QTDDTOT

Is bench pressing with dumbbells so much worse than with the barbell? I don't have a gym bro or spotter, and I don't want to kill myself with the bar, no power rack in my gym. there is a bench press stand, but there's no guard rails on the side, so if the bar comes down, there's no stopping it before it hits me. what do?

If strength is your goal over just wanting to look good then yes dumbbells are inferior since you can add ALOT more weight to a bar. However if strength isn't your main goal then by all means use those dumbbells as your main tool for crafting your chest. Still follow the principles of progressive overload and you'll be fine

Bump

It isn't? Seems like alot.

Something in my shoulder gets sore when I do front raises, what can I do to fix this? What executrices should I avoid other than front raises, obviously.

From my own experience, 90% of weight loss comes from your diet.

I also think that the GOAT cardio is swimming. Makes your heart work really hard, and really improves your posture, chests and shoulders (might call broscience on this one, but seriously, every swimmer i've met had great shoulders and chests).

Front raises are the most unnecessary exercise ever. Just don't do them.

What other shoulder work can I do then? I can't OHP due to a previous injury and I also want to strengthen my rotator cuff

When pressing without a spotter/power rack, don't use clips to hold the weights. Should the bar ever fall, you just lift it from one side, the weights will slide off and you will be safe.

Additionally, take it easy with pressing. Don't go to failure, don't test yourself. Yes, you could have managed to finish that 5th rep, but finishing at 4 reps beats not being strangulated by the barbell. I'm at 2pl8, 4x5 and i don't have a power rack.

Dumbbell pressing is inferior, but it isn't bad. Pulling numbers out of my ass, i'd wager the bench press is a 10/10 chest exercises, while the dumbbell press is a 8/10 one. Like the other user said, follow the principles of progressive overload, pay attention to proper form and you will see results.

Can you Bench press or do dips? Really Any pressing exercise involves your front delts enough.

Look up YTWL

If I'm a skinnyfat DYEL, should I consider body recomposition?

>I can't OHP due to a previous injury

I don't have experience with injuries. Is that an actual order from your doctor, or are you assuming you shouldn't OHP?

Heavy OHPs are the best shoulder exercises out there. If you can't do that, i'd wager you should try some dumbbell shoulder pressing, but your injury might not allow for that either.

Best shoulder exercises are, imo -

OHP
Dumbbell Shoulder Presses
Lateral Raises
Face Pulls

But seriously, OHP is the numero uno for your shoulders.

Order from my doctor.

So I didn't eat enough and had a bad sleep the day before my SS workout.

The last session was fine and my squat was a decent speed. Today, the bar felt incredibly crushing on my back and even though I got all sets of 5, they were very grindy with just a tiny amount of form breakdown.

Should I continue to up the weight and just make sure I eat enough/sleep well enough and consider it as just a bad day?

How e-stats work?
When somebody talks about a 1plate lift, does he mean 40kg/90lbs (1plate*2) or 60kg/135lbs (1plate*2+bar)?
If the bar is implied, should I always assume it's an olympic bar (20kg/45lbs)?

no,add pushups and bodyweight squats else u wont look balanced.

1 pl8 = 1 pl8 on the bar each side

I'm gonna put some chicken and broccoli on a pan for lunch today. How do you bastards make it taste good?

What if I throw swimming into the mix?

Am I ready to move on to 5/3/1. I did stronglifts for 6 months, took a year off lifting completely due to family issues, and have been doing it for the past six months again. Haven't made any progress in lifts in a month.

SQ: 95kg x 5
BP: 60kg x 5
OHP: 45kg x 5
DL: 100kg x 5

learn how to do the "roll of shame"

Switch to SS, it will probably give you some more gains before going intermediate.
Also that deadlift is low compared to your squat. Form check on both?

I'm getting weird forearm pain.

I notice it the most when I do barbell curls. It's a strange pressure feeling. I don't care about the pain but I don't want to pull a muscle or something and hurt myself. Should I lift through it or take it easy?

You are doing it with a straight bar, amiright?
Switch to the ez-bar or better, switch to hammer curls for a while and it may go away.
Don't go back to the straight bar or it'll fuck you in the ass.

Ok, thanks. Any reason why straight bar is so bad?

Have any of you fags gotten massages? My upper back and lower back feel super tense, how do you deal with the autism of being touched, also male or female masseuse? No homo of course.

Never "play through the pain" if it hurts STOP.

Its probably not your program thats the issue. Eat above matainence, sleep 8hrs minimum and train CONSISTENTLY. Then you can worry about specific programs. You will make progress with ANYTHING as long as you are consistent

Fuck that bitch up with hot sauce.

What actually works the back the most in a deadlift? Is it the lockout phase? Is it pulling it off the ground?

Is it safe to say that getting it to above your knees is the leg phase and the "rack pull" is for your back?

If you dont know you can move up you shouldnt move up. Think of your body as a house. You know how you make a fucking beautiful house? You lay each brick, place every beam as straight and as perfectly as you can, one by one untill there are no more pieces to place. Thats your workout, make every set perfect and the result can only be perfection.

Should I smile at strangers when outside?
Currently I just return the smiles was wondering whether I should progress to dealing them

Switch to lat raises. Your front delts get more than enough activation through every other form of pressing we do. Medial delts on the other hand...the part of the delt that actually gives you that roided out canonball shoulder look, those need isolation work.

More pressing of any kind will help though i would reccomend you incorporate cable flys or pecdec to isolate the pecs if you truely feel they are lagging behind

Of course. If you enjoy it when people smile at you why wouldn't they enjoy you smiling at them. Plus it makes you go from RBF to having a more approachable demeanor.

You'd be surprised how many people smile back when you smile at them.

Never be afraid to make eye contact and smile back bro. It brightens people's day

Not really, somthing in your forearm is being agrivated by the straightbar so its inly logical to switch to somthing that doesnt cause pain

>Pressed 75kg strict, no belt
>Took a picture of my bod
>Look flabby as fuck
Feels bad man, can't even take off my shirt on the beach without feeling bad.

the straight bar for curls puts your wrists in a weird position and makes you apply force (thus exercising). this unnatural position of the curl with applied force will make your stuff go inflamed.
quit the straight bar breh.
do preacher curls with the ez-bar, hammer curls, concentration curls, etc.

My gym banned deadlifts, and I don't have the money to cancel the membership and go elsewhere. What can I do to substitute?

>pulled/tore something in my shoulder almost two weeks ago
>still hurts bad as fuck from any weight put on that arm
I'm starting to get mad and worried. Why the fuck is it taking so long to heal?

Dumb bell Romanian deadlifts would be a decent alternative

Go to a fucking doctor you mook

Related question then.

I always treat dumbbell excercises and machines as auxillary, and I only warmup with barbell compounds. Should I be warming up with auxillaries and dumbbell lifts?

Good question. I get a lot of varried answers when it comes to how to warm up. Personally i do a full mobility routine every morning and before each workout but i take a very proactive aproach to injury prevention. As long as the weight is less than 25% of your work weight i think your db work would be sufficent for warming up.

If you are working off someone elses program chances are they have a warm up method associated with that particular program. If not, Id advise you to check out the plg pastebin for mobility and warm up resources

What would a doctor even do for that? He'd probably just tell me to keep resting it. I'm just wondering if it's normal for something like this to take two+ weeks to heal. I'm sure some people here have taken a trip to snap city in the past.

1: would tell you if it was a tear or a sprain for Which would be the difference between getting rest and deciding whether you need surgery/PT.

2:he might even be nice enough to perscribe some fun pain killers and/or muscle relaxers.

Two weeks is not normal heal time. 4 weeks seems appropriate

Anyone ever have tendonitis before? In the forearm/wrist. Already took a week off what's the procedure?

Do you guys use different shoes for squatting and deadlifts?

also what muscles keeps the humerus to the shoulder? I've got an injury and thought it was a dislocation but after x-ray, shoulder seems fine.

thoughts? doc's analysis is inconclusive and wants me to get an MRI, but I can't afford one right now

Ice twice a day for two weeks, rest for 4. When you do return to working out do so lightly, progressively working back up to your previous working weight

Joint injuries take 2-4 weeks normally if they are minor
Takes like 3-6 months if you btfo it

I've only been lifting for about 2 months now and I noticed when I compared my form to my brother's that I pause at the bottom of every squat whereas he does it in one motion. Is it a bad thing to do or am I just making it a little bit harder on myself?

You are making it harder on yourself it will still carry you though carried me up to 128 kgs and then once I was told I was pausing too much managed smash my upcoming workouts.

Squat and bench with oly shoes DL barefoot here.

Such a bad time to get it, oh well at least i can work on my cardio

lmao this pic...

Plus your legs, your abs and especially your glutes. I never directly trained my ass untill injury left me little else to do in the gym and hoooooooleeeeee shiiiit! I didnt add very much size onto my glutes but the level of attention i get for it is unreal

I can't wrap my mind around deadlifting, I've watched tons of form videos but as far as I can tell everyone lifts with their back when it comes to hinging their torso upwards. My entire life I've heard that picking things up with your back is dangerous and should be avoided though, so how are these guys safely lifting 4pl8?

is there anything wrong with DL with oly shoes?

Started ice cream fitness about 5 weeks ago now. Started at the bar and today I finally hit 135 for squats and 115 for chest.

Most of my exercises seem to be at all sorts of different weights. Are they meant to be or should I focus on getting them all to the same weight?

pics are taken roughly 1 month apart.
WHY AM I NOT PUTTING ON MUSCLE? :c

Switched from 4 months of fuckarounditis split routine to SL.

67kg 178cm eating @2390-2500 kcal/day and getting a minimum of 150g daily protons.

Estimated 1RMs from symmetricstrength:
Back Squat: 85 kg[Novice] //didn't train legs for those initial 4 months
Deadlift: 128 kg[Intermediate]
Bench Press: 76 kg[Novice]
Overhead Press: 47 kg[Novice]
Pull-up: 23 kg added[Intermediate]
Pendlay Row: 70 kg[Intermediate]

So... Where the fck are my gains escaping to?

How often should I lift per week while on a cut?

I find myself rather doing cardio than lift since I'm not gonna make gains on a cut anyways.

>always feel awkward on deadlift setup
>try sumo, pull my conventional max easily
>nagging knee pain gone

Should I work to fix my conventional setup/form or just be a sumocuck

>body weight squats

Does that meaning a 180lb. bar bell... Or just what is known as a 'squat'

Does cardio really kill gains or is it just some bullshit Veeky Forums spouts?

GF wants thinner legs and everywhere it says "do cardio"

But I don't want to lose my quads, but I need to get to at least 13% BF.

Eat more

fuck me she's so beautiful

please define "more" to a recovering fatty afraid of having lovehandles again

my right pec feels like it's smaller than my left, is there any reason/fix for this or is it just undertrained compared to the other one?

>GF wants thinner legs

remove

Does anyone have a body mode chart with examples? Like, a serious one? Bear mode, ottormode, skinnyfat, skelly, etc?

cardio kills fat.

More

Above your tdee, the sticky has info man

1plate*2+bar.
1pl8 = 60kg
2pl8 = 100kg..
and so on.

doing SL myself, you seem to have forgotten your Rows?

BENCH and do isolation.

Do you also have problems benching
Does the bar move side to side
Fix your bench and move up in weight
If you do, i rather you should just focus on bench form and do isolation like the unilateral dumbbell presses

Unilateral Dumbbell Press will fix movement problems but not in a great extend muscle development but it will help

>you won't make gains while you cut

Why does this meme persist, you WILL MAKE GAINS but lose bodyfat and some muscle in the same period

The sole purpose of cutting is to lose as much bodyfat to muscle mass as possible so you're still GAINING muscle mass.

You should go to the gym.

What do you guys call the exercise where you grab a plate with both hands and move it around your head?

The umbrella press

Why can't I feel any lat activation during pull ups? I've tried with narrow and wide grips but I never feel like I've worked them hard. I feel much more when I'm doing seated rows

The spartan phalanx

anyone remember the name of that canadian online protein supplier? he browsed Veeky Forums and i ordered some from him a while ago, but i forgot the name
call me a shill if you want, the stuff is actually not bad

Typically you should keep back/chest exercises relatively close. If you can bench 225, you should be able to do a pullup with x amount of weight added to your body to equal 225.

Squats/deadlifts should be higher than both, as they use more muscles to perform. Deadlifts use more than squats, so you should be able to deadlift more than you squat.

It's fine to have variations between the 3 big lifts, deads, squats and bench, but for isolation/hypertrophy different weights don't really matter.

is there any point in taking creatine on a cut?

75% of a deadlift is in your legs, your back is mainly for stabilizing and getting it past your knees

I got me a good pair of Chucks for the gym. They're flat enough for stability and their shape is good for really driving in with your heels

Does doing higher sets on a lower weight build mass, opposed to doing lower sets on a higher weight building strength?