Do Sports And Bodybuilding Mix?

I am a 17 year old football player/bodybuilder. 5'10" 186 pounds. I recently bought some supplements and would like to know what exactly I should do to maximize their effectivness. My main goal is to increase lean muscle mass while burning some fat. The supplements I have are pure creatine monohydrate, Ripped Fuel, Pure Whey protein, HMB pills, and a weight gainer. I also take a multi-vitamin. I would also like some advice on my workout routine. It goes like this:

Monday - Chest

incline press
decline db press
dips
flys

Tuesday - Back

pull ups
lat pulldown
t-bar rows
low lat pulls
hyperextension

Wednesday - Shoulders/Traps

military press
lateral raise
rear lateral raise
upright rows
shoulder shrugs

Thursday - Legs

squats
leg press
leg curls
leg extensions
calf raises

Friday - Arms

barbell curls
preacher curls
hammer curls
concentration curls
close grip bench
pushdowns
overhead extensions
kickbacks

Note: To learn how to do these exercises and much more, click here.

I also do abs 3 times a week and cardio 2-3 times a week. For reps I stick with 6-10 and pyramid some exercises. I typically perform 3-4 sets per exercise also. Any advice you could give me would be appreciated!

This seems to be very typical of the emails I receive. I hear about many football players that also consider themselves bodybuilders. Unfortunately, this can lead to a lack of success in either or both endevors. The reason stems from strength and speed development, to the forms of hypertrophy developed.

When we speak about muscle mass gains, we can speak of two primary forms, sarcroplasmic and sacromere hypertrophy.

Sacroplasmic: is the increase in volume of non-contractile proteins and plasma between the muscle fibers. The decreased density of the muscle fiber and the fact there is not improvement upon the components of the fiber correlated to strength, there will be little carry over to most forms of usable strength.

Sacromere: increase in number and size of sacromeres, this will improve the ability of muscle to produce force. The density of the muscle fiber actually increases and there is a very positive correlation to strength increases.

This is an important distinction because many bodybuilding methods improve sacroplasmic hypertrophy with very little to the sacromere hypertrophy. This is extremely important when you are adding weight because you assume it will transfer to your sport well. This is why we sometimes see athletes become bigger, yet seem to be slower and less "athletic."

We also need to realize there is more than one form of strength. Without making this too complicated we can simply see becoming stronger is not the most important aspect of training with weights. Instead, it would be considered being able to produce a high amount of force in a short amount of time (rate of force development, RFD). By only training with bodybuilding methods or even very heavy weights, there is little improvement in RFD. Again, we can see that it is the athlete that produces more force in a smaller amount of time that will succeed over the athlete that can just lift a lot.

Your training program seems to be much more geared for general bodybuilding than for football. However, in actuality I don't even recommend most natural bodybuilders use so many isolation type movements. I believe those that utilize a high proportion of compound movements grow much better and have much better functional strength. You might also want to consider speed-strength, or strength-speed movements. Traditionally this is a combination of plyometric training, olympic lifts, etc. However, if you are unfamiliar how to incorporate these methods effectively you can use some of Westside Barbell Clubs ideas of speed work which are easier to adapt and less technical as far as skill of lifts. Please refer to Dave Tate's website, www.elitefts.com.

AAPJosh@aol.com

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