Weight Training For Beginners

[k31th]

care to elaborate on the difference?

[Puffwagon]

Not really, maybe later. I'm not saying that to be a butthead, just basing it on what you've told us in this thread.

[k31th]

either way, I guess I'm not really focusing on building huge muscle mass, just very slow increases  I'm not actually complaining about not being able to gain weight as that's probably a good thing, but I'm just referencing the fact I'm at least partially trying to gain muscle mass and very slowly achieving it... around ~1kg per year haha

[Puffwagon]

If you did focus on building as much muscle as possible you would probably gain double or triple that for a number of years in a row.

 

From 2010, it took me about 7 or 8 years to go from 78kg up to 105kg at 15 to 20% bodyfat. Since then I've gained about up to another 5 to 10kg of mixed results. The 120kg plus times were from excess drinking which resulted in pitting oedema. That's just a sh*tload of water retention which quickly disappears.

 

It's a slow process whether or not you actively chase the gains.

[k31th]

yeah, I started going to the gym again (went for a couple of years at high school from 17-18 years old after which I stopped when I went to university in 2006) regularly in 2016 at ~70kg, now 7 years later (1ish covid-interrupted years; two winters of closed gyms...) I'm at 78 pushing 79kg, with around 10% body fat... that's with doing a fair chunk of hypertrophy but a bunch of other functional fitness stuff... never pushing big heavy weights and never tailoring a diet or supplements to it... so I guess one could say I'm half-arsing it, but the effort I put in at the gym isn't half-arsed  

[Puffwagon]

You know it's funny how the perception of weight changes over the years. Eventually heavy weight becomes light and the process comes full circle.

 

Even if you aren't training for maximal gains, you've made some great progress 

[k31th]

oh yeah, my 2016-self would look at the weight and reps I now regularly lift and be like "f that"... so yeah, gains! even if somewhat slow  

[Puffwagon]

Haha yeah same, now it's a balancing act with lifting enough to make gains while still being able to recover. Speaking of slow gains, I added 30kg to my deadlift over the past 12 months, that's only 2.5kg per month. I'll be pretty chuffed if I can do that again this year and be comfortable there, rather than nearly maxed out.

[Puffwagon]

Righty ho, time to get this party started. Day 1 of the last BB meso, feeling good, feeling strong, ate a huge bowl of rice bubbles, smashed coffee, had vitamins, looking forward to getting a pump and making some gains

[Mrs Jeturbo]

🙌🏼🙌🏼🙌🏼