Australian_Mens_Fitness_April_2017

If you ask a good

coach about effective

ways to get bigger

and stronger, you’re

likely to hear about moves that

give you “a good bang for your

buck”. What they mean by this is

that for the amount of time and

effort you put in to training, some

exercises give you more in

return than others. And if, like

most modern men, you are time-

poor and you want to make sure

that your gym sessions are both

effective and efficient, it makes

sense to identify the most useful

exercises you can do so that

you can build your workouts

around them.

With the help of top personal

trainer Tom Wright, a man

who has entered physique

competitions and also lifts

impressively heavy weights

(he squats 220kg and benches

170kg), we’ve focused on the

seven moves that will give you

better and faster results when it

comes to building strength and

size than any others.

They are all barbell exercises,

for one simple reason. “When

you’re strength training, the best

tool you can use is the barbell,”

says Wright. “Nothing else comes

close. Lifting for strength

requires multi-joint exercises

known as compound lifts, which

create tension through different

muscles and movement

patterns, and they stimulate

thousands of nerves which are

all part of getting stronger.”

But before you head to the gym

with a new punishing seven-

move routine, Wright has some

advice about how to weave them

into your training regime.

“Because these movements

require the recruitment of a large

number of motor units and they

provide a big stimulus to the

central nervous system, I always

put them at the start of training

sessions. Generally you pick two

of these exercises as your main

lifts, such as squat and deadlift

for a lower-body session, or

bench press and barbell row for

the upper body.”

Alternatively you could do a

full-body strength session,

performing an upper-body move

followed by a lower. “This upper/

lower style of training can allow

y o u to ge t m o re w o rk d o n e i n a

shorter amount of time because

less recovery time is required

when you move between

different body parts. Another

benefit of this method is

increased heart rate as the body

pumps blood from one area to

another, leading to a higher

metabolic rate and increased

fat burning.”

I

APRIL 2017 MEN’S FITNESS 61

THE RIGHT MOVES. FOLLOW OUR EXPERT GUIDE TO BUILD STRENGTH FAST. BY JOHN LIPSEY