OK. I’ve finally given in and have decided to resort to indoor exercise. I also recognise that riding my bike alone isn’t giving me a balanced workout.

So, I’m going to head to the work gym at midday (three times a week)and spend 30 minutes doing some upper body weights.

Suggestions please..!

A few pints of heavy down the pub?

if you are only doing three times a week,

1. chest & arms
2. chest & arms
3. chest & arms

Supersets – ideally alternating upper to lower body compound exercises.
If you don’t want to do legs, superset between ‘push’ and ‘pull’ exercises.

Do not, I repeat DO NOT, just do chest & arms!

you also needs to do some abs work and lower back to strengthen your core muscles

I’d do a quick weights circuit

personally i’m a fan of compound exercises (Involve more than 1 muscle)

bench press, deadlifts, squats. These are far, far better then doing isolated bicep curls etc as they force you to to recruit other muscles to balance

3 days a week?

Do 1 of squat, deadlift and bench on each day.

Supplement that with bodyweight stuff like chins, dips, press ups and whatever you like to do for abs.

Don’t arse around with a dedicated warm up, stretching etc – just do a few sets of the bar and very light weights to get going.

TSY – fancy expanding on what supersets are?

TBH, I’ve always just played sport/ridden my bike and never paid any attention to weight lifting of any sort.

Oh, and for me “upper body” means “above the legs”.

and yes.. don’t overwork 1 muscle group. Guy at work used to constantly do chest and arms. He had to go see a physio after a year as he was getting terrible shoulder and back pain. Turns out he had built up massive muscle imbalance and his back muscles were really weak in comparison.

He was given workouts to strengthen these and he’s been fine ever since

Why only work the upper body?

<soapbox>
I see this so often. Guys with massive upper bodies and puny legs that can hardly hold them upright. What they fail to realise is the whole body needs to be balanced and the most important thing is a strong foundation (the legs)

An Outline of the Lance Armstrong Workout 2010

Why only work the upper body?

I commute a round trip of 34 miles to work by bike. Legs are well taken care of.

i’ve never done much with my legs as i thought that biking was the best exercise for them and i wonder if bulking up with weights is helpful or could cause problems or at least unnecesary weight /bulk

Work on you core with freeweights?

Uesd to do a 20min plan that you only do 2-3 times a week, which along side a good eating plan, gained me some noticable results.

Worth reading up on Mike Mentzer & MMF, plus his book of healty eating, not dieting 😉

Lost over a stone and a half using this plan.

If you want a copy, I have it here somewhere, let us know.

My current workout:

Warm-up: bag work, sit-ups etc – 5 minutes.

Monday
Bench Press superset Pull-downs 6×6

Tuesday
Deadlift superset Shoulder-press 6×6

Wednesday
Tricep Press superset Narrow reverse grip Pull-downs 6×6

Thursday
Squats 6×10

Friday
Bicep curls superset Skull crushers 6×10

Notes

Superset 6×6: 6 sets of 6 reps. Do the first exercise, rest for a minute then do the next one. Repeat. Don’t go to failure – pick a weight you can do 8-10 reps with on the first set.

Bench Press: Regular bench press. (Alternative exercise: pec deck)
Pull-downs: Wide grip, regular grip (palms facing away). Pull to upper chest.
Deadlift: Dealift grip (one hand palm facing away, the other facing towards).
Shoulder-press: Standing with wide grip, lowered infront of face to below chin.
Tricep Press: As bench press but narrower than shoulder width grip lowered to lower chest.
Narrow reverse grip Pull-downs: Narrow grip with palms facing towards body. Pull to lower chest. (Alternative exercise: low pulley rows)
Bicep curls: Regular curls.
Skull crushers: Lie on bench, narrow grip facing away, lower to forehead. (Alternative exercise: tricep pushdowns)

6×10: Straight 6 sets of 10 reps. Plenty of rest between sets.
Squats: Regular squats below the horizontal.

EDIT: for a 3 day week drop my ‘Wednesday’ and ‘Friday’ workouts or if you really don’t want to train legs (which is a mistake) drop ‘Thursday’ and ‘Friday’ instead

Supersets – Alternate between 2 (or even 3) exercises. Instead of sitting about resting between sets of 1 exercise, you do a different exercise.

Eg –

Set 1 x3
Benchpress
Deadlift
Sit ups

Set 2 x3
Chin ups
Squats
Sit ups

Set 3 x3

Flys
Bent over rows
Shoulder press

I’m a big fan of working the core muscles as well. don’t neglect these

very important for cycling

all this is wearing me out, time for a cake

I commute a round trip of 34 miles to work by bike. Legs are well taken care of.

That depends. You’ll be getting a mainly aerobic workout by cycling to work. Gym workouts can develop more strength and explosive power

Excellent pointers, cheers guys.

And yes, core strnght is something I really need to work on.

Yes phil, you’re young, you can get away with it!

Arms now ache, and holding a pen is a challenge. 😳

A quick routine completed in 30 mins:

Weights (using machine – v few freeweights in the gym at work)

Bench press (vertical) and pull downs 3 x 10 of each
Tricep pull downs and bicep curls 3 x 10 of each

Core exercises:

Plank – 10s x 5
Plank walkout x 5 (last rep held 10s)
Bridge x 15
Back extension x 15
Chair 1 x30s