Body types, Body shape, Training & Diet

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Body types & Diet

The body types are a scientific classification of a person's body shape determined by physical characteristics. Genetics determine our body types and hence the body shape we develop from birth through to adulthood. We cannot change our body type we can only make the most of what mother nature gave us. Getting the most out of our body types depends on our diet and exercise regimen.

There are 3 basic categories of body types:

Endomorph

Ectomorph

Mesomorph

Endomorph Body Types are often characterised with big bones, round face, large trunk and thighs and a naturally high degree of body fat, especially around the midsection. Endomorphs usually struggle to control their weight although it may simply mean more determination is needed for an endomorph to lose as much weight as a mesomorph.

Mesomorph Body Types are characterised with broad shoulders, narrow waist, naturally large muscles and fast metabolism due to the amount of lean muscle. For men a mesomorph looks like a natural muscle man with a heavy, hard and athletic physique.

Ectomorph Body Types are characterised with a thin, linear appearance. They often possess narrow waist, hips and shoulders. The ectomorph also has a low body fat percentage. An Ectomorph body type may be considered lucky to some people because their linear appearance and ultra fast metabolism enables the ectomorph to stay slim even if they eat well, however the downfall is ectomorphs lack shape due to their low muscle weight. Lean muscle weight is what gives us that shapely figure.

Very small number of us are purely 1 of the body type. For myself, i won't be a complete ectomorph. I am a mixture of mesomorph/ectomorph, it will just depend which side i'm closer to.

There's no 1 diet which will suit everyone. But generally, a good diet will show progress for everyone. We just have to tweak a little bit of a "good diet" in order to get the best progress.

Generally for meso, you are blessed. For ecto, we can afford to eat more carbs. For endo, have to be very strict about carbs intake.

Body Shape & Training
Our body shape is determined by our genes. I'll talk about chest & calves here.

People say that doing bench press will make your chest bigger & doing chest fly will "push" your chest towards midline of body so that you can get a nicer "cleavage" for guys.

I disagree with this. How our muscle shaped largely depend on genes.

2 guys with different genes, but with identical workout and diet, can get different shape for their chest.

Ok, i'm having a hard time trying to convey my idea down here.

Basically, when people approaches you in the gym and advises you what to do? Don't believe everything that you hear. They may say "twist here or there" to get better development. Sometimes it's real, because of the movement, but they are crap most of the time.

Shoulder press v Arnold press
Both train shoulders. Both are similiar vertical push movement but you have your arm twisting for A.press. Yeah i agree that Arnold is definitely big, but well, bodybuilders have their own kind of trainings which is not suitable for all of us. By doing A.press, you are sacrificing your elbow health. Muscle hypertrophy for both press should not differ much. For myself, i get more muscle hypertrophy with normal shoulder press. :D

Conclusion: Stick to basic compound movement, you should do fine.

Regarding calves, i admit that i seldom train my calves. That explain for the huge underdevelopment as compared to my thighs. I can only blame myself.

I heard people (ladies especially) that they get "BIG" calves when they jog. Let me tell you this, if getting big calves is so easily attainable by jogging, why is my calves so small when i sprint quite a lot?

You have big calves because of your genes.

But to those people with "small calves genes", don't give up. With proper training, it's possible to get decent calves. Everything is possible when training and diet are correct. Just that it's pretty tough to get monsterous calves with poor genes though.

ps: never resort to steroid though, unless you have 100% knowledge about drugs.

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