You guys are going about it all wrong. Go buy a carnival mirror, it's much easier than working out. In reality I am 5-8 185, but in my mirror I am 6-2 200. I don't have to worry about injuries and I can eat whatever I want.

This is actually pretty common. Try rock climbing or just switch over to dumb bells. Both will force you to use ("recruit") a lot of the small muscles that stabilize the big ones. The machines probably the worst for isolation (or the best if you want to isolate for various reasons).

My nutsack would blow out before I could ever budge 325lbs!

I do dumbbells also. I do at least two exercises per muscle group, and I switch which two exercises I do every week. The only thing in my workout that stays the same from week to week is that I do "light" bench presses on Mondays and "heavy" bench presses on Fridays. Every fourth week I do no weight lifting and only do cardio. It gives my muscles a chance to really rest. I think this has saved me from some stress/fatigue-related injuries. I've been weight lifting for 13 years. The last 11 years, I've never taken a break longer than two weeks. I listen carefully to my body and when it says "not this week" to an exercise, I try something different for the same muscle group. Sometimes my body still tells me no, and I skip that muscle group that week.

When I hear the phrase "work through the pain", I immediately think of expensive, painful surgery later in life...

Your're all right, I've spent too much down time because of injuries (shoulder has been 2 years!). I only wish I'd had better instruction when I was younger...the dumb bells I agree are the ticket.

Man, that sounds familiar. :( The way I look at it, every joint only has so many movements before wear, deterioration, and arthritis sets in. Sure their are the exceptions like the runner that runs into his 70's, but more often then not there are those getting surgery and knee replacements. Moderation is the key to the game. You would be surprised how your body responds to different activities.

This information could seriously impact my sex life!

Specialization is for insects. Give the left paw a chance.

325 is a lot, but quite a few of the muscleheads at my gym can
put that much up. Myself, I could probably put up close to 300,
but I dont flat bench anymore.

- Jim said


Yes, me too. I get a strong pain in my right rotator cuff which
prohibits heavy benching so I switched to dumbells a while back.

Sometimes I do incline flat bench, but have to be very careful
with the shoulder.

A friend of mine who was a personal trainer recommended
doing side and front lateral raises with light 10-15 lb dumbells
to condition the muscles in the rotator cuff...and eventually removing
the pain in that area.

I did that and surprisingly it worked well and the pain went away
however i need to do them daily or the pain comes back. its weird.

anyway, like Jim said, the pump from the dumbells is plenty
good enough to give you some nice Beach Pecs.

http://media.washingtonpost.com/wp-d...7010801538.jpg

Pesidential Candidates need dumbells too.

Again, not quite the picture I was looking for...

C'monnnnnnn Legion.......and others.......

I am too sober to respond to this request, I have a good one but it was intended for only my wife to see, sorry!

Besides this crew in here is brutal, no way.

I'm somewhere in this picture:

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1156122948.jpg

Ahhh, that was easy, Chris.

Thank you very much :D (thumbs up)

Hiding in a backpack isn't good for you yah know!

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1180409155.jpg

Yosemite with my 5 year old Erin.