Hi guys, I am new here and just looking for a bit of advice and direction.

Firstly about me:

Age: 30
Height: 5'11''
Weight: 155lbs

I play lots of sport, mainly football (soccer) and have always kept fit and in reasonable shape without really ever having much muscle defanition.

My goals are to increase in muscle mass and just generally bulk up a bit without putting on too much body fat.

I have read and the sticky's and lots of the other threads on this forum as well as elsewhere but just wanted to check if what I am doing is likely to provide results for me.

I understand everyone is different but I have started a routine that I enjoy and wanted to know what people think.

Due to work, family and other commitments the only days I have free to workout are Mondays and Wednesdays after work.

Monday

20 minute run

Barbell Curls - 3 sets
Lat Pull Downs - 3 sets
Seated Rows - 3 sets

100 ab crunches

Wednesday

20 minute run

Incline Bench - 3 sets
Pec Dec - 3 sets
Shoulder Press - 3 sets

100 ab crunches


On all sets I aim for 10 and set the weight accordingly. So for example I may push 10/10/8 the first week and then once I manage 10/10/10, I up the weight and then try and progress like this.

By doing this I find it a lot easier to motivate myself to progress.

I have a pretty good balanced diet and the only thing that I've read that has let me down is eating more regularly. So from now on I will be trying to eat every 3 hours or so.

I have a read about the fact I need to being taking on more calories that I am using and so the increased meals per day should help me there.

But any tips or advice would be muchly appreciated and as I am relatively new to all this please try keep the terminology as simple as possible.

Thanks.

Well your right about the fact you need more calories.

Id say your missing out some key lifts in that routine. Also you dont work your legs!

Just remember to lift heavy, and include some squats & Deadlifts at least.

In order to gain, you need to eat more calories than your body uses up. By running, your burning calories. You might want to cut back on the running for the time being as the two are basically working against each other.

As you're only working out twice a week, you might want to try a full-body workout (FBW), that way, you'll hit each muscle group twice a week.

BigTomW is spot on here. To grow, you need to eat...but you also need to be stressing all the muscles you want to have grow.

you're focusing on some of the wrong stuff. You should try to hit each muscle group twice per week, and with more compound exercises. pull ups are better than lat pulldowns, but pulldowns are ok if that's really your ONLY option.
do barbell bent over rows.
add pec flyes for chest.
start squatting and deadlifting!

I'd drop the bicep curls completely. your back exercises hit them, and they are tiny muscles compare to other body parts, so there's no need to focus so much on them.

I agree you need more calories and squats, deads, pull-ups, dips and military press. I would loose the curls but if you are going to do them you want to do them after your pull-ups or lat pull downs and rows because your biceps assist in those movements. Your back will not get a good workout if your biceps are already fatigued. But I wouldnt even wory about them. Your biceps should get a great workout just from doing your back.

How often do you pay sports ( other than soccer) during the week - and, how often do you have soccer games / practices throughout the week ?

How hard / intense are those 20 minute runs of yours ?

aside from what the posts above me have already mentioned, squats deadlifts etc. Really the only chest workout you have is incline bench and pec dec, try dumbell bench. Also if you really want to work biceps by themselves which is what i choose to do, see if your weightroom or gym has an Easy Curl bar. Basically its a barbell that has bends in it that can be used for a variety of excersies. Also you'll find that doing 100 ab crunchs will most likely take too much time out of your workout(at least for me) and you would be better off doing weighted sit ups or crunchs.

Thanks a lot for your help and advice so far. Some of the lifts etc you guys have recommended, I'm not entirely sure what they are or how to perform these. Could someone please recommend a website or somewhere I can get more information on these (squats, deadlifts, pec flyes etc?).

Also I read the phrase 'compound exercises' a lot on posts but am not entirely sure what these are? I told you I was new to this didnt I.




I play soccer twice a week, Thursdays and Saturdays during the season and just Thursdays out of season.
Out of the soccer season I also play some tennis.

The 20 minute runs are usually about 15 minutes at a fast paced jogging and then 5 minutes at a higher intensity running.


Thanks again for the advice so far and please keep it coming and hopefully I'll be able to peice together the perfect routine for me.


One more thing once the football season finishes, I will be able to add another days workout on Saturdays. Should I replicate what I'm doing on either a Monday or Wednesday or different lifts all together?

Cheers.

Compound exercise means that more than one muscle group is invovled in moving the weight. For example, the bench press is a compound exercise - while the bench press is primarily a chest exercise, it also works the shoulders and the triceps. The main way to tell if something is a compound exercise is to look at how many joints are invovled. The compound exercises involve at least two joints bending to do the exercise (Bench - elbow & shoulder, Squat - knee & hip). Isolation exercises involve only 1 joint (like the elbow for a biceps curl or the knee for a leg extension).

When the football season ends, you could do the same routine each day (3 days a week), or you could split it up. If your body does not recover from a workout quickly, you may want to split up your routine into two different routines: workout A - squat, bench, shoulder press and workout B - deadlift, row, pullups. Alternate each workout so one week you'll do A, B, A and the next week you'll do B, A, B.