Females & Bulking Up - Did You Think It Would Be Easy?????

When I start resistance training with women, I can pretty much guarantee that, at some time, they'll make comment about whether or not they want to bulk up. Usually it goes something like this, "I want to do some weights...but I don't want to bulk up". This is normally followed by something like, "I've already got huge legs - I don't want them to get any more muscly". And I then launch into a long and drawn out conversation about the ins and outs of growing muscles in women.

 

So let's just keep it simple for a start......BUILDING MUSCLE IS BLOODY HARD!!!!! I'm flat out trying to build up, bulk up and shape up and it's certainly not going to happen when you aren't looking - rest assured!!!!

 

I'll get back to the Women & Bulking Up later. Firstly, the biggest news of the week is that I have a trainer!!!! Woohooo!!! Finally some clarity in this fog of exercise! Her name is Sammy and, while I don't have her full credentials at hand, I know she is an accomplished figure competitor and has trained some of last years' winners. She works at the Wicked NRG supplement shop in Darwin alongside her personal training, and I'm stoked to have her on my side!

 

So we've thrown a few emails and phone calls back and forth and this has resulted in my first 2 week training and nutrition regime. While the exercises are very familiar and exciting, the nutrition is a bit on the mind-boggling side! I don't think I was quite ready for all that it encompasses. I went shopping yesterday and spent about 15mins in the health aisle to end up with only 2 small bottles of tablets in my basket. I was looking for some really weird stuff like; magnesium and zinc and chlorophyll and chrondroitin!!!! Doesn't this stuff belong in a science lab/??? I eventually found the 'chia' seeds and still don't know what they are! Clearly I haven't actually opened the packet yet and I have full intentions of doing something with it.....just not sure what. They look like tiny ballbearings and they look about as palatable as ........tiny ballbearings. The fear of not being able to do this whole thing almost swallowed me whole yesterday. I felt a bit panicky and considered just throwing in the towel early and getting on with life. Then I sat down and laid it out in front of myself and realised that I would regret forever not giving it a go. And regret is a waste of bloody time! Then I realised that the nutrition is what's scaring me - not the hard work in the gym. And then it hit me with extreme clarity - I'm not a quitter!!!!!! No way!!! Not this time!!!! So I'm thinking less and doing more and I'll let you know the results.

 

I sent Sammy through a few of my current photos. On a scale of hard-things-to-do, being photographed is about 9.8/10. I absolutely hate it but I know it's a necessary part of a distance-training relationship. Consequently I had a critique of myself and can say that I'm feeling ok about my upper body. I'm told that there's a long way to go but my base is pretty ok for now. Legs wise she thinks the muscle is sitting there waiting to be found. I think it's hiding under 'stuff' for now. We all know what the 'stuff' is but I don't want to say it out loud! hehe. So I'll show you a couple of photos and leave it at that.

 

 

As for women and bulking up. Let's just clear the air with some of the facts, as I know them to be.

* Women simply do not have the testosterone that men have. Testosterone aids with increasing muscle mass. We do not have enough to sprout the huge muscles that men find so much easier to achieve.

* Women have a physical make up that makes it much easier for them to gain fat rather than lean muscle.

 

Resistance training (when performed correctly!) causes tiny tears in your muscle fibres. The muscles adapt to that stress by increasing & growing in size to produce bigger muscles. However (and this is important!!), you must know the correct exercises to do, the correct weights to lift, the correct cadence or speed to lift, the correct amount of reps to complete and the correct amount of rest time between lifting. The typical high reps/low weights routines favoured by classes such as pump, will lead to lean muscle and fat loss but will not produce 'bulk'.

 

Another point to remember in relation to weight loss is that when you lose weight, your muscles become visible. Don't mix this up with 'bulking up'. You are just removing the 'stuff'' that's covering the muscle.

 

So rest assured ladies, you are not going to grow bulky by accident. If it were that easy, I wouldn't be trying to fit tiny ballbearings into my daily diet!!!!!

2 Weeks In & I Haven't Lost Any Weight - YAY!!!!

It was with trepidation that I stepped onto the scales this morning. It's been two weeks since I last weighed and I've been working out like crazy, there's been a distinct lack of evening wine and I'm trying to make sure that 99% of what goes in my gob is good and not evil. As you know, my goal is to put on good strong muscle without plonking on a big dollop of fat. I'm trying to eat the correct amount of calories in order to do this while offsetting the exercise, and that can equal up to 2,500 calories a day - that's a bloody lot of oats and rice!!! Meanwhile I've had two people in the past week comment on the fact that I look like I've lost weight - how disheartening!!! (hehe - not many women get to feel disheartened at appearing slimmer!!)

But alas - my diet has prevailed and I have gone from 61.9kg to 61.8kg in two weeks - WOOT WOOT!!!! I'm stoked!!! I felt like doing a bit of air thumping around the bathroom but then realised that I haven't quite mastered the whole "put on weight" thing yet so I'll save my self-preening until then.

I think what those around me are seeing is a change of shape and I can certainly notice it myself. I can feel my top half getting more solid while my waist is feeling smaller and I'm having to re-knot all of my exercise pants!!

Not much else to blab on about today. Am working hard and lifting heavy. I've been on creatine for about a week now and they say it takes about that amount of time to saturate your body to the point that it starts 'working'. I've always been dubious about vitamins and supplements because I can't quite measure them like I can other things, however I'm doing what I'm told and I'll report back when/if I feel any changes.

If not I'll be like the rest of Australasia and produce some very expense waste products! 

Who's Hidden The Milk?

Have you ever seen a dog or a cat when they are feeling a little under the weather - and they head to a patch of grass and start eating it? And nobody really knows why because cats and dogs don't normally eat grass and it's probably not that good for them?

Well, my food of choice when I'm feeling a bit less-than-wonderful is milk. Straight milk. If I've been out for the night and consumed just a wee bit too much of the vino, I'll spend the following day drinking milk from morning til night. On those days I like to add a bit of flavour....like a tablespoon of sugar with 2 more of milo....or maybe some chocolate syrup if I ever had it!! I would say that I go through 2-3 litres of the stuff on my party-boxing-day. In NZ we had a milkshake that you could buy from the local dairy (no aussies, not a cow farm - a corner store!!), and they would come in a large white cup with a picture of a giraffe's head and neck on it saying "The Longest Drink in Town", or something like that. Strawberry would be my poison first thing in the morning.

So what has this got to do with life? Well, I was a bit surprised on Wednesday when I woke up craving milk. And I promise, promise, promise, promise no alcohol has touched my lips for......well I won't say least I embarrasse myself....but it has definitely been a lot of hours that have made up quite a few days since I've had one. 

Just a side story - I called into the Woolworths bottle shop just before Xmas Day and bought 2 bottles of wine that I took to different parties around that time. Inevitably I left both unfinished bottles in the hosts' fridges and again had none at home. So just before New Years Eve I went to the shop again feeling a bit conspicuous about buying yet another two bottles!! Then I had a little laugh at the 'Katherine grog situation' and realised that I have nothing to fear as I am a very small minnow in a large sea of grog-buying. So, can you imagine my complete horror when I got to the checkout and the operator said, "You know - last time you were in here ........." Oh..My...God!! I am being recognised at the grog shop! Unbelievable!! I'm going to shop around from now on. Sorry ........ back to the blog.....

So I woke up craving milk and had; a shake before breakfast, followed by a tall glass of milk, followed by my usual oats soaked in yet more milk. At lunch time I had a bite to eat and another shake and repeated the same at dinner. Before bed I had another two glasses of milk and could have gone for more if I didn't think I'd be up all night!

I had a think about it and concluded that it's been a huge week of running around with the kids, fitting in a heap of good workouts, swimming, socialising, work, the start of bootcamp and the running of a household with all of the usual dramas that go with it. While I feel really vitalised and happy with it all, I think my body must have had an off day and there's something in milk that it needs or craves. I'll keep looking into this and see what I'm lacking or if it's just my own special thing that I do...like the cats and dogs!

So I've knocked off a heavy legs, heavy shoulders and lats, medium bis & tris and a couple of good runs. I'm looking for a solid chest & middle back to round off my week.

Kylie is sending me her 5 inch heels and posing bikini so I can start practising my moves! I'm laughing out loud at the thought of myself prancing around in front of the mirror in this get up! (Rob's not laughing. He's smiling. A lot.) She's also warned me about the tan. Apparantely it's beyond the call of any sort of normal tanning. Think more like a can of paint and a roller brush!! And layering it on over a period of days to ensure it's nice and rich in colour. I'm imagining myself walking around Katherine in searing heat with long pants and a long sleeved shirt on to hide the fact that I look like an Indian with the wrong coloured face!!!! Parts of this challenge are going to be very funny, I can just tell! I promise photos will come.....maybe.....

Legs - Who Needs Them?

So I've got these legs right. They are perfectly functional and have done well for me as far as walking, running, jumping and anything similar is concerned. I don't want to bag them too much least they rebel any further than they are. But the fact is - they are just the hardest thing on my body to train!

I thrash them with weights - and I mean I really do smash them sometimes. I do normal squats, wide stance squats, narrow squats, side squats, kick squats, prisoner squats and split squats. Then I lunge. By crickey I lunge! I lunge forwards, backwards, sideways and anyways I can! I even throw in a few jumps in between lunges yet I STILL don't see the changes that I hope for. By rights I should be able to slap on a red one-piece and run exotically down the beach as an extra for Baywatch.....but I certainly can't! I still have round knees and decent wobble somewhere on the back half of them! How can I be sure? Easy - my kids stand behind me when I get out of the shower and wobble those bits and tell me they can see lots of 'bumps and stuff'!!!!! Sigh.

I'm not finished with them yet though. I've still got a bit of fight left in me. A lot actually. And I'll continue on in my quest to find muscles that I can see in the mirror.

Yesterday I commandeered two lovely ladies and we killed our legs all together - it's so much more fun that way! When I do it alone I want to cry. When I hear the others whimpering it actually makes me want to giggle. It's the sadistic side of me.

Anyhow, we only did 4 leg exercises - but each one was paired with a plyometric (jumping) exercise and we completed 4 sets in total. It took a full hour and I gotta say that my legs were shaking with fatigue afterward. I'm pretty sure we all felt the same, and today I'm still suffering. I was very happy instructing the gym circuit class today without having to do it!

Two days ago we blasted chest and upper back, now with nice sore legs I think I'll do a simple bit of cardio for today and get back into some weights tomorrow.

Oh yeah - we all ate brown rice again last night and there was no moaning! I think the taste was masked by the 'hint' of chilli in the beef strips - yum!!! Hopefully I'll get through this thing without estranging my whole family!

Rest Day

3 days on with a 8.5km run on Tues, cardio based weights session on Weds and a good tough shoulders and lats workout yesterday followed by an interval run on the treadmill.  However I am trying to make absolutely sure that I don't burn out as I can see that this would be quite easy to do. I can see that this is going to be a long and intense ride and I'm going to need to be very sensible about my approach.

When lifting weights I understand that small micro-tears are made in the muscles, which then respond to the stress by repairing bigger and better giving us nice big muscles. The repair is best carried out when our bodies are resting which is why it is imperative to have at least a 24 break between muscle sets. I'm trying to work on a 4-day split right now consisting of;

- Legs

- Chest & Upper Back

- Shoulders & Lats

- Bis & Tris

Then I throw in 2 x cardio based weights workouts and another straight run.

I seem to need two rest days at the moment but will probably have to lower that to one as time goes on.

If I don't rest, then I'm at risk of stripping away the very thing I'm trying to build - muscle!! And with all of the work I'm putting in, that would be a crying shame!

Balance, balance, balance. Life is good and I'm happy. I like learning about new things.

Powders & Tablets & an Inferiority Complex

Maybe you'll believe me, maybe you won't - but it's true. I often feel intimidated when walking into a gym, sports shop, sports shoe shop or anything remotely similar! Why? Because the monkey on my shoulder whispers things like, "You're getting a bit old for this!" or "You don't look like you belong here" or "You're absolutely crap at sports so you don't really fit in". When I was on the heavier side I was convinced that everyone in the gym or shop was snickering about me, saying things like, "What the hell is she doing here?! Obviously it isn't working!"

What shitty things to say to yourself. But it's common, especially among women. Men seem to have a bit more confidence in themselves physically - even if they aren't in perfect shape. I see it all the time. They wander into the gym and give anything a go. Meanwhile the ladies are often too intimidated to even enter the weights section.

I feel that a very large part of my job at the gym is to help those who are unconfident to fight their fear and "do it anyway".

So what the hell does this have to do with my training you ask? Well, I went to a supplements shop in Darwin and all of those old feelings came flooding back as the fit young staff mmember strolled over asked me if I needed help. There's nothing that makes you feel like an amateur more than when you have to admit that you have absolutely no idea what you need to buy!! Man I felt silly. I felt really silly. Amateur with a capital 'A'!

Never mind. I got through and walked out with a selection of bottles containing;

- BCAA (branch chain amino acids) that are supposed to ..... aid recovery and .... shit I don't know! But they are supposed to be good. I take them in a powder form that tastes like nasty orange cordial, 30mins before and 30mins after exercise.

- Glucamine - is supposed to promote muscle growth, reduce muscle breakdown, aid recovery blah blah blah - it all starts sounding the same but they are supposed to be good so I have a little bit of powder that I pop in some water and gulp down before bed

- Creatine - is supposed to aid in energy for explosive exercise such as heavy lifting. It is a very common supplement for body builders but apparantely needs to be cycled so as you're not on it for extended periods of time. I was sold it in tablet form and take a couple before and after workouts. Again - I'm trusting the experts on this stuff!!

- Protein Powder - I'm sure everyone knows about protein powder and it's benefits. I've got a yummy chocolate flavoured powder and, secretly, it's scrumptuous!! I have one shake as soon as I wake up, another immediately after workout and could easily sneak another one in somewhere but am trying to use whole foods as a better protein source.

So I'm not exactly a wealth of secure information on this lot! I'm more flying by the seat of pants and hoping the 'experts' are right. If I start getting facial hair or my voice gets deeper - please feel free to let me know!!

Just kidding Mum!!! These are all standard supps!