Weight Training Routines For Beginners

When you finally make the decision that you want to start building your muscles with a weight training program the first step of your new routine should be to slow down and get ready. Many times a mistake many people make when starting a weight training routine is to be over confident and jump right in.

Although it is great to have excitement and determination to begin, your body probably doesn’t share in your mind’s enthusiasm. All to often too much is done in the first few days, leaving muscles damaged and sore. As well as being detrimental to your body, this can be very disappointing to your eager mindset.

Many people who jump right in and over do it, end up just giving up because they feel it is too strenuous dealing with the aching muscles and negative progress. This best way to avoid this scenario is to spend your first month of weight training doing nothing but preparing your body for the new routine.

During this prep time you will want to focus on learning proper technique, what exercises you will be doing, and how often. Enlisting the help of a professional trainer to teach you these things, as well as help you to develop a successful routine is strongly recommended.

You should start out during this time with a full body work out. Be sure when exercising that you take time to stretch before any aerobic or strength training routine. This helps to loosen and prepare your muscles for your exercise, as well as helping to reduce the chances of damage to the muscle tissue. After stretching you can begin your exercise routine by warming up the rest of your body with 5 or 10 minutes of light cardio.

Start out with a program that pushes you a bit, but not tremendously. Pick only one exercise for each part of the body. Do each exercise with a very small amount of weight, and no more than 10 or 15 reps of each. Start with twice a day for one or two days a week, then slowly increase the frequency. Slowly over this month you will also begin to increase the weight.

The ideal amount of weight resistance is achieved when you only have the strength to execute your set number of reps, but not being able to do any further. Eventually as you gain strength you will be able to increase the number of reps you are capable of, as well as the amount of weight.

The most common system for doing this is when you are capable of doing 16 reps at your current weight, you should add 3 to 5 pounds to your upper body weights and 10 pounds to lower body weights. When you add the weight you should drop yourself back down to 10 reps, and begin the process over again. This keeps you at a steady stream of improvement, without any drastic changes that can overwhelm and injure your body.

By the end of your first month, you should have a pretty good idea of what your body feels comfortable with. The key to progressing to your desired goal is to not let yourself slack off. It is important to keep challenging your body. When a certain exercise has become very easy for you, it is probably time to add an exercise for that muscle group, or replace the current exercise with one that is more difficult.

The same goes for your weight and reps. If your body is not feeling challenged or pushed by your current routine, then it is a safe bet that you are in a sort of stasis, maintaining your current muscle mass, but not improving it. Maintaining a slow yet steady progression keeps you mind focused on your goals, and keeps your body moving along the path to achieving them.