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@eighty No, because if you can't reliably select an appropriate load, it's going to be more difficult to avoid under/over shooting appropriate training intensity. You might think you're getting stronger when you're staying the same or getting weaker, or vice versa, leading to poor decisions...

@eighty You're being pedantic. It's hard to gauge the absolute load you're using with pull-ups because it's harder to standardize reps. With a machine movement, it's often much easier to replicate reps with the same basic relative effort and tempo. With some movements, it's very easy to avoid...

@vinod367 The problem with pull-ups is that it's very hard to progressively overload because you can subtly cheat in 1000 different ways. When you add the weighted pull-up component, there's a variable that's very easy to control. The more variables that are easy to control and measure, the...

@awoods88 There's no real benefit to a massive deficit or fasting for a single day. The fatigue/muscle loss/diet fatigue cost is greater than the fat loss benefit. With dieting, it's more important to stay in a sustainable range for you at the current time for the duration than to willpower...

@sammyclifnote You're just being overly strict with the definitions here. Ultimately, all of these "training splits" are about splitting up the total training so that you're not too sore when you train a muscle, but you're getting as much training as you can handle so you progress. The general...

@ensea12 I plan out recovery and rest times that work for me ahead of time. If I’m feeling crappy, I go to the gym and adjust the load/reps/volume as needed. Often I feel crappy before the gym and I’m fine once I warm up.

@enkaybien That makes sense because I love the arsenal leg press, but I don’t love their hack squat or pendulum squat. My former gym also had the arsenal vertical leg press and all vertical leg presses should be banned by the Geneva Conventions.

@prcg345 I don't think height matters at all but if you're in the 99th percentile for height, you often have longer limbs so you look have muscles that insert less "bubble" like.

@dkitching Panatta Super Inclined Bench Press, incredibly smooth and you feel like your pecs are going to explode with the stretch at the bottom. Maybe my favorite feature is the food pedal operated start so you can unrack the weight in the middle position without having to start in a...

@brianlee3271 These are made up numbers, but it's illustrating a point: Let's say there's a range of intensity 100/100 being the hardest effort you could possibly do at this time. 70/100 to 100/100 will trigger a response from your body, "hey, we're being asked to do this hard thing, let's...

@balalla I wouldn't worry about this too much. There are a bunch of general types of fatigue. Muscular soreness, cardiovascular fatigue, sleep status/lack of sleep, stress from activities of daily life, small nagging injuries, and "central nervous system fatigue." They all factor in to your...

@%D0%BF%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%BD%D0%BE Anyone can show up if they pay money to compete. But, if you're training with weights twice a week and you never train your legs, you have no business doing physique competitions. It's not worth all of the work, money, time required to do the contests if you...

@livingme7 It's a good heuristic because hypertrophy is so hard to quantify in the short/medium term. If it facilitates getting stronger in the 8-20 rep range more, it's better. If it makes you plateau and stop gaining fitness adaptations as quickly, it's probably bad. A lot of people are lazy...

@daughteroftheonetrueking The issue is most likely that your training isn't up to par. Bulking doesn't inherently add any muscle. You have to have a solid program and execution in the gym to create the stimulus to grow muscle.

@livingme7 Here's how I like to look at it:Imagine you're trying to raise your squat 8 rep max, but you're only allowed to do sets of 8-12 reps on squat. Are you going into the gym on week 1 and squatting an 8 rep max for your first set? Clearly no. Why? Your quads will be absolutely nuked and...

@gracer Right. It can also just be your anatomy and flexibility. Some people are limited by those factors and they put more load onto delicate structures because they're at the end range of their flexibility. I used to try to low bar squat with terrible shoulder flexibility so I had to really...

@rufflychux That sounds perfectly reasonable. I think the reason most people do bodybuilding is to look better with their shirt off, not "having the most muscle possible." Congrats on the progress, keep it up.

@jamierite74 Yeah, and just for health and performance, you don’t want to be fat. That seems like a reasonable approach, I wouldn’t worry that you’re not bulking enough.

@gracer This article is great advice. Personally, I've just found the best strategy is: Find out what exercise is causing the tendon to get inflamed/painful/injured. Stop doing that exercise or change the exercise so it doesn't cause any pain (switch from low bar squats to high bar for...

@neverbeenalone If you're metabolically healthy, you have a normal waist circumference, and you don't have any specific medium/short term goal of leanness, you can bulk. But, you could also keep losing weight. There's no reason you have to stop cutting at 77 kg. Long story short, just do...