Favourite bodybuilding supplements

[subzero]

What are your favourite bodybuilding/training supplements?, or what's your current stack?

Here's my current stack...

Protein powder ( Sports Fuel )
L-Arginine 'nitric oxide booster' capsules ( Olimp )
Beta alanine powder ( Bodybuildingwarehouse )
L-Glutamine powder ( Bodybuildingwarehouse )
Amino X BCAA's ( BSN )
Multi level vits & mins pack ( Scitec Nutrition )

I don't even know if there's any weight trainers in here, there might be one or two :lol:

 

[Robstyley]

I just saw this thread and thought.. how random! But I like it. I've been training (in the gym) for a few months now, been running since new year. I was a big fat person 2 years ago and I've now got down to 12.5 stone and feel much stronger and healthier. Anyway, I lift weights and do other crossfit and body resistance type stuff and I just take normal whey protein shakes and wellman multivitamins. They seem to be working for me. To be honest I don't know that much about it and I'm not bodybuilding, just trying to burn fat and build strength... I'm too old for heavy weights. Interesting to read your list, I might do a bit of research

 

[Mr-shifter]

I don't know what any of that means. My body building stack consists of the following:

Chicken tikka vindaloo.
Chilli paneer
Mushroom rice.
Garlic naan
Kingfisher (x many)

Stormcab does weights and Steve savoury is a personal trainer I think, so those guys might be more on your wavelength.

 

[Mini99]

I don't know what any of that means. My body building stack consists of the following:

Chicken tikka vindaloo.
Chilli paneer
Mushroom rice.
Garlic naan
Kingfisher (x many)

Stormcab does weights and Steve savoury is a personal trainer I think, so those guys might be more on your wavelength.

Ah beat me to it...I was going to say pies :lol:
Good answer though.

 

[Snaketibe]

Er, this one?

Do you think he can still find his own winkie? :wink:

 

[Mini99]

Find it?
Don't they disappear inside if you get to this stage of "peak perfection". :roll:
All joking apart, congratulations Rob on your success.

 

[Dannywhiteley]

By the power of Grayskull, I have the powerrr!!!!!

 

[subzero]

Well done Robstyley on the transformation, if you want some excellent workout tips look no further than Athlean-X on youtube ( if you haven't already found it ), the guy Jeff is a complete legend and his advise has made my workouts that bit more epic. But yeah if you're not training with super intensity to gain as much muscle as possible then to be honest yes you'll only need just your food and some whey, and creatine can be good if you're looking for strength. If you're training super intense for muscle mass though then glutamine will help muscle recover quicker when taken post workout.

Mr-shifter I might try out that stack one day :lol:

As for Jay Cutler, complete legend right there, seems like a really nice down to earth guy too from what iv'e seen.

 

[Robstyley]

By the power of Grayskull, I have the powerrr!!!!!

I ****ing love those new adverts, crack me up :lol:

 

[weasel]

By the power of Grayskull, I have the powerrr!!!!!

I ****ing love those new adverts, crack me up :lol:

Really? I ****ing despise them with a passion. WHY WHY WHY WHY is Skellator dancing in most of them? At no point in the cartoons did he ever dance about, so why does he dance in every single advert. I'm not a huge MOTU fan but those adverts **** me off royally every single time. I just end up swear at the tv and turning over. **** knows what they are advertising, I've never got the end of one of the ads, but I'll never use said company/product..........once I figure out what/who they are.
If they want someone who dances about use one of the guys from Strictly FFS.

 

[subzero]

By the power of Grayskull, I have the powerrr!!!!!

I ****ing love those new adverts, crack me up :lol:

Really? I ****ing despise them with a passion. WHY WHY WHY WHY is Skellator dancing in most of them? At no point in the cartoons did he ever dance about, so why does he dance in every single advert. I'm not a huge MOTU fan but those adverts **** me off royally every single time. I just end up swear at the tv and turning over. **** knows what they are advertising, I've never got the end of one of the ads, but I'll never use said company/product..........once I figure out what/who they are.
If they want someone who dances about use one of the guys from Strictly FFS.

I think Skeletor is your subconscious trigger :lol:

I loved the first advert but hate the second one, it was good and random to see it when it surprised me appearing on telly, but it's gotten boring very quickly. I can see a further 10 ads being done in all different ways.... huhh!!! :|

 

[theforceuk]

Ah, but subconsciously you do know what they are advertising Weasel and you have probably already purchased it without realising. :lol:

 

[subzero]

I wonder what kind of evil bodybuilding stack Skeletor uses :lol:

 

[pizzathehutt]

I box twice a week and have been for the past few years

Have lost my beer belly and toned everything but would like to build a bit of muscle so have been thinking about taking whey and doing some weights with dumbells just to try and build pecs and a 6 pack but I don't want to join a gym and am not sure whether those extra 2 days of dumbells and anything else I can do at home will be enough to give me good results

Any advice would be good thanks

 

[theforceuk]

I box twice a week and have been for the past few years

Have lost my beer belly and toned everything but would like to build a bit of muscle so have been thinking about taking whey and doing some weights with dumbells just to try and build pecs and a 6 pack but I don't want to join a gym and am not sure whether those extra 2 days of dumbells and anything else I can do at home will be enough to give me good results

Any advice would be good thanks

Do push ups and abb crunches at home, start off doing 3 sets of how many you can do of each every other day and try to increase the amount of reps you do every week. When the push ups get to easy, elevate your feet and increase the sets to 4 and 5. I started off doing this 3 years ago, I struggled to do 3 sets of 10 push ups and 3 sets of 25 crunches. I'm now doing 5 sets of 45 declined push ups and 5 sets of 100+ crunches. Last January I got the abb roller and through in 5 sets of 30 abb roles and that has really done the job.

Best thing is I haven't been to a gym for over 15 years and I literally just do them at home when I get a spare 5 minutes. It's best to do them close together, but if you don't have a solid half hour to spare do some in the morning and some in the evening, it's better than nothing.

Abb rollers are really good as well youtube them, make sure you keep your back arched so your only working your 6 pack. You can pick these up on eBay for under £10.

 

[pizzathehutt]

I box twice a week and have been for the past few years

Have lost my beer belly and toned everything but would like to build a bit of muscle so have been thinking about taking whey and doing some weights with dumbells just to try and build pecs and a 6 pack but I don't want to join a gym and am not sure whether those extra 2 days of dumbells and anything else I can do at home will be enough to give me good results

Any advice would be good thanks

Do push ups and abb crunches at home, start off doing 3 sets of how many you can do of each every other day and try to increase the amount of reps you do every week. When the push ups get to easy, elevate your feet and increase the sets to 4 and 5. I started off doing this 3 years ago, I struggled to do 3 sets of 10 push ups and 3 sets of 25 crunches. I'm now doing 5 sets of 45 declined push ups and 5 sets of 100+ crunches. Last January I got the abb roller and through in 5 sets of 30 abb roles and that has really done the job.

Best thing is I haven't been to a gym for over 15 years and I literally just do them at home when I get a spare 5 minutes. It's best to do them close together, but if you don't have a solid half hour to spare do some in the morning and some in the evening, it's better than nothing.

Abb rollers are really good as well youtube them, make sure you keep your back arched so your only working your 6 pack. You can pick these up on eBay for under £10.

Thanks I have a look.

Push ups are no problem but as I'm 6'3 I've always struggled with sit ups and posture.

I'm gonna give this a go for sure as the boxing twice a week hasn't really added much apart from fitness and being toned, I find running really helped shift the beer gut

 

[subzero]

If you're looking to build muscle size and you've never done it before then like theforceuk said doing push-ups is a great thing and you will def see results, but this will only benefit you for so long until your muscles need much more different kinds of stimulation, otherwise your body will get too used to doing them and you basically won't grow any more. The key thing to remember is intensity, lots of it and doing exercises that you either have never done before ( or haven't done in a while ), it's the shock that you're after which is the main thing that tears the tissue down so it can grow bigger, you need to stimulate them with things that they're not used to doing.

Lots of people spend years doing the exact same workouts week in week out and they never get anywhere size wise beyond a certain point, they fall into a comfort zone and keep doing the same exercises they enjoy the most and it doesn't challenge the muscles. So do a different way of weight training every week or two and completely turn your workout upside down, one week do slow reps, then fast reps the next week, after that do a mix of both, 21's ( have a look on youtube ), drop sets, pyramid sets, super sets, high weight with low reps for strength, low weight with high reps for a huge pump. There's so many ways you can train with the same weights to keep gaining size without needing to constantly add more weight.

But i'd recommend building a foundation first and when you feel like you've plateaued with your strength ( could take a year or two depending on the person ) then start mixing things up as shown above to break through plateaus and add new challenges to your muscles.

One more thing for muscle growth is don't stop when it starts to really hurt, the painful reps is where the magic happens and causes growth, a lot of people put the weight down when it becomes too much and they move on, but you actually want to train to failure a lot of the time where you just can't do any more, then after that do more lol. Mind / muscle connection is also really important, don't just lift weights and expect changes to happen, concentrate on the feeling of the muscle on every single rep and contract as much as you can at the top of your reps and really feel it, if you're not doing this then your workouts will mostly be a waste of time, you'll grow a bit but nowhere near as much as you could if you have good mind / muscle connection. And never just let gravity drop the weight back down after you've hit the contraction at the top of a rep, controlling the negative on the way down is equally important ( if not more ) as the positive part, the negative is what creates most of the muscle tears.

With exercises there's tons of ways to build muscle without actually needing a lot of equipment, there's so many ways to train with dumbbells and resistance bands, some people have build really good physiques using only resistance bands. I'd browse on youtube for different exercises and techniques too, because there's different ways to do even the exact same exercise to add variation and hit the muscles at different angles etc.

To start with when it comes to weights the known basics that most people do are 3 sets of 10 or 12 reps, but i'd advise to never keep that set in stone, it's all about doing more if you can wherever possible. Stopping on the 10th rep on the 3rd set just because 'that's what you do' means you're robbing yourself if you know you could have pushed for more, even 1 more set if you have to, always do more 8)

And you'll want to keep the intensity in there with only 30 seconds - 1 minute rest between sets, if your workout takes more than 1 hour you're either doing too much or you're having too much rest in between sets, cram in as much as you can within 40 - 50 mins for the intensity you need.

And because you're looking to keep a good physique keep in mind that you don't need to eat crazy calories to gain decent muscle, lots of people think this and end up getting fat trying to get big lol, you can still build good muscle with extra protein, it takes longer going on more of a clean bulk but you won't look like **** in 12 months :lol:

 

[SAVORY100]

Broadly speaking for a healthy diet, that if you are doing the correct exercises will help you grow and get leaner:

• Chicken
  Fish
  Beef
  Eggs (erring on more whites than yolks)
  Potatoes
  Green Veg
  Brown Rice
  Water
  Fresh Fruit (in small portions)

Everything else in moderation; don't be a clean freak, just makes you mental, anti-social and a bit weird; I know this from experience.

I think the most simple rule is - if it was in your grandparents pantry, eat it, if it wasn't don't go near it...

There is very little actual science behind the 'supplements' claims and if your diet is correct, there should be no need to supplement it with magic potions; its lazy and shows a distinct lack of understanding of the physiology of human exercise and muscle performance. Having said that I will take a protien shake (with as little other additives as possible) after a really long & intense piece of exercise; say over 2 hours of running... never after a 30-40 minute workout though as we all often see at the gym :roll:

 

[subzero]

There is very little actual science behind the 'supplements' claims and if your diet is correct, there should be no need to supplement it with magic potions; its lazy and shows a distinct lack of understanding of the physiology of human exercise and muscle performance. Having said that I will take a protien shake (with as little other additives as possible) after a really long & intense piece of exercise; say over 2 hours of running... never after a 30-40 minute workout though as we all often see at the gym :roll:

It really depends what you're doing in 40 mins, if it's very intense heavy weight lifting then an immediate protein source is absolutely needed post-workout and before bed if you want to recover properly. But I agree that a proper full diet should be nailed down first before any other supplements are even considered.

There are however exceptions with some supplements, BCAA's, and l-glutamine ( as examples ) are things that you cannot get from real food in decent quantities as an immediate source ( it's impossible to do ), you'd need to eat a **** ton of food all at once to get the several grams you want and then wait for the food to process. It's true these supplements aren't needed but they do give you an edge in making your muscles recover a bit quicker compared to somebody who doesn't take them.

I absolutely need these supplements with the way I train, very intense 40 mins 5 days per week, even with my diet eating 7 meals a day i'm more tired, have less endurance and have more muscle soreness without these supplements added to my diet, so personally I know they work well for me, but everybody of course is different and will have varying results, some it will work well for then others maybe nothing.

Some people swear by creatine and say they're a bit weaker without it, but years ago I tried it and got absolutely zero results in strength gains after 6 months, different strokes for different folkes :wink:

 

[SAVORY100]

There is very little actual science behind the 'supplements' claims and if your diet is correct, there should be no need to supplement it with magic potions; its lazy and shows a distinct lack of understanding of the physiology of human exercise and muscle performance. Having said that I will take a protien shake (with as little other additives as possible) after a really long & intense piece of exercise; say over 2 hours of running... never after a 30-40 minute workout though as we all often see at the gym :roll:

It really depends what you're doing in 40 mins, if it's very intense heavy weight lifting then an immediate protein source is absolutely needed post-workout and before bed if you want to recover properly. But I agree that a proper full diet should be nailed down first before any other supplements are even considered.

There are however exceptions with some supplements, BCAA's, and l-glutamine ( as examples ) are things that you cannot get from real food in decent quantities as an immediate source ( it's impossible to do ), you'd need to eat a **** ton of food all at once to get the several grams you want and then wait for the food to process. It's true these supplements aren't needed but they do give you an edge in making your muscles recover a bit quicker compared to somebody who doesn't take them.

I absolutely need these supplements with the way I train, very intense 40 mins 5 days per week, even with my diet eating 7 meals a day i'm more tired, have less endurance and have more muscle soreness without these supplements added to my diet, so personally I know they work well for me, but everybody of course is different and will have varying results, some it will work well for then others maybe nothing :wink:

Years ago though I tried creatine and found absolutely zero results in strength gains after 6 months, but some other people swear by it and say they're a bit weaker without it.

Fair enough, I'm not going to argue the point, we clearly disagree on supplements, I would however never advise any PT client or runner I was coaching (outside of those that have no other life commitments of course) to take on 5 days per week 'intense training' either; I believe it to be totally detrimental to muscle growth and overall fitness with nowhere near enough recovery to benefit either; please be careful out there rest is as, if not more at times, important than training after all!

I would though agree with your meals per day regime though; little and often is a great plan IMO to maintain a balanced bloodstream, which I presume is why you're doing it.

Out of interest, what are you training for/trying to achieve? Aesthetic competitions? functional fitness? strength/olympic/cross-fit competitions? I always find it more fascinating what someone's motivation is as much as their methods and activity to get to their goals...