OVERALL WELLNESS: GYMMING

Hi LOVES,

As we can see from the first post, we focused on being happy. 
Feeling happy itself is not enough as you need to be confident of yourself as well! 
This will then lead to the overall wellness of your own being. 

For this post, we will be teaching you on how to be confident by keeping yourself fit and healthy! So, in order to feel even more confident and happy, we, the ohsobeaute team, came to a conclusion that we should look fit and healthy. 

This will inevitably lead you to feel confident of yourself and thus feeling happy :)

This was what Benedict felt or though of after going to gym for many occasions:

"When I first got into the muscle building scene I was overwhelmed by the amount of different training programs, bodybuilding supplements, diets, articles and information there was out there. There were so many conflicting diets and training programs available and I had no idea what I “should” be doing. The result of this was about 6 months in the gym with little gains and almost no motivation to workout anymore.

I was at a complete loss and about to throw in the towel and give up. Then a guy in the gym gave me a magazine and told me to read the article in there about body types. So I did and it opened my eyes up to the reason why I wasn’t making any gains in the gym."

So basically, the most important thing before you hit the gym is to know what kind of body shape do you actually have. 

There are 3 types of body shape: Endomorph, Ectomorph and Mesomorph!

So.. What exactly are these different types of body shape? We will be explaining in details below!

Ectomorph

Ectomorph’s are typical skinny and tend to have a light build with small joints and lean muscle. Usually ectomorph’s have long thin limbs with stringy muscles. Shoulders tend to be thin with little width.

Typical traits of an ectomorph:

• Small “delicate” frame and bone structure
• Classic “hardgainer”
• Flat chest
• Small shoulders
• Thin
• Lean muscle mass
• Finds it hard to gain weight
• Fast metabolism

Ectomorphs may find it very hard to gain weight due to the fast metabolism which they have which burns up calories very quickly. Ecto’s need a huge amount of calories in order to gain weight. The workouts they carry out should be short and intense focusing on big muscle groups. Supplements are definitely recommended. Ectomorphs should eat before bed to prevent muscle catabolism during the night. Generally, ectomorphs can lose fat very easily which makes cutting back to lean muscle easier for them.

Mesomorph

A mesomorph has a large bone structure, large muscles and a naturally athletic physique. Mesomorphs are the best body type for bodybuilding. They find it quite easy to gain and lose weight. They are naturally strong which is the perfect platform for building muscle.

Typical traits on a Mesomorph:

• Athletic
• Generally hard body
• Well defined muscles
• Rectangular shaped body
• Strong
• Gains muscle easily
• Gains fat more easily than ectomorphs

The mesomorph body type responds the best to weight training. Gains are usually seen very quickly, especially for beginners. The downside to mesomorphs is they gain fat more easily than ectomorphs. This means they must watch their calorie intake. Usually a combination of weight training and cardio works best for mesomorphs.

Endomorph

The body type of endomorph is solid and generally soft. Endomorphs gain fat very easily and are usually of a shorter build with thick arms and legs. Muscles are strong, especially the upper legs. Endomorphs find they are naturally strong in leg exercises like the squat.

Typical traits of an Endomorph:

• Soft and round body
• Gains muscle and fat very easily
• Is generally short
• "Stocky" build
• Round physique
• Finds it hard to lose fat
• Slow metabolism
• Muscles not so well defined

When it comes to training endomorphs find it very easy to gain weight. Unfortunately, a large portion of this weight is fat not muscle. To keep fat gain to a minimum, endomorphs must constantly train cardio as well as weights. Supplements may not be needed as long as there is a high protein intake in their diet.

To read more about it, you can head down to this website to get more information.
http://www.muscleandstrength.com/articles/body-types-ectomorph-mesomorph-endomorph.html
 

After knowing about the body types, Benedict and Edwin went down to a gym nearby to WORKOUT. Haha as we can see, both of them are of the Ectomorph body shape. This means that they have to take in lots to supplement in order to build up!

Once both of them went into them gym, they headed straight towards the bench to do some chest exercise.

Ben started off with the chest press and he looks like he is doing well. However, he has made two mistakes which causes this training to be of little use. His arms are not fully trained due to lifting from bottom up and not from the side up. Another mistake is when he did not force his stomach out while lifting which will causes him to utilize his back to help him lift the weights up.

While Edwin, he started off with doing skullcrusher. 

This exercise is to basically train your triceps and these are the steps required to do so:

1. Pick up a bar and insert weights into it depending on your preference. Lay on the bench so that the bar is above your body.
2. Take hold of the bar, raising your elbows so that the upper arm is perpendicular to the floor. With the elbow flexed, the bar should be above your head. This will be your starting position.
3. Extend through the elbow to straighten your arm, keeping your upper arm in place. Pause at the top of the motion, and return to the starting position.

Usually, people will do up to 4 sets with 8 reps each set.

This equipment used by Benedict here is to train his thighs. It can be done so by adding on weights at the both side of the equipment. 

However, there are a few mistakes that you should avoid which he has done.

1. Lifting his head up

2. Hands are not placed on the handle bar

Benedict moved on to doing bicep curls using the bar with weights added on. As we can see, he is very serious and motivated to doing his sets of 20 reps. 

Thing to take note: 

• Depending on the wideness and narrowness of your grip, you will train different parts of your body.

PS: After gymming, Edwin grow immensely strong and he was able to raise the machine (weighing 100kg) with only one hand!

That's all folks! :)

Tune in to our final post tomorrow

xxx

Stay beautiful!

With love;

Ohsobeaute Team