Training Smart - Not Hard

Fadi said:

No need to apologies litebulb; you only need to apologies when you don't ask. To answer your question directly, the answer is yes it is counter-intuitive up to a point and at certain times.

What we are talking about here does not involve getting lean or very lean. Oh no; we are talking about a totally different ball game where fat levels are taken down to a stage that is way below what is considered normal or healthy. We are talking about that stage where the bodybuilder gets ripped to shreds. Is that normal? No thanks; not my cup of tea.

You talk about gaining some weight and losing some definition; that's quite normal. After that stage becomes the hardening up. That occurs by you staying at 80kg and training smart whilst eating at maintenance calorie level. Muscles will get bigger and you lose fat. It's a slow process for some and a fast for others depending on metabolism speed. I'd concentrate on building muscles by training smart instead of losing fat by dieting. You also mention milk in another post, a large amount of milk and protein consumption. No need for either to be at an extreme level.


Just bring your calorie down a bit and exercise properly and your body will take care of the rest. Don't play with your macros except to bring them all down proportionately. 25%, 33%, and 42%. That's P, F, and C. It's very close to a diet called the "zone diet" that is comprised of 30-30-40. Who cares, as long as we don't go to extremes and begin to panic about every minute detail; raising our stress hormone cortisol in the process and letting it have a free feed on our precious muscles.

The more you think about it the more you complicate it. Eat a balanced "diet" that covers all the essential nutrients and train smart (don't like the word hard). We can get into the specifics if you like Litebulb, just ask me a specific question and we'll take it from there...bit by bit (the puzzle comes together to reveal the masterpiece that is you).


Fadi.

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Fadi, can you enlighten me on what it means to train "smart", not "hard"?

As of yesterday, I've started a day-on-day-off circuit which is made up of the following (all sets are 30 reps, with 1 min between sets (as per your thread on circuit training)):

1- Thrusters
2- Standing Military Presses
3- Abs
4- Push-ups

5- Hamstring Curls
6- Calf Raises
7- Abs
8- Barbell Curls

9- Assisted Chin Ups
10- Deadlifts
11- Abs
12- Push-ups

Let me assure you, once I was done, I didn't feel "smart". I reached lactic threshold about 24 reps into the Deadlift set too. I must say, the pain felt great (as sado-masochistic as that sounds).


I've also noted in bold-underlined font that you said it was possible for me to stay at 80kg, get bigger, and lose fat at the same time - again, I'm getting a bit of cognitive dissonance here....didn't we say that it was impossible to grow while burning fat?

I'm sure in a few more weeks / months / years I'll start catching on a bit more!

I'm really enjoying the new lifestyle!


"We don't eat for taste, we eat to get big and shred"

PS, Fadi, you have a fantastic moustache! I'll be becoming a Mo Bro as of tomorrow for Movember.

Depression is a very tough thing, so I encourage the rest of you guys to harden up, grow a tash, and support Movember!

I'm goin the mo' as soon as november comes around!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Even get your mum to join in on it if she can! lol

litebulb said:

Fadi, can you enlighten me on what it means to train "smart", not "hard"?

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I never said don't train hard; I said I don't like using the term "hard". Because what is hard? Hard is relative. Smart encompasses hard and not the other way around.

Let me give you an example relating to squats. If you walk into the gym and start to do squats for say 10 sets of 20 reps. Now is that hard? Yes. Is that dumb? Yes! I'm after smart and hard and nothing else. Hard without smart has to have an element of dumbness involved. So why is 10x20 not smart? Because unless your name can suddenly become Superman, then your limited level of recovery will most definitely let you down. So here we're talking about the lack of recovery created by our 10x20.

How about if I decide to perform 5x5 on the squats with a weight that I can only manage 3 good reps with? Again, not a smart idea. But no one can say it's not hard, can they? I've written an article called the "F" word, in which I talk about going to failure and beyond. Once you stimulate a muscle, you can not stimulate it more. But you can certainly damage it excessively which again will lead us back to the issue of recovery. The gym is not where one builds muscles, gets stronger, or more powerful. All that is done outside the gym whilst you're recovering. Your gym workout was nothing more than a stimulus that you've placed on your neuromuscular system, forcing it to adapt by getting stronger/bigger/ and more powerful.

Training smart is planning your workout ahead of time. Training smart for strength athletes like weightlifters and powerlifters is planning a program that is based on a 1RM that gets renewed every 4-6 weeks so as to plan further ahead and so on...

Training smart is like eating smart. Training hard but not smart is like eating big without paying attention to balanced macros. Why not increase your calories by just drinking some oil, surely that will up the calories tremendously. It's not smart!

As of yesterday, I've started a day-on-day-off circuit which is made up of the following (all sets are 30 reps, with 1 min between sets (as per your thread on circuit training)):

1- Thrusters
2- Standing Military Presses
3- Abs
4- Push-ups

5- Hamstring Curls
6- Calf Raises
7- Abs
8- Barbell Curls

9- Assisted Chin Ups
10- Deadlifts
11- Abs
12- Push-ups

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Where did you get 12 exercises from?

I've also noted in bold-underlined font that you said it was possible for me to stay at 80kg, get bigger, and lose fat at the same time - again, I'm getting a bit of cognitive dissonance here....didn't we say that it was impossible to grow while burning fat?

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Here's what I said in bold:

That occurs by you staying at 80kg and training smart whilst eating at maintenance calorie level. Muscles will get bigger and you lose fat.

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I can't see where the problem is Litebulb. I did not say you'll gain weight/get bigger and lose fat. I said in bold that you stay at 80kg whilst the muscles will get bigger and you lose fat. And I also said that it's a slow process since your bodyweight will remain at 80kg due to having maintenance calorie intake.

didn't we say that it was impossible to grow while burning fat?

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Sure, but who's talking about grow here? We're talking about remaining at 80kg so we don't add fat on. If you decide to grow, as in gain weight, then that added weight will not be exclusively muscle or exclusively fat, but both. That ratio of fat to muscle gain will depend on your training whether it’s smart or not. But that’s another subject since we're talking about gaining weight here. Weight= everything. Muscle gain is just that. Fat gain is just that. Weight gain is both.


Fadi.

very good post as always, Fadi... it's good that smart vs hard is now clarified. Smart = (hard,...). Hard != (Smart,...)

You certainly can't cut the HARD out of training.

Josh_GTiR said:

You certainly can't cut the HARD out of training.

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Josh, I know what you are infering by that but to be technical about it, the answer is yes you can take HARD out of training as long as you leave smart in. An example would be when you deload. Now would deloading be classified as HARD? The answer is no, because then it would simple not be deloading!

As I've said:

Smart encompasses hard and not the other way around.

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Fadi.