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Effective Chest Training, Like Everything Else, Begins With The Proper Mindset
An attitude of always wanting more, never being satisfied, is a key element in
becoming successful in whatever you do. There's always a higher level of
development to achieve-if you're constantly searching for it.
Having that mindset is essential to lasting success. It's also the cornerstone
of the habits you need to develop if you want to maximize your chest training.
You'll also need to cultivate such winning characteristics as optimism,
patience,perseverance, determination and flexibility.
A number of physical factors can also affect your mental attitude, including the
frequency of your chest workouts, the number of sets you use, the number of
repetitions you set out to perform on every set, the amount of weight you use
and the length of time you spend in the gym. When you overtrain physically it
gives your mental well being a serious blow, too.
Train to Absolute Failure The ultimate goal of every single set in your chest
workout must be to train to absolute failure.
By that I mean you must give 100 percent effort during every set. You shouldn't
have anything left in reserve at the end of the set. This is very taxing,
mentally and physically, which is why you can't withstand many sets and why you
need to work on your mindset. You need to control or get rid of that litte
voice in your head that is always telling you to settle.
That requirement is crucial to efficient chest training.
Obviously, you'll need a training partner, or the proper equipment such as a
power rack, a machine, or using dumbbells, if you're going to train to absolute
failure and train safely.
For now, let's throw out any well-known, legitimate reason you could come up
with that takes your training success or failure out of your own hands.
Whatever program you use, the important thing is to put all the effort you can
into your training.
One thing that is very important is to go over what it is you are trying to
accomplish. I briefly review in my head what I want before I do each set of my
workout. What's my goal in the set? What will accomplishing the set goal mean
to my other goals?
Now, about that intensity - you probably think you know what intensity is,right?
You train hard, right? But is training hard the same as training with 100%
intensity of effort? If you polled the people in your gym, 99% of them would
tell you they workout extremely hard.
I'm the same way. And yet when I look back on my workouts, I always realize I
could've trained a little harder. But that's okay, because I am constantly
improving my effort every time I workout. I'm always striving for a higher
level of effort andincreasing the quality of each workout.
You Can Increase the htensity of Your Chest Training Now
Before we can achieve more we must constantly be raising our own standards.
Train Your Chest Less Frequently
I know, the thought of training less worries many people that they will not only
stop progresssing but will lose what they have. This just isn't so.
Use it as a powerful motivating tool. The thought of training your chest less
frequently creates a feeling of uneasiness, or what I call a sense of urgency.
It dramatically increases the magnitude of every workout.
The benefits have a far greater effect than just bolstering my mindset.
Training less gives you adequate time to recover from your intense workouts.
Use Fewer Sets
Knowing that you're going to do only a few sets in your chest workout creates
this same sense of urgency, allowing you to bring a lot more focus into each
rep and set that you do.
Although I always change things up from time to time, a typical chest workout
for me is as follows:
After warming up sufficiently and doing two heavy sets of bench presses, I
complete my chest workout by doing one set each of three different chest
exercises. Many lifters give themselves two, three or even four sets of a
particular exercise to get it right. If you give yourself four chances at
anything, you'll have less of a sense of urgency to get it right the first
time. You will pace yourself and hold back for those other sets. It's only
human nature.
Anything less than 100 percent effort is a wasted set in my opinion. Have you
ever noticed that when you get yourself in the right mind-set, you can pump out
more reps on the last set of an exercise than you did on the first one?
It should be just the opposite. If you were really giving your all during the
first couple of sets, you wouldn't have nearly as much energy left to meet or
exceed that rep range on the last one.
If you truly train with the proper mindset, then you'll need less training to
build your chest. If your training is less than animal-like, you'll need more
sets. Be honest with yourself. Only you can determine what's best for you.
Spend Less Time in the Gym on Chest Training
The ability to focus and put forth your best effort in chest workout after chest
workout, month after month is what will bring you results.
The less time you spend in the gym, the easier it becomes to focus, and because
you're training chest less frequently, using fewer sets and fewer reps, your
time in the gym will be much shorter. It will surely make it a lot easier to
focus on building an awesome chest. Now, all you have to do is shut up and
train!
Proper Recovery Is Critical
Recuperation is probably the most important yet most-often-neglected component
of building muscle efficiently. Recuperation means to recover fully from your
intense workouts. Only when your muscles have fully recuperated are they ready
to grow larger and stronger. If you train again before this process is
complete, you will short circuit the growth/recover mechanism and your gains
will come to a screeching halt and that's exactly what you want to avoid.
Develop your new chest routine with these steps in mind and see if you don't
ignite new growth and more strength in your chest.
Written by: Gregg Gillies, www.buildleanmuscle.com
Gregg
Gillies is the founder of http://www.buildleanmuscle.com
where he publishes a free newsletter available. He is the author or
two books, as well as being a regular contributor to Body Talk
magazine. His writing has also appeared in Ironman
Magazine.
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