The First Step To Getting Ripped

Avoid the weight scale. Don't get on it more than twice per month. Use the mirror as your progress guage. Your bathroom scale cannot distinguish between fat and muscle. Your eyes can. So focus more on how you look than on how much you weigh when you are working on cuts and muscle definition.

Diet management will be your key to success. Not doing more sets or more reps or increasing your aerobic activity. All of those things are necessary but alone they won't get you there. If they could the gyms would be full of ripped guys instead of being full of puffy smooth guys trying to get ripped. The exception to this rule would be if you are doing extreme workouts like P90X or some other non-stop intense activity .

The problem with P90X type workouts is that it is difficult to maintain the results without working out like you are on speed everyday.

To get ripped you must know how much food you need per day and lay out those meals in advance. This means you have to carry prepared food with you when you are leaving home. Or you must carry enough protien supplements to replace high the protien meals you will require throughout the day.

This is how to closely estimate how much food you will need throughout each day. You will have to adjust theses calculations as you lose fat.

1. Find out your weight.

2. Next we must calculate the bare mimimum calories you will need per day to sustain yourself. To do this multiply the answer from line one by 10.5:      Line 1 X 10.5 =

3. Consider your physical activity for the average day. If you are currently not getting any exercise multiply line 2. by 20%. If you are getting a light amount of exercise say, being on your feet at least 2 hours per day, multiply by line 2 by 30%. Multiple by 40% if you get moderate exercise every day. If you do intense exercise 3-4 times per week use 50%.

4. Add line 2 and line 3. This is your daily calorie need. Or close to it.

5. Now subtract 500 (this will allow you to lose about a pound per week). The resulting number is your ideal daily calorie intake.

If you follow this formula you will lose weight.

John. This Soloflex User Got Focused And Made Some Major Changes

This post is one I am really excited to make!   It is about my new friend John and his recent physical transformation.    John's experience will not only inspire Soloflex users, but anyone wanting to shed a few pounds.   John is the first to demonstrate the Soloflex Muscle Machine as a valuable tool for building, toning and sculpting muscle while following a serious weight loss regimen.  Sure, others have undoubtedly used their machine during weight loss, but John is the first to document it publicly, as it happened.

 

These are photos of John before and after and of his home gym.  John's gym is ultra streamline, with two classic Soloflex machines. His gym is clearly capable of doing everything any die-hard weightlifter or bodybuiler could need.  Johns gym also has  additional safety features.

                                                             

You can follow John's actual progress and posts by going to the comments sections of my Hybrid Soloflex videos. 

 

The following is a cut and paste from an email that John sent to me today outlining his diet and progress.  It serves as a great guide for anyone interested in taking control of their bodyweight issues.

"The most dramatic change came the last 3 weeks of my eating plan. I used a homeopathic product called hCG in drops form. The diet was very extreme 500 calories a day for three weeks. Now I'm on eating about 1100 calories a day. The first picture was me at 188 lbs.

"The second picture was me at 172lbs. I wanted to go down to 165 lbs but I lost another 17 lbs in 21 days. The whole time on the hCG I did some exercises on the Soloflex and with the free weights. I walked alot every day a very fast pace. Usually 3 miles on my way to and from work. The first part of the diet I followed the James Bond diet Daniel Craig used for Casino Royal.

"After the intial loss I plateaued which is when I discovered the hCG diet. I've been on it for 3 weeks with the drops and almost 2 weeks off the drops. I completely gave up all starchy carbs these past 5 weeks. I eat 2-3 melba toasts or bread sticks a day. At each of three meals I have 4-6 oz of protein, green vegestables, and a piece of fruit. a lot of coffee, tea, and water. I have much more energy, sleep better, and a whole new wardrobe. I even fit into my Army uniform from 31 years ago which is a size 38 when I was 29 years old. I just need to tighten up the slight bid of fat arund the middle. I took your advice and bought a fat burner called Recreate. I start tomorrow."

 

Done like an expert, John.  Thanks for leading the way.

 

How To Create Your Custom Workout Using The Gadget Located On The Right Side Of This Page

The workout gadget will produce two weeks of routines. As you progress through the input steps of the gadget you will be able to enter a start date for your routine to begin. Day 8 of the routine will be the same as day 1 of the routine. In other words, you will start the weekly routine all over again on day 8. Beginning with day 1.

The first box in the gaget requires your "Split information". Here you are able to decide how many times per week you want to work all of your major muscle groups. You are able to "Split" your full body workout up to span the course of a seven day period.

Box two requires you to decide how many days per week you want to do your "Split" workout. Said another way, "How Often" do you want work your entire body in a week?

You will not input information in the third section of the gadget. In this "Traning Days" section the gadget will inform you how your work and rest days will be broken up after you apply the informaion you have entered in the first and second boxes.

The "Weak Muscle Group" section is pure genius! We all have one or two week muscle groups. The workout gadget takes your individual weaknesses into consideration and builds your routine to focus more one those groups.

The "Exercises, you cannot do" area is self explanatory. Check the exercises listed that you can't do or prefer not to do. The workout gadget will give you exercise options which will allow you to still work the scheduled muscle group(s).

After you input all of this information and press Continue you will discover more options at the top of the gadget to select from.

Enjoy your workouts and I hope you find the workout gadget as useful as I have.

The Second Thing You Need To Know To Get Ripped

After you have workd out a close estimate of how many calories you must limit yourself to daily, next you must lay out your diet.  In the beginning you will have to literally read the nutritional lable on everything you plan to eat.  Count calories.  Count grams of protein and count grams of carbohydrates.  At first this is a royal pain in the ass.  But it is a necessary evil.  After a while you will get used to your diet and will be able to roughly figure food values in your head.  Then counting everything will not be necessary.  Until then a small note book to log your food intake and gram values each day is a must-have.  I still have my old pocket notebooks and will be posting some of my actual daily meals on this blog sometimes in the future.

Before I go further I should probably pause and tell you how log I had to follow this diet to get ripped.  Well, in three months I was astounded by the results.  By month 4 I had to begin to consuming empty calories just to keep  from looking too freekish.  Overall I had droped 20 lb of fat before I reached the degree of muscular definition that you see in the Soloflex Hybrid videos.  Do not think for one moment that you cannot achieve the same results.  You can.  I have seen others do it, you can as well

The two main rules that you have to keep in mind when you intend to get ripped is to keep your daily consumption of carbohydrates between 100 - 300 grams.   Focus on getting your carbs from complex carbohydrate sorces.  Avoid simple carbohydrates.  Or keep them to a minimum.

The second rule is to consume 30 - 40 grams of quality protien every 2 hours.  This step serves multiple purposes in the process.  1.   It keeps you from feeling hungry to the point that you lose control and stray off your diet.  2. Your body has to use more fuel to digest protien than it does for other food components, which means you will burn more calories.   3. You will meet your muscles REAL protien requirement needs.  Most people who workout aren't even close.  As a result their progress from their workout routines often lag. 

A high protien diet will require you to drink a lot of liquid.  Drink often (limit alcohol.  Most alcohol has way too many carbs) while on this diet.

 Begin the diet with your carbohydrates around 300 grams per day and slowly, work down to about 100 per day.  Or when you reach the degree of cuts you desire adjust your carbohydrates to maintain that level.  You will have to pay close attention to your body to do this. 

Keep your breath fresh.  The side effect of this diet is bad breath.  The smell actually comes from your body using protien as fuel.  The side effect passes as your body adjusts to your new diet.  Until then be aware of your oral condition.  Plenty of liquids will help keep your system flushed and keep the breath problem small.

Thats it.  Get to it.

Inversion Weight Training Preparation

For anyone interested in inversion weight training I will make the following suggestions.

Spend time just hanging in the inverted postion for a week or two. Rapid internal changes will take a little time to get used to. Invest time in mounting and dismounting the machine. This is how I adjusted to the quick blood pressure changes which occur when standing up from the inverted postion. Workout slowly and carefully. Pay atttention to any changes in consciousness. At the first sign of dizziness stop and dismount the machine. After you dismount hold on to the machine to keep your balance until you feel oriented again. Your ability to reorient quickly will improve as you get used to the exercises.

My idea behind inversion weight training is simply an extreme attempt at muscle confusion. But it works. I consistently experience muscle soreness after I do inversion weight training exercises. I always use light weight when doing inversion exercises. My consistent ablily to get sore from using light weight when doing inversion exercises is how I guage the potential of this type of training. I consider inversion weight training a valuable, though certainly unusual, way of introducing muscle confusion. It is a great method for shocking the system when progress has stalled.

All of this is theory, of course. I could be doing nothing more than creating the slow on-set of mental retardation by weightlifting in an inverted position. But somebody has to volunteer to be the lab rat in the name of expanding our fitness horizons. It might as well be me.

How to build a freeweight attachment for your Soloflex Muscle Machine

The Length of the inside pipe is EXACTLY 40 3/4 inches (fourty and three quarters). 1/2 inch inside diameter blackpipe. Threaded on both ends. The exact cut of this pipe is important because the more precise it is the better able you will be to screw the plate ends on without having slack between the reducers and the Soloflex barbell arm. I screw my plate arms on and off as I need them. This will make more since later if it doesn't now.

Once you have the inside bar cut you will need to wrap it with duct tape. Not the entire bar. You will wrap it In sections. Remove all oil from the bar with alcohol or some other degreeser. After the degreeser on the pipe drys stick the ducttape to the pipe and begin to wrap the tape over itself. Just like it is on the cardboard spool you are removing the tape from.

What you are creating here is a shim (a spacer) for when you insert the pipe inside the Soloflex barbell arm. You want to stop taping the pipe when the taped pipe will barely slide into the Soloflex barbell arm. Repeat this about six times down the length of the pipe. Space the tape evenly along the pipe.

When you are finished slide the taped pipe into the barbell arm. It should be slightly difficult because the tape should be barely allowing the pipe to fit inside. When you are finished with this part of the assemebly you can check if you have done it right by spinning the barbell arm.

The barbell arm will be heavier because of the additional weight. Hold it with one hand on the top of the bend in the neck and spin the entire thing 360 degrees a few times. The pipe inside should stay put. If it doesn't remove it and add more duct tape. Make it stationary inside the barbell arm but removable in case you decide to use the machine in 100% classic mode.

The plate pipes should be cut 15 inches long. 3/4 inch galvanized pipe. You will need two, of course. Thread one end of each pipe. DO NOT REAM the uncut ends of the pipes. Reaming expands the ends and will prevent certain small holed plates from sliding onto the pipe. I had this problem in the beginning.

Add a 3/4 X 1/2 inch reducer to the threaded end of each pipe and tighten with the pipe wrenches.

Now screw these onto the pipe inside the barbell arm. At first REALLY tighten the plate pipes onto the barbel arm. I mean crank it down! Then, remove both plate pipes, reducers and all from the inside pipe. Take them off completely. Screw them on again. Repeat the tightening steps. Really crank it down for a second time! Remove the plate pipes again at the reducers.

From now on you will be able to tighten the ends down hand-tight.

Here are the hand-tight steps:

Make sure you have the same amout of thread sticking out on either end of the barbell arm. Screw the plate pipes onto the ends of the barball arm pipe. Stand in the middle of the barbell arm. Grab the plate pipes and turn in the the opposite directions Really handtight. They will hold. I have used up to 200 lbs with handtight torque. For heavier weight just attach the pipe wrenches to the Reducers and do the same opposing motion.

Thats it. Enjoy your workouts and have a great day!

Fitness, Illegal Drugs, Tobacco Products, and Alcohol

One of my beliefs is that by constantly reminding ourselves of how amazing we are as individuals, the more we lessen our dependency on outside sources to fulfill us.

I am writting this post as a reminder.  Not as condemnation. You see, I am guilty of the very things  I am writting about.

Good health allows us to be strong , happy, smart and as skillful as we can possibly be. The worst thing about illegal drugs and the overuse of legal drugs is that they damage us from the inside. Our bodies and minds are wonderful, complicated systems that run like finely tuned machines when we take care of ourselves. Here are some reasons you should not use or not overuse illegal drugs, tobacco products and alcohol.

Illegal drugs can damage the brain.

Illegal drugs are "psychoactive." This means that they can change your personality and as well as the way you feel. They also impair your judgements. While under the influence of drugs, we are more likely to endanger your life or someone else's. You will also be less able to protect yourself from danger.

Many illegal drugs are addictive, which means that once a person starts taking them, stopping is extremely difficult. An addicts mind craves the drug and becomes dependent on the way it makes him or her feel. The drug user or abuser may become sick if the drug is discontinued and so may become a slave to the substance.

These are really basic facts which, do to their simplicity, hardly get a second consideration after being heard. We have all known these truths since childhood. Many of us have just forgotten that we ever knew.

Here are some reasons why you should moderate or avoid alcohol:

Alcohol is the second leading cause of death in our country. More than 100,000 people die every year because of drinking.

Adolescents are twice as likely as adults to be involved in fatal alcohol-related car crashes.

Half of all assaults against girls or women involve alcohol.

Here are a few reminders about Cigarettes:

Nicotine is highly addictive. Once you start smoking, it is very hard to stop, and smoking cigarettes causes lung damage, cancer and other diseases. Tobacco and nicotine related diseases kill more thatn 400,000 people every year.

Each day, 3,000 children begin smoking. One third of these youngsters will probably have their lives shortened because of tobacco use.

Children who smoke cigarettes are almost six times more likely to use other illegal drugs.

Just some food for thought . . .

My intent with this blog

My intent is to provide exercise, workout and fitness suggestions based on my experiences with the Soloflex Muscle Machine. I will sometimes offer limited advice on diet and weight control. The advice will be limited because I am no expert. I have no professional or formal fitness training. I am not a personal trainer and have never aspired to be one. Any advise I offer will be based on the trials, errors and successes encounted in the course of achieving my idea of physical fitness. Not much else.

As I create posts I will insert them across all of my internet blog sites. The topics featured on this blog site will be the same topics featured on my other blog sites. There will be differences with regard to which Soloflex Hybrid attachment is being discussed on the site, but not much differnce in overall blog content.

The execption will be my Stock Charting Blogs. Their content will be completely different from the Solofllex Hybrid blogs.

Parts list for the Mainframe rack

The Soloflex mainframe rack is easy to build.  This is a list of items you will need:  To put it together just look at the video at

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVXUK7-7OzA .

2  - 10 inch pipe wrenches

2  -  3/4 inch X 10 inch threaded steel pipes

6  -  1/2 inch close nipples

2  -  3/4 inch X 8 inch threaded pipes

4  -  1/2 inch X 6" threaded pipes

4  -  1/2 inch X 3/4 inch reducers
2  -   Load Pins

2  -  1/2" Plugs