5 Keys For Teen Bodybuilders

If you're a teen bodybuilder and you're passionate about training and perhaps even competing, you are extremely fortunate. Some people don't find that type of passion until they're much older—and many never find it at all. Having something that you're passionate about motivates you and gives you a focus that will enrich your life.

Your ambitions in bodybuilding are probably sky-high right now, but I'll let you in on a secret: Your passion doesn't have to be something that makes you money or makes you famous in order to sustain you. It just has to be something that makes you happy and gives you a sense of satisfaction. Bodybuilding is a great passion to have, because it's all about being healthy and living a clean lifestyle.


That said, I know as well as anyone that there's plenty of bad information out there. My goal is to help you know how to separate the two. I've earned my knowledge about bodybuilding and muscular development over a time period spanning longer than you've been alive. I can't think of too many things that would be more rewarding than attaining the body you want through knowledge and experience.
If you were my son, this is the exact advice I would give to you. Use it wisely! If it helps, you can think of me as that "buff dad you never had."

Tip 1 /Find a Great Mentor
There's no hard-and-fast rule about what a mentor is, or who is qualified to be one. But after you've been through the wringer of physique transformation—especially for competition—you'll realize how important it is to have someone who shares your passion, inspires you, and pushes you to the next level.
Your mentor doesn't have to be a professional or someone who competes on a national level—although they can be. They might be older, or they might be your age. They don't even have to be someone who directly coaches you, helps design your program, or maps out your nutrition—although they might.
What a mentor provides is more vague—and more important in the long term. They keep you accountable. They keep your best interests at heart, and their personality motivates you. That may not sound like much, but remember: Bodybuilding is a lifestyle, more so than almost any other sport. You can get strong without support, but you won't stay strong without it.

Tip 2 /Surround Yourself with the Right People
When you're new to bodybuilding and trying to learn, grow, and reach your goals, the last thing you need is to be surrounded by people who don't "get" what you're doing. Spending day after day around people who don't understand why you bother working out can bring you down and kill your motivation.
The answer isn't to dump your family or friends. It's to get to know other bodybuilders in your community and at your gym. Maintain a social circle that understands what you do and why, and who can provide you with camaraderie and shared experiences. Bodybuilding is too long and difficult of a journey to do alone.

It'd be great if you could just walk into the gym and find the perfect posse, but I know it doesn't happen that way. Even if you don't have bodybuilding friends in your area, you can still find community through my Facebook page, or by signing up for your own BodySpace account and getting acquainted with the The Skip La Cour - Mass Machine Bodybuilding thread on the Bodybuilding.com forum.
I created the thread in the hopes of allowing people at all points of the process to hook up and communicate. And sure enough, the people who participate in the thread are incredibly supportive of each other. There are people there who can help celebrate successes and give that push to move forward. That kind of community can be important, especially for a teen bodybuilder who isn't receiving it elsewhere.

Tip 3 /Get Your Information from the Right Sources
There's so much information on the Internet about bodybuilding—and everything else—those of us who were around back in the pre-Net days can barely believe it. This is both good and bad. Plenty of what you see if you type in a simple question is just plain wrong. It will slow your progress, get you hurt in the short term, and damage your health in the long term.
This is especially true in social media and on forums. Everybody under the sun has an opinion, and you have no way of determining if they know what they're talking about. One of the worst things you can do is post your nutrition plan or your workout routine on a forum and ask people for their input. Half of them will tell you it's awesome, and the other half will tell you it's stupid. That just leaves you confused and running from program to program, based on advice from total strangers.
What's the answer? Stay skeptical and be patient. Seek out respected and responsible sources of bodybuilding information. On my website and sites like Bodybuilding.com , you can get information that is well-researched and based on solid science and years of experience. Steer clear of half-baked bro-science and be wary of opinions on Facebook, Twitter, or random forums from people you don't know.

Tip 4 /Be Confident on Your Own Path
When I was just starting out, I lived in a town where I didn't know anyone in bodybuilding. I was passionate about the sport, and I decided I wanted to enter my first competition, a small local event. I trained my heart out for months and I was so pumped up and excited about seeing what I could do.

Skip La Cour is a six-time national drug-free champion bodybuilder who has won 15 bodybuilding competitions in his career. His 10 books, eight top-selling DVDs and five audio seminar courses have helped thousands of people at all training levels reach their goals. His Mass Machine Bodybuilding thread on the Bodybuilidng.com has also grown into a phenomenon, with more than 8,000 posts and more than 500,000 views.
Skip also owns and operates the Mass Machine Nutrition supplement line, available through the Bodybuilding.com online store. Mass Machine Nutrition was nominated for "New Brand of the Year" in the 2012 Bodybuilding.com Supplement of the Year Awards.
About two weeks before the event, a friend of mine took me aside and told me I had no chance of winning. He wasn't a bodybuilder, but he was a local, and he swore that I had no chance of winning because I was new on the scene and the judging was too political.
By the time he told me this, I was already totally committed. I'd been working hard for a long time and the event was right around the corner, so his advice didn't change anything. I actually went on to win that event, but what if he had given me his "insider knowledge" when I first started training for the competition? I probably would have believed him, I probably would have quit, and I certainly wouldn't have won that event.
Unlike a straight numbers game like golf, perception and judgment are part of the process in bodybuilding. Unfortunately, everyone sees the world through their own eyes. So ultimately, you have to decide for yourself what you're up for: how much humiliation or failure you're willing to risk, and how far you want to go. You may have the world's best mentor and a great community behind you, but ultimately, it's all still up to you.
Listen to the advice of people who know what they're talking about. But when it doesn't sound right, research the facts yourself and make decisions based on your gut.

Tip 5 /It's All about Your Mindset
This last piece of advice is one of the most important things I can say to you: Your mindset is everything. It means more than your metabolism, your genetics, whether you have a coach, and even what kind of gym you have access to. If you are determined, if you believe in yourself, and if you continue to work past any obstacle, you can achieve your goals.

You may only stick with bodybuilding for a few years. One day—maybe sooner than you think—work, kids and life in general may cause you to stop training. On the other hand, you may still be training hard when you're 60. Teen bodybuilders are the champions of tomorrow; with the right mental approach, you can go as far as you dream in this sport.
Leave your comments below. Tell me what helps you to take your efforts to a higher level.

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All About Glutamine: Your Expert Guide

If your body was a country club for supplements, you'd see glutamine everywhere: chilling by the pool, hobnobbing with directors, and playing entirely too much tennis.

As the most abundant amino acid in the body, glutamine can be found in muscle tissue, plasma, and in nearly every animal product you ingest. On average, it constitutes a little more than five percent of the amino acids found in animal-derived protein sources such as meats, dairy products, and eggs. That may not sound like much, but make no doubt: Glutamine is critically important to a wide range of bodily processes.

Expert Guides: Glutamine
Something this important has to be an "essential" acid, right? Not exactly. Glutamine is considered "conditionally essential." This means your body can produce enough to meet its needs under normal circumstances, but not always. In other words, you need to consume dietary sources of glutamine under certain circumstances when your body is under extreme duress.

As a supplement, glutamine has plenty of die-hard fans. It also has detractors who say that unless you are a recovering burn patient, this amino is best left on the shelf. I'm here to sort through the research and help you decide if glutamine is right for you.


Glutamine is created in the human body when the non-essential amino acid glutamate (or glutamic acid) is broken down and binds with nitrogen-containing ammonia molecules. Think of glutamine as a kind of nitrogen sponge. It mops up ammonia and shuttles nitrogen between tissues, where it can be used for cell growth and tissue repair, among many other functions. It's been reported that some 30-35 percent of all nitrogen derived from protein breakdown is transported in the form of glutamine. Glutamine can also be broken down to re-synthesize glutamate, which makes glutamine a critical source of ammonia and nitrogen.

Approximately 70 percent of your body's internal glutamine is produced in skeletal muscle, from where it travels to the small intestine, kidneys, and white blood cells. These are the dominant sites of glutamine usage.
Internal levels of this amino acid depend on various factors. Pregnancy and lactation significantly deplete the body's glutamine stores, as do exhaustive exercise, illness, disease, starvation or fasting, rapid growth and development, and other conditions of extreme physiological stress. These are some of the conditions where increasing your glutamine intake or considering supplementation is appropriate.

Glutamine—like other alpha-amino acids—is involved in regulating protein synthesis and breakdown. However, there's far more to it than that. Glutamine significantly affects BCAA metabolism, gut barrier maintenance, normal immune function, glucose formation, water transport, neurotransmission, and more.

Your kidneys are a primary consumer of glutamine use that's where the ammonia cleaved from glutamine works to maintain your body's acid-base balance. Anywhere you find ammonia, you'll find glutamine. As metabolic acidosis increases—as in response to intense training or a high-protein diet—renal uptake of glutamine soars. In fact, one study found that just four days of a high-protein, high-fat diet, was enough to cause a 25 percent drop in glutamine levels in the plasma and muscle tissue.

If all of these competing uses begin to outpace your body's ability to produce glutamine, then you may start to show signs of deficiency, including muscle wasting, depleted energy, and increased susceptibility to infections.

What Are the Performance and Physique Applications? ///
Despite glutamine's various functions, little evidence suggests it will directly result in increased muscle mass, reduced body fat, or gains in muscle strength or power in normal, healthy people. However, given how stressful intense training is on the human body, athletes may see certain benefits from supplementing with significant levels of glutamine, or from stacking it with other supplements.

One study found that when athletes suffered from mild dehydration, supplemental glutamine increased exercise performance and enhanced fluid and electrolyte uptake when combined with a glucose and electrolyte beverage. Supplementation has also been shown to raise levels of growth hormone in response to cycling to exhaustion.


Extracellular concentrations of glutamine have also been shown to activate the signaling pathway mTOR, which is known to be responsible for increasing muscle size. However, here again, the benefits of glutamine supplementation required that other conditions be met: in this case, mTOR signaling appeared to require the presence of BCAAs (leucine, most importantly), as well as some threshold level of cellular hydration.
In another case, collegiate track and field athletes who consumed four grams of glutamine per day for eight weeks, along with a loading and maintenance dose of creatine, saw greater gains in lean body mass than those who used creatine alone. This may sound significant, but it's hard to draw conclusions over a mere eight weeks at such a low dosage. Whether higher doses or a longer study would have resulted in significant differences is anyone's guess.

What Are the Differences Between Types of Glutamine? ///
Other than your stack, the most important thing to consider when selecting a glutamine product is the delivery system. If you're purchasing a powder, capsule or tablet, then free form L-glutamine works best. However, because glutamine is unstable, avoid ready-to-drink beverages or protein bars claiming to contain supplemental L-glutamine.

If you favor RTDs and bars, look for the peptide-bound forms of glutamine, such as L-alanyl-L-glutamine, glycyl-L-glutamine hydrate, or an ingredient listed as "glutamine peptide." Just remember that the glutamine concentration of one of these peptide forms is typically approximately 65-70 percent. In other words, there's only about 6.5-7g of glutamine per 10g of glutamine peptide. Dose accordingly.

Regardless of the form, up to 90 percent of ingested glutamine is eliminated during first pass. A mere fraction of the glutamine you consume will make it beyond your liver. The majority of the glutamine you consume being eliminated by the digestive enterocytes and immune cells within your gut.

It's best to avoid products that contain n-acetyl-l-glutamine (not to be confused with N-acetyl glucosamine) or alpha-ketoisocaproyl-glutamine (also known as aKIC-glutamine). Both the acylated and aKIC forms may be stable, but the existing evidence suggests that they're both poor delivery forms for glutamine.

What Should I Use It With? ///
Consider stacking glutamine with sodium and other electrolytes first and foremost. Glutamine transport occurs via a sodium-dependent mechanism, and it has been shown to significantly increase cell volume, electrolyte absorption, and hydration. This might be helpful for both endurance and physique athletes, the latter because cell water volume is one of the many aspects of muscle hypertrophy. Significant decreases in cell water volume can also inhibit mTor signaling, which is crucial to building muscle.

Other candidates to stack with glutamine include:
BCAAs: There are two main reasons why combining BCAAs and glutamine may promote greater gains in muscle mass and performance. First, ammonia concentrations, and therefore glutamine, directly affects BCAA metabolism. And second, mTOR signaling from extracellular glutamine first requires the uptake of BCAAs, primarily leucine. BCAAs plus glutamine might promote performance and muscle gains.

Citrulline: Glutamine functions as a precursor for arginine and NO synthesis by transporting citrulline between tissues. Using glutamine with citrulline might boost citrulline's ability to stimulate the production of nitric oxide, which might lead to better oxygen delivery and nutrient transport to skeletal muscle. More nutrients to the muscle might translate to better recovery and growth. That may sound somewhat indirect, but then again, a messenger substance like glutamine has its hand in a lot of processes.

Alpha-Ketoglutarate: Like glutamine, aKG serves as a precursor to glutamate and has been shown to dose-dependently spare glutamine degradation and increase mTOR signaling pathways, as well as glutathione. This means that glutamine, taken with aKG, might boost the potential for muscle growth and the production of glutathione, a powerful antioxidant.

Glucose or N-Acetylglucosamine: Glucose deprivation reduces glutamine uptake and negatively affects cell growth and survival. If you're on a low-carb diet, it appears that the glycoprotein N-acetylglucosamine (NAG), which is available in supplement form, might be able to restore glutamine uptake and metabolism, potentially boosting recovery and cell function.

It appears that the daily intake of supplemental glutamine needs to be high—at least 20-30 g per day, consumed frequently—in order to raise plasma glutamine concentrations.

To provide some perspective, consider that critically ill patients usually receive a constant intravenous infusion of between 20-30 g of glutamine per day. However, the bioavailability of infused glutamine they receive is 100 percent. It's no more than 30 percent from orally consumed glutamine. Thus, I recommend up to 30 g of glutamine per day in divided doses throughout the day, preferably with meals or snacks containing carbohydrates to support glucose utilization.

On training days, I recommend you consume glutamine prior to or during exercise to support hydration, electrolyte transport, and BCAA metabolism. You could take 10 g before, during, and after your workout, or you could reduce those dosages to 5 g if you also dose in the hours leading up to or following exercise. On non-training days, consume at least 5 g of glutamine at frequent intervals, at least every 2-3 hours, to sustain an increase in plasma glutamine concentrations.

There appears to be no need to cycle glutamine. In fact, there's more evidence to support the need for chronic ingestion of glutamine during periods of extreme physiological stress.

Are There any Side Effects? ///
There's a considerable amount of data supporting the lack of adverse reactions to glutamine doses as high as 30 g per day. A recent 13-week toxicity study concluded that the "no-observed adverse effect level" (NOAEL) for L-glutamine occurred at the highest daily dose provided to male and female rats.
In a human, this dose equates to roughly 0.308 g of glutamine per pound of body mass per day. For a 170-pound adult, that's a little more than 52 g of glutamine per day. Again, this dose was shown to result in an extremely high level of safety with no documented adverse effects.

Yes, glutamine is a key player in a whole host of functions that dramatically impact your ability to achieve your overall health and fitness goals. However, if you're depending solely upon glutamine or aren't using enough, you may be disappointed.

Maximizing glutamine's effects on your body requires you to use your head first. If you're not training hard, your body probably can supply you all you need. But if you're the type who punishes your body regularly, taking it in the right way could help you keep performing at an elite level.

About The AuthorDr. Chris Lockwood earned his Ph.D. in Exercise Physiology and his M.S. in Exercise & Sports Science. Your comment has been posted! Because comments are displayed from oldest to newest, it will appear on the last page. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Integer mattis varius nisi eu aliquet. Integer mattis.Lorem ipsum dolor sit ametFeatured Product
BodySpace is YOUR key to success! Create a profile, meet others, track your progress and much more!

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Dragon Flag

Welcome to My DoFollow Blog! As a Big Thank You, I'd Like to Give You FREE Access to my "19 Tips to Build Muscle & Gain Weight" Report That Gives You The Key Ingredients For Success in YOUR all your workouts! ~ Marc David; CPT


The Dragon Flag is arguably the best ab exercise and probably the most difficult one you can do. If you can do these in “good” form, you have core strength without a doubt. Popularized by Bruce Lee and sometimes referred to as the Rocky Ab Workout, this is one of the top three best ab bodyweight exercises you can do (the other two being the full hanging leg raise and the abs wheel roll out).

This should not be attempted by somebody who is just beginning. This is an advanced core exercise.  If you want to start building your ab core strength slowly, I suggest the classic abdominal plank which is the simpliest type of ab exercise to master or the reverse crunch.

Your shoulders and head should be in contact with the bench (floor) at all times. Notice in some clips, mine is not! There is always room for improvement and it’s why I advise my clients and myself to video yourself so you can see what you are doing and adjust as necessary. My form is good not perfect and I can do better!


usually performed face uppoint your toes (it helps keep you in alignment)grip that bench for supportkeep your head on the benchkeep your body straightavoid bending at the hipsdo not take this exercise to failure (form is critical)

If there is such a thing as a perfect form Dragon Flag it would include no piking, no loss of shoulders or head with the bench, smooth and controlled.

If you desire to do this exercise, start off slowly by doing easier core exercises to build up your strength.  You can start with a leg lift or hip lift from the floor and move up to dragon flag negatives.  Eventually moving to a few repetitions and then sets.  This is one of the very few exercises you don’t want to jump into without a solid strong abdominal core.

Until now, only a handful of professionals and hand-picked amateurs have been allowed to learn these amazing “win smart/win ugly” secrets that practically guarantee you will always have six pack abs every time you lift your shirt (even if you've never stepped foot in a gym). Now, with the unexpected release of this “top secret” information, you can rocket from raw rookie to respected six pack guru almost immediately!
Be Fit, Stay Strong!
Marc David – CPT
PS – If you can do a Dragon Flag, send me the link to your video so I can add it!

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Rest Between Sets and the Effects on Your Workout

Welcome to My DoFollow Blog! As a Big Thank You, I'd Like to Give You FREE Access to my "19 Tips to Build Muscle & Gain Weight" Report That Gives You The Key Ingredients For Success in YOUR all your workouts! ~ Marc David; CPT

Rest between sets
should be 30 seconds to 5 minutes.  True or False?

I’m sure by now you are well aware that rest between sets are just another variable you can manipulate depending on your overall objective (strength, muscle growth, endurance). What you may not be aware of is rest periods between sets have very different outcomes depending on your objective.   Improper use of rest between workouts can eventually lead to overtraining.  Here’s the scoop…

Fixed Recovery Time Between Workouts
Rest between sets can and will vary depending on your objective and the type of muscle fibers in your body.  You’ve probably been told to take 60 second rest periods between sets maybe a bit more and as you get more advanced, you take less rest towards 30 seconds to make the workout more intense.  While it can be that easy for a particular workout routine, your rest intervals really depend on several factors such as:
weight being usedgoal of the training plan (strength, hypertrophy, endurance)type of strength being sough afterexplosiveness of the exercises

Taking a mere 30 seconds of rest between sets for weightlifting would be mistake and lend itself to sub-optimal training results.  Taking 3 minutes rest between sets for something like TRX exercises (not rounds) is sub-optimal as well.  Tossing a random number at your clients is great for the general population but when it comes to YOUR training, you need to know what the rest between exercises should be to obtain maximum results and replenish glycogen.

The rest between sets has a primary goal to generate enough ATP (adenosine triphosphase) to get most of your strength back to complete the next set properly. In about 30 seconds of rest, 70% of ATP has been restored.  You won’t get near complete ATP regeneration until about 3 to 5 minutes of rest between exercises (useful for maximum lift attempts).  After about 2 minutes, you can get 84% of your ATP stores returned and 4 minute rest intervals can get your closer to 89%.  Somewhere about 8 minutes you’ll get complete restoration.

High Volume Training vs. Maximum Lifts vs. Muscular Endurance
Taking this into account, you should see that if you are doing high volume training utilizing alternating sets (or supersets), less than 60 seconds probably isn’t enough rest between sets to allow enough restoration to do another set with an adequate training load. If you are doing force and power generating type lifts, 85% of your 1 rep maximum, 2 to 5 minutes is better suited for regeneration. Resting longer while doing heavy lifts, you can lose approximately 12% to 44% of that force and power generating capacity! This still doesn’t mean you can’t lift heavy with minimal rest but it does mean you may not be at peak capacity.

For example, even with only 60 to 90 seconds of rest between sets, you could do single reps of 85% of your maximum lift with a mere 60-90 seconds of rest between reps. It’s an extended set for sure and just below what’s optimal for such a lift but the intensity will be much harder because of a shorter rest period and you might feel pumped. This is an advanced technique but it shows that rest between reps is a personal variable like anything else.

All this means if that if your goal is heavy lifting, somewhere in the range of 2 to 5 minute rest between sets are optimal. That doesn’t mean you have to wait that long, but don’t be shocked when you start to feel too fatigued and weak to do the workout properly.

Short rest between sets across many sets and reps are not optimal if you are trying to maximize muscular strength and power development. Meaning, if you are doing high volume training, you’ll want at least 60 seconds to 2 minutes so you can continue to lift moderate amounts of weight.
However, if it’s muscular endurance you are after, it is almost common sense that shorter rest between sets would be advantageous in this training situation. In fact, some adaptations can occur with shorter rest intervals and high volume training such as:
increases in blood flowbuffer capacitymitochondrial density

You know that annoying lactic acid build-up that stops you short of doing those last few reps? The burn is so bad you have to quit before it’s over? High volume, short rest between sets may increase that buffer and allow you to move moderate weight over longer periods of time. It’s why going from a regular training program to a high volume program can be a really painful experience if your buffer capacity is very low.
That being said, if you do any type of high volume training (many sets, 10+ reps per set) I’d suggest 60 second rest between sets at a minimum to generate enough ATP to perform your sets at optimal levels. Anything less and you might start off fatigued (heart rate, waste products not flushed, low strength output) to really give it your best effort.

If you haven’t heard, shorter rest between sets might improve hormonal responses that are thought to be responsible for greater stimulus for hypertrophy. Specifically, weight training programs that utilize shorter rest intervals, with higher repetitions (10+) with 55%-75% weight loads, greater growth hormone is released!
However, high levels of growth hormone have been shown to be released in weight training programs that use longer rest between sets (2 to 5 minutes), compound exercises with moderate to high intensity and lower repetitions. Translation, lift heavy with sub maximal intensity and plenty of rest periods between sets.
What you don’t see is short rest between sets utilizing isolation movements or high repetitions with low training loads. To be even more blunt, how much growth hormone is released and how that directly translates into actual muscle growth is not known.

Shorter rest between sets as you can see don’t lead to complete recovery and generally decrease the amount of workload you can do (weight lifted; volume load). If you believe that muscular hypertrophy is the resulted of weight lifted (tonnage) then shorter rest between sets for strength training may not be optimal.
It really comes down to your ability to recover that determines your rest between sets when targeting muscular hypertrophy. If you can recover well enough to lift moderate weight loads for higher reps, then 30 seconds may be all you need. If you are not that advanced, you may need longer rest periods between sets to move the same amount of weight.

The difference is really the training objective of the entire program down to the objective of the actual workout training session. On a heavy training day, longer rest between sets for strength training of 2-5 minutes are best. If you are lifting less weight but higher repetitions, you can opt for short rest intervals IF indeed you can recover.

Predetermined Heart Rate
Instead of using fixed time rest periods between sets depending on the training load and objective, you can use a predetermined heart rate. One method is to set a heart rate rate of 120 to 130 beats per minute as a cutoff for the next set (muscular endurance). A second method is to set the recovery period as however long it takes to get your heart rate back to 65% of maximum.

The first of these methods is better suited to help determine rest periods for cardio interval training. The second method can be used for weight training. After your set, watch your heart rate, when it gets back to 65% of your maximum, initiate the next set. As you get more advanced, your heart rate should decrease faster, and your rest between exercises grow shorter.

The Bottom Line
If your goal is to use heavy weight (85% of maximum and higher), you’ll require longer rest periods between exercise sets in the range of 2 minutes to 5 minutes. If you are using moderate weight (55% to 85%), your rest intervals between sets can be shorter from 30 seconds to 90 seconds.
Taking Creatine Can Help with Your Rest Between Sets Variables:
Bring your stopwatch to the gym and test different rest time intervals.  The primary objective of the rest between sets is to recover the strength required to complete the next set properly.
Be Fit, Stay Strong!
Marc David – CPT

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