People are often misled when it comes to starting a resistance training program. They believe that all they will have to do is throw weights up into the air over and over to become a Herculean figure. There could be nothing further from the truth. Resistance training should be approached very seriously and scientifically. Of every sport out there, weight lifting has the highest injury rate. From pulled muscles and strains to blown tendons and slipped discs, lifting injuries range from painful to crippling.

The first rule in starting any training program is making sure you don't over do it. You can't just jump in and throw weights around. You have to take things slowly. Start out with calisthenics, push-ups, crunches, lots of stretching. After you have those muscles used to doing work and those tendons limbered up, you can start to do actual lifting. I recommend a solid six week period just getting ready for the weights.

The first six months is by far the most exciting. You will feel more strength every single time you work out. During this period you aren't really gaining any muscle, at least not much. You are training your nervous system to use the muscles that are already there. This is the period where you will go from a sixty pound bench press to over a hundred pounds. Nothing is more exciting. Just keep taking it slowly, make sure that you aren't lifting too much weight. Warm up before your workouts and stretch out thoroughly. The usual workout in this time period is upper body three times a week with one exercise per muscle group. Lower body should be done on the alternating days, twice a week. You can get away with this for the first six months because you aren't tearing down the muscle as much as training yourself how to lift.

After this period is over, you will usually start to hit walls. This is because your nervous system is trained and the muscle is starting to grow. At this point it's time to change your strategies. Stack on the weight a bit more heavily and shoot for exhaustion at around eight to ten reps. If you can do more than that you aren't breaking loose those muscle fibers. Also during this time period you will need to change your recovery strategy. On the average, it takes muscle around 72 hours to recover from a proper workout. This means that your three day a week program will cause you to loose muscle mass as your muscles will never heal from the prior workout.

Supplements while during these periods should be kept simple and to the basics. That is all you will need. A gallon of water a day, a good multi-vitamin such as Opti-Men, 1g of protein per pound of body weight, and a sensible diet filled with lean meats, healthy fats, fruits and veggies, and whole grains. Sticking to these few basics will give your body all it needs for maximum growth. Forget all the hype on the other supplements. They may work great for an advanced body builder with advanced needs, but you are still at the stage where your body has not hit its limits. Save your money and keep it simple.

Later I will post a nice, simple, intermediate workout to start at week six through month six. Until then, keep lifting.