Full body workout with limited bench?

[chumpy]

Hello everyone. After finding this site a year ago and seeing the progress John Stone had made in only a few months, I got motivated and decided to change my life. I was pretty much a wreck. I knew nothing about nutrition, portion sizes, or calories. I weighed in back then at 263 pounds.

Well, long story short, I'm here today happy to say I've lost ~80 pounds and now weigh 184 pounds. I didn't follow a particular diet, or time my meals or eat six a day (however I'm sure I would be seeing even better results if I had). That stuff really doesn't work for me. I simply just started cutting back on crap and eating healthy while watching calories. And to my suprise, eating healthy wasn't even hard. Of course, there's always random nights that I decide to go to a restaurant with friends, so those are really my only cheats. We never have any junk food in my house like chips or cookies, so there's really no room to cheat at home, and if I need a snack I usually just grab a banana.

Quick stats:
Age: 20
Height: 6'3
Weight 184 lb

Of course, I made mistakes along the way. I barely did any weight training. I have a weight bench and occasionally would throw some weights around but nothing ever serious. I work at a grocery store and my job is pretty physical (I unload boxes, pull pallets, carry crates of milk, walk around a lot, blah blah) so thats really been all the "weight training" I've been getting.

At 184 pounds I still have a pretty high body fat % (I can tell, I've never measured though).

Anyway, I really want to begin weight training, because after looking in the mirror I can start to see how my body could shape up from lifting. I also want to lose more weight. My goal right now is to get to 170 pounds, but eventually I'd like to weigh around 160-165. My goal in all this was to just get thin and slender. I don't want to bulk up and have huge muscles or anything, just be thin (I know I know "you wont suddenly be big and bulky from weightlifting" but I cant help think it sometimes, haha).

I want to do a full body workout, three times a week. Like I said before, I have a bench. It is pretty limited though. When I got the bench way back last year it came with a defect and the pole for pull-downs wouldn't fit properly onto the bench, so I cant use that. So basically I have this bench, a barbell, weights, and two 10 pound dumbbells.

I'm not experienced on exercises and I've been looking around at several workout plans but a lot seem to incorporate exercises where the pull-down bar (I dont know the correct term here) is used. Basically what I'm looking for is someone to suggest a full body routine that can be performed using the equipment that I have. (Also let me note for my cardio I do 20-30 minutes Sunday-Thursday, and I'll probably be doing weight training on M,W,F)

I'll answer any other questions you have if you need more info.

Any suggestions?

[rtestes]

Originally Posted by chumpy

Hello everyone. After finding this site a year ago and seeing the progress John Stone had made in only a few months, I got motivated and decided to change my life. I was pretty much a wreck. I knew nothing about nutrition, portion sizes, or calories. I weighed in back then at 263 pounds.

Well, long story short, I'm here today happy to say I've lost ~80 pounds and now weigh 184 pounds. I didn't follow a particular diet, or time my meals or eat six a day (however I'm sure I would be seeing even better results if I had). That stuff really doesn't work for me. I simply just started cutting back on crap and eating healthy while watching calories. And to my suprise, eating healthy wasn't even hard. Of course, there's always random nights that I decide to go to a restaurant with friends, so those are really my only cheats. We never have any junk food in my house like chips or cookies, so there's really no room to cheat at home, and if I need a snack I usually just grab a banana.

Quick stats:
Age: 20
Height: 6'3
Weight 184 lb

Of course, I made mistakes along the way. I barely did any weight training. I have a weight bench and occasionally would throw some weights around but nothing ever serious. I work at a grocery store and my job is pretty physical (I unload boxes, pull pallets, carry crates of milk, walk around a lot, blah blah) so thats really been all the "weight training" I've been getting.

At 184 pounds I still have a pretty high body fat % (I can tell, I've never measured though).

Anyway, I really want to begin weight training, because after looking in the mirror I can start to see how my body could shape up from lifting. I also want to lose more weight. My goal right now is to get to 170 pounds, but eventually I'd like to weigh around 160-165. My goal in all this was to just get thin and slender. I don't want to bulk up and have huge muscles or anything, just be thin (I know I know "you wont suddenly be big and bulky from weightlifting" but I cant help think it sometimes, haha).

I want to do a full body workout, three times a week. Like I said before, I have a bench. It is pretty limited though. When I got the bench way back last year it came with a defect and the pole for pull-downs wouldn't fit properly onto the bench, so I cant use that. So basically I have this bench, a barbell, weights, and two 10 pound dumbbells.

I'm not experienced on exercises and I've been looking around at several workout plans but a lot seem to incorporate exercises where the pull-down bar (I dont know the correct term here) is used. Basically what I'm looking for is someone to suggest a full body routine that can be performed using the equipment that I have. (Also let me note for my cardio I do 20-30 minutes Sunday-Thursday, and I'll probably be doing weight training on M,W,F)

I'll answer any other questions you have if you need more info.

Any suggestions?

Take a look at this exercise program. read the article and followon discussion. You might check walmart and yard sales for new bench and more weight, it is cheap way. You could use 25 or 30 lb dumbbells. and some plates for your barbell. you are still a big boy at 184lbs.

You know you could easily carry 195 at 6'3" if you put form to your body. But everybody to their kick, I suppose. At 160, you would be mighty skinny. Did you make a mistake and mean 5'3"?

Welcome to forum.

[goonie]

Nice work on taking control of your body, and continuing to want more.

You might want to think about posting a current picture of yourself, and another picture of someone else who poses an ideal look you'd like to see your body take on in some way.

If your height is right, I seriously doubt you want to weigh 165 lbs. You're going to make a world class marathon runner look heavy at that weight.

I understand you're not looking to gain a lot of muscle, but you have it exactly right in that this will never happen without extremely specific execution, and desire. It's nearly impossible to gain at a rate that exceeds what you have established in your mind as ideal. Telling everyone to gain as fast as possible actually works out to be pretty good advice because of the amount of time it takes, and the natural governing that occurs within each of our own minds, which in turn affects our actions.

I'd bet there's a good chance if we could visually demonstate how your body would look at 180-185 lbs, you'd pick it over the 165 lb look.

Don't get ahead of yourself with the numbers though, because they don't really matter in the end. Attaining the body you want staring you back in the mirror is more important, regardless of how the math shakes out.

If you have a barbell set but without a squat rack, I'd recommend learning how to safely power clean the barbell to your shoulders so you can work front squats for legs. This is a good exercise in and of itself for total body development anyway.

If you can safely press the bar to your back (and return it to the front), this will open up even more exercises.

No real loss on the lat pulldown station; a pull-up bar using your bodyweight is going to be a more effective exercise anyway. They're cheap enough to install at home, or you can probably find a park/school that has one.

[jediMaster]

Originally Posted by chumpy

I want to do a full body workout, three times a week. Like I said before, I have a bench. It is pretty limited though. When I got the bench way back last year it came with a defect and the pole for pull-downs wouldn't fit properly onto the bench, so I cant use that. So basically I have this bench, a barbell, weights, and two 10 pound dumbbells.

I'm not experienced on exercises and I've been looking around at several workout plans but a lot seem to incorporate exercises where the pull-down bar (I dont know the correct term here) is used. Basically what I'm looking for is someone to suggest a full body routine that can be performed using the equipment that I have.

Check out this site:
http://www.exrx.net/Lists/Directory.html

It shows tons of exercises using a variety of setups. Just go to the different muscle groups and look for the barbell and dumbbell listed ones. Pick at least one exercise for each major body group and you've got yourself a full body workout.