Strength / ripped rowing training schedules

[RowingRon]

Hi everyone,

Here is my question first. I will give some background info.

I would like to get more strength and build bigger arms and chest + slimmer down the belly.

What are the best training schedules to do this? Do you guys have some more multiple weeks schedules? Or what are some good sites / programmes?

I've picked up rowing quite a while ago. First to get a fitness test, now just because I like it. I followed along quite a lot of YouTube videos, and I think my technique is quite OK. Not the fastest out there, but can do quite good (I think, I don't know what the standard is!?). Besides this, I also run and do pushups / pull-ups at home.


Thanks a million!

[Dangerscouse]

Rowing will help make you stronger, eventually, but it's not a good way to build bigger muscles. It just doesn't work you like that, and you'll get more definition than bulk.

If you keep working hard, and have a proper training plan & diet, you should lose weight but it does take time, and it will be reliant on your physiology and dedication. Some of us lose weight faster and easier than others, partly due to your gut microbes (some people literally have hungrier microbes that extract more calories, and there's no way to change that)

Push ups, pull ups and other bodyweight exercises, if you can't get to a gym or have dumbbells/ barbell at home will be far more beneficial for gaining muscles.

[GreenStratMan]

Some of us lose weight faster and easier than others, partly due to your gut microbes (some people literally have hungrier microbes that extract more calories, and there's no way to change that)

You can change your microbes. It’s about eating the correct food on which the good microbes thrive. Taking a good probiotic now and again. If you eat plenty of resistant starches, sweet potato, parsnips, turnip, swede, carrots . Plenty of leafy greens, spinach, cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts. Good fats too coconut oil, olive oil. Eat only pasture fed meats, although I don’t eat any meat. It’s a good thing to do, look after your gut. The rubbish microbes just die when we stop eating processed foods. The gut is a second brain and does a much better job when the microbes are on top form. I don’t think the corona virus would have been so prolific if gut was better throughout the population. Eating in this way is becoming more popular in general.

[jamesg]

I would like to get more strength and build bigger arms and chest + slimmer down the belly. What are the best training schedules to do this?

Rowing is an aerobic exercise for fitness done sitting down. No doubt a 1000kCal/day will have it's effect on fitness. But it won't have much effect on strength or weight, using mainly the existing muscle in legs and hips, and our power production is quite efficient, about 25%.

So you may also need to lift weights and stay out of the cook's domain.

[Dangerscouse]

Some of us lose weight faster and easier than others, partly due to your gut microbes (some people literally have hungrier microbes that extract more calories, and there's no way to change that)

You can change your microbes. It’s about eating the correct food on which the good microbes thrive. Taking a good probiotic now and again. If you eat plenty of resistant starches, sweet potato, parsnips, turnip, swede, carrots . Plenty of leafy greens, spinach, cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts. Good fats too coconut oil, olive oil. Eat only pasture fed meats, although I don’t eat any meat. It’s a good thing to do, look after your gut. The rubbish microbes just die when we stop eating processed foods. The gut is a second brain and does a much better job when the microbes are on top form. I don’t think the corona virus would have been so prolific if gut was better throughout the population. Eating in this way is becoming more popular in general.

Yeah, you're right, but isn't there a theory about the general make up of your gut microbiome that tends towards more efficient carb extraction?

Admittedly it's just a theory, but it does help confirm why people tend towards to a natural weight. Regardless of diets, some people can't put weight on, and others can't keep it off over the longer term. I know of quite a lot of people that gravitate towards a natural size, albeit with some fluctuations due to notable exercise and/or diet.

[GreenStratMan]

Some of us lose weight faster and easier than others, partly due to your gut microbes (some people literally have hungrier microbes that extract more calories, and there's no way to change that)

You can change your microbes. It’s about eating the correct food on which the good microbes thrive. Taking a good probiotic now and again. If you eat plenty of resistant starches, sweet potato, parsnips, turnip, swede, carrots . Plenty of leafy greens, spinach, cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts. Good fats too coconut oil, olive oil. Eat only pasture fed meats, although I don’t eat any meat. It’s a good thing to do, look after your gut. The rubbish microbes just die when we stop eating processed foods. The gut is a second brain and does a much better job when the microbes are on top form. I don’t think the corona virus would have been so prolific if gut was better throughout the population. Eating in this way is becoming more popular in general.

Yeah, you're right, but isn't there a theory about the general make up of your gut microbiome that tends towards more efficient carb extraction?

Admittedly it's just a theory, but it does help confirm why people tend towards to a natural weight. Regardless of diets, some people can't put weight on, and others can't keep it off over the longer term. I know of quite a lot of people that gravitate towards a natural size, albeit with some fluctuations due to notable exercise and/or diet.

Ecotomorph, endomorph and mesomorph and all of that. I’m not sure how that relates to the gut, there is probably more to it and may be genetic related; I’m no expert. The trouble with these theories is, they’re based on reductionism and that is always a mistake. The holistic approach is key, but much more difficult in terms of gaining knowledge. But is knowledge that important? We’ve lost touch with our own true nature and therefore inner wisdom. With all of this stuff, it pays to do the best you can with what you have in my humble opinion. Striving for some outcome because it might make someone happy or better accepted is something the fitness industry cons people into. It’s all nonsense. A lot of people make a lot of money out making others believe they’re going to be better off if they conform to the latest fad and coerce people into comparing themselves with others.

Very few of us lives in a state of true joy and that is such a pity because that is where our true value lies. In that light our pursuits become divorced from striving which is great because we’re unlikely to becoming seduced into identification with specific objectives. In other words, I erg because I enjoy it and if the joy becomes diminished I allow myself to find out why and allow the joy to return because any pursuit flourishes in the presence of joy.

Anyway …

[Dangerscouse]

You can change your microbes. It’s about eating the correct food on which the good microbes thrive. Taking a good probiotic now and again. If you eat plenty of resistant starches, sweet potato, parsnips, turnip, swede, carrots . Plenty of leafy greens, spinach, cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts. Good fats too coconut oil, olive oil. Eat only pasture fed meats, although I don’t eat any meat. It’s a good thing to do, look after your gut. The rubbish microbes just die when we stop eating processed foods. The gut is a second brain and does a much better job when the microbes are on top form. I don’t think the corona virus would have been so prolific if gut was better throughout the population. Eating in this way is becoming more popular in general.

Yeah, you're right, but isn't there a theory about the general make up of your gut microbiome that tends towards more efficient carb extraction?

Admittedly it's just a theory, but it does help confirm why people tend towards to a natural weight. Regardless of diets, some people can't put weight on, and others can't keep it off over the longer term. I know of quite a lot of people that gravitate towards a natural size, albeit with some fluctuations due to notable exercise and/or diet.

Ecotomorph, endomorph and mesomorph and all of that. I’m not sure how that relates to the gut, there is probably more to it and may be genetic related; I’m no expert. The trouble with these theories is, they’re based on reductionism and that is always a mistake. The holistic approach is key, but much more difficult in terms of gaining knowledge. But is knowledge that important? We’ve lost touch with our own true nature and therefore inner wisdom. With all of this stuff, it pays to do the best you can with what you have in my humble opinion. Striving for some outcome because it might make someone happy or better accepted is something the fitness industry cons people into. It’s all nonsense. A lot of people make a lot of money out making others believe they’re going to be better off if they conform to the latest fad and coerce people into comparing themselves with others.

Very few of us lives in a state of true joy and that is such a pity because that is where our true value lies. In that light our pursuits become divorced from striving which is great because we’re unlikely to becoming seduced into identification with specific objectives. In other words, I erg because I enjoy it and if the joy becomes diminished I allow myself to find out why and allow the joy to return because any pursuit flourishes in the presence of joy.

Anyway …

Very true Kevin

"I erg, therefore I am" - Stu Wenman 2022

[max_ratcliffe]

Very true Kevin

"I erg, therefore I am" - Stu Wenman 2022

"Ergo, ergo sum" - René Descartes 1637

Thank you very much.

[GreenStratMan]

Descartes was a complete twit. It's a pity he was so influential. To equate thinking with being is a grave mistake. He was so successful in entrenching the idea that identification with form was important. Being is the ultimate truth and one that most of us deny ourselves of, without even realising. And that's very sad.

oh well. Ergwards and upwards ;o)

[btlifter]

Descartes was a complete twit. It's a pity he was so influential. To equate thinking with being is a grave mistake. He was so successful in entrenching the idea that identification with form was important. Being is the ultimate truth and one that most of us deny ourselves of, without even realising. And that's very sad.

oh well. Ergwards and upwards ;o)

Different ways of looking at it, I suppose. While one can interpret that first principle of his as prioritizing thinking, I prefer to adopt a more liberal interpretarion, assuming simply that if one is "doing" anything (be it "thinking" or erging, or breathing) then there must, in fact, be a "one" present.

Admittedly, I'm not such a fan of a dualistic approach, personally. Still, I think there are good faith interpretations that needn't prioritize any particular cognitive process.

...at least that's what I think

[GreenStratMan]

Descartes was a complete twit. It's a pity he was so influential. To equate thinking with being is a grave mistake. He was so successful in entrenching the idea that identification with form was important. Being is the ultimate truth and one that most of us deny ourselves of, without even realising. And that's very sad.

oh well. Ergwards and upwards ;o)

Different ways of looking at it, I suppose. While one can interpret that first principle of his as prioritizing thinking, I prefer to adopt a more liberal interpretarion, assuming simply that if one is "doing" anything (be it "thinking" or erging, or breathing) then there must, in fact, be a "one" present.

Admittedly, I'm not such a fan of a dualistic approach, personally. Still, I think there are good faith interpretations that needn't prioritize any particular cognitive process.

...at least that's what I think

That’s the paradox I suppose, without dualism, there’d be nothing to say. Which is interesting because oneness can’t be spoken about, not with any truth. Pointing at fire with ice ….