I remember the first time in the gym, I didn’t know what to do. I was going on machines at random just to train the muscles that I wanted. Then I told myself that it’s better to follow a program to really evolve my muscles because I had seen a picture of people who didn’t train legs on Internet . So I bought two magazines Flex and Muscle & Fitness. I was really happy, inside there were several programs but what I liked most is that in one magazine, there was a training program section from 2 to 7 days for all muscle groups.
There my training completely changed, it’s harder, I have new sensations, I feel working muscles I didn’t know, everything is new. I knew I had to pay attention to nutrition but I wasn’t paying attention. My goal was to gain muscle, gain muscle, gain muscle.
After 3-4 months, I couldn’t find my body had changed especially, but my exercises were easy and I was sweating less. The workouts started a little bored me. Suddenly I see a guy who did an exercise with heavy weights (I forget the exercise), the guys go and I do the exercise right after him without change the weight. And then my friends, it was the drama, I can’t lifted, I tried, I tried and I failed.
This is where I wonder how he lift heavy weight ? He was more muscular than me which meant he was training for a long time. So I asked him after his set how he did because I wanted to lift as heavy as him. He takes me a notebook and a pen from his pocket, he shows me and I see that he notes everything he does for several months. He said: “You write everything and all two months you change the repetition numbers or weights and you’ll see you‘re going forward. If you don‘t do that you’re not a real athlete“. Being a “real athlete“, I don’t know why but it had upset me, he was treating me like a little jerk who was spending his time in the gym to show off.
The next day I was in the gym with an A4 paper and a pen, I had prepared everything, that’s what I had written on the sheet (I check examples on Google):
Date
Exercise name
Number of sets
Weight x repetitions
And since that day, my training has a better level and I guarantee you that your workout is better quality and it’s motivating you to see your progress because your friends or your entourage around you will not congratulate you for that, they will become jealous, I warned you, it hurts but everyone live his life and you’re the one to take care of your.
And there are people you don’t even know who are going to create problems, I’m not particularly muscular, but do you know a celebrity who doesn’t criticize ? Well that’s another topic maybe I’ll talk to you about this another time.
Having a journal or a training log is really convenient because you forget nothing, everything is noted, you know what you did and you know what you’re gonna do for the next session. Planning your progression, visualize what you gonna lift in two months (increase reps or weight), feel the muscle during training to know if it’s the time or not to increase, avoid injury is very important. Change one element of an exercise like hand position or change the exercise to train the same muscle but in a different way. There are a lot of thing really cool to do and it’s great.
But one day, you know, I lost some pages. I loose my mind because I was doing an Excel file to make a graph of my evolution. Yes, in fact I’m a software writer and analyze data I like it. So I decided to use my performance’s data to have some graphs and it became a little obsessive.
And I got my new smartphone Sony Xperia Z3 compact, I choose it, it was in February 2015 for his images in 4K and quality sound for music. I make my special playlist for training, I took pictures of me to see my evolution, everything is cool. And one day I forget my notebook. I make a note on my sony, it’s take a long time and I said “Damn, fuck, but there is not an app for this ?!? “.
I back go home, I wrote data in my Excel file and I’m looking for an workout app. A scandal, scandal, millions of app for running but nothing for the gym. I seek, I seek and I found only 2 : Jefit and Bodyspace (Bodybuilding.com). I don’t understand why there are so few good app. There Touchfit: GSP that looks good but it’s bodyweight exercises.
Frankly when I see the number of people in the gym who always train same muscles, I think they will be distorted. Once I saw a guy in the street there was a huge back but no chest, I’m telling you, in his tight t-shirt, it was disgusting to see, oh my God. I don’t’ speak about toilet brush guys. That annoys me, I can’t anymore, shut up and train your legs.
I know that not everyone has the same goal but when you train you want to have a symmetric body, right? A well balanced body no matter your muscle mass, then no kidding? Stop stops immediately.
Make yourself a notebook, Excel, Google sheet file, an app and track your progress and you will see, you will be better than yesterday.
-Steph
P.S. All this made me want to make a platform on internet or an app to track performance and track bodyweight, circumference and body fat%. With a social networks that members could initiate challenges, it’ll be fun.