Smith Machine shenannegans

edit: I'm aware that the formatting of this text SUCKS. I'm not a big fan of Blogger's text editing tools, and though I know enough HTML to go fix it, it would take too much time. I've tweaked it enough to be mostly readable. Leave a comment if you have problems with it.

There's a Smith Machine in virtually every commercial gym in the Western World. Some consider this a sign that the Smith Machine is a worthwhile and valuable piece of exercise equipment. This is not the case. Remember those vibrating belt machines from the 1950's or so? They were in every gym in the US, and they did absolutely nothing but make you jiggle while standing still. (See picture at the bottom of this post.)

The Smith Machine is in exactly the same position: widely used, easily recognizable... and completely useless.

"But wait," you say, "I've heard that the Smith Machine is a great way to do Squats, Bench Press, and other exercises when you don't have a spotter."

NOT TRUE. Like any machine, the Smith Machine is inferior to free weights in many ways:

Safety

Many people think that the Smith Machine is a safer alternative to barbell exercises, but this is not the case. The Smith Machine might feel safer, but the fixed bar path actually makes many exercises more dangerous.

The most obvious example is the Bench Press. With free weights, there are a number of ways to get out of a failed rep without a spotter. In a worst-case scenario, when the bar is on your chest and you absolutely cannot lift it off, you could lean to one side until the weights fell off to free yourself. If the same situation arose in a Smith Machine, the bar is held in place, so your only option is to scream for help and/or wait to die as the weight slowly crushes you. Your call.

Some people think Squatting is safer in the Smith Machine, as well. This guy probably used to think so, too:

This wouldn't have happened with free weights, because he would've felt his balance shifting when the weight was too far forward and compensated by taking a step forward.

Injury

The Smith Machine's primary characteristic is that it removes the need to stabilize the weight while lifting. This means that the stabilizing muscles that you would normally use through a range of motion are not used and therefore are not strengthened. This leads to strength imbalances which can, in turn, lead to injuries.

In extreme cases, the primary movers can become so strong in relation to the stabilizing muscles that they contract with enough force to literally tear those stabilizing muscles. To return to the Bench Press example, the pectoral muscles could become much, much stronger than the stabilizing muscles in the shoulder, leading to recurring shoulder injuries. Not a good thing.

The Ego Boost

The Smith machine will artificially inflate your numbers. If you regularly perform your Bench Press workout with 155 pounds with free weights, you can easily add another 30-50 pounds on in a Smith Machine. Conversely, if you bench 155 in a smith machine, you'll have problems lifting 125 with free weights.

Strength built with free weights translates readily to movements done in the Smith Machine. Strength built on a Smith Machine does NOT translate to free weights, or real-world strength.

Look, we're exercising!

Uses for the Smith Machine

Despite what I've said above, the Smith Machine is not completely useless. It makes an excellent adjustable chin-up bar (scroll down to Step 2) or inverted row station, and the loons over at T-nation thought up a few more uses, as well.

A good rule of thumb for using the Smith Machine: if the exercise involves you moving and the bar staying still (chin-ups, inverted rows, etc.), then you can use the Smith Machine. If the exercise involves the bar moving at all (Squat, Press, Bench Press, Deadlift, etc.), then STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM THE SMITH MACHINE.

Lessons Learned Thus Far

I've learned a lot since I started actually recording my workouts and trying to learn as much as possible about lifting three months ago. Looking back, it's almost comical how little I knew when I started. I'm sure that, 3 months from now, it'll be comical to look back on how little I know right now. But here are a few of the highlights of what I've learned:

1 - Lifting weights doesn't build muscle. Recovery builds muscle.

That's the biggest mistake I made when starting out in September -- I took a 3-day a week program, looked at my schedule and said "4 days a week works better for me," and proceeded to transform a well-organized program into something that almost ran me into the ground on a couple of occasions.

Working out tears up your muscle and makes you weaker than you were before. Your body then repairs the damage and adds a little more muscle and strength on top (supercompensation). It is this rebuilding process makes you stronger, and if you don't give it enough time to occur between workouts, you'll end up overtraining to some degree.

Maximize your recovery between workouts by spacing your workouts 24-72 hours apart, eating right (pay special attention to getting enough protein -- roughly 1g per pound of bodyweight per day) and getting plenty of sleep.


2 - For strength in non-elite athletes, isolation is basically useless.

Want to get strong? Stop the bicep curls. Now. Seriously. Put those 30-lb dumbbells down and do some pullups. If you want to get stronger, you have to use compound exercises that work multiple joints and muscle groups, because that's the way your body is designed. In the real world, bicep strength isn't important -- pulling strength is. Tricep strength isn't important -- pushing strength is.

Isolation exercises work muscles in a way that you'll never actually use them -- alone and without regard to strengthening the rest of the musculature that would contribute to pushing, pulling, lifting, dragging or carrying heavy stuff. Compound movements work all muscles involved in a certain motion in the proportion to which those muscles contribute to that motion. That leads to a high level of balanced, functional strength.


3 - You are what you eat.

We exercise buffs rarely admit this publicly, but what you eat is possibly more important than how you exercise when it comes to how you look. If you want to look like a fat slob, eat like a fat slob: twinkies, doritos, cheesburgers, etc. If you want to look like you're fit, eat like you're fit: veggies, fruit, lean meat, whole grains.

Diet also has a big impact on performance. If you want to be as "strong" as Kate Moss, eat like Kate Moss: celery, water, water, celery and water. If you want to be as strong as a powerlifter, eat like a powerlifter: meat, eggs, milk, and veggies.

Yes, it's important to train hard in order to get stronger or look better. But if you don't give your body the right "raw materials" to use in recovery (see #1), then your results will be less than optimal.


4 - A training partner is essential.

I don't have a regular, every-day training partner. And I don't mind it -- I like being able to do my own thing in the gym and not worry about keeping someone else happy. But I do have a roommate who trains with me once or twice a week, and having him there has been invaluable to my progress. He keeps an eye on my form, helps keep me motivated, and keeps me honest when I'm tired and start trying to cheat a little bit on the last few reps.

If you can't get somebody to work out with you at least some of the time, invest in a video camera. Video a few of your workouts so that you can see what you're doing and spot any weaknesses or technique flaws. Post the videos online and ask for tips or advice. It'll act as both motivation and a chance to learn.


5 - I love this crap.

I thought I liked working out before, when I did so with no real plan and with no real attention to what I was doing. But now that I'm learning as much as I can, keeping track of what I'm doing and trying to make educated, practical decisions about what I need to do in order to improve, I'm having twice as much fun as I was before. Seeing my progress (or lack thereof) and finding ways to improve or fix problems is an incredibly satisfying experience for me.


Based on what I've learned over the past months, I'll be starting a new and improved program next week. I'll be lifting 3x a week instead of 4, so I'll have adequate recovery time between sessions. I'll be refining my exercise selection in order to meet specific goals and hopefully facilitate slightly shorter, more intense workouts. I'll be adding some general conditioning twice a week in the form of Crossfit.

Early this week, I'll test some maxes and goof around. I'll do whatever I can figure out for workouts while traveling for Thanksgiving. Then next week the fun starts! Here's hoping that I've got a better grip on what I'm doing this time than I did last time!

Good Carbs!

I didn't lift yesterday. I forgot that I had a meeting after work until 8, and I'd already arranged to go out with friends at 8:30, which if I hadn't had that silly meeting, would have given me plenty of time to go home, work out and shower. D'oh!

But it's not all bad. I'll get a bit of rest, which I'm beginning to suspect is the missing element in my current program. Hopefully the extra rest will help me fix my Squat problems on Thursday.

Since I have no workout to report, let me ramble for a bit about nutrition. A few months ago, I was of the opinion that nutrition was unimportant and what really mattered was working hard in the gym. Boy was I wrong. Working hard in the gym matters. A lot. But nutrition is probably even more important.

Since about a month ago, I've been basing my diet on the paleo diet. The basic idea is this: only eat things that, in theory, you could go outside, pick up off of the ground (or out of the water) and eat. This means that pretty much all meat is ok, most veggies, fruits, and nuts. But no bread, pasta, potatoes, legumes, dairy or processed food.

Some people would call this a low-carb diet. I disagree. It's not a low-carb diet, it's a good-carb diet. Let me explain what I mean by this.

From the time I was a kid up until I took bread, pasta, etc. out of my diet, I would become very emotionally and psychologically unstable if I was hungry. If I hadn't eaten in a few hours, I was either on top of the world or I hated it. Something as small as stubbing my toe or thinking about having to go to school the next day could send me from one end of the spectrum to the other in seconds. I learned to control it by eating often and making sure that I always had food close to hand. My stomach literally controlled my mood, and to an extent, my life.

Now I realize that this pattern was the result of a post-carb crash. Traditional high-carb foods such as bread, pasta, rice and potatoes cause a big spike in blood sugar after you eat them. Most of my meals would be full of whole grains, pasta, rice, potatoes, etc., which would spike my blood sugar levels and make me feel good for a couple of hours. Then, as my body released insulin, my blood sugar levels would plummet and I'd be moody. Since I started avoiding these foods, I've noticed that my mood is much, much less dependent on the state of my stomach, because I avoid blood sugar spikes and the lows that come after them.

So what makes the carbs from bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, etc. "bad" and other carbs "good?" Well, the good carbs, those that come from veggies, fruits, nuts, milk, etc., promote a slow, long-lasting boost in blood sugar levels instead of the spike that comes from eating the bad carbs found in bread, pasta, etc.

A carb source's status as "good" or "bad" is determined by its rating on the glycemic index:

• Low glycemic index = slow, long-lasting blood sugar boost = good
• High glycemic index = fast blood sugar spike = bad

Following a diet that has a relatively low glycemic index has been shown to reduce the likelihood of diabetes, heart disease, obesity and other conditions. Also, you avoid what I call the "after lunch nap syndrome," where you feel lazy and tired after meals. By getting my carbs from fruit, veggies, nuts, and other low glycemic index sources, I've found that my energy level stays higher throughout the day, I no longer get moody when I haven't eaten, and I don't get tired in the afternoon or early evening like I used to. I'm not eliminating carbs; I'm just being picky about my sources.

So this isn't a low-carb diet because I'm not trying to minimize the amount of carbs I eat. Instead, I'm cutting out carbohydrate sources with a high glycemic index, and only eating the good carbs. On this diet, I average 170-200g of carbs a day, which, while it is below the 271g recommended by the USDA, is more than enough to keep my body properly fueled. (I personally don't think much of the USDA's dietary recommendations, anyway, but that's another post.) As a result, I feel better, I'm healthier (I think), and my stomach no longer controls my mood. I call that a win.

Why you should always lift fast

There are a lot of different ideas out there about lifting speeds. Some people tell you to lift slow, some say lift fast. Some particularly power-mad coaches will even try to prescribe the exact amount of time for the eccentric (lowering) and concentric (raising) portions of the lift, as well as the amount of time you should pause between each.

The slow rep or precisely timed methods might work for advanced bodybuilders who have decades of high-level training under their belts and who don't care how strong they are as long as you can see the definition in their pecs. For anyone other than a professional bodybuilder, there is one speed you should go: fast.

Why should you go fast? Power. Whip out your old high school physics book, and you'll find the following equation:
We can tell from this equation that the longer you take to perform a given task (the "work" part of the equation), the less power you are producing. So a lifter who takes 1 second to complete a rep of with 200 pounds is producing much more power than a lifter who takes 3 seconds to complete one rep with the same weight.

So it takes more power to lift faster. Using more power in your workout means you're building more power. Simple enough.

Why should I care about power, you ask? I'll tell you why. Power is basically the real-world application of strength. Pure strength is isometric, when you're exerting force but nothing is moving. Power is dynamic, when you're exerting force to accelerate or decelerate an object. So while pure strength might enable you to hold 300 pounds overhead, you'll need lots of power to move the weight from the floor to overhead.

There's another reason you should lift fast. Lifting weights at a certain speed builds strength at that speed AND ALL SLOWER SPEEDS. Train fast and you'll be able to lift heavier weights slow. Train slow, and you'll still be able to lift slow, but you won't be building power like you would lifting fast.

Now a bit of qualification: don't pick a super light weight and throw it around as fast as you can. You should lift fast, but controlled. Never lift so fast that you're in danger of throwing the weight away from you or your form breaks down. If you can go that fast, you're not using enough weight! You should lift like you're trying to throw the bar up in the air, but if you find that you're actually almost succeeding in doing so, add some weight to the bar.

How to escape from a bench press gone bad

I usually train alone. Sometimes I have a roommate with me to help out, but I'm usually by myself for at least 2 of my 4 workouts every week. Recently, someone emailed Mehdi at stronglifts.com asking about bench pressing when alone -- he trained alone and didn't feel comfortable using free weights for the bench press without a spotter.

I used to be in the same boat. I would stop sets of bench press early if I felt tired or if the reps started feeling hard. This kept me from being stranded under the bar with nobody to help, but also prevented me from working as hard as I should at the exercise. So, I figured out a way to escape from a failed bench press.

If I'm bench pressing and can't complete a rep, I return the bar to my chest, push it down to my hips, and sit up. I then move the bar onto my thighs, stand up holding the bar, and place it on the bench. With the bar safely on the bench, I can easily remove some weight and/or return it to the rack.

This technique won't work if you're going for a single rep max, but I can do it easily with the weight I use for my workouts. It also isn't a replacement for a spotter -- if you have somebody who can spot for you, let them do so! But if you have to train alone, you can use this technique to get out from under the bar if you can't complete a rep.

If for some reason you're in a situation where you can't complete the rep and you also can't move the bar to your waist, you have one last-ditch option: dump the weight.

First, you'll need to make sure NOT to use clips on the barbell. To dump the weight, return the bar to your chest and slowly lean to one side until the weights on that side of the barbell slide off. You'll then be jerked back the other way by the weight on the other end of the bar, and those will slide off, as well. It's not a pleasant experience, and I wouldn't recommend it unless you're really in a bind, but it's better than lying there with 200 lbs on your chest until somebody happens to stroll by.

Again, neither of these techniques can replace a good spotter. If you have the option, always have someone spot for you. But if you're in a situation where you have no spotter and you need to get out from under a bench press gone bad, these techniques will do the job.

Just to be sure nobody will sue me: You are solely responsible for your actions. Use your head -- don't do anything just because some dude on the internet said it was ok. It's definitely possible that using these techniques could increase your chance of injury. Personally, if I was looking for a way to feel safe while benching alone, I'd use a light weight to practice rolling the bar down to my waist and sitting up until I felt confident I could handle it, and then I'd go for that extra rep when I didn't have a spotter around. But don't do anything you're uncomfortable with just because I say I'd do it; I'm just some dude on the internet.

Form on the Bent Over Barbell Row

If you're completely new to the Bent Over Barbell Row, here's a video showing the exercise. (Note: you don't have to rest the barbell on the floor between reps, but you can if you want to.)

Bent Over Barbell Row has been tough for me to figure out. On the surface, it looks like a pretty easy lift: grab a barbell at shin height, bend your knees slightly, keep your back parallel to the floor and pull the bar to your upper abs.

But it's not quite that simple. I've been working on it regularly for the past 3 weeks and am just now getting comfortable with the form. Here's what I've learned so far.

1. A stable platform is paramount. Keep your feet a little bit wider than shoulder width and keep your legs strong. If your knees are shaking during the lift, widen your stance and push through your heels almost like you're Squatting. Make sure to keep your lower back straight during the lift. If you can't keep your lower back straight, the weight's too heavy.
   
   
2. Keep a relatively narrow grip. Intuitively, it seems like a wide grip would be better for working your whole back, but this is not the case. A grip that's right about shoulder width with give you the best range of motion in your shoulders and stimulate the most muscle recruitment in your back.
   
   
3. Pull to your upper abs - NOT your chest. Try this: stand up and put your arms straight out in front of you. Now pull your hands in towards you while keeping your elbows close to your body. Your hands will end up just below your chest, at your upper abs. That's your natural path of motion, so that's where you should be aiming.
   
   
4. Focus on the shoulderblades. This is the tip that really brought my form together. At the bottom of the movement, your shoulder blades should slide slightly forward towards the floor. Start the motion by pulling your shoulder blades back. This should be a strong starting motion (but not a jerk), and you should feel that the movement of your shoulder blades is what's moving the weight all the way from the bottom up until the bar's touching your upper abs. DO NOT start the movement with your elbows or biceps, or by shrugging your shoulders.
   
   
5. Your secondary focus is the elbows. As the bar approaches your upper abs, continue pulling with your shoulder blades and think about using them to pull your elbows as far up towards the ceiling as possible, like wings. This will help you involve all of the muscles of your upper back for a really effective lift.
   

Don't be afraid to go light until you get the form right. It's much safer, and better for your strength in the long run, to go light until you get it right than to go too heavy before you know what you're doing.

Why I lift

I lift to get stronger. I'm not a powerlifter; I don't care about how much weight is on the bar, except as a measure of how much I'm improving. I want to get real-life stronger. Moving couches, carrying suitcases, helping friends, intimidating potential muggers.

I lift to look better. Let's face it, everybody who works out wants to look better, even if that's not their primary motivation. I like the fact that people think of me as in shape, physically capable and, in some cases, attractive.

I lift to be healthy. Healthiness has been important to me for a long time. My Dad had a heart attack when I was young, and ever since, my family has eaten healthy. My Mom takes walks every afternoon before dinner, and my Dad gets up and goes to the gym before work. That's one of the many great things my parents have done for me -- show me by example how to live a healthy life.

I lift because it's something I can control. It doesn't matter what else is going on in my life. My best friend could be dead, my girlfriend could be a promiscuous cokehead, my business partner could be a clinically depressed double amputee and my mother could be dying of cancer, (I'm watching Forrest Gump, can you tell?) but none of that matters in the gym. All that matters is I show up and I work as hard as I can. If I do that, I'll succeed. I'll get stronger, I'll look better and I'll be healthier. That's a kind of control I don't have in the "real" world.

I lift because it's fun. Maybe I'm weird, but I get a kick out of moving heavy stuff around in the gym. It's like a little competition against myself. If you're playing Nintendo, you try to beat the next level. When I'm playing in the gym, I try to master the next amount of weight on the bar.

But mainly, I lift because if I don't, I'll have nothing to do after work but sit on my butt and watch TV.

On sticking to the plan

I recently realized that a big weakness of my workouts for the past couple of years has been a lack of intensity. More specifically, I would give myself a pass on half-assing a particular set by telling myself I'd make up for it by adding another set or another exercise to the end of my workout. This had the double effect of making my workouts longer and decreasing the effectiveness of each individual exercise I was doing.

I realized this because I am now working off of a set plan, where I perform a specific number of sets with a specific number of repetitions in each set. This framework takes away my ability to say to myself "that set was kind of lazy, I'll make up for it at the end of the workout." Now I have to approach every set and every rep with the attitude of working as hard as I can and maximizing my intensity.

This has really improved the quality of my workouts. With no way to make up for a bad set, I just have to make sure I don't have bad sets. Sure, there will be days when I'm not able to do as many reps or as much weight as I'd like, but as long as I approach every exercise with the attitude that I'm going to give this exercise every ounce of effort and intensity that I have, I'll end up with a darn good workout.

So, even when I'm done with this program, I'll always go into the gym with a clearly defined plan for which exercises I'll do, how many sets I'll perform and how many reps in each set. That'll keep me from making excuses for myself and give me the focus I need to get the best workout possible.

Why free weights are better than machines

Tuesday at the gym, one of my roommates was having trouble with form on the Bent Over Barbell Row. Frustrated after a few unsuccessful tries, he said something to the effect of, "This is stupid. We should be using machines, anyway. They're better because they let you use more weight."

I've been lifting for almost 10 years. I'm not a certified personal trainer or fitness expert, but I have a pretty darn good idea of what I'm doing in the gym. Everything I've read, everyone I've talked to, and all of my experience tells me that, outside of a few specific scenarios, free weights are far superior to machines.

Free weight exercises work more muscles than machine exercises. Think about the bench press. You push against the bar or machine handles by contracting your chest and triceps, thus lifting the weight. You use the same primary muscles, whether you use free weights or machines. But with free weights, you also use your shoulders, biceps, back, core and even your legs to balance the bar and keep yourself in position on the bench. Using more muscles = building more strength.

So free weights help strengthen supporing muscles, whereas machines do not. This translates to more real-world strength. If you're helping a friend move a couch to his third-floor apartment, the stairs won't come equipped with guide rails or pulleys to make the job easier. You'll have to use your stabilizing muscles to support the weight of your body and the couch, and if you've been working out solely on weight machines, they won't be up to the task.

By controlling your motion during the exercise, machines prevent you from developing proper form in your lifts. This may not seem important at first, but think of the couch example again. If you've trained your body to push up against a weight while balancing with no outside support, then you'll be able to move the couch safely and easily. If, on the other hand, you're used to being able to just push willy-nilly against the bar without a thought for balance or alignment, then your body isn't trained to balance itself under the weight of the couch, and down you go.

Some people, like my roommate, think that machines build more muscle because they let you use more weight. Intuitively, this seems to be a solid argument. But weight machines control the motion of the weight you're moving and allow you to cheat by pushing at an angle slightly different from the angle at which the handle or bar is actually moving when you get tired. This means that you can do more weight on machines, but you're not working your targeted muscles any harder than you would be by doing free weights.

To conclude: working out with free weights develops supporting muscles, balance and form, whereas working out with machines does not. Using free weights also allows you to use less weight while working your muscles as hard or harder than you would on a machine, which means you have a lower risk of injury or overtraining on free weights than you do with machines.

Machines are not evil. They can be useful in some scenarios -- for people who aren't strong enough to support themselves on a movement without assistance, for beginners who need to build a little confidence before moving on to free weights, for rehab of a specific joint or muscle, etc. But for building strength and overall fitness, machines can't hold a candle to good ol' free weights.