Message sent by: Giuseppe
Hello Joseph
from what you write to me, I believe that for you a functional training is very useful for improving the muscular tone of the whole body.
Let's start with the frequency of the sessions, four workouts a week are more than enough, especially in the summer period during which you should find physical and mental energies to better face the competitive commitments of the next season (even if it is a simple match with friends during the weekend).
The sessions will begin with an initial warming of about ten minutes. The training of the abdominal, oblique and lumbar muscles will have a priority role, so they will always have to be trained at least twice a week.
There will then be an initial period in which you will have to build a good base of general strength and a subsequent period in which you will have to "transform" this force by adapting it to the gesture of competition.
For the first 2-3 weeks you will have to choose basic exercises such as leg press, chest press, pectoral, easy power pull-ups, vertical row and shoulder press. Three sets per exercise for 8-10 repetitions could represent a good stimulus for the general increase in strength.
After this initial period I suggest you gradually switch to free weights with exercises like: lunges, dumbbell thrusts on inclined, on declined, slow dumbbells and rowing with dumbbells.
As soon as you have become familiar with the movement, perform the same exercises on fit balls or swiss balls.
The swiss ball is a large ball with a diameter usually between 45 and 65 cm. This tool is highly destabilizing, because the reduced support surface makes the tool unstable. To maintain balance you will be forced to recruit numerous stabilizing muscles that are not stressed during conventional exercises.
If you continue to train 4 times a week even during this period, you could split the workout into two sessions during which you will train alternately, upper and lower body.
Fifteen twenty minutes of slow running at the end of the sessions could help you recover from the fatigue of training (especially when you train your lower limbs).
As you get closer to the specific preparation period, you can start replacing 1 upper body workout with skip exercises, short uphill exercises, rhythm changes, etc.
One day a week could be dedicated to improving global resistance and capilarization, in this regard it is useful to perform very long slow travel exits (at least 50 minutes).
At this point, the first analysis of improvements regarding aesthetics, strength, endurance and explosive strength, should take you with the help of your trainer to plan subsequent training programs
Feeding : an hour and a half, two hours before training: light or balanced dish or snack, with the right amount of complex carbohydrates, proteins, and fats, without exaggerating with the latter.
Remember to keep yourself well hydrated during training by drinking plenty of water and possibly, if you lose a lot of fluids with sweating, supplementing with a little mineral salts.
After training, continue to drink plenty of water and allow at least one hour to pass before taking solid food.
At dinner he consumes a lot of vegetables, a bit of cereal and a good quantity of meat or fish.
Integration: better to improve your eating habits first (see: Food advice). At this point I believe that any integration, beyond the aforementioned mineral salts, would be superfluous.
If you do not consume enough protein you could possibly supplement with branched amino acids, to be taken before and after training or with whey protein.
If you do not consume enough fruit and vegetables you could possibly integrate with a multivitamico, to be taken in the morning, for breakfast.
If you trust scientific research in many cases funded by the same supplement companies and whose results are not validated by the international scientific community; if you want to stuff yourself with pills at any time of the day; then go to some supplement stores and you will find a myriad of supplements, which if anything, will make you lighter during training given the conspicuous decrease in the volume of your wallet.
Sincerely
