A Starting Point

Every great thing needs a good starting point. You need to start somewhere. The same thing applies for Weight training, you first need to determine your goal for working out. It can be something as simple as trying to lose 5lbs or it can be something more complicated like a complete lifestyle change. For me I wanted to feel healthier, I wanted to have energy , I wanted to be more confident and most importantly i wanted to feel and look good about myself.  One of my online friends Eric, whom I had never met and still have yet to meet is a personal trainer. He suggested I try out the starting strength workout. The Starting Strength workout is a workout that was created by Mark Rippetoe to help people get started lifting weights, whether their goal is to gain muscle or lose fat this is the best starting workout out there.

This workout helped me shed unwanted overall body fat as well as build strength and muscle over the course of months. This was before i started to dip into nutrition so the gains were purely from the consistent workouts, hard work and sweat put in to achieve my goal. The workout looks as follows:

Workout A
3x5 Squat
3x5 Bench Press
1x5 Deadlift
**2x8 Dips (if you cant do these or no assist machine then do Decline Dumbbell Bench Press with your hands Facing each other)

Workout B
3x5 Squat
3x5 Standing military press
3x5 Pendlay or Bent Rows (or power cleans)
**2x8 Chin-ups (recommended mainly if doing the cleans)

Working out 3 days a wk and alternating workouts is the way to go, for example if you were to Start working out on a Monday then you would start with Workout A, Wednesday would be Workout B and Friday would be Workout A. The following week you would start with Workout B. As weeks go on feel free to increase weights as you get stronger. This workout contains alot of good overall body exercises as well as strength exercises.  Go Train!