Athletic
Content
ROB RICHES
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Athletic Aesthetic Photoshoot/Fitness Model Preparation Workout Words by Rob Riches: TEAM True Performance Nutrition Captain. Photo’s by Noel Daganta ittle over 5 years ago, the only aesthetic (and athletic!) competitions available for many were bodybuilding and powerlifting shows. Both of which you needed to be big and strong to perform well in. Those who did well were naturally big and powerful, or decided to opt for a little chemical assistance. Then came along fitness model competitions with numerous categories. Rob Riches talks about how he prepares and specifically about precompetition and getting 'photo-shoot cover model ready'. I first made a name for myself in the world of natural bodybuilding. I thoroughly enjoyed the process of training and dieting for a fixed goal that would reward me not just with low body fat levels and an impressive looking physique, but would also teach me discipline
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and commitment are two crucial factors that I have carried over into other areas of my fitness career and life in general. Even though I had varying levels of success in bodybuilding, winning several regional shows as well as the world finals in Hollywood for my age group, I was always facing other competitors who were bigger than me, carried more muscle than me and had thicker, fuller frames. As a competitor, I wanted to win, but after the first few years of competing I realised that every time I tried to get bigger I would find myself right back at my competition weight looking about the same as I did for the previous shows. I was all about progression and I realised that unless I tool several years out from competing to focus on building bulk that I wasn’t going to progress much in the world of bodybuilding. I discovered that my
talent lay in stepping on stage in great condition, being able to display practically every muscle fibre like a walking anatomy chart. Perhaps adding on slabs of muscle just wasn’t in my genes, but shedding the fat and remaining well-balanced in my physique was. Great conditioning and muscle separation seemed to be something that I was good at and could replicate time and time again. It was almost two years after my first bodybuilding competition that I had heard of a fitness model competition being held in London. It was only two weeks away, so I quickly picked up the pre-contest routine I had used for bodybuilding, tightened up my diet and literally jumped back on the cardio machines every morning for the next two weeks. By the day of the fitness model competition, I had made some decent
A new era of competitions had arrived and I was only just warming up to take it head on and dominate this category. We weren’t compared on who had the biggest muscles, or who had the lowest body fat levels, the judges were looking for ‘marketability’, ‘good looks’, and ‘stage presence’, in addition to the usual good shape and level of conditioning of everyone’s physique. For once, I was able to score higher than those who were bigger than me and who were carrying more thicker, dense muscle than I was. A new era of competitions had arrived and I was only just warming up to take it head on and dominate this category. That was almost seven years ago and while my weight still remains pretty much the same as it did back then, I’ve been hard at work chiseling away at my physique but all the time keeping in mind the idea that, ‘I still want to be able to fit into medium sized clothes’. I didn’t want to fall back into that never ending quest for muscle and size, so instead I focused on improving my conditioning and muscle separation. The routine you see here is one that I’ve built up and perfected over the years. I have relied upon it each time I step back on stage, in front of a camera for photoshoots, or just to jump into every now and then when I feel like switching up my routine. It’s also a great way to test your strength and endurance every few months as a mark of seeing if your training really is progressing you. The basis for my routine is to perform it
for several days in a row while lowering your carbohydrate intake each day and then increasing it. Typically, if I were competing on a Saturday, I would start this routine on a Sunday six days earlier and perform it every day up until and including Wednesday morning. As noted carb reduction is key I basically halve my carb intake each day from Sunday (starting at around 150g) and end up at just over 30g of carbs on the Tuesday. Then over the next three days, (Wednesday, Thursday and Friday), I would begin to saturate my muscles with up to three times as much carbs as I had been consuming before I had tapered them down (3 x 150g). This is sometimes known as Carb Loading, or Carbs Backloading. It’s a process that’s worked very well for me over the years. There’s a little more to it than just eating less carbs one day, then lots more the next and you can find out more about how I do this exactly by searching for ‘cutting week’ on my new website www.robriches.com This workout is performed to further encourage the depletion of stored muscle glycogen (a form of carbohydrate), preparing the body to be able to load up on its glycogen storing capacity for the next few days, resulting in big, full, tight muscles. The aim is to is to lift weights that are only about 60% of your usual poundage with the focus more on volume. You'll do 20 reps of each exercise, taking no rest in between and then you move on to the next exercise and follow the same format. Basically its a nonstop circuit. Doing this level of volume, working practically every muscle in the upper body at a sub-optimal intensity is like forcing the body to use up what little stored muscle glycogen (energy) it has left, practically depleting it to near empty levels (Note: not the legs as many competitors don’t train legs during the final week as it leaves them smooth and not as hard and vascular than when they exclude them from the final week before the show). Think of your stomach when you haven’t eaten all day and you feel like it’s practically shrinking and disappearing into it’s own existence. Then, you finally get to eat and you can’t stop. You seem to be able to eat much more than you usually do and you just can’t stop. Before you know it, you’ve eaten way too much and all of a sudden your stomach finally tells you to stop otherwise it’s going to pop! The stomach, like the muscle cells can contract and expand and when it has been pushed to give up everything it has (the stomach not having any foot to metabolise to produce energy, and the muscle cell not having any glycogen to give as energy when needed), it will literally override what the body is used to and for a temporary state, hold much more than it is used to, making up for the deficit. It’s this cause and effect that if performed correctly can help you ride the wave to superior muscle conditioning and definition to add the finishing touches to your stage/camera-ready body.
Ideally, you should perform this routine at times when the gym is quiet so that you have access to all of the machines and weights that you’ll need. I recommend you first start by setting up each exercise, choosing a weight about half as much as you normally lift, so that you can quickly move through the circuit without needing to wait for an exercise to become available. If this is unavoidable, I suggest continuing on with the circuit until you are able to go back to that particular exercise and complete your set. Aim to complete 3 full circuits, performing 20 repetitions on each exercise. Think of the first circuit as a warm up, aiming to add a small amount of weight to the majority of exercises for the following two circuits. Just because your not lifting as heavy as you normally do doesn’t mean to you need to do everything slowly. By the twentieth rep you shouldn’t have reached muscle failure. The goal is not to go all out and feel absolutely fatigued. Rather the purpose of this workout is to drain the body of muscle glycogen, through repetition and volume. If you feel as though you can still perform 2-3 more reps at the end of the exercise, then you’re in the right zone for glycotic depletion!
Exercise 1: Bench Press. No need to prove your macho strength on this one. Focus on contracting the chest on every rep, holding and forcing the squeeze for a split second on the final 5 reps. Keeping the bar directly above the chest with your knuckles pointing upward, reduces strain from the wrists. Control the bar down, pausing just before it touches the chest, then explode it upward making sure not to overextend your arms at the top of the movement. To further work the muscle from multiple angles, you can perform this movement with different kit/machines for each circuit, for example, using dumbbells for the second circuit and a machine for the last. Just remember not to go too heavy.
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improvements and although I hadn’t been able to match the condition I had when competing in bodybuilding shows, I could clearly display my abs and had a body fat percentage of between 5 and 7%.. A healthy level that didn’t require the usual 12 weeks of dieting to get to. By this time, I had competed in over six bodybuilding competitions and was very familiar with the poses and routines required, but what was required for fitness modellng was much simpler. You had to walk out, hold a couple of relaxed model poses, then stand in line with the other competitors until called forwards for basic comparisons and quarter turns. To give you an idea of just how new this category was, I had been used to competing against anywhere from 10-20 competitors on stage, this time, it was myself and 3 others.
ROB RICHES
Exercise 2: Bent Over Row
Exercise 4. Cable Chest Fly
Just like with bench, you shouldn’t need to use lifting straps or pile on the plates for this movement to be effective. Using a lighter weight than normal, your form should be better. Tilt forward at the waist so that your chest is lower to the ground and keep your shoulders pulled back so as not to hunch the back too much, except for a small arch in the lower back. Start with the arms hanging straight down so that the lats are stretched out, then retract the shoulder blades back and start to pull the bar up toward your stomach without leaning back. Your upper body positioning should remain unchanged throughout the entire movement, with your arms just acting as a linkage from your back to the bar. Once again, focus on squeezing the back together at the top of the lift and control the bar all the way back to start position to complete each rep. This exercise can be performed on a Smith machine if you are not too familiar with this movement and performed with dumbbells and a machine row for the second and third circuit.
Moving back to the chest this time we’re making use of cables due to their smoothness and their ability to deliver a constant level of resistance throughout the entire range of motion without any sticking points (as is the case with free weights). I like to centre myself between both top pulleys and take a step forward with one leg back,n and heel up to help stabilise me as I perform the fly movement. This stops me from rocking back and focuses all the effort on the chest. Keep the arms at a fixed angle with a slight bend in the elbows and squeeze the chest as you close the hands together, ending directly in front of your chest. On the return, don’t allow the arms to go too far back and stop when you feel a bit of a stretch across the pectorals. You can switch to a machine fly on the second or third circuits and if you use dumbbells, stick with a weight that will allow you to complete 20 reps without breaking form.
Exercise 3. Shoulder Press
Exercise 5. Seated Row
With the chest and back nicely warmed up, I like to move on to the shoulders and prefer using dumbbell presses to target the shoulders. Performing this seated means you really need to execute it with proper form as you can’t bounce at the knees to get the final few reps out. Keep the back straight and shoulders pulled back and ensure that the elbows are inline with the wrists as you lower the dumbbells all the way down to the side of the deltoids. Push straight up, lengthening the arms fully and squeeze the shoulders. This movement can be performed on a Smith machine or a machine press, although starting off the first circuit with free weights will help further deplete muscle glycogen as you recruit more stabiliser muscles to assist with the control of the weight and keep it from straying from it’s plane of movement.
You can probably see by now that there’s a pattern of training antagonistic (opposing) muscle groups. I’ve found that by switching between push and pull type movements, it allows for a little extra recovery in certain muscle groups without reducing intensity in the exercise being performed. After chest flys, it’s only natural to then focus on the back and staying with a cable movement allows you to fully engage the back without having to stabilise the movement that much. Remain seated with your back upright as you retract the shoulder blades back and begin to pull the handle in toward your torso, keeping the arms at the sides of the body. Keep the chest lifted and on returning to the start position, allow the back to stretch a little without leaning forward at the waist.
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Exercise 6. Lateral Dumbbell Raise
Exercise 8. Cable Curl
I’ve always found that while performing shoulder exercises, I see the greatest amount of muscle separation and conditioning start to show. Well developed deltoids, traps and upper back can really make a big difference to a physique so it pays to train them just as hard and frequently as you would with chest or biceps. As shoulders move in a number of different planes of movement, we’re now moving away from the heavier presses to the more conditioning-type exercise such as the dumbbell lateral raises. I personally prefer to stand while doing these, starting with the dumbbells at the sides of my body. Keep a slight bend in the elbow as you raise your arms upward so that elbows and wrists remain in the same plane as your shoulders. Imagine as though you're performing this movement in a very narrow street with your front and back only inches away from two walls. The only movement you should be making is at the medial deltoid (side of the shoulder) - you raise the dumbbells up laterally until they’re at shoulder-height. Then return back to start position, without allowing the dumbbells to touch the legs - this ensures tension is kept on the shoulders at all times. Side cables and machines can be used in following circuits.
Again, the focus is on exhausting the muscle energy stores, not trying to set new personal best records in how much you can lift. Focus on the quality of each repetition, keeping the elbows fixed at the sides of the body and using a full range of movement whilst squeezing the biceps hard at the top of each rep. You can use a machine arm curl or seated dumbbell curl on additional circuits, but remember this simple rule - if you can’t complete 20 reps without breaking good form, the weight is too heavy and you should decrease the resistance to get the full benefit of this workout.
Exercise 9. Decline Crunches
Exercise 7. Parallel Bar Dips With the chest, back, and shoulders having their fair share of punishment, it’s now time to move onto the arms, which have had it relatively easy up until now. I like to start with the bigger muscle groups out of the biceps and triceps, which is the latter and I hit up 20 parallel bar dips (triceps dips) with my bodyweight as my only resistance. Remember you only need to train at 5060% of your usual weight, so unless you’re used to attaching 70kgs+ with a dip belt, then you’re bodyweight will likely be more than enough. Make sure you have a strong grip on the bars, with your knuckles pointing downward and your wrists straight so as to reduce stress on them while lifting. As you dip, keep your chest and head lifted, going at least as deep so that your shoulders are at the same height as the elbows. If you have the flexibility to go even lower, do so, but only if you can perform 20 repetitions. If you need to break at any point, allow no more than 5-10 seconds before trying to complete the set. Assisted dips on a machine can be performed as an alternative. You can also change the exercises you use to target your triceps on the last two sets. I've found that pull downs and narrow -width press-ups are very effective.
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We start by working the upper abdominal region, performing crunches on a decline bench. There’s no need to start at the bottom of the bench and try and come all the way up so that you’re sat upright. Start by sitting in an upright position and lean back until you feel a nice amount of tension start to pull on the abs. This is usually no more than twothirds of the way back. This is your start position and where you return to after each crunch until reaching 20. As you perform each rep, focus on exhaling all the air from your lungs and squeezing the abdominals hard to contract all the muscles. No need to use added resistance having your hands up by your temples and elbows pulled back, along with the steepness of the bench will be enough to provide all the resistance needed.
Exercise 11. Decline Leg Lifts
This particular exercise has been one of my favourites for targeting the obliques and helping develop that v-taper look. It requires using on old broom handle or piece of plastic piping that you can place behind your head and spread your arms across it at full-width. It also shouldn’t be heavy like a barbell, as this will place too much stress on your obliques as you twist from side to side. The purpose of this exercise is to activate these muscles quickly, working them through their entire range of movement. In the starting position, keep your chest lifted and your arms spread as wide as you can. Begin to contract the abdominals, pulling them in tightly as though you were about to anticipate a punch to the gut. At the same time, fully exhale all the air out of your lungs and twist as far to the left as you can. Imagine you're up to your waist in cement and that your arms are in a fixed cast, so you can only turn at the torso. Rotate as far round as you can without ‘bouncing’ at the end of the movement. You should be able to hold the twist at its furthest point for just a moment. From this point, begin to rotate back to the opposite side, quickly inhaling through your nose before fully exhaling again not before reaching other right hand side. Repeat this process performing a total of 40 repetitions altogether (20 each side). If you cannot find a pole, you can perform this on the floor using a medicine ball or single dumbbell.
Many competitors struggle with targeting and really developing the lower section of the abdominals. It’s not that they don’t have lower abs, it’s just that they most likely aren’t targeting them and training them effectively. Just like when the upper abdominals contract when the shoulders are brought forwards, the lower abdominals are contracted when the hips are bought forward. Basically, what we’re doing is reversing the decline crunches and placing our head at the top of the sloping bench and raising the legs up until your backside begins to lift off the bench. This is the starting position. The legs shouldn’t go straight up, but use a circular movement as though you were trying to fold yourself in half at the waist. From the start position, contract the abdominals by pulling them in tightly and as you exhale all the air from your lungs, pull the hips up from the bench as your bring your legs up and over your body. Feel the tightened contraction in the lower abs before controlling your hips back down on to the bench as you inhale through the nose. If performing on a decline bench is too difficult at first, start on the floor with the arms at the sides of the body, palms facing upward so as not to assist in pushing down to help lift the hips up. Another variation involves hanging from a chin up bar and performing vertical knee raises, drawing your knees in to your chest. All are effective movements for targeting the lower abdominals.
After completing the circuit of 11 exercises, rest for no longer than 60 seconds, which is about enough time to take a drink of water and prepare yourself for the start of the next circuit. Remember, the first circuit should have been more of a warm-up, to test whether the weights you selected were just 'right', that's to say that's where you could really ‘feel’ the muscle working without taking it to absolute failure.
Several days of training like this will suck the glycogen right out of your muscle cells, priming it to store up to three times more than it’s normally use to. Add to this low levels of body fat and proportioned and balanced muscle symmetry and by the time you finish the 2-3 days of carb loading, you will be primed for the stage or camera. My final recommendation is that if you’re thinking of using this method prior to a competition, you give it a try several weeks
Exercise
Circuit 1
Circuit 2
out to see how you respond to it and the differences it can make. And if you have any questions you'll likely find the answers to you are looking for at www.robriches.com and the rest you can ask me on my Twitter page: @RobRiches Use the table below to note which exercise type and weight you lift for 20 reps. You can download additional blank ones of these at www.robriches.com by searching for ‘Depletion Workout’. Circuit 3
Bench Press x 20 Barbell Row x 20 Dumbbell Presses x 20 Cable Chest Fly x 20 Seated Cable Row x 20 Lateral Dumbbell Raises x 20 Parallel Bar Dips x 20 Cable Curls x 20 Decline Crunches x 20 Seated Side Twists x 20 Decline Leg Raises x 20
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Exercise 10. Seated Side Twists
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Athletic Aesthetic Photoshoot/Fitness Model Preparation Workout Words by Rob Riches: TEAM True Performance Nutrition Captain. Photo’s by Noel Daganta ittle over 5 years ago, the only aesthetic (and athletic!) competitions available for many were bodybuilding and powerlifting shows. Both of which you needed to be big and strong to perform well in. Those who did well were naturally big and powerful, or decided to opt for a little chemical assistance. Then came along fitness model competitions with numerous categories. Rob Riches talks about how he prepares and specifically about precompetition and getting 'photo-shoot cover model ready'. I first made a name for myself in the world of natural bodybuilding. I thoroughly enjoyed the process of training and dieting for a fixed goal that would reward me not just with low body fat levels and an impressive looking physique, but would also teach me discipline
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and commitment are two crucial factors that I have carried over into other areas of my fitness career and life in general. Even though I had varying levels of success in bodybuilding, winning several regional shows as well as the world finals in Hollywood for my age group, I was always facing other competitors who were bigger than me, carried more muscle than me and had thicker, fuller frames. As a competitor, I wanted to win, but after the first few years of competing I realised that every time I tried to get bigger I would find myself right back at my competition weight looking about the same as I did for the previous shows. I was all about progression and I realised that unless I tool several years out from competing to focus on building bulk that I wasn’t going to progress much in the world of bodybuilding. I discovered that my
talent lay in stepping on stage in great condition, being able to display practically every muscle fibre like a walking anatomy chart. Perhaps adding on slabs of muscle just wasn’t in my genes, but shedding the fat and remaining well-balanced in my physique was. Great conditioning and muscle separation seemed to be something that I was good at and could replicate time and time again. It was almost two years after my first bodybuilding competition that I had heard of a fitness model competition being held in London. It was only two weeks away, so I quickly picked up the pre-contest routine I had used for bodybuilding, tightened up my diet and literally jumped back on the cardio machines every morning for the next two weeks. By the day of the fitness model competition, I had made some decent
A new era of competitions had arrived and I was only just warming up to take it head on and dominate this category. We weren’t compared on who had the biggest muscles, or who had the lowest body fat levels, the judges were looking for ‘marketability’, ‘good looks’, and ‘stage presence’, in addition to the usual good shape and level of conditioning of everyone’s physique. For once, I was able to score higher than those who were bigger than me and who were carrying more thicker, dense muscle than I was. A new era of competitions had arrived and I was only just warming up to take it head on and dominate this category. That was almost seven years ago and while my weight still remains pretty much the same as it did back then, I’ve been hard at work chiseling away at my physique but all the time keeping in mind the idea that, ‘I still want to be able to fit into medium sized clothes’. I didn’t want to fall back into that never ending quest for muscle and size, so instead I focused on improving my conditioning and muscle separation. The routine you see here is one that I’ve built up and perfected over the years. I have relied upon it each time I step back on stage, in front of a camera for photoshoots, or just to jump into every now and then when I feel like switching up my routine. It’s also a great way to test your strength and endurance every few months as a mark of seeing if your training really is progressing you. The basis for my routine is to perform it
for several days in a row while lowering your carbohydrate intake each day and then increasing it. Typically, if I were competing on a Saturday, I would start this routine on a Sunday six days earlier and perform it every day up until and including Wednesday morning. As noted carb reduction is key I basically halve my carb intake each day from Sunday (starting at around 150g) and end up at just over 30g of carbs on the Tuesday. Then over the next three days, (Wednesday, Thursday and Friday), I would begin to saturate my muscles with up to three times as much carbs as I had been consuming before I had tapered them down (3 x 150g). This is sometimes known as Carb Loading, or Carbs Backloading. It’s a process that’s worked very well for me over the years. There’s a little more to it than just eating less carbs one day, then lots more the next and you can find out more about how I do this exactly by searching for ‘cutting week’ on my new website www.robriches.com This workout is performed to further encourage the depletion of stored muscle glycogen (a form of carbohydrate), preparing the body to be able to load up on its glycogen storing capacity for the next few days, resulting in big, full, tight muscles. The aim is to is to lift weights that are only about 60% of your usual poundage with the focus more on volume. You'll do 20 reps of each exercise, taking no rest in between and then you move on to the next exercise and follow the same format. Basically its a nonstop circuit. Doing this level of volume, working practically every muscle in the upper body at a sub-optimal intensity is like forcing the body to use up what little stored muscle glycogen (energy) it has left, practically depleting it to near empty levels (Note: not the legs as many competitors don’t train legs during the final week as it leaves them smooth and not as hard and vascular than when they exclude them from the final week before the show). Think of your stomach when you haven’t eaten all day and you feel like it’s practically shrinking and disappearing into it’s own existence. Then, you finally get to eat and you can’t stop. You seem to be able to eat much more than you usually do and you just can’t stop. Before you know it, you’ve eaten way too much and all of a sudden your stomach finally tells you to stop otherwise it’s going to pop! The stomach, like the muscle cells can contract and expand and when it has been pushed to give up everything it has (the stomach not having any foot to metabolise to produce energy, and the muscle cell not having any glycogen to give as energy when needed), it will literally override what the body is used to and for a temporary state, hold much more than it is used to, making up for the deficit. It’s this cause and effect that if performed correctly can help you ride the wave to superior muscle conditioning and definition to add the finishing touches to your stage/camera-ready body.
Ideally, you should perform this routine at times when the gym is quiet so that you have access to all of the machines and weights that you’ll need. I recommend you first start by setting up each exercise, choosing a weight about half as much as you normally lift, so that you can quickly move through the circuit without needing to wait for an exercise to become available. If this is unavoidable, I suggest continuing on with the circuit until you are able to go back to that particular exercise and complete your set. Aim to complete 3 full circuits, performing 20 repetitions on each exercise. Think of the first circuit as a warm up, aiming to add a small amount of weight to the majority of exercises for the following two circuits. Just because your not lifting as heavy as you normally do doesn’t mean to you need to do everything slowly. By the twentieth rep you shouldn’t have reached muscle failure. The goal is not to go all out and feel absolutely fatigued. Rather the purpose of this workout is to drain the body of muscle glycogen, through repetition and volume. If you feel as though you can still perform 2-3 more reps at the end of the exercise, then you’re in the right zone for glycotic depletion!
Exercise 1: Bench Press. No need to prove your macho strength on this one. Focus on contracting the chest on every rep, holding and forcing the squeeze for a split second on the final 5 reps. Keeping the bar directly above the chest with your knuckles pointing upward, reduces strain from the wrists. Control the bar down, pausing just before it touches the chest, then explode it upward making sure not to overextend your arms at the top of the movement. To further work the muscle from multiple angles, you can perform this movement with different kit/machines for each circuit, for example, using dumbbells for the second circuit and a machine for the last. Just remember not to go too heavy.
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improvements and although I hadn’t been able to match the condition I had when competing in bodybuilding shows, I could clearly display my abs and had a body fat percentage of between 5 and 7%.. A healthy level that didn’t require the usual 12 weeks of dieting to get to. By this time, I had competed in over six bodybuilding competitions and was very familiar with the poses and routines required, but what was required for fitness modellng was much simpler. You had to walk out, hold a couple of relaxed model poses, then stand in line with the other competitors until called forwards for basic comparisons and quarter turns. To give you an idea of just how new this category was, I had been used to competing against anywhere from 10-20 competitors on stage, this time, it was myself and 3 others.
ROB RICHES
Exercise 2: Bent Over Row
Exercise 4. Cable Chest Fly
Just like with bench, you shouldn’t need to use lifting straps or pile on the plates for this movement to be effective. Using a lighter weight than normal, your form should be better. Tilt forward at the waist so that your chest is lower to the ground and keep your shoulders pulled back so as not to hunch the back too much, except for a small arch in the lower back. Start with the arms hanging straight down so that the lats are stretched out, then retract the shoulder blades back and start to pull the bar up toward your stomach without leaning back. Your upper body positioning should remain unchanged throughout the entire movement, with your arms just acting as a linkage from your back to the bar. Once again, focus on squeezing the back together at the top of the lift and control the bar all the way back to start position to complete each rep. This exercise can be performed on a Smith machine if you are not too familiar with this movement and performed with dumbbells and a machine row for the second and third circuit.
Moving back to the chest this time we’re making use of cables due to their smoothness and their ability to deliver a constant level of resistance throughout the entire range of motion without any sticking points (as is the case with free weights). I like to centre myself between both top pulleys and take a step forward with one leg back,n and heel up to help stabilise me as I perform the fly movement. This stops me from rocking back and focuses all the effort on the chest. Keep the arms at a fixed angle with a slight bend in the elbows and squeeze the chest as you close the hands together, ending directly in front of your chest. On the return, don’t allow the arms to go too far back and stop when you feel a bit of a stretch across the pectorals. You can switch to a machine fly on the second or third circuits and if you use dumbbells, stick with a weight that will allow you to complete 20 reps without breaking form.
Exercise 3. Shoulder Press
Exercise 5. Seated Row
With the chest and back nicely warmed up, I like to move on to the shoulders and prefer using dumbbell presses to target the shoulders. Performing this seated means you really need to execute it with proper form as you can’t bounce at the knees to get the final few reps out. Keep the back straight and shoulders pulled back and ensure that the elbows are inline with the wrists as you lower the dumbbells all the way down to the side of the deltoids. Push straight up, lengthening the arms fully and squeeze the shoulders. This movement can be performed on a Smith machine or a machine press, although starting off the first circuit with free weights will help further deplete muscle glycogen as you recruit more stabiliser muscles to assist with the control of the weight and keep it from straying from it’s plane of movement.
You can probably see by now that there’s a pattern of training antagonistic (opposing) muscle groups. I’ve found that by switching between push and pull type movements, it allows for a little extra recovery in certain muscle groups without reducing intensity in the exercise being performed. After chest flys, it’s only natural to then focus on the back and staying with a cable movement allows you to fully engage the back without having to stabilise the movement that much. Remain seated with your back upright as you retract the shoulder blades back and begin to pull the handle in toward your torso, keeping the arms at the sides of the body. Keep the chest lifted and on returning to the start position, allow the back to stretch a little without leaning forward at the waist.
After chest flys, it’s only natural to then focus on the back 62
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Exercise 6. Lateral Dumbbell Raise
Exercise 8. Cable Curl
I’ve always found that while performing shoulder exercises, I see the greatest amount of muscle separation and conditioning start to show. Well developed deltoids, traps and upper back can really make a big difference to a physique so it pays to train them just as hard and frequently as you would with chest or biceps. As shoulders move in a number of different planes of movement, we’re now moving away from the heavier presses to the more conditioning-type exercise such as the dumbbell lateral raises. I personally prefer to stand while doing these, starting with the dumbbells at the sides of my body. Keep a slight bend in the elbow as you raise your arms upward so that elbows and wrists remain in the same plane as your shoulders. Imagine as though you're performing this movement in a very narrow street with your front and back only inches away from two walls. The only movement you should be making is at the medial deltoid (side of the shoulder) - you raise the dumbbells up laterally until they’re at shoulder-height. Then return back to start position, without allowing the dumbbells to touch the legs - this ensures tension is kept on the shoulders at all times. Side cables and machines can be used in following circuits.
Again, the focus is on exhausting the muscle energy stores, not trying to set new personal best records in how much you can lift. Focus on the quality of each repetition, keeping the elbows fixed at the sides of the body and using a full range of movement whilst squeezing the biceps hard at the top of each rep. You can use a machine arm curl or seated dumbbell curl on additional circuits, but remember this simple rule - if you can’t complete 20 reps without breaking good form, the weight is too heavy and you should decrease the resistance to get the full benefit of this workout.
Exercise 9. Decline Crunches
Exercise 7. Parallel Bar Dips With the chest, back, and shoulders having their fair share of punishment, it’s now time to move onto the arms, which have had it relatively easy up until now. I like to start with the bigger muscle groups out of the biceps and triceps, which is the latter and I hit up 20 parallel bar dips (triceps dips) with my bodyweight as my only resistance. Remember you only need to train at 5060% of your usual weight, so unless you’re used to attaching 70kgs+ with a dip belt, then you’re bodyweight will likely be more than enough. Make sure you have a strong grip on the bars, with your knuckles pointing downward and your wrists straight so as to reduce stress on them while lifting. As you dip, keep your chest and head lifted, going at least as deep so that your shoulders are at the same height as the elbows. If you have the flexibility to go even lower, do so, but only if you can perform 20 repetitions. If you need to break at any point, allow no more than 5-10 seconds before trying to complete the set. Assisted dips on a machine can be performed as an alternative. You can also change the exercises you use to target your triceps on the last two sets. I've found that pull downs and narrow -width press-ups are very effective.
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We start by working the upper abdominal region, performing crunches on a decline bench. There’s no need to start at the bottom of the bench and try and come all the way up so that you’re sat upright. Start by sitting in an upright position and lean back until you feel a nice amount of tension start to pull on the abs. This is usually no more than twothirds of the way back. This is your start position and where you return to after each crunch until reaching 20. As you perform each rep, focus on exhaling all the air from your lungs and squeezing the abdominals hard to contract all the muscles. No need to use added resistance having your hands up by your temples and elbows pulled back, along with the steepness of the bench will be enough to provide all the resistance needed.
Exercise 11. Decline Leg Lifts
This particular exercise has been one of my favourites for targeting the obliques and helping develop that v-taper look. It requires using on old broom handle or piece of plastic piping that you can place behind your head and spread your arms across it at full-width. It also shouldn’t be heavy like a barbell, as this will place too much stress on your obliques as you twist from side to side. The purpose of this exercise is to activate these muscles quickly, working them through their entire range of movement. In the starting position, keep your chest lifted and your arms spread as wide as you can. Begin to contract the abdominals, pulling them in tightly as though you were about to anticipate a punch to the gut. At the same time, fully exhale all the air out of your lungs and twist as far to the left as you can. Imagine you're up to your waist in cement and that your arms are in a fixed cast, so you can only turn at the torso. Rotate as far round as you can without ‘bouncing’ at the end of the movement. You should be able to hold the twist at its furthest point for just a moment. From this point, begin to rotate back to the opposite side, quickly inhaling through your nose before fully exhaling again not before reaching other right hand side. Repeat this process performing a total of 40 repetitions altogether (20 each side). If you cannot find a pole, you can perform this on the floor using a medicine ball or single dumbbell.
Many competitors struggle with targeting and really developing the lower section of the abdominals. It’s not that they don’t have lower abs, it’s just that they most likely aren’t targeting them and training them effectively. Just like when the upper abdominals contract when the shoulders are brought forwards, the lower abdominals are contracted when the hips are bought forward. Basically, what we’re doing is reversing the decline crunches and placing our head at the top of the sloping bench and raising the legs up until your backside begins to lift off the bench. This is the starting position. The legs shouldn’t go straight up, but use a circular movement as though you were trying to fold yourself in half at the waist. From the start position, contract the abdominals by pulling them in tightly and as you exhale all the air from your lungs, pull the hips up from the bench as your bring your legs up and over your body. Feel the tightened contraction in the lower abs before controlling your hips back down on to the bench as you inhale through the nose. If performing on a decline bench is too difficult at first, start on the floor with the arms at the sides of the body, palms facing upward so as not to assist in pushing down to help lift the hips up. Another variation involves hanging from a chin up bar and performing vertical knee raises, drawing your knees in to your chest. All are effective movements for targeting the lower abdominals.
After completing the circuit of 11 exercises, rest for no longer than 60 seconds, which is about enough time to take a drink of water and prepare yourself for the start of the next circuit. Remember, the first circuit should have been more of a warm-up, to test whether the weights you selected were just 'right', that's to say that's where you could really ‘feel’ the muscle working without taking it to absolute failure.
Several days of training like this will suck the glycogen right out of your muscle cells, priming it to store up to three times more than it’s normally use to. Add to this low levels of body fat and proportioned and balanced muscle symmetry and by the time you finish the 2-3 days of carb loading, you will be primed for the stage or camera. My final recommendation is that if you’re thinking of using this method prior to a competition, you give it a try several weeks
Exercise
Circuit 1
Circuit 2
out to see how you respond to it and the differences it can make. And if you have any questions you'll likely find the answers to you are looking for at www.robriches.com and the rest you can ask me on my Twitter page: @RobRiches Use the table below to note which exercise type and weight you lift for 20 reps. You can download additional blank ones of these at www.robriches.com by searching for ‘Depletion Workout’. Circuit 3
Bench Press x 20 Barbell Row x 20 Dumbbell Presses x 20 Cable Chest Fly x 20 Seated Cable Row x 20 Lateral Dumbbell Raises x 20 Parallel Bar Dips x 20 Cable Curls x 20 Decline Crunches x 20 Seated Side Twists x 20 Decline Leg Raises x 20
MAY 2013 ultra-FIT
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Exercise 10. Seated Side Twists
