I have some dumbells...

[al1991]

... and that's it.

Can anyone recommend a way to get toned up?

I don't want bulging muscles, just a little definition.

I'm 6"2 and about 12.5 stone if it matters.

TIA

[surrey7er]

I share a Personal Trainer with some of the other chaps that live on my road. Costs us about £10 each per session.

Worth every penny.

We do circuit training (lots of it with dumbbells) in our back yards. We've all lost weight and gained fitness massively...

[Defcon5]

al1991 said:

I don't want bulging muscles, just a little definition.

You really dont have to worry about that.

I think you can get posters that show you different excersises you can do with dumbells, they may be worth a look

[Victor McDade]

And throw in some core work:

[al1991]

Thanks all, particularly Victor. A very helpful post.

ETA: Time wise, would 20 mins a day see a noticable difference?

Or more than that?

Edited by al1991 on Sunday 7th November 19:46

[Morba]

Depends on how intense you work out and of course what your diet is like.

[Ordinary_Chap]

al1991 said:

Thanks all, particularly Victor. A very helpful post.

ETA: Time wise, would 20 mins a day see a noticable difference?

Or more than that?

Edited by al1991 on Sunday 7th November 19:46

I think you need a plan of action as opposed to 20mins a day.

How heavy are the dumbells? And are you looking to gain any muscle at all or just tone up your existing shape?

If you're 6'2 and 12.5 stone I'd hazard a guess gaining some muscle is going to help with your appearence.

Have you ever trained before and how slim/fatty are you?

[al1991]

Ordinary_Chap said:

al1991 said:

Thanks all, particularly Victor. A very helpful post.

ETA: Time wise, would 20 mins a day see a noticable difference?

Or more than that?

Edited by al1991 on Sunday 7th November 19:46

I think you need a plan of action as opposed to 20mins a day.

How heavy are the dumbells? And are you looking to gain any muscle at all or just tone up your existing shape?

If you're 6'2 and 12.5 stone I'd hazard a guess gaining some muscle is going to help with your appearence.

Have you ever trained before and how slim/fatty are you?

Never trained before.

I suppose I could do with some extra muscle really!

Pretty slim, skinny arms and legs - slight gut but nothing major.

[DownUnder.]

You could also do with investing in a half decent adjustable bench.

[ShadownINja]

And the weight of the dumbells? Are they enough to make it difficult to do 10 bicep curls?

[al1991]

Well I've got various weights that can go on them, but I guess I'd start off small.

Not sure what would be best? 10KG each?

I'm not particularly strong...

This is all sounding way more complicated than I'd thought, but I'm glad I asked I don't want to fk my body up.

[ShadownINja]

al1991 said:

Not sure what would be best? 10KG each?

A rule of thumb is work out what the max you could do one repetition of the exercise is then knock off about 20%. Do 10 reps of that. Do 3 x 10 reps of 80% of your max for each exercise. You'll feel st for the next two days. Repeat every other day. If anything goes twang and you get lots of pain, stop. K.I.S.S.

If you feel up to it, you could repeat every day. This is only basic stuff and won't get you a competition body but will give you definition if you're skinny.

Edited by ShadownINja on Sunday 7th November 23:21

[al1991]

ShadownINja said:

al1991 said:

Not sure what would be best? 10KG each?

A rule of thumb is work out what the max you could do one repetition of the exercise is then knock off about 20%. Do 10 reps of that. Do 3 x 10 reps of 80% of your max for each exercise. You'll feel st for the next two days. Repeat every other day. If anything goes twang and you get lots of pain, stop. K.I.S.S.

If you feel up to it, you could repeat every day. This is only basic stuff and won't get you a competition body but will give you definition if you're skinny.

Edited by ShadownINja on Sunday 7th November 23:21

Ok, thanks.

Gotta get the bds out the loft yet but I'll give that a go tomorrow night.

[ShadownINja]

That should be enough time for the proper weight lifters to log in and alert you to the rubbish I'm posting.

[maxxy5]

Advice so far looks good, but I'm going to be anal and say that there is no such thing as 'toning', muscles either get bigger or smaller.

[DownUnder.]

maxxy5 said:

Advice so far looks good, but I'm going to be anal and say that there is no such thing as 'toning', muscles either get bigger or smaller.

What people think is actually toning is training muscle for more endurance over size and strength, it can give them a slightly more "ripped" look however this needs to go with a low bf %

[ShadownINja]

DownUnder. said:

training muscle for more endurance over size and strength,

Tell me more, please? I'm trying to work on my endurance as I seem to run out of puff before my climbing partner does.

[maxxy5]

DownUnder. said:

maxxy5 said:

Advice so far looks good, but I'm going to be anal and say that there is no such thing as 'toning', muscles either get bigger or smaller.

What people think is actually toning is training muscle for more endurance over size and strength, it can give them a slightly more "ripped" look however this needs to go with a low bf %

Even if that's true - because physiologically it doesn't make sense - the average person looking for aesthetic 'tone' improvement would be wasting their time with 'endurance' weight training. Far easier to concentrate on muscle growth via progressive overload or lowering BF.

[DownUnder.]

As far as I know, maybe wrong... I was told by my personal trainer that people who want to "tone up" usually train differently, examples being the obvious higher rep lower weight. Now i thought this was wrong so did some further research.

Yes, doing higher reps less weight can to a degree train your muscles to be able to work for longer but people who generally need extreme endurance in their muscles get them from training specifics as well as strength i.e. Hannibal's street work out.

If i'm wrong feel free to correct me, i'm here to learn as much as give my own opinions

[ShadownINja]

Ah, right. Fair enough!