Bogus Health Supplements

Over the last decade or so there has been a large increase in the availability of 'health' products. Company's now have the opportunity to make a lot of money selling products aimed at health conscious buyers. 

Products are cleanly packaged with rustic colours and advertised with buzz words such as 'natural, simple and organic'. Certain colours and words are now associated with a specific type of product and people buy into this without questioning wether or not the product is actually really doing any good. 

Most vitamin C effervescent tablets contain aspartame; the controversial sweetener. Other supplement tablets often contain bulking/caking agents/modified maize starch and a long list of ingredients that could potentially be doing more harm than good.

Do your research, read the ingredient list and buy high quality, organic supplements. Remember, even the highest quality supplements will do nothing for you if your diet is not what it should be. Your WHOLE lifestyle needs to be analysed, including food, water, sleep, stress, daily habits and environment before even considering supplements. Its moronic to expect results from health supplements whilst eating mostly processed food derived from GM crops, guzzling down sugar/caffeine/calorie free chemically enhanced laden drinks.

OPTIMIZING YOUR ARM TRAINING

1. Contrary to popular belief; arms have to be trained directly with good frequency (1-3 times per week) to grow to any appreciable size. Foregoing extremely good arm genetics, the triceps will not achieve great enough stimulus to grow adequately from just benching, nor will biceps from barbell rows. These are just examples of exercises, the same could be said of any primary chest/back exercise, other than perhaps dips which hit the triceps hard. Direct arm training must be included within your routine regularly if you want to surpass 16 inch lean guns.
2. Prioritise your arm training. Schedule in a day of only arm training once a week or even start sessions with arm movements if their really lagging. Yes this will hinder the performance of other movements and the subsequent development of other body parts, but if you REALLY want bigger arms then you must utilize the most amounts of energy training them. You will be strongest at the start of the workouts and bigger weights can therefore be used. Leaving just enough energy at the end of the session to squeeze out a couple of sets will not create outstanding arms. This is potentially one of the downfall's of 3x per week full body training.
3. Fine tune your form to accentuate certain movements and muscular contractions. Small tweaks to exercise technique can make a big difference over a long period of time. For instance on dumbbell curls, keeping the elbows close to the body and rotating the wrist outwards slightly (little finger towards outside of shoulder) towards the top of the movement will incur a far greater bicep stimulus than letting the elbows move outwards and bringing the wrists in towards inner shoulder/chest. Dumbbell kickback tricep stimulation varies massively dependant upon body position in relation to elbow position; allowing the chest to rise and the elbows drop will not tax the triceps anywhere near as efficiently as keeping the upper torso low and the elbows high.

3 quick tips there to help optimize arm growth and blast past those plateaus. Advanced arm training theories coming soon.




Natural Aesthetics

If I Could Only do 5 Exercises....

1. SQUAT - The best lower body exercise. Nuff said!
2. DEADLIFT - The best exercise for overall posterior development. Hamstrings/glutes/lower back/abs/lats, rhomboids and traps/forearms. Massive exercise, must be included.
3. INCLINE DUMBELLS - Hits the chest hard and shoulders (varies depending on the % of incline) therefore more bang for your buck. Much prefer this movement to decline work.
4. WEIGHTED CHINS (close grip) - Best exercise for the lats. Heavy chins gives you wings!!!...and a hefty pair of biceps to match.
5. CLOSE GRIP BENCH - BIG tricep exercise as well as hitting the chest. Large triceps will do more for arm thickness than biceps.

Natural Aesthetics - Dream and Achieve

IS SQUATTING AN ABSOLUTE NECESSITY IN BODYBUILDING?

The question refers to whether or not the Barbell Back Squat is an absolute essential exercise for BODYBUILDING. Note the use of the word 'bodybuilding'; training purely for aesthetics. This is not in regards to strength training or powerlifting s the answer would be ENTIRELY the opposite. 

For aesthetic purposes only, the squat is not essential. If you were to train your lower body HARD, smart and consistently for years without touching the squat rack you would more than likely have a decent set of legs. Heavy leg press, extensions, curls and lunges are great tools to build thigh mass - do these for long enough and hard enough and results will come. Aesthetically, its not the end of the world if you don't squat.

However, results would be FAR greater if squats were trained (properly/full depth) regularly with other lower body exercises or even as a replacement to all other lower body exercises. That's how good an exercise it is. I know I sound like I'm contradicting myself, but bear in mind the question is wether they are an absolute necessity for leg development. Leg muscles grow without squats, but you would be foolish to leave squats out of your routine knowing that they would produce far greater results in overall leg mass than any other exercise. I had decent legs a few years ago and my squatting was poor, infrequent and the technique inadequate. My legs were muscular from training HARD on exercises like lunges, leg press and extensions. The last 2 1/2 years or so I have focused mainly on progressing the squat for lower body training and subsequently my legs are bigger than ever.  

As a natural trainee aiming to develop serious muscle mass - strength and it's progression must be considered. Simply pumping light weights with no regard to progression of reps, sets, weight or intensity variables will not yield the results commonly seen by trainers using steroids. The squat is the key exercise in the development of lower body strength and strength progression is the catalyst for any natural bodybuilders muscular development.

Although we can build lower body muscle without the back squat, progression will be far greater if heavy back squats are included in your routine regularly - especially for NATURAL trainers where strength progression is so key (but not the only way) to increased muscular development.  

Any questions, OR ONLINE TRAINING enquiry's email me at rossi01@hotmail.co.uk

Facebook - www.facebook.com/naturalaesthet1cs
Youtube - www.youtube.com/naturalaestheticstv

Natural Aesthetics - Dream and Achieve

HOW TO MAKE CONSISTENT PROGRESS IN THE GYM.

Food for thought hear guys; just a really quick article regarding training progression and why most people do not achieve the results they want.
The top graph in the diagram depicts the progress 95% of gym goers see. After their initial gains in strength/muscularity from the body adapting to new loads (starting training) they will generally stall and fail to make any headway. They have no plan, do not track performance or variables and thus have no idea what to do to improve. They train MINDLESSLY, hopping from exercise to exercise, seeking out the pump.

The second graph shows a linear approach to training - in that progress is attempted each and every session. These guys have a plan and train hard to try and reach their goals but fail to understand that progress cannot be made continually. This works, to a point; until injuries start building up, fatigue sets in, demotivation perhaps and plateaus. This, combined with the first graph was how I trained for many years. Poor exercise form/chronic muscle tightness on key exercises as well as an inability to back down lead to plateaus and injuries.

The third chart represents the few trainers who understand patience is key to making consistent progress. Periods of intense, heavy training are followed by periods of lighter training to help the body recover and enable continued progress to be made once the intensity rises again. This can be called 'periodization' and is the best way to train for the longest without encountering injuries. Progress may be slow, but consistent. This is the phase of training I'm moving into now and I urge you to follow!

Ross Newham - Natural Aesthetics
www.youtube.com/naturalaestheticstv
www.facebook.com/naturalaesthet1cs

DREAM AND ACHIEVE

 

6 COMMANDMENTS OF NATURAL MUSCLE GROWTH

 

 

1. EAT TO GROW! Feed your body the necessary calories required to add muscle. Your trying to gain weight; to add muscle tissue...this is not possible if your chronically under-eating. Rice cakes and chicken will not cut it 24/7.

 

2. INTENSITY IS EVERYTHING! Stop farting around and start training like its your job. 15 rep sets with a weight that you could do 25 reps with will not cause serious growth. Embrace pain - learn to love it!! 

 

3. FOCUS ON WHATS IMPORTANT! Stop worrying about stuff that doesn't matter....how many meals are optimal/what type of carbs should one eat/how many sets should one do? Just DO something, its never going to be 100% optimal.

 

4. PATIENCE! Unless you have amazing genetics to build muscle its going to take years. Accept it and your training will benefit from that. Stop looking for a shortcut, supplement or a secret training formula that will get you to where you want quicker.....leave that for those who want to use drugs.

 

5. TRAIN HEAVY! To build a big natural physique your going to have to lift heavy! Ive never seen a BIG natural who trained with light weights exclusively. Include compounds lifts (multiple muscle movements; bench/deadlift/squat/overhead press/pullups and dips etc.) in your training. Focus on getting stronger over time on these lifts and they will act as a catalyst for your training and physique.

 

6. VARIETY ISN'T ESSENTIAL! Variety for the sake of it is far too common. Why change exercises when the basics have not been mastered. TOO much variety will hinder progress. Muscles do not need exercise surprises, bludgeon them into growth with variations of volume (how much training, sets and reps)/frequency (how many times per training cycle) and intensity (weight and or overload techniques) instead.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ross - Natural Aesthetics

 

 



 

 

 



 

 

NATURAL AESTHETICS Competition Training Program 2014



 



Day 1 [upper] 

Incline DB's - 5x5

BB row - 5x5

Military Press - 5x5

Low row - 3x10

Rear delt rows - 3x10

Close Grip bench - 5x5

DB hammer curls - 3x10

Day 2 [lower]

 

Back squat - 5x5

Leg Press - 5x12-->4

Hamstring curls - 5x5

Calves - 3x10

 +cardio (25min) 

 +Ab circuit

Day 3 [upper]

 

BB bench press - 5x5

Pull-ups - 5x5

DB Shoulder Press - 5x5

DB Flys - 3x10

DB Laterals/upright rows - 3x10

Cheat curls - 5x5

Bar Pushdowns - 3x10

Day 4 [lower]

Deadlift - 5x5

Front Squat - 5x5

Hamstring Curl - 3x10

Calves - 3x10

 +cardio (25min)

 +Ab circuit 

+ Cardio (HIIT) 8x30sec sprints/60sec recovery - on Day 5 

Notes - 

* 5x5 will usually indicate 5 sets of 5 including ramping sets, only last set will be a true 'working set'. 

* Occasionally, I may veer away from the layout of the program during a particular session and blast a compound exercise for more sets than prescribed.

* Attempting to increase, or at the very least fighting to maintain strength, in the big compound movements will be of the upmost importance. 

Aiming to beat the size achieved last year: 

Natural Aesthetics - Dream and Achieve

Ross