Just keep in mind Mike loved whole body workouts which is now a thing of the past pretty much and he loved Nautilus machines. Everyone should read his book. In the end...TRAIN, EAT, GROW!!

As far as creatine, do not get discouraged as it can bother your stomach. It does for alot of people as ther are two types so if one bothers you, try the other and usually 5 grams before and after a workout never hurts anyone. I do not believe in the ones that do not have a loading stage, it is better if they do have a loading stage. If you are looking for all in one type products that have creatine and are very good, NO-Explode (before) and Cellmass (post workout) or Cytomax makes one called Fast Twitch that will have you flying as it has caffeine in it.

-Js

PaulMD said:

Thanks, the squats every other week suggestion sounds very good. I read somewhere (no reference, sorry) that after a maximal workout the muscle needs 5-10 days to grow and that with one heavy training / 2 weeks it was possible to grow and to get stronger.

About nutrition and supplements: I have learned a lot professionally and personally about it. I work as a medical doctor at a intensive care for newborns. The newborns grow very fast (or better: have to grow very fast) and we give them special nutritions.

Getting enough quality proteins from a normal diet is very difficult when you want to eat 2 gram of protein / 1 kg of body-mass. With a special diet it is possible but it isn't a lot of fun. I use protein shakes to get easily quality proteins. Whey has a good mixture of amino-acids and is rich of BCAA's. The protein contains the quality amino-acids we need and is relatively easy to digest. I use whey from EAS and use a small amount before and after my training. Sometimes I use it to get extra proteins after diner or lunch when it was a low-protein meal.

The next 4 weeks I am trying creatine as a supplement. After that I will start with my new program: a mixture of all information posted here. A lot of SST, some L4 and some strength work.