Six Keys to Successful Bodybuilding

To make clear the simplicity of bodybuilding I've arranged a list of six basic keys to successful weight training. They're nothing new and read like the same stuff in any motivational book on the market today. Yet they offer valuable insight and are essential to getting started with your exercise program... and sticking to it.

1. Set a realistic goal - short and long term.

2. Plan an orderly and thorough routine to train the entire body.

3. Make a commitment to stick to your routine for 4-5 weeks - - to begin to see changes and benefits, develop perseverance and create a habit.

4. Enthusiasm for training must be recognized as the main and driving force to perform successfully.

5. Ease into a training program with a wholesome, thoughtful nutritional plan - proper food, order and amount of consumption.

6. Be confident from the beginning that the application of these sound principles will produce the desired results.

GOAL SETTING

Be realistic in your goal setting. It's important from the very beginning and throughout your training to experience victory in each and every workout. Ease into your training with good energy, being careful not to overload yourself and fall victim to mental and physical burnout. Planning to look like Rambo by the end of summer will be frustrating and you may give up your training entirely.

ORDER IN TRAINING

Decide how much time you have to devote to your training - how many hours per day and how many days per week. Based on this schedule, design an orderly and efficient routine that includes only basic exercises. Working your mid-section first, followed by chest, back shoulders, biceps, triceps and legs is always a good rule of thumb. Choose two exercises per bodypart, three to four sets of 8 to 12 reps with a day's rest between muscle groups if you're just getting started.

In organizing an exercise program, keep your eyes and ears open. Scan the Web, magazines and books, visit the gyms and get input from your friends and mentors. An orderly and intelligent training routine is the major tool in achieving your bodybuilding goals.

COMMITMENT

We now come to commitment, the Big Power Switch of our mental mechanism to see if we have the juice to crank over the engine and keep it running. Commitment is your personal promise - your word of honor - to realize your challenge and is vital in aspiration. The naturally occurring ingredients of commitment are consistency, persistence and determination. These gut disciplines engaged with patience and faith set you in positive motion toward your muscular goals.

ENTHUSIASM

Each workout is a unique and separate experience unto itself. Events of the day, mood, energy levels and tensions effect every performance differently. Gather up as much enthusiasm as possible before each workout so you enter the gym with energy and a positive attitude. Your training must not become drudgery or a chore that has to be done. This is negative energy, producing negative results and must be willfully resisted.

PACE AND ATTITUDE

Keep your workouts tight and efficient, leaving no room for boredom or idle thought. You should quickly develop a mature training attitude allowing no interruptions in the flow of exercise from start to finish. This is not to suggest that you hurry in your training. A hurried attitude produces anxiety, nervousness and agitation, resulting in negative performance and loss of concentration. Quite the opposite, here I encourage a steady lean on your training - setting a vigorous pace that reflects excitement, confidence and determination.

Become totally involved with each workout, each set and each rep. Focus on the performance of the exercise, the muscles involved and the feelings that result. Look for your particular groove and sense the burn. Training form is your priority and practice makes perfect. Learn to lift weights smoothly, sacrificing the poundage used to gain quality in your performance. Don't be anxious to overload your body and struggle to lift more than you can handle. This will create poor style and result in disappointment. These register as failures and drain your resources.

These oh-so-basics points will determine the success of your new exercise program.

Mr. Universe Dave Draper's free motivational email columns will educate and inspire you in your workout efforts. Success awaits you at his site, http://www.davedraper.com , where you'll also find workout routines and advice, an active discussion forum and, of course, a hefty instructional blog.

Bodybuilding Supplements: How To Choose The Best Ones For Your Needs

Are you interested in turning your body into a muscle bound machine? If so, you are probably familiar with bodybuilding supplements. After all, these supplements have received a lot of attention over the last few years. But just like anything else that you put into your body, you need to be careful when it comes bodybuilding supplements. Although they can help you to achieve your goals, there are many people who are better off sticking to other ways of success.

So how can you choose the bodybuilding supplements that are best for you? This is a common question that a lot of people struggle with. The fact of the matter is that there are some bodybuilding supplements that may work perfect with your body, but at the same time there are others that may not be as good for you. In order to find the supplements that are best, the first thing that you must do is search through all of the available options at your local health store. When you know what bodybuilding supplements are available for purchase, you will have a much easier time deciding on what to buy.

When comparing bodybuilding supplements, there are several things that you should look at. Most of the pertinent information can be found on the label, and this is a great place to start researching each supplement. The label will tell you what each supplement contains, and will also list out any side effects that may go along with it.

But before your purchase, you will want to head home and check things out further on the internet. There are thousands of pages online that are devoted to bodybuilding supplements. You should search for reviews and detailed information on the ones that you are interested in taking. This way you will have the chance to learn about anything that may sway your decision.

Finally, checking with your doctor before taking a bodybuilding supplement is always a good idea. Even though you do not have to do this, it can help to put your mind to rest. After all, the idea behind bodybuilding supplements is to make you look and feel better. Your doctor will be able to tell you if these goals are attainable by taking the supplements that you are interested in.

Choosing the bodybuilding supplements that are best for you is not always the easiest thing to do. This industry has progressed quite a bit as of late, and for this reason you will have to sift through plenty of options before you find what is best for you. And even then, you may not make a perfect decision. But remember, the more research you do the better chance you have of choosing bodybuilding supplements that will work while also keeping you safe and healthy.

Kevin Hall is a fitness guru. Kevin buys all his Diet Supplements & Fat Burners at the interactive website retailer SupplementstoGo.com.

Natural Bodybuilding and The Secret

In my 20 years plus in the iron game I am often asked what is the biggest secret to building a championship physique or at least a great body. The answer of course has a multitude of components but it boils down to a few basic truisms.

In this series of Articles I will share with you the key components that you will need to master in order to build your Ultimate Physique. There are 3 main components to achieve your goal, which are as follows:

1. You need a scientific and systematized training program that evolves as your body evolves.

2. You need to follow a high quality nutrient dense diet

3. You need heart, discipline and a compelling REASON WHY.

In the first part of this series we will examine the first component needed to follow a systematized training program.

Before You Start ? Be Clear On Your Destination

If you want to travel from New York to Los Angeles there are several ways to achieve this and several modes of transportation you can take. First and foremost you need to select the mode of transport such as walking, car, boat, train or airplane. Each mode of transport provides advantages and disadvantages as well as differences in cost as well as time taken to get to the destination.

If you have never made the trip and have no knowledge of the transport systems the best way to get to your destination would be to consult with individuals who have made the journey and select which modality meets your criteria of cost and time invested.

Much time on the journey can be saved with planning your trip in advance as well as selecting the most cost effective method of transport. If your goal is to build a strong, well-developed physique a little planning before hand can save you a lot of expense and headaches as well as ensuring you get to your destination.

The Advantages Of A Guide

Having the route planned out and the modality of transport is best left to a travel agent someone experienced in getting people to their destination. Likewise in building a great physique consulting with an expert coach will save you a great expense of time and money as well as providing you ?peace of mind?.

A great coach will provide you with a systematized scientifically proven training program. Let?s face the facts, without a good program you have almost no chance of building a great physique. I certainly never would have made it to the Mr. Universe without the guidance of my coach.

Imagine trying to get from New York to LA without a road map, any mode of transport, or any knowledge of how to get there. As insane as this sounds many individuals embark on this journey to build a great physique with this type of mindset, which pretty much guarantees failure.

Of course there are a few rare individuals who have made the journey by following many trial and error methods to build their physique but in reality no one wants to waste years and years following useless routines and getting discouraged. Every great athlete requires a coach to reach their ultimate potential as fast as possible.

Lack Of Plans Makes You Vulnerable To SCAMS

The lack of planning and coaching has put bodybuilders at the mercy of slick marketing, ?pie in the sky? supplements, and magazine mysticism that leaves bodybuilders desperate and frustrated. For some reason bodybuilders are so hooked on the "genetics is everything" they consistently fall prey to giving less then their best effort on their program, which leads to disillusionment and discouragement.

I often witness individuals who fail to plan end up using steroids and other bodybuilding drugs to compensate for a poor routine found in a magazine or randomly selected exercises performed with terrible form. These individuals also tend to build ?Bogus belief systems? that support the use of drugs to build the physique. This is a quick and slick route to poor health and the dark side of the sport that plagues the entire industry.

This no plan, drugs are the answer mentality is pervasive even at the pro-level and is a cancer to the science of building muscle. Basically once you take the drugs away from many of the top amateur bodybuilder?s and pros most have an average at best physique.

What?s really sad is many of these individuals have compensated their physical and mental health for a bigger arm or a few extra pounds on the scale. It?s sounds crazy but I see this scenario playing out in almost every gym in the world. Bottom line, get a good plan and stick with it!

Natural Bodybuilding Training ? Stage One

For the Natural Bodybuilder a great physique is not only possible it is a certainty once the individual commits to and follows a step-by-step sound training program.

The best programs will be progressively geared where the athlete first trains the nervous system to handle increasingly challenging demands so that new neural pathways can be developed to build muscle. The body becomes it's function is a great truism so you need to first develop strong neural drives to each muscle group to maximize it's development.

This first stage of training is usually followed for several years with an emphasis on Classic movements, high volume training at high intensity, with body parts being worked in groups as opposed to individually. Dietary intake in this stage is almost always eat as much as possible to fuel growth and energy metabolism.

For more details on routines, styles and training check out my website.

The Second Stage of Training

Once you have built sufficient mass from foundation training you can then incorporate training that involves strategic or body part training. The difference in style means your training will need to pay particular attention to smaller muscle groups to improve the shape, function and aesthetics of the physique.

Usually accompanying this stage is a dietary regimen that strips away body fat to reveal the underlying musculature. This is a critical aspect to fully realize where one's physical development is and where improvements need to be made.

The length of time of each phase depends on the maturity of the nervous system, goals of the individual, and body fat percentages. For most trainees these two stages should compromise approximately 1-3 years depending on how fast the individual responds to training and the continuity of the effort exerted.

In reality most people take 3-5 years to get their nervous system to the high levels of training capacity required to excel in a given discipline.

Incorporating Training Cycles

Cycling back and forth between Foundation training for the structure and body part training for the aesthetics compromises the bulk of these stages until the individual get's down to single digit body fat levels with a significant level of muscle mass.

At this point a more complex routine is required because the body's ability to adapt to training has significantly improved

Stricter attention to nutrition as well as advanced supplementation and serious psychological training is then required to overcome perceived limits in performance. This is where most trainees falter and there physical development halts.

Make no mistake! Intense effort is required to break past this barrier, and this takes incredible self-discipline, and desire (Big Reason Why). I also suggest that any individual sincerely seeking their ultimate potential must employ regular psychological training techniques from a professional sport psychologist.

If you can?t afford a professional psychologist simply start with books, CD?s, courses and camps developed by proven professionals.

The Third Stage Of Training

In this third and ongoing stage both foundation and body part training are performed throughout our workout regimens and training reflects constant change to maximize growth and overcome underdeveloped areas. Each month specialization on weak aspects is a must while maintaining or improving strong points.

Arnold refers to this stage in Pumping Iron when he discusses how he overcame his weak points and now in order to increase one muscle in size he must change every part of his physique in order to accommodate this change.

Of course few people will ever reach Arnold's development but the implications are the same for every trainee when it comes to advanced workout design.

This long-term healthy scientific approach to bodybuilding is far superior to training using drugs because without drugs the individual needs to first follow sound training science and sound nutritional advice.

By building a solid base to your training and nutrition long term improvement is guaranteed and bodybuilding becomes a long term and continually improving pursuit. All too often I see individuals underestimate the power of nutrient dense diets, scientific training, combined with self-discipline and a positive attitude.

These are the real secrets to building an outstanding physique.

The Disadvantages Of Steroids

Conversely, bodybuilders who use drugs to build their bodies quickly lose their gains once the drugs stop because of poor training and poor nutrition and most of all a short-sighted approach to their training and nutrition program.

Not only do these bodybuilders lose the muscle once the drugs stop the psychological dependence on drugs lead many top level bodybuilders to become so depressed after they stop a cycle that they discontinue training which further compounds and accelerates the physical degeneration of their muscles.

The loss of identity and false euphoria that drugs create can often lead to other more serious psychological/sociological problems. Natural bodybuilding is a far superior way to build every aspect of your physique as well as your mind and emotional state. Natural bodybuilding is a compliment to a productive and happy level not a detriment.

Many natural trainees continue to improve late into there life. I have personally witnessed people making gains in they?re 50's, 60's and even 70's with consistent and applied scientific effort in Natural Bodybuilding. More importantly the long-term benefits of Natural Bodybuilding far outweigh any short-term illusionary gains that drug use provides...

In the next part of this article we will discuss the second part and most overlooked aspect of training; following a nutrient dense diet. Until then train hard, train smart and most of all train natural.

Wade McNutt is a Natural National Bodybuilding Champion and an IFBB Mr. Universe World Champion. He combined the secrets of Eastern Yoga Masters with, scientific, muscle building to produce a revolutionary new health system, called Freaky Big Naturally, find out more at http://www.freakybignatural.com