50 Bro-Friendly Workout Tips To Help You Decrease Gains
Has your motivation and progression stagnated in the gym recently? If so, fret not! Employ these 50 bro-friendly workout tips to maximize your gains.
1) Wear a belt. For every exercise. You never know when those triceps pushdowns require extra core stabilization.
2) Wear sweatpants or track pants at all times. You’re not hiding your chicken legs, you’re just trying to keep them warm and not make everyone else look bad, because “leg day is tomorrow”.
3) Pair your sweatpants with a stringer tank top. The more hardcore logo and text on the tank top, the better.
4) Take care of your body – avoid squats and deadlifts. Everyone knows they’re bad for the knees and back.
5) Only perform partial reps. Full reps are dangerous and bad for the joints; plus, you can’t use nearly as much weight. Everyone knows that 50 plates for quarter reps on leg press is 100X more anabolic than 5 plates for full reps.
gym bro brō [broh, bruh]. A young male often negatively characterized as being a mirror-gazing, faux hawk-sporting, fan of bouncing bench press reps, Smith machines and endless bicep curling sessions, etc.
6) Perform a bicep curl variation at the end of every workout. If you don’t, your biceps might disappear.
7) It’s ok to use the pink dumbbells. It’s not the weight on the bar that matters, but the mind muscle connection. If you can get a good “squeeeeeze” out of 135 on bench then you should NEVER go higher, that’s just dangerous.
8) Ask gym patrons to throw heavy objects at you throughout the workout. This will maximize muscle confusion, which maximizes muscle growth.
9) In the gym, it’s all about the angles – bench angles, arm angles, and selfie angles. If you must sacrifice one, ensure it’s never the latter.
10) Disregard the 10 different pad settings on the adjustable bench. There’s really only 3 settings – horizontal, diagonal (ensure it’s 45 degrees – bringing your plum bob and protractor is acceptable), and vertical. Just remember, if it’s not one of those then the exercise doesn’t have a name, therefore it doesn’t exist.
11) When performing bicep curls, turn your wrist at exactly 59.47 degrees and remove your pinky maximize to bicep contractions.
12) If you use chalk, perform the LeBron James chalk toss before every set.
13) It doesn’t matter how little the bar moves; as long as the bar moves you should count it as a rep.
14) There is only one appropriate place to curl – the curl rack (don’t let those naysayers who call it a “squat rack” tell you otherwise).
15) Never rack your plates or wipe down the equipment after you’re done. That’s the job of the employees and when you’re in a Church of Iron, it’s sacrilegious to waste time with such minutiae.
16) The more pre-workout powder you consume, the better you will perform in the gym. It doesn’t matter that you’ve pulled 3 all-nighters in a row, haven’t eaten anything but Skittles in the past 24 hours, and primarily have hydrated yourself with beer. The pre-workout powder will completely override those limitations.
17) If you want to gain weight, don’t worry about calories, only worry about protein. Everyone knows that you can build mass eating 1200 calories and 400 grams of protein because muscle is made from amino acids (aka protein) and fat makes you fat.
18) Always force reps – it doesn’t matter if your bench spotter has to deadlift the bar off of your chest. You should rest assured that everyone thinks you’re badass for trying to get that extra rep and “almost having it”.
19) ALWAYS try to pick up chicks at the gym. The gym is a prime location to find ladies at their weakest and most vulnerable. Musical artist Drake paints a picture of them perfectly – “sweatpants, hair tied….no makeup on”. To maximize effectiveness I would recommend approaching the ones with headphones in, preferably mid-set, and start critiquing them or offering unsolicited advice. At first it might seem like they won’t want to hear it, but actually they’re just too nervous to ask and you’re really doing them a favor.
20) It’s best to superset multiple pieces of exercise equipment during peak hours. The gym is like a dog park, you’ve got to mark your territory with bodily fluids to assert dominance.
21) Pick one random gym patron and maintain rigid eye contact between sets for the duration of your workout. This is another crucial step in asserting gym dominance and ensuring no one uses your equipment.
22) Pick the hottest girl in the gym and structure your entire workout around the exercise equipment she’s using. You need to continuously show her how Alpha you are and it’s been scientifically proven that working out around females maximizes testosterone production.
23) Offer tips to the biggest and strongest guys in the gym. Every other Joe Gymbro asks for training advice from this crowd but you have 10 million rep points on a Bodybuilding forum and watched a YouTube video on exercise form one time.
24) It’s ok to bring Tupperware and eat a meal intra-workout. If meal 10 lands directly in between your 3-hour biceps and triceps workout, then you NEED to immediately drop the weights and consume solid food. Otherwise, you risk going catabolic and losing all of your gains since the Dawn of Time.
25) If you suck at an exercise or don’t like performing it, then completely avoid it. Some schmucks perform those exercises to bring up weaknesses but everyone knows that you should hide all weakness and showboat your strengths.
26) To maximize gym performance, choose one of the following music genres – Heavy Metal, EDM, or Gangsta Rap. If you can find an artist that combines all 3, you win! Additionally, keep the volume at 11 at all times – most people use headphones for personal enjoyment but you already enjoy the f*** out of this music and it needs to be loud enough for everyone else to appreciate.
27) If you’re training to increase force output, you can adjust two variables – mass and acceleration. I recommend picking a light weight and throwing it as far as possible. Anyone who tells you that force output isn’t high is lying to you.
28) If you don’t know what to do in between sets, find a mirror and flex. All those intra-set isometric contractions add up over time and before you know it, you’ll be eclipsing the Sun with your biceps.
29) Don’t worry about bringing a towel; you’ve got a cotton tank top that’s exceptionally absorbent. Is it a coincidence that the largest surface area of the tank top happens to be around the abs? I think not! Lift up tank top and show all the ladies your abzors.
30) Employ ONLY the following concepts during each workout – forced reps, drop sets, partial reps, and sets to complete failure. Straight sets are lame, boring, and performed by all the other Joe Gymbros.
31) Act better than every other gym patron at ALL times. Once again, you need to assert dominance and if you’re lucky, they’ll be remembering your name and clearing the way every time you walk in to the gym.
32) Use one or more of the following gym-approved conversation topics: GNC, steroids, EDM, pumps, Arnold Schwarzenegger, how much you benched last workout, your favorite protein, and that cutie on the Stairmaster.
33) Avoid cardiovascular exercise – you’re not in the gym to get better at moving your feet up and down on an endless rubber rotary from Hell (aka treadmill). You’re there to get HYOOOOGGGEEEEE.
34) Don’t ask to work in while someone else is using a piece of weight equipment, just do it. Chances are a.) They were about to be done anyways b.) They won’t be using as much weight as you and/or c.) Their form is garbage compared to your form and you’re just trying to lead by example.
35) Get or appoint yourself a gym nickname. Sure, all your “friends” know you as the one-dimensional Gym Guy or the Workout Bro, but they just don’t understand what dedication looks like, brah. You need a REAL gym nickname from those pseudo-friends you make at the gym via exercise spotting and awkward eye contact in the locker room.
36) Structure your workout routine so that you train your most important body parts (i.e. chest, arms, and abs) before going out to the bars and clubs with your buddies. Place your least favorite body part (i.e. legs) on the worst day of the week, Monday.
37) Grunt and moan before, during, and after EVERY exercise to ensure everyone knows a.) You’re still alive b.) You’re lifting “heavy” weight c.) You’re the Man. Once people step in to the gym, they immediately become hard of hearing and use sonar to visualize your surrounds. You’re actually doing noble work by being so loud.
38) Employ your resting bitch face (RBF) between sets; you’re there for YOU and no one, and I mean NO ONE should ever approach you in the gym. Heaven forbid you get distracted or lose that tunnel vision focus from your latest pre-workout.
39) Don’t bother bringing a water bottle – you can either bond with your gym buddy by borrowing his or walk to the water fountain for ONE sip between every set. However, to minimize the catabolism of cardio, try to select gym equipment as close to the water fountain as possible. It ok’s to build a fort of benches and dumbbells around the water fountain if that’s what it takes.
40) It’s ok to get angry if you leave the piece of workout equipment you were on, flirt with the cutie working at the front desk, and come back to find someone else using that piece of equipment. To maximize effectiveness and dominance I would suggest raising your voice, employing rigid eye contact, and threatening to bring gym management over.
41) Don’t bother training calves and forearms. Everyone knows that no matter how hard to try, calves will never grow and are all genetics and that the only forearm routine you need to follow is alternating hands when you’re on dates with Handgelina Jolie and Palmela Handerson.
42) Always use gloves. You have to keep the hands soft and supple for the ladies, plus calluses look gross.
43) Frequently jump from routine to routine. Sure, everyone else sticks to the same routine for months or even years on end to milk progression for all it’s worth, but you know better. You know that the PERFECT workout routine exists and everyone else has merely given up the search. Switching routines frequently is also a key input for muscle confusion, which we know is a key driver of muscle gains.
44) The more supplements you bring and take to the gym, the higher your credibility and potential for gains. This is unrefuted science ladies and gentlemen; why do you think professional bodybuilders give away so many free supplements for their supplement line? I’ll tell you why – it’s because they already maxed out their 3 gym bags with supplements and can’t possibly carry any more to the gym. Thank me later.
45) Maintain your social media presence at all times; pre-, intra-, and post-workout. The gym is NOT the time to let your Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram go silent. I recommend alternating taking selfies overlaid with motivational quotes and looking at other people’s over-hashtagged fitness photos.
46) It’s completely rational for you to spend all day eating chicken breast, brown rice, and broccoli, lifting for 3 hours straight and then spending the entire evening drinking yourself in to oblivion and doing enough drugs to make Pablo Escobar jealous. Anyone who tells you differently is just a hater. No bro lifts for health – they lift to pull chicks and look good when they rage at EDM concerts.
47) If you see another potential gym bro working out, aggressively approach him and start throwing out Zyzz references and quotes. If he understands them, then he’s a brother of iron; but if he doesn’t, then he’s the scum of the Earth - cut off communication with him immediately.
48) If you’re lifting with a gym buddy, shower him with endless comments about how big, swole, cut, shredded, vascular, stacked, yolked, hench, beefy, thick, solid, tight, jacked, tan, and/or monstrous he looks. It’s been scientifically proven that an inflated ego and bro-love maximizes gym gains.
49) The second you finish your workout, sprint to the locker room and chug your protein shake as fast as your body will allow. The second you finish your last set, the window of opportune protein synthesis and recovery decreases exponential. Inject your whey protein intravenously while you’re still sitting on the bench or in the curl rack for maximum swole-a-tude.
50) Even if you’re completely exhausted, crippled, and sore to the point of crawling out of the gym, just remember one thing - there’s always room for one more set of curls.
As you can see, the tips above are solid gold. If you don’t increase muscle size, muscle strength, and sex appeal from employing the 50 above tips then you’re probably a hopeless Joe Gymbro that should just quit now. You’ll thank me later and help keep the gym empty for the rest of us hardcore folks.