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www.ironmanmagazine.com \ APRIL 2006 261

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Available at Home-gym.com and Ironmanmagazine.com This DVD features Greg Plitt, one of the top fitness models in the country and up-and-coming Hollywood actor. Seeing Greg’s muscles in motion will motivate you, as he demonstrates the techniques to sculpt your own impressive physique.

Greg is a former Army Ranger and was recently voted Hollywood’s top body.

150 DECEMBER 2009 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

October 2005

Vol. 64, No. 10

Big-Time Arm Training, page 126

Real Bodybuilding Training, Nutrition & Supplementation

FEATURES

72 TRAIN, EAT, GROW 72 They say change is good, but at every workout? Our TEG men give variation implementation a test drive.

82 A BODYBUILDER IS BORN Ron Harris teaches his young bodybuilding protégé how to eat large to get as big as a barge. Pass the cow, please.

90 TOP-10 DIET FALLACIES, PART 2 Ori Hofmekler explodes more mealtime myths.

118 RESEARCH TEAM It’s time to pack on serious muscle in your home gym.

126 BIG-TIME ARM TRAINING Christopher Pennington gives you the tools for gargantuan guns. Plus, a look at Mr. O’s biceps programs.

144 SPECIAL K Jerry Brainum’s mineral analysis.

160 PAIR OF ACES David Young talks to Mike and Holly Semanoff, the Fittest Couple in the house at the ’05 FitExpo.

Fat by Pollution, page 222

Pair of Aces, page 160

178 ORDINARY TO EXTRAORDINARY Performance guru Pete Siegel tells you how to push your size and strength to the limit via mind power.

190 ANGLING FOR DELTS

David Dorsey, Carmen Garcia and Federica Belli (inset) appear on this month’s cover. Hair and Makeup Kimberly Carlson.

Photos by Michael Neveux.

Eric Broser helps you reel in a pair of shocking shoulders.

206 HEAVY DUTY John Little delves into Mentzer’s triceps-training tactics.

214 REP-RANGE REVELATIONS How to blast every last fiber for ultimate hypertrophy.

Angling for Delts, page 190

222 FAT BY POLLUTION Can food additives and toxins be keeping your rippedness under wraps? Jerry Brainum says yes.

238 MAXIMUM MUSCLE, MINIMUM TIME C.S. Sloan’s innovative two-day fast-mass program.

256 X FILES Muscle-building info from our online e-zine.

274 HARDBODY Is Federica Belli our hottest Hardbody ever?

312 ONLY THE STRONG SHALL SURVIVE Bill Starr’s back-to-the-rack odyssey, part 4.

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Rep-Range Revelations, page 214

DEPARTMENTS

34 TRAIN TO GAIN Five ways to get the most out of your squats—and the secret to mega motivation.

52 CRITICAL MASS Steve Holman has the goods on how to fill your deltoid void. There’s also info on neck work and Bowflex.

56 NATURALLY HUGE John Hansen’s advice on how to have wilder workouts on a weird work schedule.

60 EAT TO GROW New studies on protein and muscles. Plus, creatine cranks up anabolic hormones and the NO pump.

Research Team, page 118

106 SMART TRAINING Charles Poliquin’s hardgainer healers and his twisted look at pressing issues.

262 NEWS & VIEWS Lonnie Teper and Ruth Silverman crash the best body bashes—and emerge with plenty of cool buzz and hot pics. And speaking of steamy photos, Jerry Fredrick’s Hot Shots are here too.

298 MIND/BODY CONNECTION Randall Strossen, Ph.D., says to be innovative with the iron, while Dave Draper debates: To bulk or not to bulk?

Sean Jones stars in our Serious Training segment.

Hardbody, page 274

308 BODYBUILDING PHARMACOLOGY The fat-loss formula-one race is on, and Jerry Brainum says there’s an ingredient that could be the fat-free key. Is it better than ephedrine? Start your engines.

320 READERS WRITE News & Views, page 262

Pump & Circumstance, page 268

Web Alert For the latest happenings from the world of bodybuilding and fitness, read the Hot News at www.ironmanmagazine.com and www.graphicmuscle.com.

Cover kudos, bodypart art and ab obsession. Also, one reader reports on how frequent layoffs have given him bigger gains.

In the next IRON MAN Next month we’ve got an exclusive report on an independent research project conducted by John Little. Is it possible to pack on 100 pounds of solid muscle in one year? According to some of Little’s findings and test-subject results, the answer is a resounding yes. This is exciting stuff! And speaking of mega mass, we have a wild analysis of Ronnie Coleman’s training in the Texas heat. You won’t believe what Mr. O does in the gym to get his Jurassic size—and there’s plenty for you to experiment with to send your own size skyward.

Plus, we have another righteous episode of “A Bodybuilder Is Born” from Ron Harris, a look at chiseling your chest from Eric Broser and an interview with new bodybuilding sensation Sagi Kalev. Watch for the gnarly November IRON MAN on newsstands the first week of October.

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John Balik’s

Publisher’s Letter

Founders 1936-1986:

Peary & Mabel Rader

From Sex to Survival What gets you into the gym? What makes you want the pain? Is it an emotional need? Is it the muscle that attracts the opposite sex or the confidence the muscle helps to create?

The truth is that the reason is different for different people, and it changes at different times in their lives.

In a very real sense sex is survival. From puberty forward the need to procreate is undeniable, but as we pass through those very good years, survival of the species evolves into personal survival. That’s also the way the bodybuilding lifestyle evolves. Ask a young man why he trains, and being more attractive to the opposite sex is usually among his top three reasons. Being attractive to the opposite sex is always important, but priorities change. All of a sudden “functional strength” becomes a part of your vocabulary.

Being strong is replaced by being strong for your age. The true wonder of the barbell and dumbbell is that the same tools work for all ages and goals. With their adjustability and physical simplicity they not only last a lifetime but also enhance and extend that lifetime.

Even if you do the same workout regularly, it’s always a different workout because you’re different every day. Each day brings its own challenges and solutions, stresses and rewards. Not every workout is a great one, but every workout is valuable. I tend to measure my workouts not so much in poundages lifted but in the level of involvement I feel. Did I really get into the workout? Did I feel the bar in my hands, the edge of the knurling against my calluses, that first delicious rush of blood to the hungry muscle? Little pleasures but pleasures none the less.

I read Dave Draper’s Bomber Blast in our Mind/Body section and Larry Scott’s Success Secrets in Train to Gain—both are barbell lifers, by the way—and I hear the same murmurs of pleasures experienced in the workout. At the other end of the spectrum is my teenage son who exults in every personal record he makes. He is not focused on the nuance but on being bigger and stronger—now!

We here at IRON MAN understand that you have a relationship with your workout—and that it will change just as all relationships do. Our challenge is to give you the information that will help you adjust your training to meet your needs.

With that in mind, please let me know how IRON MAN can help your workouts. You may want to start by identifying what gets you into the gym, what gives you the most pleasure from your workouts and why you train. Send e-mail to me at ironleader@aol.com. IM

Publisher/Editorial Director: John Balik Associate Publisher: Warren Wanderer Design Director: Michael Neveux Editor in Chief: Stephen Holman Art Director: T. S. Bratcher Senior Editor: Ruth Silverman Editor at Large: Lonnie Teper Articles Editors: L.A. Perry, Caryne Brown Assistant Editor: Jonathan Lawson Assistant Art Director: Christian Martinez Designer: Emerson Miranda Ironman Staff: Denise Cantú, Vuthy Keo, Mervin Petralba, David Solorzano Contributing Authors: Jerry Brainum, Eric Broser, David Chapman, Teagan Clive, Lorenzo Cornacchia, Daniel Curtis, Dave Draper, Michael Gündill, Rosemary Hallum, Ph.D., John Hansen, Ron Harris, Ori Hofmekler, Rod Labbe, Skip La Cour, Jack LaLanne, Butch Lebowitz, Stuart McRobert, Gene Mozée, Charles Poliquin, Larry Scott, Jim Shiebler, Roger Schwab, C.S. Sloan, Bill Starr, Bradley Steiner, Eric Sternlicht, Ph.D., Randall Strossen, Ph.D., Richard Winett, Ph.D., and David Young

Contributing Artists: Steve Cepello, Larry Eklund, Ron Dunn, Jake Jones

Contributing Photographers: Jim Amentler, Reg Bradford, Jimmy Caruso, Bill Comstock, Bill Dobbins, Jerry Fredrick, Irvin Gelb, J.M. Manion, Gene Mozée, Mitsuru Okabe, Rob Sims, Leo Stern, Russ Warner

Director of Marketing: Helen Yu, 1-800-570-IRON, ext. 1 Accounting: Dolores Waterman Director of Operations: Dean Reyes Subscriptions Manager: Sonia Melendez, 1-800-570-IRON, ext. 2 E-mail: soniazm@aol.com Advertising Director: Warren Wanderer 1-800-570-IRON, ext. 1 (518) 743-1696; FAX: (518) 743-1697 Advertising Coordinator: Jonathan Lawson, (805) 385-3500, ext. 320 Newsstand Consultant: Angelo Gandino, (516) 796-9848 We reserve the right to reject any advertising at our discretion without explanation. All manuscripts, art or other submissions must be accompanied by a selfaddressed, stamped envelope. Send submissions to IRON MAN, 1701 Ives Avenue, Oxnard, CA 93033. We are not responsible for unsolicited material. Writers and photographers should send for our Guidelines outlining specifications for submissions. IRON MAN is an open forum. We also reserve the right to edit any letter or manuscript as we see fit, and photos submitted have an implied waiver of copyright.

Please consult a physician before beginning any diet or exercise program. Use the information published in IRON MAN at your own risk.

IRON MAN Internet Addresses: Web Site: www.ironmanmagazine.com John Balik, Publisher: ironleader@aol.com Steve Holman, Editor in Chief: ironchief@aol.com Ruth Silverman, Senior Editor: ironwman@aol.com T.S. Bratcher, Art Director: ironartz@aol.com Helen Yu, Director of Marketing: irongrrrl@aol.com Dean Reyes, Dir. of Operations: ironreyes@aol.com Jonathan Lawson, Ad Coordinator: ironjdl@aol.com Sonia Melendez, Subscriptions: soniazm@aol.com

28 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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SEXY ROCK-HARD ABS FAST The Secret to Etching your Granite-Carved Abs in 10 Short Minutes Picture this... you with tight, shredded abs, serratus and intercostals all sharp, sliced and visible from across the room or on the sun-glared beach! And from the rear, lower lumbars that look like two thick steel girders supporting your muscle-studded back. Imagine looking like a Greek god... in street clothes... in the gym... or anywhere.

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34 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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MASS MOVES

Neveux \ Model: Gus Malliarodakis

5 Ways to Get the Most Out of Your Squats Since squats have served me well over the years as a means of developing overall mass and power in the thighs, it irritates me when guys with big upper bodies and small legs claim that squats do nothing for them. That’s nearly impossible. Squatting is such a basic and natural movement that hard work on squats virtually guarantees results. If you haven’t been getting the most out of squats, here are some suggestions that could instantly turn the situation around.

1) Do not use a spotter. You read that correctly. I was like many other lifters for many years, relying heavily on spotters when I attempted a challenging weight. Looking back, I am ashamed at how much I relied on them—needing a bear hug from behind with the spotter’s arms under my armpits to help lift me up, even at one point asking spotters to set their thighs under mine! Without a spotter you’ll find out what you can actually do on your own. Let me tell you, there’s a world of difference between getting good reps with 405 on your own and depending on the generous assistance of a spotter. Not only will you feel a much deeper sense of pride and achievement, but your quads, hams and glutes will receive far more growth stimulation.

2) Squat in a power cage. I’m sure that the first suggestion elicited panic in some of you, as taking away a spotter would be tantamount to removing all sense of safety. How can you put a heavy weight on your back without fear of getting stuck at the bottom? Enter the power cage.

IRON MAN writers like Curtis Schultz and Bill Starr laud the virtues of that simple steel apparatus, and with good reason. All you need to do is set the safety pins just under the point where the bar will descend, and there’s nothing to worry about. If you can’t get up from your last rep, sit down a little deeper and rest the bar on the pins.

3) Perform full squats, not half-assed half reps.

Every gym I’ve ever been to had at least a few guys who could squat four or five plates on each side of the bar. In most cases, though, they weren’t full reps, not even approaching parallel. While those who don’t know any better look on in awe at that kind of display, I’m a lot harder to impress. Unless you’re going down to at least parallel, I wouldn’t count a single rep. I believe full squats are the most beneficial. In fact, I’ve tried a few times to squat just to parallel, and I couldn’t even do it. It didn’t feel right. At rock bottom it’s your hamstrings and glutes that reverse the movement of the bar, while at parallel or above it’s the

tendons and ligaments around the knee. So when people say that squats are bad for the knees, they’re partly right.

Go all the way down, or don’t bother squatting.

4) Do not use knee wraps. Another practice that takes away from the effectiveness of squatting is the use of knee wraps. My feeling is that unless you’re a competitive powerlifter, you have no business even owning a pair of knee wraps. They enable you to lift more weight, but that’s not what bodybuilding is about. Bodybuilding is about working the muscles as hard as you can and stimulating growth. I like Dorian Yates’ remark about knee wraps, explaining why he didn’t see the point: “I could put a giant spring under my ass too, but what good would that do my quads?” Knee wraps can compress the patella and make it more susceptible to injury. Besides, they take a long time to put on and take off and draw out your workout. It shouldn’t take you 40 minutes to do four sets of squats.

5) Use a belt only for your heaviest sets. A lifting belt is a worthy accessory for squatting but only for your heaviest sets. Until you’re using weights that limit you to less than 10 reps, you should leave the belt off. Once you get to your top weights, cinch it on for that extra bit of support and blast out some killer reps. By saving it for when you really need it, you’ll make the belt a far more effective tool.

6) Wear very sturdy shoes or boots. Years ago I couldn’t understand why some of the big guys liked to squat in work boots or army boots. It looked so uncomfortable, and I assumed they were just trying to look tough or something. When I started squatting heavier, I understood.

Those types of shoes were perfectly suited to the lift. The soles are sturdy, and there’s support all the way up the ankle. In contrast, running shoes or even high-top basketball shoes are too springy (especially since they all have some sort of air bubble in the heel these days) and don’t keep the ankle stable enough for heavy weights. On squat day you’re better off with boots. Any Army-Navy surplus store will sell the version used by SWAT teams all over America. They’re what big Ronnie Coleman, a man who can squat 800 and leg-press a full ton, wears on leg day, so that should tell you something.

—Ron Harris Editor’s note: Check out Ron Harris’ Web site, www.ronharrismuscle.com.

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HE WANTED TO FIGHTUntil I Crushed His Hand!

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TRAIN TO GAIN

BOOK EXCERPT

Big Jay Cutler’s

MUSCLE RESEARCH

study on All-Over Bi’ Size New regional biceps growth Bodybuilding dogma has it that different exercises affect different parts of a muscle. That explains the reason for varying your exercises. Not everyone agrees with that concept, noting that muscles have distinct nerve connections and that making minor changes in angles or exercises does little or nothing to change the function of any particular muscle.

A study presented at the 2005 meeting of the American College of Sports Medicine, however, seems to confirm that muscles can be activated at different points.1 The muscle in question was the familiar biceps.

The purpose of the study was to determine whether varying biceps exercises, as commonly used by bodybuilders, produces a differential growth pattern in three regions of the muscle: near the origin (top of the arm), the belly (middle of the upper arm) or near the insertion (at the bottom of the upper arm).

Sixty-eight subjects trained with weights for 12 weeks on a biceps program. They used a progressive, periodized protocol, doing four weeks of 12 reps using 65 to 75 percent of one-rep maximum, or 1RM, weight; five weeks of eight reps using 75 to 82 percent of 1RM; and three weeks of six reps, using 83 to 90 percent of 1RM. Thus, the training required a gradual increase in poundage coupled with a decrease in reps. The exercises were preacher curls, concentration curls and standing barbell curls.

To determine changes in the subjects’ biceps as a result of the training, the researchers used magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI. After 12 weeks all areas of the biceps showed growth, with the greatest change appearing in the lower biceps, near the insertion of the muscle. Investigators thought that was because it’s the part of the biceps most affected by maintaining the hand in a typical curl position. The next most affected portion was the belly, followed by the top of the upper arm.

The study lends weight to the long-held notion that different exercises affect different portions of a trained muscle, despite a common nerve supply. Once again, science has born out the experiences of countless bodybuilders over many years.

—Jerry Brainum 1 Price, T., et al. (2005). Biceps brachii regional growth in response to 12 weeks of resistance training. Med Sci Sports Exer. 37:S131.

“Jay’s training style can be described as high volume with high intensity. He flies through approximately 20 to 25 sets per bodypart, taking only 30 to 45 seconds between sets. Back is the only exception to the rule, as he does 25 sets in the morning session and another 25 in the afternoon session. Each session takes about 40 minutes, and his reps are usually in the six to 12 range.”

—Larry Pepe The Precontest Bible

Editor’s note: The Precontest Bible contains the exact precontest blueprints of the world’s best bodybuilders, including Dorian Yates, Jay Cutler, Dexter Jackson, Lee Priest and Gustavo Badell. You’ll see their training routines, diets, cardio regimens and loads of incredible photos. The Precontest Bible is available from Home Gym Warehouse for $49.95. Call (800) 447-0008, or visit www .Home-Gym.com.

36 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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Neveux

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Training

YOU CAN BENCH BIG Add 20 Pounds to Your Bench Press Almost Overnight!

How would you like a surge in upper-body power and a bigger bench press—say, 20 extra pounds on the bar—after only a couple of workouts? Sure, adding 20 pounds to your bench in two or three training sessions may sound crazy, especially if your bench press poundage has been stuck in neutral for a while.

But nine times out of 10 this stall is due to an easily correctible muscle weakness—not in the pecs, delts or triceps but in a group of muscles known as the rotator cuff.

The rotator cuff muscles stabilize the shoulder joint. During the bench press and almost all other upperbody movements these muscles protect the shoulder joint and prevent ball-and-socket slippage. If these muscles are underdeveloped, they become the weak link in the action and your pressing strength suffers, or worse, you injure your shoulder. One of the best ways to strengthen this area and create an upper-body power surge is with direct rotator cuff exercise.

Once you start using the ShoulderHorn for two or three sets twice a week, your pressing poundages will skyrocket. This device allows you to train your rotator cuff muscles in complete comfort and with precise strengthening action. After a few weeks you’ll be amazed at your new benching power. There have been reports of 20-to-30-pound increases in a matter of days.

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One of my favorite pieces of reading material is the magazine The Physician and Sportsmedicine. I like it because occasionally I run across some excellent research that can be very helpful in my own training and in training our clients.

I always look at one column in particular. It’s written by Dr. George Sheehan. He’s a marathon runner and preaches the benefits of running.

What’s captured me is his ability to find pleasure in the running discipline. In days past his own running times were quite respectable; consequently, the main focus of his earlier articles was how to improve runners’ marathon efforts. Now, however, he runs with the arm of Father Time hanging on his shoulder. Even though his times are not record breaking, he continues to be excited about his running and the progress he’s making.

Running has not been my exercise of choice, but Dr. Sheehan’s ability to stay enthusiastic about his daily battle with the pain of tired muscles keeps me interested. Frankly, I wonder how he manages to stay excited about running after all these years, yet when I reflect on my own training and the excitement I feel about my workouts, I guess it’s not so amazing. In fact the other day I was thinking about my next workout, and the thought occurred to me: “How do I personally stay motivated after all these years?”

It was more than 35 years ago that my feeble arms first lifted a barbell, yet I still get excited by my training. Realistically, you can’t expect to get bigger forever. Nor can you expect your maximum lifts to continue to increase. So what is it that helps me continue to train with such motivation? It isn’t the competition because I have retired from that. I think what drives me is the same thing that drove me when I was pounding the iron for the Mr. America or the Mr. Olympia contests. It’s a sensation that we can all experience. The feeling is so great that often I can’t help exclaiming out loud during my workout, “This is so great.” Often heads will turn in my direction and shake a couple of times, as if to say, “It’s that crazy Larry again, finding happiness in all this misery.”

I feel the ebullience especially on a Monday workout when I’ve had two days of weekend rest. Just last Monday I sat down to start my shoulder workout with seated presses.

Prior to starting, my mind had done most of the work. My brain had carried my body to the office, placed me at my desk and taken care of the morning’s activities. Most of the day had been attended to by my brain, and my body was just the vehicle for getting it into the different positions required for carrying out the day’s responsibilities. Now, however, I was seated under the press machine with chalk on my hands, grasping the rotating handles. Rhythmically, I pressed the bar overhead. My shoulders creaked, groaned and complained about being awakened. The reps continued as the

Neveux \ Model: Luke Wood

The Secret of Mega Motivation weight increased for the next set.

I could hear them say, grudgingly, “Hey, this is pretty good.”

On the next set I increased the weight. “Oh, man, this is great,” they purred, as thousands of oxygen bubbles danced on nerve endings. Just as a slight tremor on the outer reaches of a spider web sends a message to the builder, a message was sent to my brain: “You can’t believe how good it feels down here!” My brain, reading and feeling the message, said, “Yes, yes, it does feel good.” In less than a millisecond, scanning through its vast storehouse of cataloged experiences, it continued, “I recognize it; it’s the beginnings of a pump.

It’s good for the body. I can trust the sensation. I’ll go on automatic pilot while the body takes over. I’ll just relax and coast in the glow of sensation coursing up from the

muscles.”

More sets after some rest, and the sensation of warmth was joined by a feeling of fullness. The skin started to get tighter, come alive and grab the baton to lead the orchestration of growth. Soon a melody of warmth and fullness was joined by power and confidence. The skin, ever the leader of the senses, directed the music to a higher pitch. Gradually, the maestro was challenged for the lead by lactic acid. The intensity lessened, replaced by a soft fullness. Finally, the music finished, and the players laid down their instruments and basked in the afterglow of a piece well played. The brain, roused from its rest, licked its lips and said, “My, that was pleasant. Let’s try that on another bodypart.”

A bit allegorical, I’ll admit. But how else can one describe a sensation like a pump or the pleasure that comes from it?

Perhaps it’s more important to be aware that it exists. Just to speak of it brings greater life to the pleasure of training.

Shortly after writing the first draft of this column, I went to the gym full of anticipation for my workout. Casey Adams, one of my training associates, couldn’t help but notice the extra excitement I had in my training. “Boy, you are sure wired today,” he said. “What’s happened to you?”

I know most of you are aware of the good feel that comes from training. Perhaps this reminder will inspire you to go to the gym and brush the cobwebs off your instruments. Isn’t it a wonderful thing to have been given a body upon which we can play such a lovely melody?

—Larry Scott

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Ball Bearings Risks and rewards of training with a stability ball, part 2 That’s supposed to “strengthen the core.”

Balance is certainly involved in performing those exercises, but how much core strength do you think is actually achieved by balance work alone? It certainly has a place in training, particularly in training for sports. I’ve included it in programs for elite athletes. Balance training, though, is just that. It’s different from what you need to do to improve core strength.

The difficulty of balancing on the ball compromises your ability to perform the exercises. The amount of weight you handle is reduced, so how effective can the curl, military press or triceps extension be? If you go back to the fundamental questions—What do I want from training? What will I achieve by doing this exercise?—you’ll see that the ball exercises may not achieve your goals.

You get core strength by placing a progressive-resistance demand on the abdominal and back muscles. That can come from squats, deadlifts, Romanian deadlifts, hypers, glute/ham raises, variations of the Olympic lifts, abdominal training and various medicine ball throws. You can do those types of movements with as little weight as the situation requires.

Beginners are taught them with a PVC pipe that weighs a half pound, and that can be used for postinjury patients as well.

They can be incorporated into traditional stability ball exercises.

Anyone who’s performed those exercises has felt the increased stability of the core muscles. The abdominal and back muscles fire to protect the spine while the exercise is performed. There’s a reason that elite weightlifters do their lifts wearing wooden-soled lifting shoes while standing on a wooden platform. They need a stable surface to support maximum effort in the muscles firing during the lifts. The core stability of weightlifters is superior.

My advice is to use the balance board if you wish and to develop balance without performing other exercises at the same time. Train on a stable surface (athletic shoes on the floor) so you can safely push your lifts harder—and make better gains.

—Joseph M. Horrigan Neveux

Last month I addressed some of the issues and risks surrounding the popular fad of weight training while standing on stability, or Swiss, balls and hemiballs. The original use of the Swiss ball was to develop activation of back and abdominal muscles in patients who had chronic and acute lower-back injuries or who’d had surgery. There’s no question that some patients improved with the approach. It’s also true that some did not improve, and some actually aggravated their symptoms. That’s not a condemnation. Any procedure or treatment has three possible outcomes: improvement, worsening of symptoms or no change.

The problem is the widespread use of the Swiss ball in socalled stability and core exercises that were never meant to be “core” exercises. The true core-strengthening concept is mostly valid, and for decades, particularly when patients used it following episodes of low-back pain, its focus was on strengthening the abdominal muscles. The ab work helped some patients but caused others to have more back pain.

(The many causes of lower-back pain are a topic for a future column.) Finally, the back muscles, or erector spinae—or simply paraspinal muscles—were recognized as muscles that need to be strengthened to help stabilize the spine, or core.

The approach with stability balls is to have trainees perform curls, laterals, front raises, military presses, triceps extensions, bench presses, flyes and more while standing on the ball.

You don’t need a stability ball to train your core.

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Editor’s note: Visit www.softtissuecenter.com for reprints of Horrigan’s past Sportsmedicine columns that have appeared in IRONMAN. You can order the book Strength, Conditioning and Injury Prevention for Hockey by Joseph Horrigan, D.C., and E.J. “Doc” Kreis, D.A., from Home Gym Warehouse, (800) 447-0008 or at www.home-gym.com.

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Critical Mass

Q: My delts are just not rounding out. I know you’re a hardgainer, as I am, and the drive to develop full, round delts probably pushes your shoulder workouts as it does mine. In my case my medial delts seem to be coming along, but my front delts aren’t. When I raise my arm for a double-biceps pose, my front delt is just a thin strand of muscle, and there’s hardly any separation between the front-delt head and the biceps. I know you say to focus almost all attention on the medial head, but I need help with the front. Also, my outer-biceps heads don’t have much pop to them. When my arms are down close to my sides and flexed, as yours are in some photos I’ve seen, the short inner heads and tendons stand out, but the long heads are nowhere to be seen. What did you do to help fill in your outer biceps heads?

A: Thanks for the questions. You’re proof that very few blanket recommendations work in bodybuilding. We all have different attachment positions, muscle lengths, bone lengths and so on, so what works for me might not work for you. You have problems with your front-delt heads; most

Q: What are the best exercises for bringing up the neck muscles? I’m pretty strong and strict when I do dumbbell shrugs and bent-over rows, but my neck is still thin. I’m having a hard time looking in the mirror because of my pencil neck. I like the neck development and overall muscularity that you have. Lastly, considering my narrow clavicles, is it going to be really hard for me, an ectomorph, to get sweeping lats like Frank Zane’s? Every time I do pulldowns and chins, I really feel the muscles burning, especially doing drop sets and supersets. But my lats aren’t improving that much. Do I have to be patient with it, or is it genetics again?

Bent-over lateral raises hit the posterior-delt heads, but they also work the rear fibers of the medial head, which can help give your shoulders more width and roundness.

52 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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Neveux

Deltoid Void

trainees have difficulty building medial-head mass. That said, let me answer your questions: Although you say your medial-delt heads are coming along, you also say your delts aren’t rounding out. I’ve noticed that bodybuilders often develop new width when they add some rear-delt work. Bent-over laterals work the rear head, but they also bring in the back fibers of the medial head, so you get more delt fullness. You may want to consider one or two drop sets, either right after your midback work or at the end of your delt routine.

As for your front delts, overhead pressing should get the job done. I suggest using a Smith machine so you can concentrate on pushing without balance issues. You may want to do two sets somewhere in the middle or near the end of your delt workout. Follow that with a drop set of thumbs-up dumbbell front raises on an incline bench. You sit back on an incline, about 70 degrees, in order to get resistance in the low, semistretched position. Stop the movement when the dumbbells reach eye level, then lower. Keep tension on your delts throughout the set, reversing the downward movement when your arms are even with your torso.

As for your biceps problem, you may have a short attachment on the outer heads; however, you can still develop them to a great degree. Hammer curls or incline hammer curls are great for hitting the brachialis and the lateral head of the biceps. Close-grip barbell or cable curls also work well, lighting up both heads and the brachialis.

A: Heavy exercise on big movements like squats and deadlifts should increase your neck size. If

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Steve Holman’s

Critical Mass Heavy low-rep work on the big exercises like deadlifts and squats can spur neck growth, but you may need some direct exercises if it’s a stubborn muscle group. sure you’re not tossing and turning when you should be sleeping soundly.

Q: What’s your opinion on naps in terms of their effect on bodybuilding results? If they are beneficial, what’s the best time and duration?

A: IM publisher John Balik has caught me napping at my desk a number of times, but I couldn’t convince him it was for the good of my physique and the magazine. Seriously, I believe a 15-to-30-minute nap in the afternoon can be very beneficial to your bodybuilding efforts under one condition—that it doesn’t disrupt your nighttime rest. If you nap and then get restless during the night, it can make hormone release erratic.

Most people need eight or more hours of sound sleep at night; however, a nap may reduce that amount. Just make

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Editor’s note: Steve Holman is the author of a number of bodybuilding best-sellers, including Train, Eat, Grow: The Positions-ofFlexion Muscle-Training Manual. For information on the POF videos and Size Surge programs, see page 195. For information on Train, Eat, Grow, see page 80. Also visit www.X-Rep.com. IM

54 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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Neveux

you want to target it specifically, you can use manual pressure on your head. Work each direction for about 20 hard reps, resisting with your arm. Or get a head strap and hook it to a cable or attach plates to it. That’s a favorite of wrestlers and football players, who need sturdy necks.

Nautilus used to make a great four-way neck machine, but I believe it was discontinued. Too bad. It should be in every college weight room.

As for sweeping lats à la Frank Zane, I’ve always had problems with my lats because of my ectomorphic structure and high insertions; however, I’ve recently noticed those muscles jutting out more down low on my rib cage, thanks to beginning my lat routine with V-handle (close, parallel-grip) pulldowns done with X-Rep partials at the end of the set near the top, semistretched point—close to lockout.

A: A Bowflex is just okay as a stand-alone home gym. Some exercises are good; others aren’t so good. My main gripe is that the max-force point for most muscles is near the semistretched point—for example, near the start of an incline press when your hands are close to your shoulders. The way the Bowflex is designed, with rods that increase pressure as you extend, there’s less resistance at that key point and more at the top of the movement, where the rods are maximally flexed. It’s the same with pulldowns and rows. From that standpoint it’s mandatory to incorporate X Reps at the max-force point when you hit nervous system exhaustion on most sets to stress the muscle optimally.

Otherwise, you’ll be getting even less max-force-point overload than if you used standard barbells and dumbbells (because the most force occurs at the top of the stroke on most Bowflex exercises).

If I had to use a barebones home gym, I’d get an adjustable bench and the heaviest selectorized dumbbells available—like a PowerBlock. That gives you the most versatility—even though the setup doesn’t look nearly as cool as a Bowflex. [Note: For more on the PowerBlock, see page 118.]

Neveux \ Model: Noel Thompson

Neveux \ Model: David Yeung

Q: What are your thoughts on the Bowflex?

I’m thinking about buying one. Can it deliver a workout good enough for someone using it to gain muscle and look better?

Steve Holman ironchief@aol.com

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Weird Work, Wild Workouts

A: You definitely have a challenging schedule, but as the saying goes, Where there’s a will, there’s a way. I believe you can create a program that will effectively train each bodypart without getting too much rest between muscle groups and build the body that you want.

My first suggestion is to buy some dumbbells and an adjustable incline bench in place of your Bowflex machine.

[See the Research Team on page 118 for information on selectorized dumbbells.] In all honesty, I’ve never used a Bowflex machine, but I’ve also never heard of a successful bodybuilder who built his physique exclusively with that piece of equipment. In order to progressively build muscle mass, you need to continually increase the resistance you use in your workouts. If you can do that with the Bowflex machine, you could possibly use it to build your physique.

If you can’t, purchase some dumbbells and a bench.

Considering the amount of time it takes you to travel to work plus the fact that you’re working 12-hour days, I suggest that you leave your workouts for the days you’re off work.

So, if you train on the days you don’t work, your twoweek schedule will look like this: Week 1: Monday, work; Tuesday, work; Wednesday, train; Thursday, train; Friday, work; Saturday, work; Sunday, work

Q: I’m trying to get fit, but I’m not having much luck. I work 12-hour days, and I drive about an hour to work, so I’m away from home at least 14 hours a day. By the time I get home, it’s time to get some shut-eye. I work two days, am off two, then work three. The following week is the opposite. I only have time to work out on my days off. I currently use a Bowflex. I also try to take 20-to-30minute walks on my days off. I work all bodyparts every day that I’m off, even though they say you should give bodyparts a day of rest before working them. If I did that, though, sometimes I’d only work out one day a week. Should I work upper body the first day and lower body the second day and do that every time it comes to my days off?

How would I do it on my three-day weekends? Or should I keep my same routine and work each bodypart every day? Should I do that but change my routine every day by doing different exercises for each part? My workout currently takes about 30 to 45 minutes. Am I using too much weight or trying to do too much? I ask because sometimes my shoulders and lower back feel torn up by the time I’m done.

Week 2: Monday, train; Tuesday, train; Wednesday, work; Thursday, work; Friday, train; Saturday, train; Sunday, train Since your training time is limited, I suggest you split your muscle groups over two days, training half your body on one day and the remaining bodyparts the next day.

When you have the three-day break from work, you can split your body up over three days instead of your normal two-day split. Here’s the split: Day 1: Chest, back and shoulders Day 2: Legs and arms That split gives you four to five days of rest between bodyparts, which is ideal for the routine you’ll be following.

When you have the time to train three days in a row, you can change your routine slightly: Day 1: Chest and arms Day 2: Legs

Neveux \ Model: Derik Farnsworth

Day 3: Shoulders and back

Different training splits can help you make better gains when you’re on a weird work schedule.

The three-day break from work will enable you to devote more time to each bodypart by not having to train so many muscle groups in one workout.

Regarding how heavy to train and how many reps to use, the six-to-10-rep range is best for building muscle. Your shoulders and lower back are no doubt hurting so much because you’re overtraining by working the same muscle groups every day. You need rest after you perform resistance training, especially when you train the muscles intensely. The split that I recommend will help you build muscle without overtraining.

You can use approximately two exercises for each muscle group for an average of three to four sets each. Begin with a moderate weight for 10 reps, and then increase the resistance on the second set and do eight reps. Finish off

56 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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Workout 1 Chest Dumbbell bench presses Incline flyes Back Dumbbell pullovers One-arm dumbbell rows Deltoids Seated dumbbell presses Lateral raises Dumbbell shrugs Abs Crunches Seated knee raises

4 x 10, 8, 6, 6 3 x 10, 8, 6 3 x 10, 8, 8 3 x 10, 8, 6 3 x 10, 8, 6 3 x 10, 8, 6 3 x 10, 8, 6 2-3 x 30-40 2-3 x 30-40

Workout 2 Legs Dumbbell squats Dumbbell reverse lunges Dumbbell leg curls Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts Calves One-leg dumbbell calf raises Triceps Seated dumbbell extensions Bench dips Biceps Seated dumbbell curls One-arm preacher curls

4 x 12, 10, 8, 8 3 x 12, 10, 8 3 x 10, 8, 6 3 x 10, 8, 8 4 x 15, 12, 10, 10 3 x 10, 8, 6 3 x 12, 10, 10 3 x 10, 8, 6 3 x 10, 8, 6

Q: I’m 48 years old and have followed bodybuilding on and off for more than 20 years. Recently, I’ve noticed natural bodybuilding getting more publicity, and I’ve taken an interest in it. I’ve always trained six days a week, working each bodypart twice a week. Lately, I’ve been using a three-on/one-

off routine and was wondering if that’s too much.

Would a four-on/one-off routine be better? I am 6’1”, 220 pounds and would like to compete in a natural contest in the next year or so—by age 50.

A: I think training six days in a row is too much for a natural bodybuilder. If you’re training hard, with weights heavy enough to limit your repetitions on each work set to six to 10, you won’t be able to train six consecutive days without a lapse in your intensity. You also aren’t giving your body a chance to rest—and to grow.

The three-on/one-off routine is a better choice, as you give your body a rest after training three days in a row.

When you return to the gym after your rest day, you’ll have much more energy. In addition, the day away from the gym will give your body as a whole a chance to rejuvenate.

As we get older, our recuperative abilities decline, so taking more days off from the gym is a wise choice. The added rest days will allow your muscles and joints more time to recuperate from the heavy, intense training. After 20 years of training, I’m sure your joints need more time to recover than they did when you were 28 years old.

The four-on/one-off routine will give your body one more day of rest. Your decision to use one routine or the other depends on how well you feel you’re recovering from your workouts. I’m sure you noticed a difference in your training when you switched from a six-days-a-week routine to the three-on/one-off workout. If you feel you need more time to recuperate, by all means switch to the new routine.

The best way to determine which training program to use is to record and analyze your workouts. If your training poundages are increasing and you’re getting bigger, then you’re definitely on the right track.

I recently switched from training each bodypart once a week to using a four-days-a-week schedule. I train two days on/one off. So instead of giving each muscle group seven days of rest, I’m only giving them six. At times I felt that I was getting too much rest, training each bodypart only once every seven days. My work schedule and the work schedule of my training partner have permitted this change, so I thought I’d give it a try and note the results. I’ll keep you up to date on what happens in this column.

Editor’s note: John Hansen has won the Natural Mr. Olympia and is a two-time Natural Mr. Universe winner. Visit his Web site at www .naturalolympia .com. You can write to him at P.O. Box 3003, Darien, IL 60561, or call toll-free (800) 900UNIV (8648). His new book, Natural Bodybuilding, is now available from Home Gym Warehouse, 1-800-4470008 or www.HomeJohn Hansen Gym.com. IM Neveux

Neveux \ Model: Jeff Dwelle

with a heavier resistance for six reps. Keep track of each of your workouts, and try to make them progressive by using either more resistance or more repetitions each successive workout.

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John@NaturalOlympia.com

58 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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EAT TO NUTRITION SCIENCE

Protein and Muscle Size Increase New studies answer the question: Do you need more aminos to grow?

It may seem on par with those who insist that the earth is flat, but some self-styled nutrition experts insist that bodybuilders need no more protein than a couch potato does.

Two recently published studies that examined protein use specifically for

building muscle, however, show that protein type and timing are of fundamental importance.

The first study lasted 14 weeks and compared the results of taking protein or carbohydrate after training.1 The participants were 22

Neveux \ Model: Tamer Elshahat

Protein does make a difference when it comes to packing on muscle.

men, average age 23, none of whom had trained in the six months prior to the study. Nor had they used any food supplements that could be construed as having “anabolic� properties, such as creatine or protein drinks.

The men were divided into two groups, with one group getting protein, the other carbohydrates. The protein serving contained 16.6 grams of whey, 2.8 grams of casein, 2.8 grams of egg white protein and 2.8 grams of L-glutamine. The carb serving contained 25 grams of maltodextrin. Both supplements contained an equal number of calories, and both were heavily flavored with vanilla to disguise which was which.

The subjects took them before and after each workout and in the morning on rest days.

All the men trained only their legs during the study, using standard exercises, such as leg presses, leg extensions and leg curls.They did the workout three times a week for 14 weeks, doing three to four sets of each exercise.

The results were hardly surprising.

Only those in the protein group showed gains in muscle size and strength. The training and additional protein led to an 18 percent size increase in the type 1, or slow-twitch, muscle fibers, and a respectable 26 percent increase in the size of type 2, or fast-twitch, muscle fibers. Despite using an identical training program, those who got only the carb supplement gained nothing.

Why would anyone compare

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GROW Nutrition With a Get-Big Mission

research (reported in this column) showing that when you increase whey protein intake, its efficiency drops, likely due to greater oxidation in the liver. The efficiency of soy, though, drops even more. So if you get amounts of protein that exceed the requirement for muscle protein synthesis, most of the excess will be oxidized in the liver.

Some scientists who study protein metabolism think that suddenly limiting protein in those who, like bodybuilders, have a habitually high protein It’s difficult for active people to get intake can result in a negative fat with excess protein. nitrogen balance—again, because of upgraded liver oxidation of excess protein. The scientists did. Another part of the study found think that the body gets so used to that milk protein was far more effioxidizing protein that if you take in cient than soy in promoting muscle less, the body will increase the breakgains. down of existing protein—as in musClearly, there is no reason to add cle. That’s a controversial theory that soy to a milk protein blend. Soy offers isn’t supported by a large body of no advantages from an anabolic proof. perspective, and it tends to promote The other fate of excess protein is internal organ protein synthesis conversion into fat, though that instead of skeletal muscle. Soy does doesn’t happen in offer one advantage: It’s cheap and a active people. That good filler, so you can use less of the Soy is a rapidly absorbed protein source doesn’t keep “exhigher-grade milk proteins. comparable to whey, but speed is where the perts” from saying —Jerry Brainum similarity ends. Soy is vastly inferior. that “eating too much protein can References make you fat.”

1 Well, yes, but only Andersen, L.L., et al. (2005). The if you do nothing effect of resistance training combined more physical than with timed ingestion of protein on press buttons on muscle fiber size and muscle your TV remote. strength. Metabolism. 54:151-56.

2 Phillips, S., et al. (2005). Dietary In the new study, intake of protein to support anabolism with milk protein led to resistance exercise in young men. J a markedly greater Amer Coll Nutr. 24:134S-139S. uptake of amino nitrogen than soy

protein with carbs as a way of encouraging muscle gains? Past studies show that taking in carbs after a workout appears to blunt the effects of cortisol, an adrenal catabolic hormone that increases with exercise. Blunting the effects of cortisol would tip the balance toward muscle growth, and carbs promote an insulin release that drives amino acids into muscle. Amino acids must be present as protein, however, for that to occur. As the study shows, carbs without protein do nothing to promote muscular gains.

The second study compared the effects of milk and soy proteins in promoting muscle growth in young men.2 Some authors have mistakenly identified soy as a slow-acting protein, but like whey it is, in fact, a rapidly absorbed protein source.

That, however, is where the similarity ends. Whey supports muscle protein synthesis because of its rapid uptake, while soy protein more rapidly degrades in the liver and supports liver protein synthesis more than muscle.

The study mentions previous

www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 61

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Eat to Grow NUTRITION NOTES

Food Facts

H E A LT H M E A S U R E S

Fast Food, Faster Death?

Heating oil to frying temperatures produces toxic chemicals Next time you happen to visit a fast-food joint, check out the frying section. That crackling grease can’t be good for you, despite the banners noting that the hot oils contain “no saturated fat.” A new study shows that the heated oils contain something far worse than saturated fat.

The study results were presented at the 2005 American Oil Chemists’ Society meeting in Salt Lake City by researchers from the University of Minnesota. They found that when highly unsaturated vegetable oils are heated at frying temperature—about 365 degrees Fahrenheit—for as little as 30 minutes, a highly toxic compound forms in the oil: HNE, or 4hydroxy-trans-2-nonenal. The chemical is produced when soy, sunflower and corn oils are heated. Heating soy produces three additional toxic compounds.

The toxins are highly reactive with the body’s proteins and nucleic acids, such as DNA and RNA. HNE results from the oxidation of linoleic acid. Several reports have linked the chemical to various diseases, including atherosclerosis, stroke, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s and liver abnormalities.

Repeatedly heating an oil—that’s what happens in fast-food joints— increases the content of HNE. No wonder Morgan Spurlock, who lived on fast food for a month and then documented it in the film “Super Size Me,” experienced such a rapid health decline. The stuff is so bad that you should avoid it at all times, even during so-called junk food days. It’s not just junk food; it’s death food.

—Jerry Brainum

•Frozen vegetables can often contain more nutrients than so-called fresh. Why? Vitamins and phytochemicals start breaking down when the vegetables are harvested. If they’re frozen immediately, those nutrients remain; if they’re shipped long distances and then sit on store shelves, nutrient content can degrade.

•Microwave cooking may help retain nutrients better than other methods of preparation because the cooking time is far less and nutrients don’t leech from the vegetable.

•Hard cheese is generally more nutritious than softer varieties because it has less moisture.

That means it’s denser, with more calcium and protein ounce for ounce.

•Vitamin D supplements may be necessary if you don’t get enough sunlight. By the way, glass blocks ultraviolet B (UVB) radiation, which is the type that stimulates vitamin D production. So don’t think what you get through your car window is doing the job.

—Becky Holman www.X-tremeLean.com

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Neveux

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That can affect your workouts and health

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Eat to Grow AMINO AMMO

Let the NO Flow L-arginine is a conditionally essential amino acid, meaning that it’s essential in the human diet under certain conditions— among them periods of rapid growth, pregnancy and after injuries. The liver synthesizes arginine during the urea cycle, which is involved in the excretion of proteinmetabolism waste products. The arginine the process produces, however, isn’t available to the rest of the body. Instead, an arginine metabolite amino acid called L-citrulline circulates in the blood to the kidneys, where it’s converted back into Larginine.

L-arginine is present in most protein foods, and the average person consumes about five grams a day. It first became popular with bodybuilders about 25 years ago, after the publication of the book Life Extension by Durk Pearson and Sandy Shaw. They quoted studies showing that arginine is a potent stimulator of growth hormone release. An Italian study published a few years later showed that taking a supplement containing 1,200 milligrams of both arginine and L-lysine produced a 600 percent increase in GH release in 14 young men. The results of that study, however, have never been replicated. Most scientists discount the use of oral arginine as a GH promoter because most studies that have shown significant GH release involved a 30-gram intravenous infusion.

More recently supplemental forms of L-arginine have been promoted as a nitric oxide booster. L-arginine is the immediate nutritional precursor of nitric oxide, which is a free radical and a type of gas that, among other things, acts as a potent dilator of blood vessels. The dilation of blood vessels gives you greater muscle pump during a workout, as well as in-

What’s the best L-arginine dose for pumping you up?

creased nutrient and oxygen delivery to muscle.

Absorption of L-arginine in the body isn’t straightforward, however. An enzyme in the liver called L-arginase degrades a large oral dose of arginine, which helps explain why an infusion is more effective in GH release than an oral dose. Another problem, more directly related to nitric oxide synthesis, involves the presence of methylated forms of arginine that actually inhibit nitric oxide synthesis during protein digestion. Thus, for arginine to effectively increase nitric oxide synthesis, you must get an oral dose sufficient to overcome the formidable barriers to its uptake.

A new study sought to determine the optimal oral dose of L-arginine for purposes of nitric oxide synthesis.1 Twelve healthy people took free L-arginine for four weeks—free not because of price but because it wasn’t complexed with anything else, such as hydrochloric acid. (Oral intake of too much HCL causes gastrointestinal distress.)

The subjects took increasingly larger doses of arginine— three, then nine, 21 and 30 grams a day. Researchers measured not only arginine levels but also insulin, creatinine and several other substances. Five subjects reported side effects that included diarrhea, vomiting and nosebleed at the 21gram dose. At the 30-gram level two of the subjects refused it, while nine subjects reported diarrhea, one had a headache, and another complained of dry mouth. The lower doses produced no side effects except with one person who had a nosebleed.

Arginine levels peak 60 minutes after oral intake and are still elevated after eight hours, though how much arginine is absorbed varies considerably. Based on their findings, the authors suggest that the best dose for ensuring nitric oxide synthesis is nine grams a day but caution that dosage must be tailored to each person. One way of doing that is to note the level of arginine that leads to side effects, then reduce it until the effects subside.

Unlike previous studies, this one found that arginine—at any dose—didn’t promote the release of insulin, nor did it affect glucose metabolism in any way. The only amino acid arginine lowered was glycine. The authors think that since both glycine and arginine are precursors of creatine synthesis, the arginine may have increased that. (Creatine helps build muscle and is good for the neural and cardiovascular systems.) On the other hand, the lack of effect on levels of creatinine, a metabolic waste product of creatine synthesis that is excreted through the kidneys in urine, appears to discount that theory.

—Jerry Brainum 1Evans, R.W., et al. (2004). Biochemical responses of healthy subjects during dietary supplementation with L-arginine. J Nutr Biochem. 15:534-39.

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Eat to Grow SKIN

The Zit List

Milk may be an acne accelerator

Illustration by Christian Martinez

In years past diet was thought to be a significant factor in the onset of acne, particularly in teenagers. As research continued, however, dietary factors were largely discounted. That was based on the discovery that acne formation involved two primary mechanisms: an excess level of sebum, a fatty secretion that both moisturizes the skin and clogs skin follicles, and a type of bacteria called P. acnes that feeds on the excess sebum.

Sebum formation is promoted by androgens, such as dihydrotestosterone (DHT) and DHEA. The bacteria produce irritating by-products that lead to inflammation and subsequent blocking of the skin follicles.

A recent study suggests that diet may be a factor in acne flare-ups after all.1 A longitudinal study of 47,355 nurses begun in 1989 looked at female health and diet habits. The women answered questions about their diets during their high school years, and the effects of various foods on the incidence of acne was examined in that population. The foods included typical teen favorites, such as french fries, pizza and chocolate.

Skim, or fat-free, milk showed the highest relationship to acne, as did instant-breakfast drinks, cream cheese and cottage cheese, as well as saturated fat and trans fat. Supplemental vitamin D showed a relationship to acne, yet the natural form of the vitamin found in food did not.

What is it about milk that may lead to breakout? The authors suggest that the culprit is the hormonal content of milk—estrogens, progesterone, androstenedione, 5-alpha-androstenedione and DHT. Milk also contains glucocorticoids, insulinlike growth factor 1 and other active peptide hormones. The big controversy is whether those substances survive the digestive process. Some studies show that native milk proteins, including casein, appear to promote hormone uptake by protecting them from the usual enzymatic digestive process.

Milk also contains testosterone in amounts that vary from 0.02 to 0.15 micrograms per liter. The average young girl produces about 32 micrograms a day of

testosterone in her body. Testosterone, however, would not be a likely factor in acne because all oral testosterone undergoes rapid first-pass metabolism in the liver. Indeed, the behavior of oral-dose testosterone led to the development of oral anabolic steroids, which are forms of the hormone structurally altered to resist initial liver breakdown.

Milk’s content may be a more significant problem. Studies show that IGF-1 can be absorbed orally by newborns, but there is scant evidence to show that adults can absorb it orally. As a long string of amino acids in a specific sequence, IGF-1 should degrade like any other protein supplement. On the other hand, some studies show that native milk proteins shield IGF-1 from digestion, and what’s absorbed drives the effects of other hormones, such as glucocorticoids and androgens, that are linked to acne incidence.

High serum levels of IGF-1 and androgens show up in adults who have acne. In teens the primary hormonal culprit is DHEA, an adrenal androgen secreted by both sexes. Many formerly acnefree women who use DHEA food supplements report developing it.

The finding that skim milk shows a greater relationship to acne than whole milk leads the authors to suggest that its metabolism may somehow increase the bioavailability of factors in milk that promote acne. Whole milk may be a lesser factor because of its higher estrogen content, but it’s hard to understand how skim milk could have more active hormones, since so many are removed with the fat content of milk. If anything, the processing of skim milk would tend to inactivate hormones.

The study raises some interesting questions. The authors contend that milk products contain active hormonal factors that survive digestion, though that’s never been shown to occur in adults. If milk did contain active hormones, such as androgens and IGF-1, it would affect diseases related to them.

For example, breast and prostate cancers are accelerated by IGF-1, which promotes rapid cell division, and cancer is a disease of uncontrolled cell division and mutation.

And another thing: If milk does contain active prohormones, shouldn’t it fall under the ban on pro-hormone food supplements that went into effect last January? A good argument against the ban is that those hormones exist naturally in milk and aren’t added. That, however, was the same rationale that enabled pro-hormone supplements to be sold in the first place: They, too, occurred in natural forms in many foods.

The dairy industry has thus far remained silent on the issue of milk and acne. Doubtless it’s reluctant to change the advertising slogan from “Milk is for every body” to “Milk is for every pimple.”

—Jerry Brainum 1 Adebamowo, C.A., et al. (2005). High school dietary diary intake and teenage acne. J Am Acad Dermatol. 52:207-14.

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Eat to Grow WARRIOR NUTRITION AND EXERCISE

Keep Gaining Without Overtraining Professional athletes, bodybuilders, martial artists, cops and soldiers often face the risk of overtraining. Tough training programs that incorporate long, intense exercise sessions or brutal split routines five to seven times a week typically increase the chance of overtraining. An overtrained individual may suffer from subtle or profound adverse symptoms, such as fatigue, weakness, irritability, lowered resistance to stress and vulnerability to disease. So overtraining may lead to severe metabolic setbacks and impaired performance.

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Elevated postexercise amino acid availability enhances muscle protein synthesis and overall recuperation. Recent studies at the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition at Iowa State University investigated the effects of long-term postexercise protein supplementation. They revealed that even small recovery meals—i.e., 10 grams of protein, eight grams of carbs and three grams of fat— provide huge benefits in the long run. The researchers found that a group of trainees with postexercise protein

supplementation profoundly outperformed a group who didn’t supplement. The supplement group experienced 33 perPrevent bodybuilding cent fewer total medical visits, 28 percent battle fatigue. fewer infections, 37 percent fewer muscle and tendon problems and 83 percent less heat exhaustion.

The researchers concluded that postexercise protein supplementation not only enhances muscle protein deposition but also has a positive impact on health, muscle soreness and tissue hydration during prolonged intense exercise.

In practical terms, fast-releasing proteins, such as whey, in a postexercise recovery meal facilitate amino acid availability in the muscle tissue right after every workout. If you incorporate split routines or are under prolonged physical stress, you should also incorporate small protein recovery meals between physical bouts.

—Ori Hofmekler Editor’s note: Ori Hofmekler is the author of the books The Warrior Diet and Maximum Muscle & Minimum Fat, published by Dragon Door Publications (www.dragondoor.com). For more information or for a consultation, contact him at ori@warriordiet.com, www.warriordiet.com or by phone at (866) WAR-DIET.

SUPPLEMENT SCIENCE

Creatine Cranks Up Anabolic Hormones Creatine offers many benefits to bodybuilders, and research continues to illuminate the versatility of this popular food supplement. Its effects on muscle growth remain controversial. While several studies show that creatine may exert anabolic, or growth-promoting, effects in muscle, other studies claim the added bulk may consist mostly of water.

Creatine promotes intracellular water retention, but that’s considered beneficial, since one potent signal of anabolism is cellular swelling due to hydration. Some scientists even suggest that it may be the mechanism through which creatine exerts its anabolic effects. Another theory suggests that merely by providing energy, creatine fosters an anabolic effect when combined with exercise. The protein synthesis process is energy intensive, but that energy is mainly supplied by fat.

A recent study takes a different approach to the question of how creatine may promote muscle gains.1 The premise was that creatine may promote an anabolic response in muscle by upgrading certain anabolic hormones—specifically, the activity of insulinlike growth factor 1 in muscle. When produced locally in muscle under the impetus of intense exercise, IGF-1 promotes the activity of a number of substances actively involved in the muscle growth process. In addition, IGF-1 promotes satellite cell activity, which is required for muscle growth and repair after hard training.

Six healthy young men were divided into two groups. One group got 21 grams a day of oral creatine monohydrate for five days, while the other group got a placebo (maltodextrin, a carbohydrate). The maltodextrin placebo was mixed with protein and given three hours after exercise.

In the subjects who got creatine, IGF mRNA, a marker of increased IGF-1, increased by 30 to 40 percent under resting conditions. IGF-2 also increased in the creatine group. Exercise alone increased those hormones, and the effect with creatine wasn’t cumulative, but the creatine group experienced elevated resting IGF-1 levels, an effect not seen in the placebo group.

The researchers who conducted the study think that the elevation of IGF-1 is responsible for the creatine-related anabolic effects in muscle.

—Jerry Brainum 1Deldicque, L., et al. (2005). Increased IGF mRNA in human skeletal muscle after creatine supplementation. Med Sci Sports Exer. 37:731-36.

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Train, Eat,

GROW Muscle-Training Program 72

From the IRON MAN Training & Research Center

o force a muscle to grow, you must change something in your workout for that bodypart. Growth is an adaption to new stress. It used to be so easy in the beginning, remember? All you had to do was keep adding weight to the barÑand you could do that at almost every workout. But after years of training, poundage increases are few and far between. Just ask Mr. Olympia Ronnie Coleman.

ColemanÕs one of the strongest and biggest bodybuilders alive, yet he still managed to pack on pounds of muscle prior to his past few Olympia victories. Did he get a lot stronger during that time? No, heÕs been damn strong for a while, using close to the same poundages.

So whatÕs his secret? Well, one of his key strategies for continuous mass gains is the old bait and switchÑhe has two distinct training routines

for each bodypart that he alternates. So he baits a bodypart with one program, then switches it completely at the next workout.

Obviously, ColemanÕs strategy works well for him, but for those of us who donÕt have superhuman genetics that include heightened neuromuscular efficiency and superior coordination, doing key exercises only once every week to 10 days can be a problem. For example, if you do squats at one quad workout, switch to leg presses at your next and then go back to squats a week and a half after your previous squat workout, the squatting movement is going to feel awkward, almost foreign. Why? You have to relearn the movement pattern somewhatÑget your nervous system back in the groove of creating the best muscle synergy during the exercise. The same goes for bench presses.

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Models: Jonathan Lawson

by Steve Holman and Jonathan Lawson • Photography by Michael Neveux

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Train, Eat, Grow /Program 72

We’ve found that for us mere mortals a better strategy is to keep the key exercise for each bodypart the same at every workout and then swap out the exercises that come after it. That usually means isolation exercises because there’s a lot

less relearning involved with singlejoint movements, like pushdowns for triceps, for example.

Incidentally, using different exercises can also attack some different fibers, and the more fibers you can get growing at once, the bigger

you’ll get. So, by continually switching between exercises, you stimulate more of the muscle.

You probably want some scientific proof of what we’re saying. We’ve used the following quote before, but it bears repeating because it’s

IRONMAN Training & Research Center Muscle-Training Program 72 Monday and Thursday: Delts, Midback, Biceps, Forearms Rack upright rows or seated laterals (first set is a drop; last set with X Reps and X/Pause) 2 x 10(6), 10 Forward-lean laterals (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Superset Forward-lean laterals 1 x 8-10 Standing laterals 1 x 8-10 Smith-machine behind-the-neck presses (second set with X Reps) 2 x 8-10 Superset One-arm cable laterals (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Behind-the-back cable laterals (X Reps) or incline one-arm laterals (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Superset Cable upright rows (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Shrugs or Nautilus shrugs (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Machine rows (second set with X Reps) 2 x 8-10 Behind-the-neck pulldowns (X Fade or staged) 1 x 8-10 Superset Bent-arm bent-over laterals 1 x 8-10 Bent-over dumbbell rows (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Bent-over laterals or standing uncrossovers (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 10(6) Preacher curls (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Cable curls with Biceps Blaster (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Concentration curls or one-arm dumbbell spider curls (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 8(6) Rope hammer curls (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 10(6) Superset Reverse wrist curls (X Reps) 1 x 15 Forearm Bar reverse wrist curls or dumbbell reverse wrist curls 1x8 Aftershock superset Wrist curls (X Reps) 1 x 15 Forearm Bar wrist curls or dumbbell wrist curls 1x8 Rockers (drop set every other workout) 1 x 15-20

Tuesday and Friday: Chest, Lats, Triceps, Abs (Friday Add Calf Work) Smith-machine incline presses (second set with X Reps) 2 x 10, 8 High-low cable flyes (drop set to high cable flyes with X Reps) 1 x 10(6) Superset Decline-bench presses or wide-grip dips (staged) 1 x 8-10 Flat-bench dumbbell presses (X Reps) 1 x 10, 8 Middle cable flyes (drop set to low

cable flyes with X Reps) 1 x 10(6) Narrow, parallel-grip pulldowns (second set with X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Superset Chins (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Dumbbell pullovers 1 x 8-10 Superset Pulldowns (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Rope rows or machine pullovers (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Decline extensions (second set flat with X Reps in press position) 2 x 10, 8 Tri-set Rope or elbows-flared pushdowns (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Stiff-arm kickbacks 1 x 8-10 Bench dips (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Tri-set Cable pushouts (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Stiff-arm kickbacks 1 x 8-10 Bench dips or parallel-bar dips 1 x max Incline kneeups (X Reps) 1 x 15 Superset Incline kneeups 1x8 Bench V-ups 1 x max Ab Bench crunches 1 x 8-10 Tri-set Ab Bench crunches (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 8(6) Freestyle twisting crunches 1 x 15 Bench V-ups 1 x max Friday only Seated calf raises (X Reps) 2 x 8-12 Standing calf raises 1 x 20-25

Wednesday: Quads, Hams, Gastrocs Smith-machine squats (second or third set with X Reps) Leg extensions (drop set; X Reps) Leg extensions (X Reps) One-leg leg extensions Hack squats (feet high and wide) or leg presses (feet high and wide) Leg curls (drop set; X Reps) Leg curls (wide with X Reps) One-leg leg curls (X Reps) Hyperextensions (X Reps) Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts Leg press calf raises (last set Fade X) Superset Hack-machine calf raises (X Reps) Standing calf raises (X Reps) Machine donkey calf raises or leg press calf raises (X Reps) Seated calf raises Low-back machine (X Reps)

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3 x 10-12 1 x 10(8) 1 x 8-10 1 x 8-10 2 x 10, 8 1 x 10(8) 1 x 8-10 1 x 8-10 1 x max 1 x 10-12 2 x 15-20 2 x 8-12 2 x 8-10 1 x 12-15 2 x 20-25 1 x 10-15

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w w w. I ro n M a n M a g a z i n e . c o m

© 2005 IRON MAN Magazine

It’s a big blast of workout information, motivation and muscle-building science in your e-mail box every week—and it’s all free! Tons of practical training tips, analysis and size tactics are jam-packed into this e-zine from the IRON MAN Training & Research Center, where there’s more than 50 years of training experience to get you growing fast! Here are a few of the latest editions’ titles (online now):

important to understand why changing exercises creates more size gains, not to mention the fact that multiangular training, like the Positions-of-Flexion system, is a key to complete muscle development. It’s from Designing Resistance Training Programs by Steven J. Fleck, Ph.D., and William J. Kraemer, Ph.D.: “If the body position is changed, the order of recruitment can also change (Grimby and Hannerz, 1977). The order of recruitment can also change for multifunctional muscles from one movement or exercise to another. Recruitment order in the quadriceps for the performance of a knee extension is different from that for a squat. The variation in recruitment order provides some evidence to support the belief held by many strength coaches that to completely develop a particular muscle it must be exercised with several different movements or exercises.”

On that note, let’s discuss how we’re alternating exercises for our bodyparts. In our program on page 74 the word or between exercises indicates that we alternate the two exercises from workout to workout.

Note that we do X Reps at the end of most exercises in order to completely tax the muscle.

Delts. Okay, we lied. The or on the leadoff exercise here doesn’t mean we alternate between the two movements listed. Jonathan does two sets of rack pulls while Steve does two sets of seated laterals.

Steve has a forearm injury that prevents him from doing heavy freebar upright-row movements, so he opts for a seated-lateral move that’s something between an upright row and a lateral raise. The switch for delts occurs further down the list, on the final shoulder superset. At one workout we do one-arm cable laterals as a drop set; at the other we superset one-arm cable laterals with incline one-arm laterals.

Traps. Here we usually start with close-grip cable upright rows supersetted with barbell shrugs or shrugs on the Nautilus multi-exercise machine. The machine enables us to pull up and back, squeezing our scapulae. At the other workout, when we use barbell shrugs in-

stead, it’s just a heavy up-and-down movement.

Midback. We get some midback variety with the shrug variations mentioned above. For a little more we depend on two rear-delt moves that bring in the midback. At one workout we do strict bent-over laterals, and at the other we do uncrossovers. What the heck is an uncrossover? Stand in the crossover machine and grab one of the upper handles with the opposite hand, holding it at the opposite shoulder.

Now step over to the other side and grab that handle with the opposite hand, bringing it to the opposite shoulder so your arms are crossed over your chest. Move to the middle of the crossover apparatus, step back about a foot, and extend your arms out in front of your face, hands together and cables crossing.

With a slight bend in your elbows, pull the handles back. Use your midback muscles, squeezing your scapulae together as you pull, and your rear delts to get the handles back. In the finish position you should look like you’re doing a back double-biceps pose with bad form.

Biceps. We can’t decide between preacher curls and cable curls for our opening biceps exercise, so we do one set of each, both with X Reps. You may notice that we do cable curls with the Biceps Blaster device, a metal elbow support that hangs around your neck by a leather strap (an old Arnold favorite). It makes X Reps much more effective due to the elbow stabilization it provides.

We alternate exercises on the contracted-position movement. We do a drop set on either concentration curls or one-arm spider curls (performed on the vertical side of a preacher bench). To perform concentration curls, you bend over and curl the dumbbell to the opposite shoulder. On spider curls you rest your arm against the vertical side of a preacher bench and curl the dumbbell up to the working-arm shoulder. That’s an example of a slightly different angle that should hit some different fibers.

Forearms. We do one superset for flexors and one for extensors, alternating the second exercise for each. We do barbell wrist curls for

flexors and barbell reverse wrist curls for extensors as our mainstay first exercises. For the second exercises in the supersets we alternate between the dumbbell form of the first exercise—dumbbell wrist curls and dumbbell reverse wrist curls— and a movement done on the Forearm Bar. What’s a Forearm Bar? It’s a V-shaped bar with a pin in the middle for barbell plates. You grip the bar with an overgrip or undergrip, stand up straight and do wrist curls. It’s a very cool device that hits your lower arms from a new angle.

Chest. We alternate between decline presses and wide-grip dips.

Whichever exercise we choose, we always superset it with flat-bench dumbbell presses.

Lats. Here the exercise switch takes place in a superset at the end of our lat routine. We do regular pulldowns, hands slightly wider than shoulder width, then move immediately to bent-over rope rows on the low cable or machine pullovers. Notice that both those exercises involve pulling your arms into your torso; however, the machine pullovers are more isolated and you get a full range of motion—with stretch—another case of a slight alteration that causes different fibers to react.

Triceps. We switch two exercises here. The first is on the initial triset. On the first exercise, pushdowns, we do them either with a rope or with a straight bar and our elbows flared. The second version is more of a power move and gives us a completely different feel from the strict rope pushdowns. The other switch comes on the last tri-set. We do overhead cable pushouts, stiffarm kickbacks for long-head action and either bench dips or standard parallel-bar dips. We usually do the

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Jonathan reps out with the unique Forearm Bar.

Train, Eat, Grow /Program 72

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Train, Eat, Grow /Program 72

Almost 10 pounds heavier and just as shredded as last year.

Model: Steve Holman

dips—whichever version—in nonlock style.

Abs. Here it’s a subtle change. On the last tri-set we do the middle exercise, full-range twisting crunches on a bench press bench, freestyle. That means that sometimes we work one side first, seven reps pulling right elbow toward left knee and then seven reps pulling left elbow to right knee. At other times we alternate from rep to rep.

And sometimes we come up, hold in the contracted position and twist back and forth four to six times before lowering to full stretch. We try to make it different every time.

Quads. We use a subtle change

here, but we get more quad variation on the leadoff hamstring exercise, as you’ll see in the next section. For quads the change is on our three sets of Smith-machine squats, the leadoff exercise. We do X Reps on either the second or third set. We also alternate between nonlock-style squats or full lockouts, depending on our mood—and pain tolerance. We get more reps with the lockout style, but the nonlock style is better at searing our quads. (Coleman uses a nonlock style on all his squats, in case you’re interested.)

Hamstrings. The reason we’ve been alternating exercises on the

ITRC Program 72, Abbreviated Home-Gym Routine: Monday Through Friday Monday and Thursday: Delts, Midback, Biceps, Forearms Rack pulls or seated laterals (second set with X Reps) 2 x 8-10 Superset Forward-lean laterals (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Standing laterals 1 x 8-10 Dumbbell presses or Arnold presses (X Reps) 2 x 8-10 Incline one-arm laterals (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 10(6) Dumbbell shrugs or barbell shrugs (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Bent-over rows or chest-supported dumbbell rows (X Reps) 2 x 8-10 Bent-arm bent-over laterals (drop set) 1 x 8(6) Palms-down bent-over laterals or palms-back bent-over laterals (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 10(8) One-arm dumbbell rows (X Reps) 1 x 8-10 Preacher curls (second set with X Reps) 2 x 8-10 Concentration curls or drag curls (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 8(6) Hammer curls or incline hammer curls (X Reps) 1 x 8(6) Superset Reverse wrist curls (X Reps) 1 x 15 Dumbbell reverse wrist curls 1x8 Superset Wrist curls (X Reps) 1 x 15 Dumbbell wrist curls or behind-the-back wrist curls 1x8 Rockers (drop set every other forearm workout) 1 x 15-20

Tuesday and Friday: Chest, Lats, Triceps, Abs (Friday Add Calf Work) Incline presses (second set with X Reps) Incline flyes (drop set) Bench presses or dips (X Reps) Decline flyes (drop set) Narrow, parallel-grip chins (X Reps) Superset Chins (X Reps) Dumbbell pullovers

2 x 10, 8 1 x 10(6) 2 x 8-10 1 x 10(6) 2 x 8-10 1 x 8-10 1 x 8-10

Undergrip rows or one-arm dumbbell rows (arm close to torso) 2 x 8-10 Decline extensions (X Reps in press position)2 x 8-10 Superset Kickbacks 1 x 8-10 Bench dips 1 x 8-10 Overhead dumbbell extensions or one-arm overhead extensions 1 x 8-10 Incline kneeups (X Reps) 1 x 15 Superset Incline kneeups 1x8 Bench V-ups 1 x max Superset Ab Bench crunches or full-range crunches 1 x max Bench V-ups 1 x max Friday only Seated calf raises (X Reps) 2 x 8-12 Standing calf raises 1 x 20-25

Wednesday: Quads, Hams, Gastrocs Squats (second or third set with X Reps near top) 3 x 10-12 Leg extensions or hack squats (X Reps) 2 x 10-12 One-leg leg extensions or one-leg squats 2 x 8-10 Leg curls (drop set; X Reps) 2 x 10(8) One-leg leg curls (X Reps) 2 x 8-10 Hyperextensions (X Reps) 1 x max Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts 1 x 10-12 Standing calf raises (second set with X Reps) 3 x 15-20 Seated calf raises (X Reps) 2 x 15-20 One-leg calf raises (bodyweight) 2 x max Note: Train Monday through Friday, following the sequence of workouts as listed. Also, it’s best to have a selectorized dumbbell set, such as the PowerBlock, if you don’t have a rack of fixed dumbbells of various weights. If you don’t have a leg extension machine, do old-style hacks with a two-second contraction at the top of each rep instead. Use partner resistance, towel around the ankles, if you don’t have a leg curl machine.

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Train, Eat, Grow /Program 72

leadoff movement for this bodypart is that we can’t decide which we like better, leg presses done with feet high and wide or hack squats done with feet high and wide. Both give us a lot of quad involvement as well, so there’s total upper-leg variation. Our hams have been getting sore after every leg workout, so that could be a good sign.

Calves. Here we make the switch on the last gastroc exercise, alternating machine donkey calf raises and a return to the leg press for stretch-position calf work.

And on the subject of calves, note that we’ve added a miniworkout for calves to Friday’s session. Even with all the cardio we’re doing, we’ve noticed that calves recover quickly, much faster than quads and hams.

That’s probably because they’ve adapted to all the work they go through on a daily basis. In other words, they’re resilient bastards.

Friday’s calf work is two heavy low-

rep sets of seated calf raises followed by a high-rep set of standing calf raises. That prioritizes the soleus, something we need because the soleus muscles get hit last, after gastrocs, on Wednesday with two high-reps sets. On Friday we can blast them hard and heavy without prefatigue from gastroc work.

Photo Shoot Update We did our annual photo shoot in mid-June, almost three weeks earlier than last year. It’s a testament to our X-Rep strategy, which apparently has helped us get bigger and leaner faster over the past two years. This year we included new hybrid techniques, like X/Pause and Fade X, which could be the reason our results came more quickly once again. We were both between five and 10 pounds heavier than last year but in the same ripped condition. That’s especially

impressive for Steve, as he was right at 200 pounds the day after the shoot. He’s never weighed that much in such shredded condition in his life—and he turns 46 soon.

By the way, we’re still adding to our training blog at www .X-Rep.com, so for up-to-theminute reports on what we’re doing in the gym, log on and click on XBlog.

Editor’s note: For the latest on the X-Rep muscle-building method, including X Q&As, X Files (past enewsletters about X Reps), our before and after photos and the new X-Blog training journal, visit www.X-Rep.com or www .X-tremeLean.com. For more information on Positions-of-Flexion training videos and Size Surge programs, see page 195. To order the new Positions-of-Flexion training manual Train, Eat, Grow, call (800) 447-0008, visit www.HomeGym.com, or see the ad below. IM

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80 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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A

Bodybuilder

andy had been training with me for just more than a week, and he was learning a lot in the gym. Still, I knew that at least half the battle of building the kind of physique he wanted would not be waged at the bench press or squat rack but at the dinner table. We had just finished working chest and triceps and had

slugged down our postworkout shakes. I told him to go home, shower and meet me at Grassfield’s, a local restaurant that served healthy fare in large portions. When I eat out, nothing pisses me off more than waiting a half-hour for my food only to get a plate that looks like a kiddie meal.

The shower was necessary be-

cause while Randy didn’t seem to produce an offensive odor during training, I sure do. Since I perspire as freely as the late Chris Farley in a sauna, a pungent mix of ammonia and sour sweat permeates my person after any workout. My wife has compared it to the aroma one experiences near the monkey cages at the zoo. Fear not, however. It’s

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Is Born Episode 3: Eating Is a Job

by Ron Harris Photography by Michael Neveux nothing some hot water and Ivory soap can’t fix in a jiffy.

Freshly washed, I found my young charge waiting by the hostess’ desk. The hostess, a pretty dark-haired college girl, was sneaking glances at him while catching up on her reading assignments.

Randy was a good-looking kid and not much older than she was. Thir-

ty-three isn’t quite middle-aged, but she probably still thought I was his dad as I walked up. She was new and didn’t recognize me from the many times I’d eaten there with my family. My son was known for throwing crayons and forks at the other patrons, the adorable little scoundrel.

“Two, please.”

She led us over to a table and handed us menus, smiling to herself as she returned to her post.

“I think she likes you, young buck,” I teased Randy.

“Yeah, right,” he replied, dismissing the idea as absurd. Yes, I had gotten hold of this guy at a perfect stage for learning, before brash arrogance had taken hold of him.

www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 83

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Model: Ken Yasuda

A Bodybuilder Is Born way. We don’t want fat in the posttraining meal; you need the food to digest fairly rapidly if we’re going to take advantage of the window of opportunity to replenish glycogen and amino acids.”

He didn’t argue any further.

The waitress came by to take our order, and a little more than 15 minutes later returned with two enormous platters piled high with chicken and rice. I checked my watch.

“We finished training and had our shakes just over an hour ago,” I said. “You don’t ever want to go much longer than that after a workout without eating your next meal, and the meal should be of considerable volume.” I motioned to the dual masses of food laid out on the table. “Just like this.” Randy was looking distressed.

“I’m supposed to eat all of this right now?” he asked.

“What do you weigh, Junior?”

“Um, today I was 172 in clothes.”

“Okay, what would you like to weigh?” Randy got a gleam in his eye at this question.

“Man, somewhere around 230 or 240 would be awesome.” He was

Most guys his age who trained with weights—the ones I knew anyway— were convinced that the female population of planet Earth was universally paralyzed, lusting over their buffed bodies. That self-satisfaction made them less than receptive to any form of guidance whenever they were within 20 yards of any reasonably attractive woman.

Randy was already looking at the menu, but I never opened mine. I knew what I was getting, or should I say, I knew what we were both getting.

“We’re having the teriyaki chicken stir-fry,” I informed him. Randy looked up, puzzled.

“But this double burger looks pretty good,” he suggested.

“No, what you need right now are protein and complex carbs to get your recovery process well on its

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Model: Ken Yasuda

Episode 3: Eating Is a Job

“We finished our training and had our shakes just over an hour ago. You don’t ever want to go much longer than that after a workout without eating your next meal.”

A Bodybuilder Is Born

Episode 3: Eating Is a Job

Model: Tamer Elshahat

“[Eating for muscle size] is a lot like weight training. Week by week, month by month, you try to eat just a few more calories a day.”

staring off into a dark corner of the ceiling, no doubt envisioning himself with a heavily muscled body, probably oiled up on a beach somewhere with a harem of Britney Spears look-alikes.

“So you’re looking at about 60 or 70 pounds of weight to gain. That’s a hell of a lot of muscle weight for an adult to put on. And as hard as you’re training, it will never happen without some very dedicated eating on your part. Now dig in.”

Some time later my plate was bare except for a few clumps of chicken gristle I had spat out.

Randy’s plate was still about half full, and he was chewing each bite

with the deliberate slowness of a cow. He looked miserable, and it was apparent he had passed feeling full some time ago.

“Where’s your appetite?” I asked him, trying to keep the sarcasm out of my voice—which is very hard for me to do.

“I’m not hungry anymore. I can’t eat all that food at once.”

“Do you think I really wanted to eat all that food?” I queried. He shrugged.

“You’re a lot bigger than me,” he retorted.

“Now we’re finally getting to the chicken or the egg question,” I grinned. “Did I eat all that food

because my size gives me more of an appetite, or did I get to be this big because I’ve been forcing myself to eat like this for years?” He was clearly confused.

“I’m going to let you in on a little secret, and I don’t want this to get out. I really don’t have the monster appetite that everyone thinks I do.

In fact, I have been forcing myself to eat the amount of food that I know my body needs to grow, even when there were hundreds of times I felt like barfing if I took another bite.”

“So you’re telling me I have to cram all this food down now or else I won’t grow?” Randy was already

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A Bodybuilder Is Born

“Becoming an elite bodybuilder is not a fast process. You’re in this for the long haul, or you’re not in it at all.”

Model: Derik Farnsworth

turning a little green at the thought, looking to see how far we were from the men’s room should he need to make a mad dash.

“No, but you do need to start training your body to eat greater volumes of food. It won’t happen overnight. It’s actually a lot like weight training. Week by week, month by month, you try to eat just a few more calories a day. Didn’t you figure out that you usually only average around 2,500 calories a day?” Randy nodded with guilt.

“I hate to say this, but you’ll never put on more than a few pounds eating like that, no matter how hard and heavy you train. That caloric total has to at least double if you want to start really gaining. You need to treat eating like a job, getting all those nutrients and calories in on schedule whether you like it or not. You have to think of it as absolutely essential to reaching your goals.”

Randy looked glum now. “Relax, you’ll be able to eat more soon if you make an effort to gradually increase the size of your portions.”

“I know; it’s just that I know it’s going to take a while.”

Episode 3: Eating Is a Job

“Hey, I’ve been trying to make you understand that becoming an elite bodybuilder is not a fast process. You’re in this for the long haul, or you’re not in it at all.” To my amazement, he started eating again.

“Holy moly, did you get a second wind or something?” He tried to answer, but his mouth was full. The waitress came back with the check.

I saw my chance. While Randy’s cheeks were still stuffed like a chipmunk’s with the now cold rice and chicken, I patted him on the shoulder as I got up and shoved the check toward him.

“You’re on your way now, champ.” And before he could swallow enough food to say anything, I was off. My work here was done for now, and lunch was on my young friend.

Editor’s note: You can contact Ron Harris at his Web site, www.ronharrismuscle.com. IM

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Top

10

Diet Fallacies Exploding Mealtime Myths and Nutrition Superstitions, Part 2

by Ori Hofmekler Photography by Michael Neveux

I

n the conclusion of his myth-busting exposĂŠ, Ori Hofmekler, author of The Warrior Diet, tackles the final five controversial beliefs about nutrition. www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 91

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Top p 10 Diet Fallacies

Fallacy 6 The best way to control your weight is to count calories.

Calorie counting has been widely regarded as a reliable method of weight management. Some of today’s most established diet plans use calorie counting as a principal way of controlling energy intake.

Yet, in spite of its reputation and wide appeal, calorie counting fails to provide the long-term benefit of staying lean and healthy.

The reason: Real life involves dynamic changes that aren’t included in the typical calorie-counting calculation. You cannot overlook the profound effects of life changes on your body. For that matter, humans (like other animals), carry survival mechanisms that regulate fuel use and energy generation, in response to changes in environmental conditions.

Your basal metabolic rate fluctuates according to changes in physical activity, food availability and overall calorie intake. For instance, lower calories generally promotes a BMR decline, whereas higher calories generally promote an overall increase in BMR. (Many health clubs provide machines that check BMR.) Since calorie counting is based on a fixed BMR, it often fails to provide a real-life measurement of energy balance; that is, the surplus or deficit of calories.

Athletes and bodybuilders who use calorie counting to improve body composition should be aware of the downside. A calorie isn’t a calorie. Calories coming from sugar cause more fat gain than calories coming from grains or nuts. The human body has adapted to use calories derived from certain food combinations better than from others. The same calories that cause fat gain in one food combination can induce fat loss in another (see fallacy 4 in the September ’05

IRON MAN).

Timing is another factor that’s often overlooked by calorie counters. The same carb calories that could be very beneficial when eaten right after exercise to increase protein synthesis in the muscle may be harmful if eaten before exercise due to excessive cortisol release.

One of the most controversial diets today is the calorie-restriction diet. The CR is based on the assumption that chronic calorie restriction increases life span. That dietary approach has been endorsed by anti-aging advocates who are convinced that CR reduces overall metabolic stress and thereby increases life span. There are, however, a few concerns regarding CR. 1) CR can lower body temperature, which may be a sign of lower thyroid activity and a total metabolic decline.

2) CR may cause a substantial loss of libido. It’s often associated with declining sex hormone levels and an impaired ability to maintain

The human body has adapted to use calories derived from certain food combinations better than from others.

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Top p 10 Diet Fallacies

The same carb calories that could be beneficial when eaten right after exercise may be harmful if eaten before. vigor, potency or fertility.

3) CR compromises the ability to endure intense exercise and, for that matter, build muscles.

Recent studies on intermittent

fasting—one day of fasting followed by one day of overeating—at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland found that such feeding cycles provided superior benefits to those

A calorie isn’t a calorie. Calories coming from sugar cause more fat gain than calories coming from grains or nuts.

gained with CR. According to Dr. Mark Mattson, professor of neuroscience and head of the research team at Hopkins, intermittent fasting increases the resistance of mice to degenerative diseases—such as diabetes, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and stroke—while improving body composition and increasing life span more than what occurs with mice that are fed a CR diet. More studies are required before we can fully understand the effects of similar feeding cycles on humans.

All that said, calorie counting can still be an accurate way of evaluating food-energy intake. If used correctly, it can help measure the effect of calorie intake on nutrient use. Indeed, studies by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) have established that overall calorie intake affects protein use. A highcalorie intake (about a 20 percent surplus) maximizes protein use and vice versa. Low-calorie intake decreases protein use. Active individuals should take advantage of that by incorporating a specially designed high-calorie meal, preferably at night (see last month’s

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Recent studies suggest that even small changes in the macronutrient content of the diet affect skeletal muscle performance. installment).

So you can use calorie counting as a standard measurement of food energy intake, but you shouldn’t apply it as your principal dietary approach if you want to avoid metabolic setbacks and impaired performance.

answer is that it’s not okay to eat everything in moderation, and this idea is particularly misleading for athletes and bodybuilders.

Model: Allen Sarkiszadeh

Top p 10 Diet Fallacies Moderation does not go hand in hand with scoring and achieving.

Real-life superiority requires extremes. Some of the greatest figures in history—including Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Napoleon Bonaparte, Ludwig von Beethoven, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Albert Einstein and George Patton—had extreme personalities.

All classical training methods since the days of the Roman army have been based on one master principle: Adaptation to extreme conditions. It’s been established that the human body can adapt to environmental changes as well as to physical and nutritional changes.

The more intense the change, a.k.a. the stimulant, the more likely it is to trigger the so-called thrifty genes, the genes that force the body to adapt and better survive.

The most important actions of the survival genes are those that lead to an improvement in fuel use.

The capacity to generate energy from diet is critical for survival.

Studies at the Food and Agriculture Organization revealed that the human body does better on food combinations than on a single food source. Researchers believe that humans have adapted to changes in food availability due to periods of famine or seasonal or climate changes. In other words, the body

Fallacy 7 It’s okay to eat everything but in moderation.

The term “being moderate” typically refers to the opposite of being extreme. Moderation is a buzzword when people talk about living a balanced lifestyle. Many health experts recite the moderation mantra to make people feel good: Everything is allowed in moderation.

The result is that millions of people who fail to manage their weight or sustain health are trying to figure out what went wrong. The

An athlete who wishes to excel can’t afford to eat even small amounts of junk, especially before exercise, when it may adversely affect postexercise cortisol level.

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Top p 10 Diet Fallacies

Indeed, though the body requires dietary protein for the buildup of muscle tissues, that’s only one of several major variables that affect the body’s capacity for growth. responds better to extreme feeding cycles that somewhat mimic cycles of famine and feast—undereating and overeating—alternating between fat fuel and carb fuel. Similar to physical exercise, such feeding cycles force the body to survive on either fat or carb fuel and thus improve the use of both.

The idea that everything is okay in moderation typically refers to bad stuff, like junk food or alcohol.

But is it okay? Not really.

What may seem to be a moderate serving does not translate into anything moderate when it hits the body. Recent studies at the University of Wollongong, Bandoro, Australia, reveal that even small (moderate) changes in the macronutrient content of the diet affect skeletal muscle performance.

Small dietary changes in fat intake exerted a major influence on muscle cell membrane fatty acid composition. For instance, unbalanced high-fat diets that include large amounts of omega-6 fatty acids and moderate amounts of hydrogenated fats—the trans fats abundant in

junk food—can lead to severe deficiencies in muscle omega-3s. That type of deficiency is often associated with chronic inflammation,

impaired recuperation and muscle waste.

Moderation doesn’t apply to reallife sport nutrition. An athlete who wishes to excel can’t afford to eat even small amounts of junk, especially before exercise, when it may adversely affect postexercise cortisol level. Insulin sensitivity is necessary for the maximum anabolic impact of meals. Note that even a single sugar binge can lower insulin sensitivity, compromising the body’s ability to recuperate and build tissues.

Do not fall for tricky words like moderation. Even moderate amounts of junk food can adversely affect your capacity for exercising, recuperating and excelling.

Fallacy 8 Low-carb products will help you lose weight.

We’re living in an era that may be remembered as the dark ages of human diets. Even though more people than ever before are on diets, obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease are at all-time highs. Ironically, the worst time in human diet history involves the

Carbs are also important. A low-carb intake adversely affects the body’s capacity for generating energy, building tissue and maintaining optimum health.

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Top p 10 Diet Fallacies Protein reaches maximum utilization when taken within the first 30 minutes after exercise.

Model: Tamer Elshahat

greatest production of purported health products. Among the most popular are low-carb foods.

Low-carb products appeal to those who desperately believe that carb consumption is the villain in the fat-gain scenario. Yet most lowcarb dieters fail to maintain a lean body. Statistically, they suffer from a fat-gain rebound, gaining more weight than they initially lost. Lowcarb products fail to promote fat loss for two reasons: 1) A low-carb intake adversely affects human capacity for generating energy, building tissue and maintaining optimum health (see fallacy 5).

2) Low-carb products are often made with low-grade carb-substitute chemicals, artificial sweeteners, sugar alcohol and/or hydrogenated oil.

Low-carb products, in particular some protein bars, typically have a funky aftertaste—not to mention the fact that they often bring on adverse side effects, such as indigestion, bloating and nausea.

Due to their often inferior nutritional composition and high content of chemicals, low-carb products may increase the overall metabolic stress on the liver. That may lead to accumulation of metabolites such as coenzyme A and acetate, as well as estrogen chemicals, in the liver, which causes insulin resistance and the accumu-

lation of stubborn fat with the former and the accumulation of abdominal fat with the latter.

Don’t attempt to fool your body.

Stay away from products that are loaded with chemicals or cheap carb substitutes. They could be your worst choice, especially if you’re already fat.

Fallacy 9 To build muscles, you need to eat a fixed amount of protein based on your bodyweight.

General George Patton certainly wouldn’t tell you that moderation is a key to success.

One of the trickiest fallacies is the notion that there’s a fixed amount of protein, based on your lean bodyweight, that you’ll need to eat in order to gain muscle. Indeed, though the body requires dietary protein for the buildup of muscle tissues, that’s only one of several major variables that affect the body’s capacity for growth. In fact, it isn’t even the most important.

The amount of protein required for muscle gain depends on critical variables such as hormonal balance, intensity and frequency of exercise, timing of meals and the overall nutritional state, including protein biological value, or BV. Since protein requirements can change as the variables change, the idea of a fixed amount of protein intake just doesn’t work. Here are the major variables that directly relate to protein intake:

Hormonal Balance The body requires a certain hormonal balance in order to build tissues. A low ratio of androgens-tocortisol or a low ratio of IGF-1-tobound IGF-1 may weaken the body’s ability to create the kind of anabolic state required for muscle gain. If untreated, hormonal imbalance can jeopardize any chance of gaining muscle mass, even if protein intake is high.

Exercise Intensity and Frequency Muscular development relates to the intensity and frequency of exercise. Numerous studies reveal that a

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Top p 10 Diet Fallacies high level of exercise intensity, such as occurs during resistance training or sprint intervals, increases levels of growth hormone as well as androgens and maximizes the muscles’ capacity for adapting, gaining mass and performing. A recent study done at the University of Western Ontario, in Canada, reveals that intense prefatigue exercise (without a moderate warmup) boosts VO2 max in older individuals to near young-adult levels. Moderate aerobic exercise just doesn’t do it.

Long-distance runners would fail to gain total-body strength and muscle mass even if they took in a lot of protein. Furthermore, when the frequency of training is too high and trainees don’t get enough rest, the body may be prone to muscle waste. Recent studies done at the University of Alabama found that a hormonelike metabolite called IL-6 may be chronically elevated due to overtraining. That can lead to a long-lasting inflammatory process that may cause muscle loss.

Model: Skip La Cour

Studies reveal that the human body does better on food combinations than on a single food source.

Timing of Meals Protein reaches maximum utilization when taken within the first 30 minutes after exercise. Any delay beyond that will gradually slow down the rate of protein synthesis in the muscle. Thirty grams of protein

eaten right after exercise equals 60 grams eaten five hours later. So meal timing is critical, and the same protein that is so beneficial after exercise may cause adverse effects if you eat it before exercise.

Even a single sugar binge can lower insulin sensitivity, compromising the body’s ability to recuperate and build tissues.

Overall Nutritional State To be fully used, protein must not be eaten on its own in large amounts. Studies by the FAO reveal that a high-calorie intake positively increases protein bioavailabity, and vice versa. The higher the fat or carb intake—effectively, the higher the calorie intake—the less protein is required for muscle gain. Besides being a source of energy, carbs and fats play additional important roles.

Carbs are necessary for critical anabolic actions—enhancing growth hormone and IGF-1 impact—in particular after exercise.

Fat is necessary for supporting a healthy hormonal balance.

So, while there is no fixed amount of protein required for muscle gain, protein intake is important and should be adjusted according to other variables. For instance, young people who have a superior hormonal balance require less protein than older people who have inferior hormonal balance. Another example: When protein has a higher bioavailability, the body requires less of it to build muscle than when the protein has a lower BV. If ap-

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Top p 10 Diet Fallacies plied correctly, the strategy of eating small protein meals after exercise can yield the same net-protein use as double-size protein meals that are eaten either too early or too late.

Carbs are necessary for critical anabolic actions— enhancing growth hormone and IGF-1 impact.

Model: Michael O’Hearn

Fallacy 10 Your diet should consist of certain percentages of protein, fat and carbs.

Don’t attempt to fool your body. Stay away from products that are loaded with chemicals or cheap carb substitutes.

The suggestion that there is one set of macronutrient percentages that fits all humans is ludicrous. So is the notion that there’s an ideal “zone” in which all humans reach peak performance. No scientific evidence substantiates that. Quite the opposite: There is substantial evidence that humans have primarily adapted to seasonal foods and, thus, different percentages of macronutrients. Furthermore, due to the primal necessity of surviving on accessible food sources—i.e., vegetable- and animal-based— humans were forces to cycle their diets and adapt to different macronutrient percentages. No one formula fits all.

It has even been established that people who live in different climates differ in their capacity for using foods. For example, due to their adaptation to the Arctic climate, Inuits do better on raw fish and blubber than Africans, who live in a tropical climate and survive better on grains or fruits.

The notion of fixed percentages of macronutrients is another attempt to oversimplify diet theory for people who are desperate for a quick fix. When it comes to nutrition, there’s no such thing.

Editor’s note: Ori Hofmekler is the author of the books The Warrior Diet and Maximum Muscle & Minimum Fat, published by Dragon Door Publications (www.dragon door.com). For more information or for a consultation, contact him at ori@warriordiet.com, www .warriordiet.com or by phone at (866) WAR-DIET. IM

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Charles Poliquin’s

Smart Training

Q: I’m a so-called hardgainer. The older guys at the gym say that I’m too nervous to grow. Is that possible?

A: Yes, it’s possible, and the good news is that it can be easily remedied. When someone is anxious or nervous, the corresponding demands on the neuroendocrine system lower the training response in various ways, such as producing too much cortisol late in the evening.

Managing the condition with supplements is rather easy.

Here are some options: •Phosphatidylcholine: Three grams of phosphatidylcholine in the evening will help bring down the sympathetic nervous system. Your quality of sleep will improve, and you’ll find yourself more mellow. It’s also a great liver detoxifier, which may help with IGF-1 production.

•Reishi mushroom extract. Referred to as “the mushroom of immortality” in Chinese medicine, Reishi’s active ingredients include sterols, coumarin, mannitol, polysaccharides and triterpenoids called ganoderic acids.

Ganoderic acids may lower blood pressure as well as decrease low-density lipoprotein, or LDL, and triglyceride levels. It’s a strong anti-inflammatory antioxidant that lowers cortisol levels.

Phosphatidylserine (PS). This is another brain nutri-

The cause of slow muscle gains for some bodybuilders is linked to excessive stimulation of the nervous system and too much production of cortisol.

Supplements like phosphatidylserine, or PS, can help (see page 200).

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Neveux \ Model: Steve Kummer

Hardgainer No-Brainer

ent that’s of great benefit to the hardgainer. Oral supplementation of PS has been shown to positively influence neuronal membranes, cell metabolism and neurotransmitter systems, including acetylcholine, norepinephrine, serotonin and dopamine. Numerous studies have demonstrated that PS exerts significant benefit on cognitive functioning, especially those that tend to decline with age, including memory, learning, vocabulary skills and concentration. PS is made in the body from the amino acid Lserine, glycerophosphate and two fatty acids. Some PS is converted to phosphatidylethanolamine, which is in turn converted to phosphatidylcholine.

Probably the best way to use PS is postworkout in a dosage of 800 milligrams or so. It helps rapidly lower cortisol levels, thus assisting the shift from a catabolic to an anabolic state much more readily. It is my experience that dosages greater than 2,400 milligrams per week may lower cortisol too much and thereby increase inflammation in the body.

Another tip for helping your gains in the gym: Avoid watching violent stuff in the evening. Studies show that watching violent TV shows or films depletes the nutrients responsible for the synthesis of acetylcholine, an important neurotransmitter that regulates the amount of force you can produce in the gym.

I also suggest you get some relaxation tapes that you can listen to before retiring at night. They’ve been shown to help lower blood pressure and cortisol levels. Ask your local massage therapist to recommend the better ones.

Since they diminish the activity of the sympathetic nervous system, they’ll help you keep your energy reserves for growth.

Stretching may help too. For the past two decades I’ve been a strong opponent of stretching before weight training, which has been supported in the most recent scientific literature. For the same reason I hate stretching before

Charles Poliquin’s

Smart Training Semipronated, or palms-facing, dumbbell bench presses can give your pecs new growth power and a burst of strength. Try them on your dumbbell overhead presses too, and watch your upper-body mass soar.

Neveux \ Model: David Dorsey

pronated-grip presses. Pronated presses tend to shorten the pectoralis and the subscapular muscles, which leads to impingement syndromes. Supinated is a more natural position for the shoulder. Bruce Lee even indicated that punches were far more powerful when delivered with a semisupinated than a pronated grip. Biomechanical studies have corroborated his opinion.

They permit a far greater range of motion because in that grip the dumbbells don’t make contact prematurely with the front delts. The increased range of motion promotes dynamic flexibility and hypertrophy in the same way that a full squat is superior to a half squat in developing structural balance and functional strength.

Functional strength built through a greater range certainly leads to greater punching power. Semisupinated grip presses give you strength that you can use on the field. They’ve helped jolt the careers of NFL players like Na’il Diggs of the Green Bay Packers.

The greater range of motion greatly involves the serratus muscle group, which helps stabilize the shoulder long-term and avoid one of the causes of shoulder crepitus (in layman’s terms, the cracking and popping of the shoulder). The enhanced range of motion also gives better function to the front deltoids.

One word of caution regarding dumbbell presses: I recommend that you get partners to hand you the dumbbells in a synchronized manner. It will pay off long term for your shoulder health. Many individuals have done themselves serious damage trying to rack dumbbells on various types of presses. I also strongly recommend that strong individuals do six to eight warmup sets of low reps before doing the first work sets. Let’s say you want to do five sets of four to six with 110 pounds. Here’s the sequence:

training, I like it before sleep, as it calms down the nervous system and helps the recovery process.

If you apply the above information, you’ll be able to convert that wasted nervous energy into better training drive in the gym.

Q: I’m a bit confused about how to do dumbbell presses. What’s your suggestion for grip placement during pressing exercises? Should my hands be pronated or semisupinated?

A: I’ve believed in doing presses in a semisupinated (palms facing each other) grip since early in my career as a strength coach. The late Iron Man author Anthony Ditillo turned me on to the concept of doing the presses with the palms facing each other. Ditillo was always a proponent of honest hard work and believed that the semisupinated presses were a key tool in developing a massive physique.

For one thing, they’re safer for the shoulders. Over the past few years I’ve rehabbed many NFL football players who came to me with a host of shoulder injuries that in my opinion were partly caused and certainly not helped by

Warmup set 1: 45-pounders x 5 Warmup set 2: 60-pounders x 3 Warmup set 3: 75-pounders x 2 Warmup set 4: 90-pounders x 2 Warmup set 5: 100-pounders x 1 Warmup set 6: 105-pounders x 1 The warmup doesn’t take much energy, and it teaches the muscles the range of motion, gently preparing all the stabilizers for the upcoming load.

The effectiveness of semisupina- (continued on page 112)

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Charles Poliquin’s

Smart Training Too fatigued to finish your workouts? New research says branched-chain amino acids before you train can help.

Neveux \ Model: Mike Morris

HTP, which makes you drowsy and tired.

As you may be aware, 5-HTP is sold as a supplement to improve sleep, particularly for those with fibromyalgia.

But there’s a solution to your problem in the form of a readily available supplement. My suggestion is based on recent studies done in Sweden and in Japan on the effects of branched-chain amino acids, or BCAAs, on delaying fatigue.

Those studies were presented at the second annual symposium of the International Society of Sports Nutrition in late June in New Orleans. Take a dose of five grams of branched chain amino acids at the beginning of your workout.

The BCAAs will compete with the tryptophan, and the fatigue symptoms won’t show up. Then you’ll be able to put in the intensity necessary to make gains.

Q: When I train, I seem to get fatigued mentally after only 20 minutes. The muscles seem to want to keep going, but I just can’t keep it together. Any suggestions?

A: What you’re experiencing is probably central nervous system fatigue, but there could be other factors, such as hypoglycemia caused by eating too many high-glycemicindex carbs before the workout. Make sure that the glycemic index of your preworkout meal doesn’t exceed the value of 50, which should help your concentration during your workouts. Many clients of mine who drop the preworkout oatmeal with a banana and raisins and switch to steak and cashews report an immediate escape from the midworkout blahs.

Assuming that your nutrition is correct, you may be experiencing some problems with your neurotransmitters.

One of the causes of fatigue during exercise is the enhanced conversion of the amino acid tryptophan into 5-

Editor’s note: Charles Poliquin is recognized as one of the world’s most successful strength coaches, having coached Olympic medalists in 12 different sports, including the U.S. women’s trackand-field team for the 2000 Olympics. He’s spent years researching European journals (he is fluent in English, French and German) and speaking to other coaches and scientists in his quest to optimize training methods. For more on his books, seminars and methods, visit www .CharlesPoliquin.net.

Also see his ad on page Charles Poliquin 199. IM w w w. C h a r l e s P o l i q u i n . n e t Bradford

(continued from page 108) ted dumbbell presses is far underestimated as a tool for rapid strength and mass gains.

Use the information given here, and watch your upperbody mass soar.

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IRON MAN Research Team

Home Gym MUSCLE Your In-House Solution for Maximum Mass

t was almost like slow motion. I vividly remember the time I nearly split open my head doing flyes in my home gym. I was clanging my adjustable dumbbells together at the top of each repÑI hadnÕt discovered ArnoldÕs continuous-tension technique yetÑwhen one of the collars came loose and sent a plate plummeting toward my cranium. Luckily, only the 2 1/2-pounder on the end slipped off with the collar. It left a small red-and-purple impression on my forehead, but no stitch-

Photography by Michael Neveux

es were necessary. It also gave a whole new meaning to the term Òdrop set.Ó That was years and years ago. I havenÕt had to use adjustable dumbbells in a long timeÑeven if I choose to train at homeÑthanks to recent innovations in selectorized dumbbells like the PowerBlock. The entire set takes up only a two-square-foot area and replaces an entire wall of fixed dumbbells. ItÕs truly an extraordinary piece of equipment, and it may be the most revolutionary advance in home training in the past 20 years.

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Model: Dan Decker

by Steve Holman •

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IRON MAN Research Team

These futuristic rectangular dumbbells sit on a sturdy threefoot-high stand and look like something Captain Kirk would train with on the Starship Enterprise (“Spock, spot me on some X Reps, you unemotional bastard!”). But don’t let that throw you. The PowerBlock is heavy-duty, hardcore weight-training equipment, and you can do any dumbbell exercise in the book without fear of collars and plates reeling toward your noggin.

The safety factor is only one of the advantages of using the PowerBlock, though. The biggest benefit is the selectorized feature.

To change the poundage, you simply return the dumbbells to their racks and move a U-shaped pin on each to select the weight. When you pull the dumbbells away from the stand, the poundage you choose comes along for the ride, and the rest of the plates stay on the stand.

So it’s not just an ingenious spacesaving innovation but a rapid-fire weight-change solution.

That’s extremely important from where I sit, and rep, because I’m a firm believer in drop sets for building more mass. A drop set has nothing to do with that plate dropping on my head I mentioned earlier. It’s doing a set to nervous system exhaustion, quickly reducing the poundage and then doing another set to exhaustion, a key mass-building technique that’s pretty much impossible with a standard adjustable dumbbell set unless you’re overdosing on ephedrine.

Do you really need drop sets? I say absolutely, if you want to max out your muscle size. They are ideal for isolation exercises that you do after your big compound, or multijoint, mass move. Drop sets are almost mandatory for taking your muscularity to the next level. Let me explain: Let’s say you train a big, heavy, multijoint exercise like upright rows for delts with two sets, and on the second you include X-Rep power partials at the max-force point at the end of the set. That does a number of good things that will contribute toward your packing on more fiber size, including maxforce overload. Now you move to drop sets on a continuous-tension

isolation exercise, like dumbbell laterals, which will stress a few more pure fast-twitch fibers but, more importantly, also hit loads of intermediary fibers for extra potential growth.

That’s why a good mass strategy is to finish off a muscle with drop sets. After you blow out your big exercise, you want to go for serious occlusion along with fatigue and more fiber activation. Occlusion, or blocking blood flow, and fatigue create a secondary level of growth, with capillary bed enlargement (and engorgement) and unique muscle fiber stress.

So here’s the drill: After your upright rows you go to lateral raises and rep out, hitting failure at around nine reps. You reduce the weight as quickly as possible and immediately rep out again, getting about six reps. If you’re really brave—and motivated—you may want to decrease the weight one last time and go for a third set immediately after the second. But even with only two back-to-back sets you should feel an incredible burn (if you didn’t, do another round). That helps trigger growth hormone release and signifies that you’ve occluded the muscle and attacked that important next level of growth.

Unless you have an entire rack of

Why You Should Have a PowerBlock Minigym at Home 1) You can train on a split routine at a commercial gym during the week and do a full-body workout at home on the weekends. (All you need is a PowerBlock set and an adjustable bench.)

2) You can split your program so you train your big bodyparts at a commercial gym and work your arms and delts at home.

3) If you don’t feel like coping with the commercial-gym crowd, you can opt for a private home-gym workout to keep the muscle-building machinery fired up. (It’s much better than skipping a workout just because you don’t feel social.)

4) You can give stubborn bodyparts extra work in your home gym on the weekends.

5) It may motivate your spouse or other family members to start training and set the tone for a healthful lifestyle. (It’s always good for kids to see Dad and/or Mom hitting the weights regularly; it helps get the exercise habit ingrained in them.)

Powerblock selectorized dumbbells are secure. No chance of collars and plates coming loose and falling from the sky like with adjustable ’bells (those should come with a crash helmet).

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varied-weight dumbbells, the drop sets on laterals will be impossible and your mass stimulation will be far less efficient.

With drop sets you get a bit more fasttwitch-fiber activation at the end of the first set to failure, but the real size stimulation occurs during the second reducedpoundage set, when your delts are screaming for mercy. That hits the enduranceoriented fibers, expands the need for more capillar-

IRON MAN Research Team

Full-Body PowerBlock Minigym Home Workout

You can change the poundage in seconds, which is indispensable for drop sets.

ies to fuel the muscle and can increase the supercompensation effect (you’ll end up with bigger, fuller muscles, as you’ll load more glycogen to suck up fluid during recovery). It’s one of the most efficient mass-boosting techniques around. The ability to do drop sets alone is a reason to own a PowerBlock set.

You say you train in a commercial gym and don’t need this type of equipment at home? Think again.

The PowerBlock could be your secret weapon for more muscle.

With an adjustable bench and a PowerBlock set—a veritable home minigym—you can schedule hometraining sessions along with your commercial-gym workouts during the week. That way you’ll look forward to the change of scenery on specific days.

For instance, you can do commercial-gym workouts during the week, be they full-body programs on Tuesday and Thursday or a split over three or four days, and then on Saturday do a special workout at home, in which you only train the bodyparts that need extra work.

Another option is to do your upper body on Monday, your lower body on Wednesday and then a full-body workout at home on Friday with your selectorized dumbbells and bench. Mixing up split training with full-body workouts is a tremendous boredom-breaking muscle-making strategy.

If you’re a beginner, a

PowerBlock-and-bench setup is an ideal place to learn the ropes and build some respectable muscle before you start repping in public.

Yes, commercial gyms can be motivating, and they pulsate with excitement. Sometimes, though, you just want to focus on you, your effort and getting a burn in the target muscles, not on distractions like the overweight guy sweating all over the flat bench you were going to use.

On a personal note, we have two PowerBlock sets in the IRON MAN Training & Research Center—no more individual fixed dumbbells— and they’re all we use for every dumbbell exercise. We have much more space and drop sets on dumbbell exercises are but a pin move away.

The PowerBlock comes in three models, the Elite Trainer ($349 plus shipping), which goes from five to 50 pounds per dumbbell in five-pound increments. Or go heavier with the Elite Set 1 ($588 plus shipping), which goes from five to 90 per dumbbell or Elite 2 ($848 plus shipping), which goes from five to 130. That’s not bad, considering you’d pay in the neighborhood of $2,000 to $3,000 for a rack of fixed dumbbells. And to make this offer even more enticing, you get free bonus gifts with any one of those sets: “Beginning Bodybuilding” video ($20 value), “Critical Mass” Positions-of-Flexion video set ($35) and a 20-packet box

Dumbbell squats, one-leg squats or lunges 2 x 10 Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts 2 x 10 One-leg calf raises 2 x 15-20 Seated calf raises 1 x 20 Dumbbell bench presses 2 x 10 Incline dumbbell flyes (drop set) 1 x 10(6) One-arm dumbbell rows 2 x 10 Dumbbell shrugs 2 x 10 Dumbbell upright rows 2 x 10 Lateral raises (drop set) 1 x 10(6) Lying extensions 1 x 10 Kickbacks (drop set) 1 x 10(6) Dumbbell curls 1 x 10 Concentration curls (drop set) 1 x 10 Incline kneeups 1 x max Full-range crunches 1 x max of Muscle Meals meal replacement ($65 value). That’s $120 worth of cool stuff absolutely free!

The appeal of these dumbbells is obvious. What home-gym enthusiast wouldn’t want to have 4,000 pounds of dumbbell power in a two-by-two-foot area? The PowerBlock set is one small footprint for home gyms, one giant step for home trainees. Put it on your equipment shopping list pronto, or get on the phone right now and call (800) 447-0008 to take advantage of the IM Research Team PowerBlock Special and all those free gifts. (Note: optional stand for any of these sets is $119.)

PowerBlock Pluses •It takes up a small, two-by-twofoot area, as opposed to a rack of fixed dumbbells.

•The dumbbells’ rectangular shape prevents them from rolling.

•The unit is fairly inexpensive when compared to an entire set of fixed dumbbells.

•The ’bells are sturdy and safe— the plates can’t fall off, as they can with adjustable dumbbells.

PowerBlock Minuses •Captain Kirk and Spock may want to work in with you. IM

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126

OCTOBER

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Big-Time

Arm

Training

An Insider’s Look at MassDevelopment Techniques

by Christopher Pennington Photography by Michael Neveux

Most people would agree that arm day is the one workout day above all others that gets them excited about going to the gym. There’s nothing like feeling your biceps engorged with blood after you perform a hard set of curls. The problem with so many arm-training routines, however, is that they don’t work forever. Unfortunately, gains eventually come to an end. Fortunately, it’s not a

permanent situation. The fact is that after a while the usual arm routine just doesn’t get it done anymore. At that point you need a new training stimulus to jolt further growth. Once you’ve shaken things up a bit, you can return to your previous program and expect new gains in size and strength. Let’s look at several important but often overlooked aspects of a successful arm routine. www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 127

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Big-Time Arm Training

The Exercise/ Repetition Link Although I have yet to see any scientific literature on the topic, plenty of empirical data from coaches and athletes point to the idea that certain exercises seem to work better in specific rep ranges.

For example, preacher curls seem to work well when done for eight to 10 reps per set, concentration curls in the 10-to-12 range and standing biceps curls in the three-to-six

range. A general rule of thumb is that isolation movements work better with higher reps and compound movements work better with lower reps.

You may have experienced gains using rep ranges that differ from those observations. The main point here is that you need to monitor your training and determine which combinations of exercises and rep ranges produce the best gains for you and spend the majority of your time working within those parameters.

Biceps Blast From the Past There’s been a lot of discussion lately about the best biceps exercises.

We’ve talked about Arnold’s cheat-curl technique and how it forced critical size-building stress right at the max-force point, near the bottom of the stroke. Below the midpoint, arms extended just out of a 90-degree bend, is the key semistretched point where the biceps can generate the most power and therefore fire the most fibers.

Cheat curls can be dangerous, however, so we suggest doing strict, full-range curls till nervous system exhaustion and then tacking on X Reps, doing power partials near the bottom of the stroke. It’s a safer solution and a more sensible way of hitting that key hypertrophic sweet spot. The problem is that the leverage shift on barbell curls makes bottom-range partials impossible, so we often suggest preacher bench curls instead. While it’s possible to do X Reps near the bottom on those, they can be difficult because of the arms-forward position.

We’ve recently discovered a much better solution, and it’s a back-tothe-future, Arnold-esque answer. We dusted off the old arm-blaster device, that piece of curved metal that hangs from your neck on a leather strap The old Biceps and keeps your elbows in place for curls.

Blaster can make Once you’ve got it in place, do your blaster X Reps much curls on a low cable. When you reach more effective. exhaustion, you’ve got the perfect setup X-Rep developer for attacking X Reps. The elbow support is Steve Holman the key. demonstrates.

We’re only doing one set of cable curls with the Biceps Blaster, and the arm pump is amazing after we crank out about five X Reps at the end of a regular set. Arnold was obviously on to something.

Incidentally, the Biceps Blaster is not a one-trick pony—it’s also fabulous for triceps pushdowns. It keeps your elbows anchored and makes end-of-set X Reps much more effective on that move as well.

—Steve Holman and Jonathan Lawson www.X-Rep.com Editor’s note: The Biceps Blaster has been out of production for a while, but Home Gym Warehouse has located a few of the devices. If you’re interested, call (800) 447-0008 for details.

Changing Angles This is an easy yet very effective way to stimulate new mass gains.

Many people incorporate this principle into their training without even realizing it. The logic behind it is quite simple: When you perform an exercise, specific muscle fibers are preferentially recruited within that movement pattern. By varying the angle of motion of an exercise, you can tap into new motor units and promote further gains.

For example, most people perform biceps curls with their elbows tucked in close to the body and forearms straight ahead. Try flaring your forearms out at an angle away from your body and curling the weight up along that plane. It may seem like a minor change, but don’t let that deceive you. Sometimes the littlest adjustments make the biggest impact.

Another way to vary the angular pathway of an exercise is by using cable movements. Cables give you unlimited variations on an exercise.

For example, by changing the position of the cable handle on the slide rail, you can change the starting point of an exercise. That forces the muscle to adapt to a new training stimulus.

At first it may feel a little awkward. Stick with it. As long as you perform the motion safely and you aren’t doing anything to harm a muscle or joint structure, the awkwardness is just the normal effects of learning a new movement pattern.

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Big-Time Arm Training

Grip-Width Alterations

Firing Your Guns With Mr. Olympia No question that Ronnie Coleman, the current Mr. Olympia, has a pair of the greatest arms of all time. If you have your doubts, just watch “The Cost of Redemption” DVD. Your jaw will hit the floor, guaranteed. Coleman’s gigantic, vascular and dense—even when he’s just puttering around in the kitchen making breakfast (watch in awe as he gets more vascular while whipping up his grits).

So how can you pack that type of incredible mass onto your own guns?

Well, first and foremost, you gotta have the genetics, but that doesn’t mean we normal mortals can’t learn a thing or two from the big R.C.— techniques that can get our arms bigger and more gnarly than ever.

For example, Ronnie changes his workout every time he hits the gym.

That’s lesson one: change things often. In the book The Precontest Bible Coleman lists the following as his biceps program, noting that he alternates the two workouts: Workout A Standing dumbbell curls Standing alternate dumbbell curls EZ-curl-bar 21s Workout B Seated concentration curls Barbell preacher curls Standing barbell curls

Narrow-grip machine curls Alternate dumbbell curls Cable curls

Neveux

And on the DVD he uses this program:

Comstock \ Model: Ronnie Coleman

Here’s another underused method that you can adopt to stimulate muscle growth. The next time you perform a set of standing biceps curls, use a different grip width from the one you normally use. That could mean taking a wider or narrower grip on the barbell. It depends on what your normal spacing is. Play around with both options and see what response you get. So much of training is individual in nature—what works for one person doesn’t always work for someone else.

Different bar types have an effect on how an exercise works for you.

Using both straight bars and EZ-curl bars on an exercise is a great way to change things up and shock the muscle. A little trick I like to use is to vary the bar type on each set of a three-set run of barbell curls. For your first set use a straight bar, on the second use an EZ-curl bar, and on the third use a thick bar if you can access one. Your arms will be screaming for mercy after this shock (continued on page 132) sequence.

On each exercise he does three to four sets of eight to 12 reps, but that’s not the most interesting part. On the DVD it’s as plain as day—this mass monster loves heavy poundages and partials. I was shocked to see that on almost every exercise he uses exaggerated X Reps, partial reps down through the semistretched position, which is between full stretch and the midpoint on the stroke, and he curls to just barely above the midpoint.

You see it on narrow-grip machine curls first, but it was especially obvious on cable curls. And to make that cable move even more max-force-point friendly, he faces away from the weight stack and positions himself so the cable runs back between his legs. He bends over slightly and curls from the semistretched point—arms slightly bent—to about halfway up, repping out like a piston. And his biceps swell up like the Goodyear blimp.

It’s not just biceps that get the partial-rep attack from Mr. O; it’s almost every exercise in his mass-building arsenal—but I’ll have more to say on that in a future issue when I analyze his training, as depicted on his DVD. Since I’m a staunch proponent of X Reps, it’s very exciting stuff!

—Steve Holman Editor’s note: For more on X-Rep mass training, visit www.X-Rep.com. To order Ronnie Coleman’s “The Cost of Redemption” DVD or the Precontest Bible by Larry Pepe, visit www. Home-Gym.com or call (800) 447-0008.

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Big-Time Arm Training

One-arm work can help activate more muscle fibers.

Model: John Hansen

This method is popular among bodybuilders, and it goes by different names. The basic idea is to completely wipe out a muscle group by performing an isolation movement for it and then moving immediately to a compound exercise that heavily stresses it. A favorite grouping is a set of lying triceps extensions followed immediately by close-grip bench presses. Be prepared for a deep burn in your triceps.

It’s usually best to use a freeweight exercise for the isolation movement and a machine for the compound exercise. You use the free weights first because you’re fresh and can better control the weight.

Once fatigue sets in, you don’t want to be worrying about balancing a free weight, so a machine exercise is the way to go. You want to avoid injury—obviously—and the best way to do that on this type of sequence is to move to a machine for your compound exercise. That should initiate a fierce pump, which triggers a growth response.

Model: Skip La Cour

Isolation to Compound

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SUPERSET

Model: Cesar Martinez

One of the best ways to coax new arm growth is with reverse curls.

Model: Jonathan Lawson

Be prepared for a deep burn in your triceps with this combination.

Big-Time Arm Training

You can even do 21s on concentration curls for a wicked burn.

Model: Ken Yasuda

Model: Jamo Nezzar

Cables can provide effective new angles of attack.

21s No article on arm training would be complete without a look at this old standby. Bodybuilders have been employing 21s for ages, and their popularity is only surpassed by their capacity for inducing growth. Many variations exist, but I’ll describe the version I’ve found to be the most productive.

Try 21s with barbell or cable curls, as follows: •Reps 1-7: full-range reps

•Reps 8-14: half reps done from the top, full-curl position to the midpoint.

•Reps 15-21: half reps done from the bottom, stretch position to the midpoint.

That’s 21 reps: seven full range, seven half reps from the top and seven half reps from the bottom.

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Grip weakness can stall your quest for massive arms.

Big-Time Arm Training

Reverse Curls How many times have you walked into the gym and seen someone performing reverse curls? For many readers the answer is probably never. If you don’t know what reverse curls are, you’re not alone.

They’re one of the most avoided arm exercises in existence. It’s too bad because they’re also one of the best and easiest ways to coax additional growth from your arms.

You do reverse curls with your palms down instead of the normal palms-up grip. That works a different portion of the biceps and also stresses the forearm muscles.

I prefer to use dumbbells instead of a straight bar on these. A straight bar can force the wrist into an unnatural position during the stroke.

You may also want to try using lifting straps on this exercise. The palm-down position puts the wrist at a mechanical disadvantage, so the strap may help you avoid excessive joint stress.

Model: Todd Smith

Heavy work is mandatory for big, gnarly arms.

Grip Training Often people don’t make progress with their arm training because they have weak grip and forearm muscles. There are lots of remedies for that. One of the best is to incorporate some thick-bar grip training into your routine. Or you can simply perform three sets each of wrist flexion and wrist extension exercises at the end of your arm workout. Do as many reps as possible on each set. Forearms are a stubborn muscle group, so you need to work them very hard to force an adaptation response.

Model: David Dorsey

Continuous tension creates a bigger pump.

X Reps If you haven’t tried these yet, you’re really missing out. After reading the info at X-Rep.com, I decided to give it a go on cable curls. I was blown away by the intense, fullblown pump in my arms. Do full reps, and when you reach failure, do partials near the bottom of the stroke. (See page 128 for more on arm training with X Reps.)

If you’re serious about building big arms fast, you owe it to yourself to try this effective technique. It just doesn’t get any better than this for

Grip changes can hit new fibers. growth stimulation.

There you have a few new ideas to spice up your arm workouts.

With just minor variations to your

normal routine you can start experiencing new growth and filling out those shirtsleeves with lots of new big-time arm mass. IM

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Special

K

Potassium Is More Important to Your Muscles and Health Than You Realize

by Jerry Brainum

The ride from the competitors’ hotel to the

venue of the Arnold Classic in Columbus, Ohio, isn’t a long one. But for Mike Matarrazo that ride must have felt like a thousand miles. Or so it seemed, judging by the expression on the veteran pro bodybuilder’s face that cold day in

March several years ago. The normally ebullient Matarrazo seemed unusually quiet and tense.

He looked to be heading to his own execution, not a bodybuilding contest. When asked how he felt, Matarrazo’s terse reply was simply, “I feel like I’m going to die.”

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Neveux \ Model: David Yeung

Potassium = Muscles & Health

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Neveux

Potassium = Muscles & Health

Neveux \ Model: David Yeung

Special K

Although he didn’t realize it at the time, Mike’s discomfort was self-inflicted. Since competitors at the major contests are judged heavily on muscular definition, Matarrazo and his fellow competitors resorted to various techniques in an effort to lose every bit of extraneous water under their skin. Water reten-

tion obscures muscular definition, and a highly defined look often separates the winners from the losers in top shows.

Mike had done what many bodybuilders have done: He’d taken pharmaceutical diuretics. The one he used in preparation for this contest was known as a potassium-

Potassium-sparing diuretic drugs eliminate several minerals known to retain water in the body, especially sodium. While they can help create that shredded look, they can be dangerous and have contributed to the death of competitive bodybuilders.

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Potassium = Muscles & Health

Special K sparing diuretic. While most such drugs eliminate several minerals known to retain water in the body, especially sodium, potassiumsparing drugs, as the name implies, not only prevent the loss of potassium at the expense of sodium but also retain potassium in the body.

Under normal circumstances drug-induced potassium retention isn’t a problem. The hidden danger, though, is combining such diuretics with potassium supplements, and that was Matarrazo's mistake. He’d taken large doses of potassium with potassium-sparing diuretic drugs because he had been told that diuretics cause loss of all minerals.

Losing potassium, calcium and magnesium can lead to muscle cramps, the last thing you’d want to experience during a posing routine onstage.

Mike’s malaise was later found to be hyperkalemia, or excess potassium in his blood. While the condition is easily treatable, your heart can stop beating if it isn’t caught in time. In fact, the lethal injection given in capital punishment contains a certain dose of potassium. Injected directly into the heart, potassium can stop the heart like a bullet. For those with normal kidney function, it’s difficult to overdose on potassium because a large dose leads to nausea, vomiting and rapid excretion by the kidneys.

On the other hand, without sufficient potassium you couldn’t contract your muscles, your nervous system couldn’t function, and you wouldn’t be able to store glycogen, the complex carbohydrate that fuels bodybuilding workouts. Nor could you secrete anabolic hormones, including testosterone.

Estimates are that prehistoric

Meeting Your Fruitand-Vegetable Quota Wondering how you can possibly consume the minimum suggested intake of five servings a day of fruits and vegetables? It’s not that hard. A serving of fruits or vegetables can consist of the following: •3/4 cup (six ounces) 100 percent fruit or vegetable juice •One medium fruit (apple, orange, banana, pear and so on) •1/2 cup cut-up fruit •1/2 cup raw or cooked vegetables •1/2 cup dried fruit (raisins, apricots, mangoes) •1 cup raw, leafy vegetables •1/2 cup cooked or canned peas or beans

Don’t forget: While five servings is the minimum suggested for health, the ideal number of servings is about 11 a day.

—J.B.

man ate up to 10 grams of potassium a day on average, or about five times more than most people get today.1 Sodium was rare in that period, and the human body evolved to conserve sodium and eliminate potassium. The kidneys regulate the process, which is why those with failing kidneys must be aware of their potassium intake.

Aldosterone, a hormone secreted by the adrenal glands, helps retain sodium while eliminating potassium.2 Potassium-sparing diuretics, such as the one Matarrazo used, block the effects of aldosterone.

Although it represents a mere 5 percent of the body’s mineral content, potassium is the major intracellular electrolyte. It has a yin-yang relationship with sodium and chloride: As potassium exits a cell, sodium enters it. Those reactions, which are powered by the sodiumpotassium ATP pump, are involved in several important mechanisms, including nerve conduction, water balance and muscle contraction.

Cells need potassium for normal growth and protein synthesis. That alone should make the mineral of extraordinary interest to anybody who wants to build muscle. Lesser known functions include its involvement in glycogen synthesis and the process that degrades glycogen into glucose to release energy. People on low-carbohydrate diets often experience weakness and fatigue due to a low-potassium intake combined with the natural diuretic effects associated with lowcarb diets. Those effects lead to general water loss, especially notable during the initial stages of the diet. But along with water, various minerals, including sodium and potassium, are also lost

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Special K

Neveux \ Model: Jonathan Lawson

Losing potassium, calcium and magnesium can lead to potent muscular cramps.

Potassium = Muscles & Health

from the body.

Heart patients on pharmaceutical diuretics that treat heart failure and hypertension, or high blood pressure, are also often prescribed potassium supplements to replace what’s lost.

The heart cannot properly function without

When injected directly into the heart, potassium is capable of stopping it as fast as a bullet.

potassium; it’s vital for the electrical conduction system that regulates heartbeat. Too much potassium, however, can lead to equally serious disturbances.

Several studies have demonstrated potassium’s benefits. It appears to help prevent the most common form of stroke.3 By opposing the action of sodium, potassium helps lower elevated blood pressure, a major cause of stroke. In addition, potassium functions as an antioxidant, limiting the activity of a destructive free radical called superoxide.4 Free radicals, by-products of oxygen metabolism, cause the major damage to brain neurons after a stroke.

The vital sodium-potassium pump mechanism sets off an electrical charge that leads to a series of reactions that send nerve impulses from brain to body and back. Without the sodium-potassium pump, glands couldn’t secrete any hormones, including testosterone and growth hormone.

You’ve likely heard that the popular food supplement creatine is best absorbed when taken with simple sugar, which causes a release of insulin. The insulin, in turn, positively influences the actions of the sodium-potassium pump, which then powers the transport protein that actually pushes creatine into muscle.

Certain hormones influence potassium activity in the body. Socalled sympathetic hormones, such as epinephrine, promote the entry of potassium into cells. Users of the drug clenbuterol, structurally similar to sympathetic hormones, have often noticed such side effects as hand cramps and muscle twitching; clenbuterol lowers blood levels of potassium and pushes it into cells.

The temporary imbalance that results leads to nerve conduction and muscle contraction abnormalities, hence the side effects.

Any drugs that either mimic or promote the release of sympathetic hormones, such as epinephrine, can lower blood potassium levels.

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Potassium = Muscles & Health

Special K

Since potassium is vital for both muscle contraction and energy release, it’s easy to understand why excessive loss of potassium leads to muscle weakness.

Many drugs used to treat asthma, besides clenbuterol, lower potassium. The most popular inhaler for treating asthma attacks, albuterol, lowers blood potassium for four hours, though not to dangerously low levels. The OTC decongestant pseudoepinephrine also lowers potassium levels, as does ephedrine, the popular fat-loss ingredient that was removed from sale last year.

Caffeine, a common ingredient in fat-loss supplements and the active ingredient in coffee, lowers potassium. An overdose of the asthma drug theophylline, which is sometimes included in fat-loss supplements, can cause severe hypokalemia. Even eating lots of black licorice will result in potassium excretion and sodium retention—an aldosteronelike effect.

Insulin potently promotes the entry of potassium into cells. One standard treatment of hyperkalemia is a dose of insulin, which rapidly pushes potassium from the blood into cells. The pH—acidity or alkalinity—of the blood also influences

potassium levels. High acidity, which you get on a high-protein diet devoid of alkaline foods like fruits and vegetables, pushes potassium out of cells, while an alkaline state favors cellular sodium retention.

Recent animal studies show that excessive acidity blunts protein synthesis. In fact, high acidity can lead to muscle catabolism, or breakdown. Potassium is an effective buffer against the effects of excess acidity caused by a high protein diet. One study published a few years ago showed that when women following a high-protein diet took potassium bicarbonate, which contains two buffer substances, muscle protein breakdown and calcium losses were inhibited.

Dietitians frequently warn that a high-protein diet is hazardous to health because it promotes calcium loss. The culprits here are amino acids, mainly the ones containing sulfur, such as methionine and cysteine. The body compensates for the increased blood acidity by releasing various buffers, including calcium, which disappears from the body during the process. When the subjects of some studies increased their fruit and vegetable intake from 3.6 to 9.5 daily servings, however, calcium excretion decreased by 30 percent. Much of the protective effect is due to the alkalinizing effects of the potassium found in fruits and vegetables.

Compared to most other minerals, potassium is easily absorbed into the body and at about 90 percent efficiency; potassium is highly watersoluble. There is, however, a flag on

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Fun Fact: When a lethal injection is given as part of a death sentence, the lethal injection is a certain dose of potassium.

Special K

Potassium = Muscles & Health

the play. Because of the dangers associated with high-potassium intake, especially in relation to heart function, the government prohibits direct over-the-counter potassium supplements from providing more than 99 milligrams per dose.

That doesn’t mean you can’t get higher amounts of potassium in other food supplements, such as meal-replacement products.

Another form of potassium, which combines potassium with chloride, is sold as a salt substitute.

The most popular food sources of potassium are bananas and baked potatoes, both of which contain respectable levels of potassium minus excessive sodium. Other potassium-rich foods include fruits, vegetables, almonds, raisins, avocado, figs, dates, yams and dairy products. Since potassium is ubiquitous, it

Caffeine, another common ingredient in various fat-loss supplements, as well as the active ingredient in coffee, lowers potassium.

seems unlikely that you’ll suffer from a deficiency of the mineral—unless you resort to some extreme measure, like diuretics.

Most Americans get 2.9 to 3.2 grams of potassium daily, which is below the acceptable intake of 4.7 grams a day. That pales in comparison to the 10 grams our Stone Age ancestors took in. Diets that eliminate the best food sources of potassium—fruits and vegetables— could lead to problems. That’s particularly true of high-protein, low-carb plans that call for no fruits and vegetables. Such diets tend to produce high acidity in the body, which can lead to muscular weakness during exercise and suppression of protein synthesis.

As a diet low in natural potassium continues, the kidneys become less effective at conserving the mineral, and the body excretes more of it. That occurs when you consistently take in less than 1,000 milligrams daily. Eventually some form of hypokalemia, or low potassium, may occur. Symptoms include muscular weakness, heart rhythm disturbances and glucose intolerance, all of which add up to lousy workouts.

Taking OTC potassium pills isn’t the best way to deal with a potassium-deficient diet. Such supplements, which often contain potassium chloride, have a caustic effect on the lining of the gastrointestinal

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Neveux \ Model: Luke Wood

Inside cells, potassium is required for normal cell growth and protein synthesis. That alone should make this mineral of extraordinary interest to everyone who’s interested in building muscle.

Special K

Neveux \ Model: Tamer Elshahat

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Special K tract and may even cause a type of ulceration and perforation.5 Fortunately, healthy kidneys eliminate excess potassium, so it’s difficult to suffer a potassium overdose unless you have some type of kidney failure.

Bodybuilders often use potassium supplements because of the notion that they prevent muscle cramps. There’s some truth to that, since potassium is vital for muscle contraction and nerve conduction, each of which plays a role in the onset of muscle cramps. Besides potassium, however, a sensible supplemental cocktail should also include magnesium and calcium.

Without magnesium, your cells can’t retain potassium.6 One thing to avoid is taking a potassium supplement on an empty stomach. That signals the adrenal glands to secrete aldosterone, which helps the kidneys excrete potassium and retain sodium.7 Then human evolution kicks in and leads to edema, or water retention. Maintaining a higher ratio of potassium to sodium promotes the excretion of excess sodium, which equals less water retention.

You should aim for about five grams of potassium a day to help maintain an alkaline state in your body, thereby reducing muscle catabolism, and replenish muscle glycogen for better workouts. The easiest way to get your potassium quota is to eat at least five (nine is

better) servings of fruits and vegetables daily.

References 1 Frassetto, L.A., et al. (2001).

Diet, evolution and aging: the physiopathologic effects of postagricultural inversion of the potassium-to-sodium and base-tochloride ratios in the human diet.

Eur J Nutr. 40:200-213.

2 Meneton, P., et al.

(2004). Sodium and

Potassium = Muscles & Health

Without sufficient potassium, you couldn’t contract your muscles, your nervous system couldn’t function, and you wouldn’t be able to store glycogen, the complex carbohydrate that fuels bodybuilding workouts. Nor could you secrete anabolic hormones, including testosterone.

Estimates are that prehistoric man took in up to 10 grams of potassium a day on average, or about five times more than most people get today.

potassium handling by the aldosterone-sensitive distal nephron: the pivotal role of the distal and connecting tubule. Am J Physiol.

287:F593-F601.

3 Khaw, K.T., et al. (1987). Dietary potassium and stroke-associated mortality: a 12-year prospective population study. New Eng J Med. 316:235-40.

4 McCabe, R.D., et al. (1994).

Potassium inhibits free radical formation. Hypertension. 2:77-82.

5 Debs, A., et al. (1988). Perforation of the small intestine caused by tablets of potassium chloride.

Press Med. 17:696-97.

6 Kobrin, S.M., et al. (1990). Magnesium deficiency. Semin Nephrol.

10:525-35.

7 Field, M.J., et al. (1985). Hormonal control of renal potassium excretion. Kidney Int. 27:379-87.

IM

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’05 FitExpo’s Fittest Couple: Mike and Holly Semanoff

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Pair of

Aces Utah Team Takes Pasadena by Storm to Win the ’05 FitExpo’s Fittest Couple Competition

by David Young Photography by Michael Neveux

M

ike and Holly Semanoff had no plans to enter a contest when they came to Los Angeles to visit some friends during the weekend of the ’05 IRON MAN FitExpo in nearby Pasadena. Out shopping, they saw a flyer about the expo and decided to go. “We were just walking around, checking out the expo, when we heard there was a competition called the Fittest Couple,” recalled Mike. “Someone said, ‘You two should enter.’

“So on a whim we did. The next thing we knew, we were shopping for swimsuits so we could compete. Then we made the finals.”

Mike and Holly ended up taking the top spot at the contest, and I was assigned to find out more about this wonder couple.

(When you see their list of accomplishments, you’ll understand why I’m calling them that). These two are on a natural high, so buckle up, kids, because it’s quite a ride. www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 161

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Pair of Aces

DY: Mike and Holly, how old are you, and what are your height and weight?

HS: I’m 21, 5’4” inches tall and weigh 120 pounds.

MS: And I’m 27, 5’11” and weigh 205.

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Pair of Aces DY: [Thinks for a second he has a shot] So, Holly, you like older men, huh?

HS: Well, this older man.

DY: Drat! How long have you been training?

MS: Since I started playing football and running track, about 14 or 15 years.

HS: I didn’t get serious until about 2 1/2 years ago.

DY: Do you both have backgrounds in athletics?

MS: I was involved in college athletics before and after the Army. Before the Army I played football for a school that is now called BYU Idaho, and after the service I competed in track and field. I did the 100 meters, 200 meters, 4x100-meter relay, shot put and discus. I went to the NJCAA nationals with our relay team in 2002. I also competed in various triathlons with the school’s team. I took a silver medal for my age group in the ’02 Utah Summer Games.

HS: I have been pretty active my whole life. I played various sports, including softball, soccer, football and track. In high school I was a sprinter, running the 100 meters, 200 meters and 4x100-meter relay and doing the long jump. Unfortunately, in my junior year I tore my hamstring in the 100, and in my senior year I broke my back. Those injuries nagged me for years, prohibiting me from doing a lot of things. It was only when I started doing yoga that the pain and tightness started to go away, and eventually they were gone completely. I became a yoga instructor because of that. I’m currently training for a triathlon and hoping also to do my first figure competition soon.

DY: Mike, what about when you were in the service: Did you continue your training?

MS: I served in Saudi Arabia with the 82nd Airborne Division for six

“We’re in the gym six days a week, three days of heavy training and three days of light.”

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Ad “I’m currently training for a triathlon and hoping also to do my first figure competition soon.” months. The environment was perfect for training. We had a lot of time, food and motivation. I weighed 215, benched 315 for 18 reps, squatted for three sets of 15 with 405 and still managed to run two miles in under 12 minutes. To this day I don’t know how I did that.

DY: [Jokes] From the sound of it, you two are real underachievers. How did you get started in fitness and bodybuilding?

MS: My family are all very competitive athletes, so fitness has been a way of life for me from the beginning. I haven’t been involved in bodybuilding until recently, when Holly started competing in figure. I guess as life changes, so does your reason for training.

HS: As I said, I’ve always been active, but I didn’t really get into fitness completely until I met Mike.

He taught me how to train, and I just went from there.

DY: What do you do for a living?

MS: I’m a microbiologist at Electric Aquagenics Unlimited, a company that specializes in electrolyzed oxidative water technologies, and a free-fall photographer for Skydive Utah. I paid my bills through college by videotaping people on their first skydives.

HS: I’m a yoga instructor and love it! I’m currently teaching at Utah Valley State College, Novell, and the It’s Yoga studio in Provo.

MS: Also, we’ve recently been working with GAGA fitness and GotGAGA.com, owned by Tom Wright, a former outfielder for the New York Yankees. He’s going to be hosting his own fitness TV show, “GAGA for Healthy Living.” It will only be avail- (continued on page 168) www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 165

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Pair of Aces

“Training is more like a lifestyle—it’s our recreation.

We don’t own a TV, so we’re forced to do something more constructive with our time.”

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Ad

“We stay pretty lean year-round; the seasons seem to dictate what training and diet strategy we’re on.” (continued from page 165) able in

Utah and surrounding states, but it’s still cool. He’s going to have us on as guest trainers once or twice a month. By the way, GAGA stands for Greater Awareness for Greater Achievement.

DY: Do you play any sports?

What about hobbies?

MS: Holly and I enjoy rock climbing, and last season we were both climbing “5.12”. If the conditions are right, we paraglide in the evenings after work. We bike 80 to 100 miles per week because we try to bike instead of driving everywhere. We both thoroughly enjoy various forms of marksmanship, whether it is with handguns, rifles or archery.

DY: What motivates you to keep training and eating right?

MS: Training is more like a lifestyle—it’s our recreation. We don’t own a TV, so we are forced to do something more constructive with our time. Our not buying a TV is probably the best thing that has ever happened to us.

HS: As for our diet, eating junk makes us feel sluggish and moody.

We generally just eat clean because it makes us feel better and perform better.

DY: What’s your diet strategy— on-season and off?

MS: We stay pretty lean yearround; the seasons dictate what training and diet strategy we’re on.

During the winter we’re in the gym a lot more, trying to build muscle, and our diet is geared for muscle development. The rest of the year allows us to be outside more, which puts us into cardio mode, just in time to cut down for the bodybuilding season. www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 169

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Pair of Aces DY: Do you have a cheat day?

HS: Yes, we allow ourselves a cheat meal—not a day—on the weekend. That’s what we consider our date night.

DY: Can you list a sample day’s meals?

MS: Sure. Here’s a precontest meal plan.

Meal 1 1 banana 8-ounce protein shake Meal 2 1 cup Eggbeaters 1/2 ounce cheese 2/3 cup dry oatmeal Meal 3 1 1/2 cups string beans 10 ounces sweet potato 3 ounces chicken Meal 4 1 cup string beans 8 ounces sweet potato 3 ounces chicken Meal 5 1 1/2 cups string beans 8 ounces sweet potato 3 ounces chicken Meal 6 1/3 cup dry oats 4-ounce protein shake DY: What are your favorite supplements?

HS: Tahitian Noni Juice. It’s amazing how much it helps with our recovery time.

MS: Holly and I have been working with a company called Aquagen.

They specialize in liquid, stabilized oxygen supplements. I’m taking a product called Oxytime®, which is something that you take when you’re preparing for hard cardio—it’s great for endurance and recovery. A lot of marathon runners really love the stuff. I like Muscle Milk for protein.

and three days of light work:

DY: How do you overcome training plateaus?

MS: I take a full week off of training and totally change my strategy when I start up again. If I’ve been doing high reps, I’ll come back after a week and hit it real heavy for a while, or vice versa. I can usually put on an easy five pounds after I bust my plateau.

HS: I mix it up. If I’m beginning to feel drained in the gym, I allow myself time away. Instead of hitting the weights, I’ll go biking or rock climbing. When I feel I’m ready for the gym again I usually overcome the plateaus on the first few days back.

DY: Can you list a typical week’s program, bodypart by bodypart?

MS: These are just in general. We modify whatever we want depending on the mood. On any given day some things just feel better than others.

DY: How do you stay on track?

HS: It’s almost a game with us. We don’t let each other fail. If someone wants to cheat, the other calls them out.

MS: You can’t be called weak by your better half.

Pull: Back, biceps, rear delts •Pullups •Wide-grip pulldowns •Narrow-grip pulldowns •Seated rows (narrow and wide in the same set) •Cable pullovers with a rope •Cable pullovers with a bar •Cable lateral raises •Cable upright rows •Cable curls (bent bar, narrow and wide grip)

DY: How do you organize your training week?

MS: We’re in the gym six days a week, three days of heavy training

Heavy work, 3-4 x 6-8 Monday: Legs Tuesday: Push Wednesday: Pull Light: 3-4 x 10-12 Thursday: Legs Friday: Push Saturday: Pull

Push: Chest, triceps, front delts •Flat-bench dumbbell presses •Incline dumbbell bench presses •Dumbbell shoulder presses •Cable flyes (high) •Cable flyes (middle) •Cable flyes (low) •Dips

Holly is a yoga instructor, so it’s easy for her to get bent out of shape.

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Pair of Aces Legs: Quads, hamstrings, calves Squats Stiff-legged deadlifts Lunges Leg presses Leg extensions (light) Leg curls (light) Inner/outer thigh machines Barefoot calf raises (toes in, toes out, toes forward) We do a lot of indescribable things for our abs. Most require a lot of core strength; we get very creative.

DY: And what about cadence (speed of movement)?

MS: On push exercises we come down slowly and under control, and then I push explosively as we exhale. On pull exercises we pull steadily and hold for a second at full contraction, really get a good squeeze.

DY: What about rest periods?

HS: Two to three minutes.

DY: What do you do for cardio?

HS: As we said, we do a lot of cycling or running, but if we can’t be outside, we hit the stair stepper or treadmill. Precontest we do one to two hours of cardio. When we’re outside cycling, it’s easy to knock out two hours. Cardio takes real dedication when you’re stuck inside

looking at a TV screen. If I do cardio in the morning, I’m charged up all day. I love it.

DY: Do you have any role models?

MS: Justin Dees. He won the Utah Spring Classic a couple of years in a row and has helped us both with our diets, posing, backstage, as well as helping us mentally prepare for shows. Not only is he a great bodybuilder, but he’s also a great father to his children, which we admire.

DY: What are your future goals in bodybuilding and fitness?

HS: We really want to promote couples fitness. Training is so much easier when you have the full support of your spouse. Fitness to us is a fundamental part of our life together, our success as a couple depends on each other’s support in and out of the gym. We hope to compete together and win together and motivate others in the process.

[Update: In June Holly took best of show in figure and Mike took first in the heavyweight division at the North West Natural Bodybuilding Championships.]

DY: What’s your life philosophy?

HS: Do what you love to do! Take time to enjoy life, and live it to the fullest.

DY: What’s your training philosophy?

MS: We listen to our bodies. We like to train hard in the gym, but because of our other activities, we have to be careful about burning ourselves out mentally as well as physically. We sometimes run into the problem with leg workouts. For example: We do a hardcore leg workout in the gym, but then for the next couple of days we might bike hard or run more than usual.

Then before you know it, leg day comes around, and we can hardly walk. So we just take the day off, swim laps and hit it hard the next day.

DY: What’s the toughest thing about bodybuilding?

HS: Sometimes we can’t stand even looking at the gym, especially when it’s nice outside, and you have a room full of toys that need some attention.

DY: What’s the best thing about being a bodybuilder?

MS: The respect you earn as you better yourself as well as the people around you.

Editor’s note: Mike Semanoff’s Web site is www.naturalhighphoto.com. Visit the Aquagen Web site, too, at www.aquagen.com and the Tahitian Noni Juice Web site at www.noniusers.com/floyd. IM

“Do what you love to do!

Take time to enjoy life, and live it to the fullest.”

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Your State of Mind

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Ordinary to

Extraordinary The Mental Set of Greatness: Muscularity Begins With Your State of Mind!

by Peter C. Siegel, R.H. Photography by Michael Neveux

T

here is a certain attitude, philosophy and ideology that, in those of my clients who’ve embraced it, has resulted in their reflecting an advancement-inducing dominance outlook—the outlook I call the mental set of greatness. It entails an unbending perception of control, conquest expectation and continual maximum power generation—it encompasses a stalwart conviction that they can, should and will surpass existing performance levels. Not only that, they will: a) Generate and sustain overwhelming, triumph-directed performance intensity in every workout with every set. b) Exercise authority and commanding control over the weights used and their muscular progress. c) Generate supremacy and superiority over every challenge and competitor they face.

When the mental set of greatness informs training and competitive outlook, the level of emotional, personal and competitive mastery generated is extraordinary.

A person who reflects this perception regularly feels totally in control, ready, primed, focused in the moment—seeing clearly the specific success he knows he can get, the success he unconsciously generates his full power toward accomplishing, the success he senses represents his very destiny.

This compelling unconscious framework is, perhaps more than any other factor, the basis from which championship effort and accomplishment emerge. By using your power to tap latent resources and access and control factors you’ve allowed to lie dormant, you can unleash the force-promoting advancement that represent the champion within you.

Illustration by Jake Jones www.Bodtbuilding Universe.com

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Ordinary to Extraordinary

Your Unconscious Belief Framework: Your Action Command Center You’re supposed to advance and further develop because you are life.

And because you are life:

Whether your thoughts are commanding or limiting, life will respond accordingly.

Your unconscious thoughts and belief system are responsible for channeling how your life potential is shaped.

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Model: Skip La Cour

Your unconscious thoughts and belief system are responsible for channeling how your life potential is shaped, formed and expressed through you. That applies to how you approach every facet of your training, the muscularity you incite and your rate and level of personal gain.

Whether your thoughts (ideas, beliefs, expectations, images) are commanding or limiting, life will respond accordingly and will become the physical and experiential manifestation of your internal state—the shape, quality and development of your body are essentially a physical extension of your state of mind.

Reread the preceding paragraph—slowly and thoughtfully so you grasp its impact and significance. When you accept, believe and comprehensively think in line with its premise, you become and stay the big you, the powerful you, the dominant you, the maximum you—all the time! That’s when a force of tenacious conquest ferocity fuels every set you perform and your effort in each workout you do.

Model: Joe DeAngelis

Your State of Mind

•You have all that life is as your potential.

•You have all the properties, qualities and characteristics of life as your potential.

•You have all of life’s nature, purpose and tendencies as your potential.

Ordinary to Extraordinary

By aligning your inner state to embrace and reflect the mental set of greatness, you will become more than you ever considered possible.

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Your State of Mind

Life continually strives to advance you. By aligning your inner states to embrace and reflect the mental set of greatness (the overall ideal reinforcing your purpose as one of being more and developing more ex-

Ordinary to Extraordinary pansively), you will become more than you ever considered possible.

Reconstructing your unconscious framework compels a dimension of creative force that’s within you. The dimension is naturally designed to increase you, advance you and drive you toward ultimate triumph.

The mental set of greatness moves you from just “considering” what you’d like to taking charge and feverishly acting to become more, better and greater with every successive workout.

Model: Daryl Gee

Your State of Mind

Structuring the Mental Set of Greatness

Reconstructing your unconscious framework compels a dimension of creative force that’s within you.

186 OCTOBER 2005 \

You can establish the mental set as your approach to training by the following idea scripting process. Read through it in its entirety, and then apply as outlined.

In bed at night before drifting off to sleep, imagine you’re standing in front of a full-length mirror, experiencing yourself as a physical reflection of majestic, triumphant, compelling muscular power. Next, imaginatively step into that body, feeling yourself as possessor of its superior development—all of it.

Then, seeing yourself as that force, notice reflected in the mirror your facial expression, your posture, your overall degree of development—every cut, groove, peak and the total representation of thick, cut, flaring density.

Next, as you’re fully engrossed in envisioning and experiencing yourself at peak development, mentally exclaim the following sequence of ideas, making the commitment to think, speak, expect, imagine, act out and work out from those ideals exclusively—in every aspect of your training. I recommend that you commit them to memory so you can express them with authority.

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Ordinary to Extraordinary

Your State of Mind

After you mentally exclaim each idea, pause momentarily and f-e-e-l its overall meaning. Feel its meaning penetrate down to the deepest level within you, lodging as a foundation in an evolving power attitude structure.

Next, imaginatively project yourself standing atop a rugged mountain peak—addressing the whole world as this maximum muscular power. Forcefully mentally exclaim what I call the vow of dominance.

Again, I suggest you memorize the following sequence of ideas so you can smoothly mentally project it.

a) I strive to create the physique I know represents my destiny—what I know is mine to claim. b) I am driven by the unchained will to triumph—I now take charge of every rep. c) I now see dominance intensity! d) I now f-e-e-l dominance intensity! e) I now take full control, and I make it happen for me.

Make your personal power become reality.

After you mentally exclaim each idea, pause momentarily and f-e-e-l its overall meaning—feel the meaning penetrate to the deepest level within you, lodging as a foundation in an evolving power attitude structure.

Then, f-e-e-l-i-n-g, expecting and perceptually b-e-i-n-g this force of dominant, commanding muscular power (and all of what you sense that entails), slowly let the mental impression fade and let yourself easily drift off into a deep and restful slumber.

Alternate this mental set of greatness process with the four-step presleep success motivation process presented above. (One night perform the success motivation

process, the next the mental set process.) Doing that will make personal power and striking size increases stop being wished-for fantasies and start becoming your demonstrable reality.

Editor’s note: Self-help author, seminar leader and personalchange specialist Peter C. Siegel is America’s foremost sports and peakperformance hypnotherapist. You can review his acclaimed self-help, personal-success-development, mega-confidence-building programs at www.incrediblechange .com, or call the PowerMind order desk at (310) 280-3269. The programs come with Siegel’s unique, results-guaranteed assurance. IM

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a) I am created to succeed. My purpose is to triumph. b) I’m primed for excellence; whatever must be done, I instantly do. c) I believe in me— I’ve got what it takes. d) I am the force of magnitude conquest fury.

Angling for Delts How to Reel In a Pair of

Shocking Shoulders

by Eric Broser

Photography by Michael Neveux

ook up the word angling in the dictionary, and you’ll likely find something pertaining to the art or sport of fishing. Since most of us are “fishing” for shocking shoulders, I guess, in a way, it kind of makes sense. Still, angling, as I’m using it, means attacking the muscle from a variety of angles and/or planes of movement with different grips to generate new muscle growth.

If you’re new to weight training, using a very standard program and repeating the same exercises week in and week out for months will be highly effective at stimulating hypertrophy. As time goes on, however, the body makes it increasingly difficult for you to make steady gains. Most trainees respond by adding some fresh exercises or simply adding more sets to existing exercises, and that can set the muscles on the path to new growth. Keep in mind, though, that the human body is highly adaptive—eventually it will fight against even your best efforts in the gym.

L

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Models: Marcus Reinhardt and Hubert Morandell

Model: Skip La Cour

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Seated Presses

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Delts

Foward-Lean Laterals

Model: Jonathan Lawson

Model: Jon Lawson

Angling means using various angles, grips and planes of movement to better stimulate a muscle to grow.

Lots of techniques can be helpful once you reach a plateau, but most of them are designed to make you work harder in the gym. Forced reps, negatives, drop sets, partials and so on are all certainly going to raise your intensity level—and perhaps that’s exactly what you need to get on the road to progress; however, those same techniques also make greater inroads into your recovery ability and could end up backfiring on you by pushing you into an overtrained state. In other words, you may actually be working hard enough in the gym, but your central nervous system and muscles might just be, well, bored.

Though most trainees change exercises occasionally, they usually have a core of five to six movements per muscle group that they use most of the time. Unfortunately, your body can get tired of doing the same exercises in the same manner, over and over, and your muscles may be firing off fewer and fewer fibers each time you perform the movement, even if you increase the weight. You may also find that

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Model: Darrem Charles

Bent-Over Laterals

Model: Marvin Montoya

Delts

Arnold Presses

you’re having a problem getting a pump from your workouts and that your joints are starting to bug you. That’s because doing the same exercises from workout to workout can, over time, cause what’s known as an overuse injury.

On the other hand, what if it’s not your muscles that are bored but your brain?

Perhaps you’re simply looking for a way to make your workouts more interesting, which will help to keep your enthusiasm higher and your time in the gym more productive. Either way, angling is the answer.

As mentioned above,

Model: Daniel Gwartney

Standing Laterals

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Delts angling is my system of using various angles, grips and planes of movement to better stimulate a muscle to grow. My guess is that right about now you’re probably saying, “But I already do that—I use three or four different exercises for each bodypart, hitting the muscle from different angles.”

And I am sure you do, but I’m talking about taking the concept a step further, performing each exercise from several different angles.

We’re applying the technique to shoulder training here. Very, very few trainees build complete deltoids from front to back—most usually lack development in one or two of the delt heads.

In my years of training clients, I’ve found angling to be an excellent way of overcoming the problem. The deltoids seem to thrive on this technique, probably because of the nature of the shoulder joint and the many planes of movement it allows.

Let’s look at a typical workout for shoulders that has probably been performed thousands of times by trainees all over the world:

The The deltoids deltoids seem seem to to thrive thrive on on this this technique, technique, probably probably because because of of the the nature nature of of the the shoulder shoulder joint joint and and the the many many planes planes of of movement movement itit allows. allows.

One-Arm Cable Laterals

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Seated dumbbell presses 3 x 8-10 Lateral raises 3 x 8-10 Upright rows 2 x 8-10 Seated bent-over laterals 2 x 8-10 It’s an excellent delt workout that hits all three heads. You torch the shoulders from front to back. After performing the same exercises for years on end, however, the body begins to get a been-there, done-that attitude, becoming increasingly less responsive

Cable Upright Rows

to them—and that equals little to no growth.

Now, let’s look at the same workout for shoulders with angling added to the mix.

Seated dumbbell presses •Perform the first set in the standard manner, with your palms facing forward; simply press upward from just above your shoulders to just before lockout.

•Perform the second set with your palms facing in toward your head at the beginning of the rep.

Press upward with an arcing mo-

tion, driving the dumbbells overhead and toward each other to a point just short of where they would touch. Make sure the dumbbells follow the same arced path on the way down as well.

•Perform the third set with your palms facing toward your chest and your elbows tucked into your body in front of you. As you press upward, rotate your palms inward so that just as you get to the top of the movement, they are facing away from you, as in a standard dumbbell press. Reverse the rotation of

the palms on the way down.

This exercise is also know as the Arnold press, as it was popularized

by Governor Schwarzenegger during his bodybuilding years.

Lateral raises •Perform the first set in the standard manner, standing or seated, with your torso erect, raising the dumbbells out to the sides to shoulder height with your palms down.

•For the second set grab an adjustable incline bench and set it up with the pad facing you. The angle of the bench (continued on page 202)

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Delts

Delts (continued from page 198) should be about 75 to 80 degrees. Grab a set of dumbbells and, while standing, lean into the bench so that your chest is on the pad and your head is just over the top of the bench.

Holding that position, raise the dumbbells out to the sides without allowing your chest to leave the bench at any point. These are harder than standard laterals, so go with only about two-thirds of the weights you’d normally use.

•On the final set turn the incline bench around and drop the angle back maybe another hole or two. Sit on the bench and lean back on the pad. Perform a strict set of lateral raises.

Upright rows •Perform the first set with a shoulder-width grip and raise the bar in a plane just a few inches away from your body.

•Perform the second set with your hands just a few inches apart and raise the bar while keeping it very close to your body.

Seated bent-over lateral raises •For the first set lean over and hold the dumbbells with your palms facing in under your thighs.

•For the second set lean over far enough that you can start with the dumbbells in front of your shins.

Instead of your palms facing in, however, they should be facing back, so that the inside plates of the dumbbells are actually touching at the beginning of the movement.

Doing bent-over laterals in this manner is very difficult, so be prepared to go very light if you expect to use a full range of motion.

There you have it, my fellow hypertrophy hounds! A run-of-themill delt routine is morphed into a cannonball-creating, melon-making, deltoid-demolishing workout with four different exercises and 10 different angles. It’s guaranteed to smash your shoulders from front to back, top to bottom, inside and out.

Give angling for delts a try, then go home and get in a good meal— maybe a nice piece of fish.

Editor’s note: For individualized programs, online personal training, nutritional guidance or contest-prep coaching, contact Eric Broser at bodyfx2@aol.com. IM 202 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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Model: Skip LaCoure

There you have it, my fellow hypertrophy hounds! A run-of-the-mill delt routine is morphed into a cannonball-creating, melon-making, deltoid-demolishing workout with four different exercises and 10 different angles.

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Heavy Duty

Heavy Duty

Heavy Duty

Heavy Duty

Heavy Duty H

Heavy Duty Building Triceps A Scientific Approach

h, to have triceps like Mike MentzerÕs! How many of us growing up in the late 1970s and early Õ80s longed for such development, making our upper arms the envy of all we knew? Overall, MikeÕs physique was one of the greatest and most inspiring of all time, but itÕs safe to say that his arms were perhaps its most striking feature. Not only were they huge, taping in excess of 20 inches at the peak of his career, but they had incredible shape and definition as well. His triceps in particular were awesome, looking like watermelons when viewed from behind and splintering into thou-

sands of fibrous explosions whenever he exercised or flexed them.

Being impressed with MikeÕs arms, IÕve since learned, is well nigh universal (recently at Nautilus North Strength & Fitness Centre, the gym owned and operated by my wife, Terri, and me, a 56-year-old retired high school principalÑwho has no interest in bodybuilding per seÑtold me, ÒMentzer had the most impressive body IÕve ever seen; IÕd love to have arms like his!Ó). Indeed, the one thing about bodybuilding that will be true till the sun cools off is that the upper arms are the most universally admired and desired bodypart.

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Mozée \ Photo Illustration by Christian Martinez

by John Little

Heavy Duty

Heavy Duty

Heavy Duty

Heavy Duty

Heavy Duty

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Heavy Duty

Building Triceps

Mozée

you.’ I knew I had arrived.”

Unlike so many other young bodybuilders, Mike didn’t make the mistake of just training his arms and neglecting the rest of his body. As he once put it, “You wouldn’t put a Mack truck tire on a Volkswagen. Nor would you expect to build a 19-inch arm on a 150-pound body.” One would Mentzer do well to remember that when growth in any muscle is was a big pro- stimulated, growth is also stimulated—though to a lessponent er degree—in the rest of the of mabody. That indirect effect chine seems to be proportional to training. the size of the muscle being worked. To get the most out of your triceps training, then, it would be logical to train your legs as hard as possible—since the leg muscles are the largest in the body, their growth will have the greatest indirect effect on stimulating growth In their desire to build their in the triceps and throughout the arms, however, bodybuilders conrest of the body. tinue to make the same major mistake in their training: They focus Triceps Anatomy: most of their effort on the “show Three Heads Are Better muscle” of the upper arm, the biThan One ceps, often neglecting the triceps.

As the prefix tri implies, the triThe largest single muscle of the ceps muscle has three separate upper arm, the triceps has a greater heads. They originate at different cross-sectional area than the biceps points on the scapula and humerus, and the rest of the upper-arm flexand insert in a common extensor ors combined. Any bodybuilder tendon at the elbow. They are: who wants to build his arms to their 1) The lateral head, which origimaximum potential, therefore, nates on the side of the humerus must focus equal attention on the near the shoulder joint and is most triceps—just as Mike did. He once readily seen on the outside of the related this story: arm in the side triceps pose.

“I recall how I measured my 2) The medial head, which origiprogress in the early stages of my nates about halfway up on the training career. The degree to which underside of the humerus and is my triceps were growing was an partly covered by the other two index of my overall rating as a heads. bodybuilder. I remember standing 3) The long head, which origiin front of the mirror by the dumbnates on the scapula and is seen on bell rack at the old Lancaster, Pennthe under side of the arm in a front sylvania, YMCA after a particularly view of a double-biceps pose. grueling workout, checking out my The triceps has essentially two thoroughly pumped triceps. One of functions: to extend the forearm the Y’s more tactful habitues felt and to bring it closer to the torso. compelled to issue a statement on the state of the Mentzer triceps to the world at large: ‘God damn, The Need to Train Heavy those things are downright ugly!’

During the course of Mike’s Knowing a compliment when I anatomy studies, one of the heard one, I replied: ‘Why, thank

anatomists he came to respect quite highly was the late Professor A. A. Travill (1925–1996), who was the head of the anatomy department at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada, from 1969 to 1978.

By all accounts Dr. Travill was an excellent teacher, physician, philosopher and historian. Said Mike: “According to the research of A.A. Travill, the three heads of the triceps contribute different degrees of work, depending upon the level of resistance imposed on the muscle.

During the course of normal activities and light weight training, the medial head of the triceps does practically all the work, with the lateral head adding a little and the long head doing virtually no work.

Interestingly enough, Travill discovered that after the resistance exceeded a certain threshold, the lateral and long heads become much more heavily recruited, with the medial head still heavily involved.”

While no one knows exactly when the threshold is reached, it appears that it’s very high. Tom McLaughlin, Ph.D., once pointed out in an article in Powerlifting USA that, of all the muscles, the triceps often show the least improvement in beginners. He attributed it to the fact that the medial head, which remains largely invisible under the other two heads, is doing most of the work. Mike concurred: “My own observations support much of what Dr. McLaughlin says.

I often hear bodybuilders remark how difficult it is to develop the long head and especially the lateral head, which McLaughlin called the ‘totally lazy’ head of the triceps.”

In order to exercise all three heads, therefore, you must impose a very heavy workload. In addition, it’s important to train both functions of the triceps.

Selecting Exercises According to Function Putting the above information together, you can see that the most productive triceps exercises will be those that involve heavy resistance and that straighten the arm from about a 90 degree bend at the

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elbow. The exercises that come closest to filling those requirements are pressdowns and dips, which, not surprisingly, formed the core of Mike’s triceps workouts during his competition days and were prescribed for his clients throughout his years as a personal trainer. It’s a testament to Mike’s logic and consistency that in approaching triceps training, he first explored their anatomy and function and then looked for additional scientific data to apply to his workouts. Of all of the triceps exercises he surveyed, however, Mike believed one in particular to be the most effective: “My favorite exercises for triceps are pressdowns or Nautilus extensions and dips. I think the dip is the best triceps exercise. It’s also the best overall upper-body exercise—I call it the upper-body squat. Dips are by far the best, as you can use extraordinarily heavy weights— especially in the negative phase. My brother Ray and I have found throughout our training careers that when we needed triceps mass, heavy dips never failed.”

Building Triceps

Don’t Overtrain According to Mentzer, “The formula is brief training, intense training and infrequent training. Young bodybuilders reading this should be cautioned against doing too many sets on too many days for all bodyparts. Their enthusiasm is often a hindrance; they’re so willing and able to train marathon-style to acquire a muscular physique that they often overtrain. I see this as probably the most pervasive mistake of all bodybuilders, including advanced bodybuilders—they grossly overtrain.”

Knowing the best exercises to perform is one thing, but other issues, such as volume (or how many sets you perform in a given workout) and frequency (how many workouts you perform in a given period of time, which affects how much time you allow for the production of optimal muscle growth), also factor heavily into the bodybuilding equation. With respect to volume, Mike found that it was, at best, unnecessary to do more than one set per bodypart—or more

than two to three sets, depending on the muscle group being trained.

He pointed out that if it were sheer volume of work that created muscular mass, common laborers who perform highly repetitive tasks and distance runners would have the largest muscles.

Since any amount of training, whether it’s of short or long duration, makes inroads in the body’s recuperative abilities, the intense training has to be infrequent as well as brief. Sufficient time must elapse between training sessions to allow for a complete recovery. Mike had a lot to say on this important subject: “Only after the body has recovered all of the energy it expended during a workout and other daily activities will growth take place. If a bodybuilder spends endless hours in the gym needlessly overtraining, then all of his energy will be spent in an attempt to overcome the exhaustive effects of the workout, with nothing left over for growth.

The acquisition and preservation of energy are the most pressing concerns of all living bodies, as energy is necessary for survival in fending off enemies, finding food and reproduction, while large muscle growth contributes little if anything to chances of survival. So, while intense training is a requirement for rapid muscle growth, such training must be brief and infrequent to allow such growth to take place.”

When Mike was training for competition (and remember he had tremendous genetic advantages that many of us do not), at most he trained once every three or four days and performed a maximum of five sets for his triceps. When training clients with average genetic ability, he recommended that they work out no more than once every five to seven days and perform no more than two sets for their triceps.

Since the triceps receive a lot of stimulation whenever you perform any sort of pressing exercise, like bench presses and shoulder presses, too much stimulation—say, from performing too much direct triceps work—can actually dig a deeper hole that will require even more days off before growth can be produced. So why delay the gains you want so badly? As you grow

Neveux \ Model: Henrik Thamasian

Heavy Duty

Heavy dips were a Mentzer favorite for arm mass.

stronger, the demands on your body’s resources will grow greater, with the result that you’ll need to factor additional rest days into your bodybuilding schedule so the growth you’ve stimulated with your workout can be produced.

When to Train Triceps One of the most frequently asked questions at Mike’s seminars was, What’s the best sequence in which to train the various bodyparts during a workout? As a rule of thumb, he said, the protocol is to train the largest muscles first, since they demand more energy, and, obviously, you have more energy at the start of a workout. So the triceps would be worked toward the end, after you train the torso muscles. As the triceps are used in many of the exercises performed for the delts and pecs, you should always train triceps after those two. As Mike asked, “Why limit the amount of weight you’d be able to use on your

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Heavy Duty

delt and pec exercises by training triceps first?”

Because of the direct stimulation they receive from their involvement in many of the movements associated with the chest and shoulders, the triceps are prone to becoming overtrained. Limit your triceps exercises to relatively few sets, and give yourself ample recovery time afterward.

Building Triceps

Proper Exercise Performance Triceps exercises—like all exercises—should be performed with slow, deliberate movements, continuous tension and an emphasis on full contraction. Keep the movement under control from start to finish. When you start an exercise with a sudden jerk and continue it rapidly to completion, your muscles get resistance only at the beginning and the end of the movement. Yanking and jerking heavy weights out of the starting position can traumatize the joints and connective tissues. Initiate all triceps exercises slowly and carry through to the fully contracted position, and then pause momentarily before lowering slowly and under control. The deliberate motion reduces outside forces and makes sure the triceps do all the work.

In performing two super triceps

builders, pressdowns and dips, Mike had specific instructions for milking the most out of them: Pressdowns. This exercise is very valuable because it requires that the triceps perform both of its functions: straightening the arms and keeping the upper arms close to the body.

Do the exercise with a high-cable apparatus, with your hands held a shoulder width apart or slightly closer and your elbows stationary at your sides. Do not allow your elbows to travel away from your sides; if they go out wide, your pecs and lats come into play.

Begin the movement deliberately from the extended position and continue by straightening your arms, pressing the handle downward until your elbows are fully locked. In the locked position make an effort to pull the bar as close to your body as possible. Pause momentarily, and then lower the weight stack—that is, return to the starting position—slowly and under full muscular control.

After I’ve done six to eight reps in that fashion, my partner will help me force out two or three more reps, in which I exaggerate the negative portion even more, taking up to four seconds to lower the weight. Then, taking no rest at all, I proceed directly to the next exercise.

Dips. After exhausting my triceps with pressdowns, I go to a compound exercise, such as dips, which enables me to continue working my triceps beyond normal failure by using my front delts and pecs. When doing dips for the triceps, be sure to keep your elbows tucked in as close to the body as possible. Although I usually perform reps to positive failure, then continue with several forced and negative reps, every third workout or so I just do pure negatives on the dips—that is, I do no positive reps at all. I stand on a bench that allows me to start in the top, or fully con-

tracted, position. From there I lower myself very slowly all the way to the bottom. I get up on the bench again and lower once more, repeating for five or six reps. When you perform pure negative reps on dips, be sure to use a weight that lets you lower yourself all the way to the bottom under full control. If you find yourself dropping quickly into the bottom position after you reach the halfway point, the weight you’re using is too heavy.

When formulating a triceps routine, make pressdowns and dips the core of your workout. Since maximum-intensity training is the best for building mass, keep your sets fairly low so that each set is maximal.

Mike Mentzer’s Heavy Duty Triceps Workout Superset Pressdowns 1 x 6-10 Dips 1 x 3-5 If you can do more than five reps with your bodyweight on dips, add weight.

Train your triceps at every fourth workout, giving yourself five to seven days between workouts to allow for full recovery and growth to take place.

Editor’s note: For a complete presentation of Mike Mentzer’s Heavy Duty training system, consult his books Heavy Duty II and High Intensity Training the Mike Mentzer Way, available through the ad on page 211 of this issue, from Home Gym Warehouse, (800) 4470008, or by visiting Mentzer’s official Web site, www.mikementzer.com or www.Home-Gym.com.

John Little is available for phone consultation on Mike Mentzer’s Heavy Duty training system. For rates and information, contact Joanne Sharkey at (310) 316-4519 or at www.mikementzer.com, or see the ad mentioned above.

Article copyright © 2005, John Little. All rights reserved. Mike Mentzer quotations that appear in this series provided courtesy of Joanne Sharkey, © 2005 and used with permission. IM

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Rep

Range

Revelations Avoid Repetition Ruts for More Size and Cuts

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Model: Quincy Taylor

by Eric Broser • Photography by Michael Neveux

lmost every day IÕm asked the same question by fellow weighttraining fanatics: ÒWhy canÕt I grow anymore? I used to grow consistently, but it just stopped!Ó Although the answer to that question can be quite complex and the result of many factors, I find a commonality among those who have hit the wall on muscle growth: They use the same rep range day in and day out, week in and week out, year after year. www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 215

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Model: John Hansen

Rep Range While it’s largely accepted that performing one to five reps builds strength, six to 12 reps build size and 13 to 20 reps builds muscular endurance, that’s far too broad a generalization—and also not entirely accurate. You probably know that muscle fibers are divided into two basic categories, fast and slow twitch (also known as type 2 and type 1), but it’s also important to remember that there are several subtypes of each, a few of which share some characteristics. So while it’s true that fast-twitch fibers have the greatest capacity for growing in size, unless you fully tax all available muscle fibers, you’ll never succeed in reaching your full muscular potential. Furthermore, if you use only one rep range, your body will adapt to that specific form of

Model: Jeff Dwelle

Keep in mind that muscles get larger through mechanisms other than actual fiber hypertrophy—such as capillary bed enlargement. stress rather quickly and stop responding to your efforts. That’s when you’ll start asking, Why am I not growing anymore? You must realize that the human body is a master of adaptation and a lover of homeostasis, so you must stay one step ahead if you want to continue to grow.

Keep in mind that muscles get larger through mechanisms other than actual fiber hypertrophy.

Higher repetitions can increase capillary beds and enhance the ability of your cells to store more nutrients like glycogen, amino acids and creatine, which can actually swell them to a greater size. In addition, the various rep ranges can set off various hormonal cascades, causing you to release greater amounts of testosterone, growth hormone and/or IGF-1. Doesn’t it make sense that you would want every available muscle-building hormone flowing through your veins in the greatest possible quantities? You bet! That should be a major concern of every ironhead interested in packing on lean mass.

While I could continue this little lesson in physiology for a few more pages, I’d rather hammer in the take-home message here: Vary your

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Rep Range rep ranges. You should do the majority of your sets in the range of seven to 12 reps (which several studies have shown to be the most effective for muscle hypertrophy); your program should also include

one rep range, several weeks with another rep range and so on. I like to get the unique feel of each rep range during a single workout. A three-to-five-rep set makes your muscles feel entirely different from what you feel with a 12-to-16-rep set. The pump you get from that type of training is outrageous, and plateaus rarely occur because you’re constantly changing the stimulus.

Here are samples of how you can structure workouts for each of your bodyparts using different rep ranges in one workout:

lower-rep sets of three to five reps and higher-rep sets of 12 to 16.

You can use various rep ranges within the structure of each workout, or you can use a periodization plan—training several weeks with

Chest Bench presses 3 x 3-5 Incline dumbbell presses 2 x 6-9 Incline flyes 3 x 7-12 Cable crossovers 2 x 13-15 Back: Bent-over barbell rows 3 x 3-5 Close-grip seated cable rows 2 x 6-9 Undergrip pulldowns 3 x 7-12 Dumbbell pullovers 2 x 13-15

Model: Chris Cook

You can use various rep ranges within the structure of each workout.

Legs Squats Leg presses Leg extensions Lunges Lying leg curls Stiff-legged deadlifts One-leg leg curls

3 x 3-5 2 x 6-9 3 x 7-12 2 x 13-15 2 x 6-9 3 x 7-12 3 x 13-15

Shoulders Military presses 2 x 3-5 Wide-grip upright rows 2 x 6-9 Lateral raises 3 x 7-12 Bent-over laterals 2 x 13-15

Model: Marvin Montoya

Arms Barbell curls Preacher curls Alternate dumbbell curls Close-grip bench presses Lying extensions Pushdowns

2 x 3-5 2 x 6-9 3 x 7-12 2 x 3-5 2 x 6-9 3 x 7-12

Remember, when it comes to bodybuilding, doing the exact same things over and over and expecting a different result is tantamount to insanity. So, if you’re feeling stale and not getting much out of your workouts, try throwing off your muscles and CNS with some new stimuli. When you see the new gains you make while using a variety of rep ranges, you’ll be glad you had a rep-range revelation. IM

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Rep Range Positions of Flexion and the Rep-Range-Overlap Technique

Model: Marvin Montoya

Model: Ron Harris

Model: Steve Mcleod

Scientists say that different exercises can recruit different muscle fibers. For example, leg extensions bring in fibers that squats don’t. It has to do with angle of pull and order of recruitment. Here’s a quote from Designing Resistance Training Programs by Steven J. Fleck, Ph.D., and William J. Kraemer, Ph.D., that substantiates that fact: “If the body position is changed, the order of recruitment can also change (Grimby and Hannerz, 1977).

The order of recruitment can also change for multifunctional muscles from one movement or exercise to another. Recruitment order in the quadriceps for the performance of a knee extension is different from that for a squat. The variation in recruitment order provides some evidence to support the belief held by many strength coaches that to completely develop a particu-

lar muscle it must be exercised with several different movements or exercises.”

That gives credence to the Positions-ofFlexion training method, which is a multiangular mass-building approach that has you work each muscle in three distinct positions: midrange, contracted and stretch. For example, a POF quad program is squats (midrange), leg extensions (contracted) and sissy squats (stretch). A POF biceps program may consist of preacher curls (midrange), concentration curls (contracted) and incline curls (stretch). A POF triceps program could be close-grip bench presses (midrange), kickbacks (contracted) and overhead extensions (stretch).

So varying angles and exercises is important, but so is repetition number. If at each of those positions you use a unique rep range, you can affect different fiber types and trigger exceptional muscle growth—the more fiber types you hypertrophy, the bigger the muscle—with more efficiency than the random, shotgun approach most bodybuilders use. In fact, if you use a different rep range on each set, you will take the multiangular approach to training to a new level, hitting a multitude of fiber types across the board.

Midrange. Because most midrange exercises allow you to overload the target muscle with the heaviest weight, that is the movement best suited to lower reps—in the four-to-seven range—and recruitment of the type 2 power fibers. After a few progressively heavier warmup sets, pick a poundage that allows you to get four to seven reps. That will hit your pure power type 2 fibers. For your second set reduce the weight so you can get nine reps. That moves you into the mediumrep-range category, so you hit some type 2 power

A POF biceps program hits the muscle from three specific angles: midrange, contracted and stretch. To get the most muscle fiber recruitment possible, you can overlap rep ranges at each position—low, medium and high—emphasizing the medium-rep range (eight to 12), which is best for hypertrophy.

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Rep Range Stretch. Your last quad exercise is sissy squats, a movement that places your front thighs in an ultimate stretch—thighs and torso on the same plane as you squat, hamstrings touching calves, knees out in front of your toes (as if you were doing the limbo). That’s a rather precarious position for the target muscle, which is why it initiates an emergency response from the central nervous system that can engage dormant fibers. The myotatic reflex, as it’s known, can help you create bigger muscles, but the stretch position can be dangerous. That’s why it’s best to use higher reps and lighter weight. On your first set shoot for 15 to 18 reps.

On your second set add weight so you get only 10 to 12.

Altogether you’ll engage more fast-twitch fibers and train a number of other subtypes as well. A stretchposition exercise is a great way to finish off a muscle and activate an enormous number of muscle fibers of all types.

Model: Jeff Hammond

Stretch-position exercises usually require higher reps.

Heavy squats: quad midrange work.

Model: Derik Farnsworth

fibers, but you also bring in type 2s that have an endurance component and even type 1s at the beginning of the set.

Contracted. Next you do leg extensions. Contracted-position exercises usually isolate the target muscle and provide continuous tension. That makes them ideal for medium-range reps and recruitment of both type 1 endurance fibers (early in the set) and endurance-oriented type 2, or fast-twitch, fibers.

Choose a weight that allows you to get 12 reps on your first set, rest for two to three minutes, add weight and do a second set so you get six to eight reps. That takes you back to hitting more type 2 power fibers, but some different ones from what you hit on squats.

The overlapping-rep-range technique is a great way to get maximum fiber recruitment in as few sets as possible while still using multiangular training. Notice that it emphasizes the medium range—as that’s the range that is most conducive to hypertrophy. Strength athletes would include more sets in the lower-rep range.

Keep in mind that you can vary the rep range for any exercise to the extreme to shake things up—like high reps for squats or low reps for sissy squats. Just be careful, as performing lower reps on some exercises can set you up for injury (doing it in the stretch position is dangerous when a muscle is fatigued).

—Steve Holman www.X-Rep.com Model: Lee Apperson

Continuous-tension isolation exercises are tailor made for a medium-rep range.

Editor’s note: For more on the Positions-of-Flexion mass-building method, see the book Train, Eat, Grow (go to page 80). To learn about POF and X-Rep training, visit www.X-Rep.com, the Web site dedicated to your muscular transformation. www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 221

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Fat

by Pollution How Environmental Toxins May Be Making You Fat—and What You Can Do About It

by Jerry Brainum

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Toro

L

osing excess bodyfat appears to be a straightforward process, involving correcting an out-of-balance energy equation. Superfluous fat represents an excess of stored energy, and if you have too much fat, that means you haven’t balanced your physical activity with your daily calorie intake. Since we know from the laws of physics that energy can be neither created nor destroyed, the basis of all fat-loss diets is to take in fewer calories than you burn through physical activity.

That’s what taps into your fat stores.

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Fat Scientists point to two particular elements that are causing obesity: trans fats and high-fructose corn syrup, which increase shelf life and lower processing costs.

Neveux \ Model: Daryl Gee

If losing fat is just a matter of eating less and exercising more, why are Americans fatter than ever?

Look at the plethora of foods targeted at dieters, such as lowfat and low-carbohydrate products. Some scientists suggest that an upsurge in processed-foods intake is the enemy in the weight-loss battle.

They point to two particular elements: trans fats and high-fructose corn syrup, or HFCS, which increase shelf life and lower manufacturers’ processing costs.

The molecular structure of trans fats is manipulated to a form that is unnatural for the human body. The body handles such fats as if they were saturated fat, which is linked to cardiovascular disease, but they’re even worse for you. Saturated fat doesn’t lower the protective cholesterol carrier in the blood called high-density lipoprotein (HDL), but trans fat does, making it

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even more potent than saturated fat in promoting cardiovascular disease and cancer.

The production of high-fructose corn syrup starts off with a natural sugar, fructose. Adding glucose produces a rapidly absorbed simple sugar that wreaks havoc in the body by causing an outpouring of insulin. That leads to a dramatic rise in blood triglycerides, or fat, which act as a substrate for increased lowdensity-lipoprotein cholesterol.

When LDL oxidizes in the blood, it promotes atherosclerosis and cardiovascular disease.

The evidence for the fat-promoting effects of trans fats and HFCS is so extensive that many people avoid such processed junk. Still, they either have trouble losing bodyfat or seem to rapidly gain it.

Others successfully lose fat through strict dieting and exercise only to see it return. In cases like that a loss of muscle through excessive calorie restriction or lack of weight-training exercise is often to blame. A loss of lean tissue, or muscle, practically guarantees fat regain, since muscle

Neveux \ Model: Tomm Voss

Some toxins are absorbed through the skin. The important point is that nearly all such chemicals are fat soluble, meaning they’re stored in bodyfat.

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Drinking more water during dieting helps flush toxins that are released from bodyfat.

Those toxins become water-soluble in the liver.

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Some toxins exert hormonelike effects.

Various plastics mimic the effects of estrogen, and excess estrogen is linked to breast and uterine cancer in women.

Excess estrogen in men results in increased water retention, increased bodyfat and gynecomastia, or male breasts.

is what maintains the resting metabolic rate.

There’s no shortage of explanations for why so many people are fat. One theory suggests that obesity is an infectious viral disease.1 According to that hypothesis, at least six known pathogens stimulate obesity in animals. Canine distemper virus causes serious disease in dogs but makes mice fat.

A virus found in chickens, Rousassociated virus-7, leads to fat chickens if the birds become exposed. A Borna disease virus will fatten a rat, as will scrapie agents.

At least two viruses, SMAM-1 and Ad-36, are thought to promote obesity in humans. Sound convincing? The trouble is, no one can explain how those infectious agents promote obesity.

A more plausible theory is that many forms of obesity are related to common toxins that humans are frequently exposed to. Most people are unaware that their bodies harbor countless potentially toxic chemicals. Tens of thousands of such chemicals exist as dyes, pigments, medicines, flavorings, perfumes, plastics, resins and rubber-processing chemicals. Humans get pesticide residue, preservatives and additives in food and water and inhale polluted indoor and outdoor air. Some toxins are absorbed through the skin. The important point is that nearly all such chemicals are fat-soluble, meaning that they’re stored in bodyfat.

Organochlorines, DDT, lindane, organophosphates, carbamate, polychlorinated biphenyl, phthalate, bisphenol A, cadmium and lead, as well as various solvents, are all linked to weight gain because they inhibit activity in the body’s hormonal systems. One animal study showed that the pesticide dieldrin doubled the bodyfat levels of treated mice. Another pesticide led to significant fat gain in mice that ate 50 percent less food!

Toxins cause fat gain by interfering with the activity of hormones involved in body composition and fat oxidation—for example, catecholamines such as epinephrine and norepinephrine, which exert thermogenic effects in stored fat.

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Fat

The evidence for the fat-promoting effects of trans fats and highfructose corn syrup is extensive, but many forms of obesity are related to common toxins that humans are frequently exposed to.

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The chemicals also prevent the conversion of relatively inactive T4 thyroid hormone to the five times more active T3 form, which lowers resting metabolic rate.

Some toxins exert hormonelike effects. Various plastics mimic the effects of estrogen, and excess estrogen is linked to breast and uterine cancer in women. Excess estrogen in men results in increased water retention, increased bodyfat, and gynecomastia, or male breasts. Some studies show that the toxins short-circuit the testosterone synthesis system, leading to lowered testosterone levels. The same is true for growth hormone. The lowering of both those anabolic hormones means less muscle gains for bodybuilders and other athletes.

The toxins reduce training intensity and even the desire to exercise by lowering the levels of such brain neurotransmitters as dopamine and norepinephrine, which stimulate the brain. Toxins also promote direct damage to both nerves and muscle. Net effects: changes in appetite, food metabolism and the

Fat desire to exercise.

One system particularly hit hard by toxins stored in fat is the sympathetic nervous system. The SNS is especially involved in fat mobilization through the actions of the catecholamine hormones, epinephrine and norepinephrine, which exert a thermogenic action in fat, leading to a loss of energy as heat, and promote fat oxidation in concert with thyroid and other hormones. When animals are exposed to the various toxins, their excretion of catecholamines increases by 50 percent.

Several drugs promote weight gain. Antidepressants, which happen to be the most prescribed in the world, promote weight gain by affecting brain chemicals that con-

Neveux \ Model: Tamer Elshahat

Some evidence shows that fiber speeds elimination of accumulated toxins released during fat loss.

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Neveux \ Model: Berry Kabov

Fat

Various nutrients support the liver’s detoxification system. These include the Bcomplex vitamins.

trol appetite. Prozac was so powerful that it was suggested as a weight-gain stimulant.

Pesticides stored in fat promote fat gain by interfering with oxidative enzymes in muscle—the same enzymes that burn fat in muscle. By inhibiting their activity, toxins blunt fat burning during exercise. A recent study confirmed that toxins negatively affect thermogenesis in humans.2 At the cellular level they block the activity of mitochondria, the portion of the cell where a process called beta-oxidation burns fat.

Another recent study found a significant increase in plasma pollutant levels in obese men and women who lost weight through dieting.3 It led to a decrease in resting insulin levels in the men but not in the women. Typically, a decrease in resting insulin levels would be considered favorable, but this study found an interference with normal insulin metabolism. One littleknown effect of insulin is that it potently suppresses appetite after meals, and interfering with it may promote increased hunger and excessive eating.

Plasma pollutants may interfere with normal metabolism of longchain fatty acids. They block the actions of enzymes that convert linoleic acid, an omega-6 fatty acid, into arachidonic acid. Arachidonic acid is the main precursor of a series of hormonelike chemicals synthesized in the body that are collectively known as eicosanoids.

While many eicosanoids mediate inflammation in the body, others are essential to both health and muscle—for example prostaglandin F2A, a potent promoter of muscle growth. Arachidonic acid is also involved in testosterone synthesis, and plasma pollutants may interfere with that. The estrogenlike structure of many plastic pollutants, meanwhile, lowers testosterone levels.

Plasma pollutants may explain a frequently encountered problem during fat-loss diets: the dieting plateau. What happens here is that after a few weeks on a decreasedcalorie diet, fat and weight loss suddenly stop. The plateau is often attributed to a lowering of the ac-

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Cruciferous vegetables contain natural liverenzyme stimulants.

Eating those while dieting will diminish the toxic effects of plasma pollutants by promoting their rapid degradation in the liver.

tive thyroid hormone, T3, and its conversion into a metabolically inactive form called reverse T3. The usual explanation is that the body perceives a loss of mass and interprets it as a starvation alert. So the body protects itself by lowering metabolism and thus preventing the catabolism, or breakdown, of lean muscle tissue: Production of reverse T3 increases, metabolism drops, and weight loss ceases.

Fat loss brings on a dramatic release of plasma toxins stored in fat. Since they blunt thyroid output and prevent effective SNS hormone activity, it seems reasonable that perhaps the plateau may actually result from the toxin release. The question then becomes what to do to offset the effects of toxin release.

The first thing to do is to avoid becoming fat altogether, since the fatter you are, the more toxins you store in your body. Lean people ingest toxins, but studies show that they release them from their bodies far faster than obese people do.

Lean athletes have the lowest levels of stored toxins in their bodies,4 clearly a reflection of their lower bodyfat levels.

If you have a lot of bodyfat, it’s prudent not to attempt to lose more than two pounds a week. Losing weight too rapidly will increase plasma pollutant levels and may interfere with fat loss and oxidation during exercise.

The frequent admonition to increase water intake during dieting serves two purposes: It staves off dehydration and flushes released toxins, which become water soluble in the liver. Make sure, however,

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that you drink pure water. Drinking water laden with toxins will only add to the problem.

Some evidence shows that fiber speeds the elimination of accumulated toxins released during fat loss.

Soluble fiber, found in such foods as oatmeal, beans and fruits, is especially effective because it directly binds to toxins and shunts them toward the exit.

Make sure to include detoxifying nutrients in your diet: the B-complex group of vitamins, such antioxidants as vitamins E and C and selenium and all essential minerals.

Nutrients that increase glutathione levels in the body may help the liver detoxify plasma pollutants. Nutritional precursors of glutathione include N-acetyl cysteine, lipoic acid and whey protein supplements.

A primary function of the liver is detoxification. All drugs are degraded by liver enzymes, including hormones, and the liver converts fat-soluble plasma pollutants released from stored bodyfat into water-soluble waste that goes to the kidneys for excretion.

Various nutrients support the liver’s detoxification system. These include the B-complex vitamins; sulfur-containing amino acids, such as cysteine and taurine; and various elements found in fruits and vegetables, such as the ellagic acid found in grapes, strawberries and pomegranates. Cruciferous vegetables, such as broccoli, brussels sprouts and cabbage, contain natural liver-enzyme stimulants such as sulforaphane. Eating foods like that while dieting will diminish the toxic effects of plasma pollutants by promoting their rapid degradation in the liver.

Since plasma pollutants interfere with the metabolism of essential fats, you need to balance intake of both omega-6 and omega-3 fatty acids. That means you need supplements such as flaxseed and fish oil blends. Supplemental amino acids that are precursors of body chemicals blocked by plasma pollutants may also help. Examples include Ltyrosine, the precursor of catecholamine hormones.

In today’s society, it’s difficult to avoid pollutants. The best way to

avoid health problems linked to their accumulation in the body is to exercise and stay lean, and try to eat as clean as possible.

References 1 Dhurandhar,

N.V. (2001). Infectobesity: Obesity of infectious origin. J Nutr. 131:2794S-2797S. 2 Trembley, A., et al. (2004). Thermogenesis and weight loss in obese individuals: A primary association

with organochlorine pollution. Int J Obes Rel Metab Disord. 28:936-939.

3 Imbeault, P., et al. (2002). Increase in plasma pollutant levels in response to weight loss is associated with the reduction of fasting insulin levels in men but not in women. Metabolism. 51:482-486.

4 Pelletier, C., et al. (2002). Plasma organochlorine concentrations in endurance athletes and obese individuals. Med Sci Sports Exerc.

34:1971S. IM

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Maximum Muscle Minimum

Time

A Power-Packed Program for Busy Lifestyles

by C.S. Sloan Photography by Michael Neveux

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Maximum Muscle Minimum Time

I

This program works because it meets all the requirements for building strength and power—in only two workouts. Let’s start by reviewing some of the basics that a routine must incorporate if you want to optimize strength and muscle growth. Whether you train twice a week or five times, you can’t stray too far from these basics.

This rule is the hardest to adhere to when you’re using a two-day schedule, but it’s not a problem when you do a whole-body workout. Most lifters make the mistake of using a split routine when they’re training only twice a week. The result is that they don’t get in enough work for each bodypart—a problem in itself—and then they compound that by taking too long off before training the bodypart again. A host of good things happen to you hormonally after you train a bodypart, and the only way to take proper advantage of that is by training all your bodyparts at least twice a week. On this program you do a whole-body workout twice a week.

Rack Squats Warmup thoroughly before hitting the heavy iron.

•Train explosively.

If you want to be at least as strong as you look, you must incorporate some explosive-rep training into your regimen. And if you want to be stronger than you look, speed-rep training is an absolute must.

•Train heavy.

And I mean heavy. Most bodybuilders think that six to eight reps is heavy, but if you’re after maximum gains in strength, six to eight reps is going to be your light stuff.

Sumo Deadlifts

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Model: Eric Domer

Power-Packed Program for Busy Lifestyles

•Train frequently enough to stimulate gains.

Some explosive work is necessary for building maximum muscle size.

Model: Andre Nielsen

hear it all the time: I would lift weights if only I could fit it into my busy schedule. Well, that’s no longer an excuse. Here’s a training routine that requires you to work out only two times a week. And you know what? It’ll be damn effective too.

Maximum Muscle Minimum Time You need to do very-low-rep work of one to three per set every week in order to keep making progress.

When you’re after mass as well as strength, you do your higher-rep work after your low-rep stuff.

•Change your program frequently.

A lot of lifters find it hard to inject enough variety into their training when they’re doing whole-body workouts. That’s because they frequently do too much work—that is, too much volume—at each session, wanting to do multiple exercises for every bodypart. The routine outlined here avoids that problem: You change exercises every week.

•Keep your sessions relatively short.

It’s the problem most advanced lifters have with twice-a-week training: How do you do enough work for each bodypart and still limit your workouts to around an hour or an

hour and a half max? I think that most lifters, especially strength athletes, simply take too long between sets. On this program you keep rest periods to a minimum.

Those are the basics; now for the workouts. Since you do only two workouts a week, you want to take at least two days off after the first session and three days off after the second. Most lifters like to train on Monday and Thursday. Just make sure your schedule fits the following model:

Day 1: Day 2: Day 3: Day 4: Day 5: Day 6: Day 7: Day 8:

Workout 1 Off Off Workout 2 Off Off Off Cycle begins again.

Changing from barbells to dumbbells can stimulate faster gains.

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Maximum Muscle Minimum Time

Speed squats 10 x 2 Always start your whole-body workouts with leg work, preferably squats. Some people like to save the leg work until the end of the session, but I think that’s a big mistake. For one thing, when you save the squats for last, you also— without thinking about it—save a lot of your strength as well. When you do the hardest work at the beginning of your session, however, you don’t try to save anything.

For me it makes the rest of the session a breeze when I know that I’ve already knocked out the hard stuff. Once I get through the squats, there’s nothing I can’t do.

Go as low as possible on the speed squats, almost to rock bottom.

Lower fast but under control, and explode out of the hole as quickly

Model: Jay Cutler

Workout 1 Explosive Day

Decline Presses

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Maximum Muscle Minimum Time

Bench Presses

Rotate rows with chins from week to week.

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Power cleans 5x3 Do five progressively heavier triples, working up to your maximum weight on the final set. The

Speed benches build strength quickly.

T-Bar Rows

Change your bench press assistance work every week too.

Parallel Dips

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Speed benches 9x3 As with the squats, you lower quickly but under control. Pause on your chest for no more than one second and explode to lockout as quickly as possible. Do these with three different hand placements. On the first three sets use a close grip, with your hands touching the smooth part of the bar.

Move the next three sets out a few inches, and for the last three sets use a grip that’s just inside the power rings.

Model: Greg Blount

as possible. Use a medium stance and place the bar fairly high to optimize the quadriceps; powerlifters may want to use a low placement and wide stance for more power. Take no more than a minute’s rest between sets.

Model: Tamer Elshahat

Hit different parts of the target muscle with grip alterations.

Wide-Grip Chins

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Maximum Muscle Minimum Time

This is a key exercise for chest mass.

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Model: Michael Ergas

Ab Bench Crunches

Model: Joe DeAngelis

Power-Packed Program for Busy Lifestyles

Pick any ab exercise and get a tough 20 to 30 reps.

Model: Lee Apperson

Alternate dumbbell pullovers with barbell pullovers weekly.

Dumbbell Pullovers nature of this exercise makes it an explosive movement.

Incline dumbbell presses, parallel-bar dips or close-grip decline presses 3 x 6-8 These are among my favorite assistance exercises for the bench press, and each has its benefits.

Rotate them on a weekly basis.

Work all three sets to failure.

Straight-arm dumbbell pullovers or bent-arm barbell pullovers 2 x 8-15 These are really great upper-body movements. Alternate them from week to week. George Turner likes to call the pullover the upper-body squat. Pullovers work your back, triceps, rib cage, chest and shoulders. Rotate your repetitions on both movements as well, using a different rep range within the broader range (8-10, 10-12 or 1215) every week.

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Barbell curls, dumbbell curls or preacher curls 3 x 6-20 Once again, rotate the exercises and the rep range on a weekly basis. These exercises are among my favorite biceps movements, though there are other good ones.

Just don’t leave out the barbell curls. There isn’t a better biceps builder out there.

Ab work 3 x 20-30 I’m not too picky about abdominal exercises. As long as you train your abs hard, use whatever you like. Pick an exercise that makes it very tough to get 20 to 30 reps.

Weighted incline crunches, hanging leg raises and hanging kneeups are all good choices. www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 247

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Maximum Muscle Minimum Time

Workout 2 Maximal Day Squats, bottom-position squats or sumo deadlifts 5-8 x 1-3 These movements are good for building your leg muscles and are all equally good for boosting your numbers on the squat and deadlift. The first two are quadricepsdominant exercises, and the sumo deadlift is a hamstring-dominant one, so you should get good allaround development.

Bench presses, incline-bench presses or flat-bench dumbbell presses 5-8 x 1-5 For me these are the best chest exercises you can use. If you prefer another, feel free to add it to the rotation. As with the leg work, rotate exercises from week to week and rotate the reps as well, working up over five to eight sets to a one-, three- or five-rep maximum.

Wide-grip chins, bent-over rows or T-bar rows 4 x 5-8 Rotate the exercises from week to week. Perform four work sets of five to eight reps.

Superset a biceps exercise with a triceps movement.

Preacher Curls

Superset

Model: Will Harris

Power-Packed Program for Busy Lifestyles

Rotate these exercises, preferably from week to week, although the less advanced you are, the less often you need to switch. Rotate the reps as well. For example, the first time you perform the squats, work up to a max single over five to eight progressively heavier sets.

At the next squat session work up to a max triple over the same number of sets. How strong you are will determine how many sets to use. Someone who squats 500 pounds will need all eight sets, while s 250-pound squatter will only need five, possibly fewer.

Barbell curls, dumbbell curls or preacher curls 3 x 8-20 Skull crushers, seated pin presses or lying pullover and presses 3 x 8-20 Once again you rotate the exercises and the rep range. For arm work you also alternate within the workout, doing a set for biceps

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Skull crushers hit all three heads of the triceps.

Model: Eric Domer

Model: Darrel Terrell

Maximum Muscle Minimum Time

Dumbbell Curls

Barbell Curls and a set for triceps—essentially a slow form of supersetting. These are the best triceps exercises bar none, and close-grip benches are fine too, if your chest development doesn’t already exceed your arm development. To perform pin presses, simply sit on a bench and do front presses in the power rack with the barbell set at about eye level.

Ab work

3 x 20-30

Model: Jonathan Lawson

Putting It Together

End your workout with one ab exercise.

Incline Kneeups

There you have it: a fantastic routine that builds plenty of strength, power and muscle mass on only two workouts a week. So you no longer have an excuse for not building the body you’ve been wanting—and the strength to go with it. You can build that body, and you will if you put this routine to work for you. IM www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 251

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X X FILES FILES Muscle-Building Excerpts From IRON MAN’s Online E-zine

by Steve Holman and Jonathan Lawson It’s one of IRON MAN’s most popular features, and it’s not even published in the magazine. It’s the weekly IM e-zine that’s delivered directly to your e-mail box free— once you sign up (it’s easy and there’s absolutely no charge; see the editor’s note at the end of this feature). Each issue offers insightful commentary, and the authors often dissect new research or analyze how the champs train. They explain

exactly how to use the information to make your hardcore musclebuilding workouts more efficient— and effective—than ever. In fact, that’s the entire purpose of the online newsletter—to get you bigger faster with quick blasts of useful info.

To find out what it’s all about, check out the excerpt below. If you like it and you want more, you’ll find past issues at www.X-Rep.com.

Click on X-Files for a complete list.

Remember, the muscle-building truth is out there—and most of it appears in the IM e-zine. Start getting yours today.

—the Editors

Arnold and X Reps Reading about the workouts Arnold did back in the ’60s and ’70s is inspiring and very enlightening

Arnold instinctively trained almost every bodypart in its stretched position. Here he’s going to attack biceps stretch on the down stroke of incline curls. Studies suggest that stretch overload may trigger hyperplasia, or muscle fiber splitting.

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Mozée

Biceps curls with a slight cheat hit the biceps’ maxforce point, right below the middle of the stroke. That sweet spot is where maximum fiber activation occurs.

Balik

from a mass-building standpoint.

For example, who knew Arnold used X Reps? Well, not X Reps as we’ve defined them—power partials on a compound exercise at the end of a set—but he often did end-ofset partials on isolation movements. He called them burns, usually doing them at the top of, say, preacher curls, where he could flex and feel the target muscle contracting after full-range reps.

While top-position X Reps on isolation movements do have their place (as we discuss in The Ultimate Mass Workout e-book), it may not be the best position for spurring the most muscle gain. Why? The contracted position of most isolation exercises is the weakest point on the stroke—for example, the top of a leg extension. For best anabolic reactions you want to overload the strongest point—where the muscle can produce the most force. The top of a leg extension is where the muscle produces the least force, which is why you can only get the weight halfway up on your last rep—the weakest part of the stroke flakes out first.

So why is the contracted position the weakest point? According to scientists, muscle fibers bunch up at the fully flexed point and have a difficult time functioning properly, or generating power. The spot at which fibers can function best and generate the most power is usually near the turnaround, where you move from the negative phase of the rep to the positive. That’s the point at which the target muscle is semistretched and power packed.

On preachers it’s near the bottom of the stroke, not the top.

Not to chastise Arnold. He did what worked for him, and even we follow his lead and use X Reps in the weakest position for a unique anabolic stress on some exercises, like the top of a concentration curl.

But while Arnold did favor contraction, we believe that it was his unshakable emphasis on the target muscle’s stretch and semistretched positions that was the real key to what set his physique apart from other bodybuilders of his era—and why his size and symmetry in his prime are impressive even by today’s outlandish standards. His

physique was ahead of its time, and his attention to stretch-position overload had a lot to do with it.

Take his delt routine, for example. One of Arnold’s favorite shoulder exercises was incline one-arm lateral raises. He’d sit sideways on a low incline bench, lean against it with his shoulder and do laterals with his outside arm. That’s a unique movement because the working arm moves across the front of the torso through the bottom of the stroke, which creates delt

stretch, something most bodybuilders don’t get (how often do you see anyone doing that exercise?). In fact, it stretches the rear and medial heads to a great degree.

You can really feel the muscle fibers in those two segments twitching— and if you’re lean, you can see it happening.

Did Arnold realize that incline one-arm laterals overload the sidedelt head near its fully stretched position, providing tremendous mass stimulation? Maybe. His use

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Balik

Arnold’s continuoustension, stretchoverload technique on flyes helped him create massive, striated pec.

of that exercise—and cable laterals, another stretch-position delt move—sure made it look as if he did. Perhaps he had an inkling that his arm had to move across his torso for the medial-delt head to lengthen for max-force production.

Or maybe he just did the delt exercises that felt right to him. Either way, the result was that overloading the stretch position helped him craft that aircraft carrier look for which he was famous.

How about his biceps? He had outrageous peaks, but was it because of his attention to peak contraction? Maybe, to a degree, but keep in mind that he almost always used incline curls, which train the biceps in their full-stretch position, and he also sang the praises of cheat barbell curls.

Cheat curls overload the semistretched position of your

biceps, the point where your arms are slightly bent and in front of your torso. That’s the X-treme powergeneration point. Think about it: Because he was able to use a heavier weight—more than he could use for strict reps—he had to lean back and heave the weight. That explosive action with a slight backward lean creates the most force right when the arms are beginning to bend—just above the straight-arm position. So the most overload on cheat curls occurs smack at the biceps’ semistretched position, with less resistance through the rest of the stroke.

Now, we’re not saying that cheat curls are safe. Arnold’s use of them was another case of a genetically superior bodybuilder using explosive reps to accelerate growth; however, cheat curls do produce the desired result—overload of the

semistretched position. A better, safer solution is to do preacher curls, with X Reps at the end of the set near the bottom of the range.

Yes, near the bottom. We know that sounds strange, but science verifies: That’s where you can generate the most force and, therefore, the most size stimulation. It’s an incredibly effective biceps builder if you do the X Reps correctly and can grind through the burn. (If you want to do top-position X Reps to flex the biceps—the way Arnold did—add them to a set after the one that includes bottom-range X Reps. It’s best to max out the strongest position early so there’s less fatigue and maximum power output.)

Another example of Arnold’s using stretch overload and X Reps is his chest workout. One of his favorite pec movements was dumbbell flyes, but he had a certain way of doing them—only moving through the bottom third of the stroke. He stopped the dumbbells when they were about three feet apart on every rep. Why? He said the short stroke kept tension on his pecs, which is true, but it also placed the most overload on his pecs when they were elongated, or stretched. Those partial flyes were really just slightly exaggerated X Reps on a stretch-position pec exercise—and no doubt one of the big reasons Arnold’s pecs were so full and striated.

Arnold instinctively knew to train every muscle near the stretch position for the fullest, most complete development possible. If you’re looking for the fastest mass gains imaginable, don’t neglect that key position. In fact, we’ve found that overloading it with X Reps can make each set two to four times more effective at building mass so you don’t waste precious recovery time—and reserves—doing set after inefficient set. X Reps can cut your workout time significantly while increasing your size and strength.

Editor’s note: You can get an issue of the IM e-zine delivered to your e-mail box every week free: Visit www.X-Rep.com and click on X-Files. Go to any of the past installments and click on the subscribe link at the bottom. IM

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Lonnie Teper’s

Onstage Antics: ’05 NPC Junior Cal

Double Impact Guest stars Coleman and Cutler Lead the Pasadena Hit Parade

Beefsteaks. Seven-time Mr. O Ronnie Coleman and threetime Arnold Classic champ Jay Cutler delighted the crowd at L.T.’s Junior Cal with more than 600 pounds of guestposing muscle.

Having 600 pounds between them, not to mention seven Mr. Olympia titles (all belonging to Ronnie), four Arnold Classic wins (three belonging to Jay) and the unquestioned status as the two top bodybuilders in the world, Ronnie Coleman and Jay Cutler made the ’05 Junior California Bodybuilding and Figure Championships a very special day.

Jay had appeared at the event, which was held at Pasadena City College’s Sexson Auditorium, for the previous two years; it was Coleman’s firstever guest-posing stint in Southern California. Thus, it was no surprise that perhaps the largest number of fans in the seven-year history of my annual NPC event came to the finals to enjoy not only the contest but also the guest-pose down between the Big Nasty and the Ultimate Beef—not to mention the popular Timea Majorova, who performed her fitness routine.

Cutler posed first, followed by Coleman. Then Jay came out during Ronnie’s routine, and the two posed. Lance Johnson, last year’s Masters National Light-Heavyweight winner, then appeared onstage to challenge Mr. Olympia. At 5’5” and 210 pounds, the 44-year-old Johnson looked great

Scene at the Sexson (from left): Timea Majorova energized the house with her fitness routine; Ray Arde dropped trou; and Masters National class champ Lance Johnson got into the action as well, challenging Coleman to a posedown.

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MORE JUNIOR CAL

Eight Is Enough After a long absence he’s a dominator

Photography by Bill Comstock

Sting Ray Arde, winner of L.T.’s initial Cal Collegiates in 1999, came down from San Jose to attend the event—and gave the crowd an impromptu guest-posing display.

but was a bit outsized by the 5’11”, 321-pound Coleman.

Coleman had the line of the night when I was interviewing Jay and Ronnie at center stage. “You know the real reason I came out to guest pose here?”

Coleman asked, as he looked me in the eye. “I read in your column two years ago that not only did Jay say he was coming back to guest pose again the next year, but he’d be coming back as Mr. Olympia. So the only way you could have Mr. Olympia onstage would be for me to come.”

Jay, one of the classier gents in the industry, took it all in stride, knowing the quip was meant in fun. They have great respect for each other, trust me.

And great confidence in their own abilities, as well they should. Ronnie says it’s going to be eight in a row come October; Jay still thinks he can unseat the champ.

What do I say? Keep reading this space, as well as www .GraphicMuscle.com, and you’ll know when the Swami’s predictions hit the streets. Also, be sure to check out the video highlights of the Junior Cal at GraphicMuscle.com. It’s the next best thing to having been there.

Chris Snell hadn’t competed in eight years, not since he finished second in the novice middleweight class at the ’97 Tournament of Champions. But, he said, sitting in the seats at the Junior Cal and Western Collegiates for the past two years gave him the itch again. And, oh, my, what a return to the stage it was.

Snell, a 5’9”, 189pounder from Azusa, California, dominated the show, taking class and overall crowns in the unlimited, novice and collegiate divisions. The 34-year-old, who has a bachelor of science degree from Cal Poly Pomona and is getting his MBA at La Verne University, made it a total of eight awards when he was honored with the Best Poser and Most Muscular trophies as well.

“Between school and work obligations I felt I didn’t have the time or motivation to compete again until your show,” Snell says. “I did, however, keep

training and worked toward developing a balanced and aesthetic physique.”

You get an A on that project, for sure, Chris.

Professionally, Snell is the vice president of Chris Majestic Enterprises Snell.

Inc., a company that operates an array of businesses, including a financial service and a limousine service.

He trains at World Gym in West Covina and at LA Fitness in Glendora, and he is, like national-level competitor William Owens, of half-Asian, half-black descent. At press time the latest Half-Asian Sensation said he was planning to continue his comeback at the prestigious Los Angeles Championships, which were held in July.

“I need to test myself against my peers at that level,” Chris says. I predict you’ll score another A on that exam, as well, Chris. Welcome back.

ADD JUNIOR CAL

Aw a rd s Edward Bojorquez (near right), now a member of the Marine Corps, made it two victories in a row in the teen division. Far right: Charles Turner earned trophies for best poser, collegiate division; and most promising bodybuilder.

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I T F I G U R E S D E P T.

Third Time’s the Charm

Promising Start Laura Coleman

She knew she’d get it right, eventually Stephanie Ilkhanoff is no stranger to the physique events I’ve produced; she’s competed in the Cal Collegiates and the Western Collegiates, finishing third in her class in the latter a couple of years back. This time around the 5’4”, 115-pounder from Buena Park reached the winner’s circle, taking the Junior Cal Figure Short and Overall titles.

Preschool teacher Stephanie Ilkhanoff, The 31-year-old former Rockflanked by Figure pros Amy Peters and June ford, Maryland, resident earned a Munroe (along with Katie the Dog), can now bachelor’s degree in sociology add the title of Junior California Figure Overall champ to her résumé. from California State University, Fullerton. Currently, she teaches preschool but plans to graduate to first or second grade next year. In addition to teaching, she works with abused and neglected children, motivating them to improve their self-esteem through fitness.

Stephanie, who has also been a personal trainer for the past 10 years, knows a lot about physiology and nutrition and has worked with people who suffer from diabetes, hypoglycemia, lower back and knee problems.

“Fitness has always been an integral part of my life,” she says, “from playing sports like volleyball to competing in figure shows. Fitness has made me become my own coach, motivator and disciplinarian and has taught me self-respect and perseverance.”

You taught yourself well, girl.

MORE WINNERS Michael Cairns took the masters men’s title.

Judd Lienhard took best arms honors.

Ruby Kan, a 38-yearold biologist, won the masters figure event.

Laura loves making progress.

Look for her to make some more real soon.

This 5’7”, 23-year-old of Portuguese and Cape Verdean descent (Cape Verde is a group of islands off West Africa) was raised in the Boston area and moved to Los Angeles a couple of years back to pursue a degree in business administration at Mount St. Mary’s College. And to track a career in fitness modeling.

Laura Coleman got off on the right foot at her first competition, taking collegiate figure honors at the Junior Cal as well as the tall class in the open figure division.

“My days in Los Angeles, for as long as I can remember, have consisted of training, studying and remembering I am my mother’s biggest investment,” says Coleman. “Winning this contest and finishing first in my class in the Junior Cal means a lot to me for many reasons. As a child I had so much potential but was deprived of participating in sports due to a sick mother.

Once I could drive, I started lifting weights and loved seeing the progress and results I got from perseverance.

“My biggest reward from this show was not the object I held in my hand. It was finally building my confidence in myself and influencing people in the audience to live healthier lifestyles.”

I’m sure your appearance onstage got them thinking in that direction, kid.

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Winners: Meet Chris LaCascia

Total-Success Story He knows how to go From flab to fab

Before Shot Chris LaCascia, a father of five, grew to 330 pounds in his all-work, no-play world as a mortgage broker.

Photo courtesy of Chris LaCascia

As a self-employed mortgage broker serving customers all over Southern California, Chris LaCascia was a big man. Real big. As in 330 pounds at 5’11”, thanks to poor eating habits, an extensive work schedule and no regular exercise program. He had a 46inch waist, a bodyfat measurement that exceeded 30 percent, and he was ready to read for the role of Sherman Klump in the next “Nutty Professor” flick.

The realization of how bad his weight problem was hit him when LaCascia’s son, Max, now two years old, patted the floor and said, “Daddy, sit.… Play, Daddy.”

Chris says, “Once on the floor, I could not get up WELL, ALMOST NO PLAY. unless my 125-pound wife helped me up. Having to count on someone else to help me up or tie my shoes was embarrassing enough; being forced to sleep on the sofa downstairs because I couldn’t get to the bedroom upstairs was another rude awakening.”

Chris wasn’t always extra large and not in charge; he grew up in Anaheim, California, and was heavily involved in sports at Orange High School, lettering in baseball two years. After graduation he spent 10 years with the Cypress Police Department before retiring.

The former police office stepped “Having 17 years of physical fitness knowledge and training behind me, I knew that I had onstage after shedding more than the ability to get in shape and lose weight,” said LaCascia, who now resides in Yorba Linda. “I 100 pounds. started my quest back to the gym in July 2004 and have lost over 100 pounds. While I was losing weight, Shawn Ray encouraged me to enter my first bodybuilding show, the Orange County Classic.”

The 37-year-old father of five placed a respectable sixth in the novice heavyweight division at that show, then followed that up with a solid performance at the Junior Cal two months later, finishing second in the unlimited heavyweight class and fourth in the novice division at a weight of 225.

“I’m happy with what I’ve done onstage so far,” said LaCascia, “but the greatest gift of all is knowing the chains of obesity have been removed and that I now I have the freedom to do whatever my heart desires.”

W O M E N ’ S D E P T.

Mona Lisa

You’d better believe she’s smiling

The stomach pains Lisa Gates suffered in late 2004 proved to be much more than she bargained for. The 5’3”, 125-pound mother of Trevor, 14, and Courtney, 10, was diagnosed with twisted and obstructed intestines and had to undergo surgery. Twice. In March, after her second operation, Lisa found out she had been but an hour from death.

Nevertheless, she wasn’t going to allow such a minor inconvenience prevent her from returning to the Sexson Auditorium stage at Pasadena City College, where she’d taken her class in the collegiate-figure competition a year earlier.

Referred to by some folks as the Marilyn Monroe of the posing platform, Gates did somehow get back onstage, winning the women’s bodybuilding division and finishing fourth in the figure short class.

Gates, 39, who works and trains at Gold’s Gym in Pasadena, is a poster child for courage and determination. The next time you say you’re going to compete in a contest, then back out, as so many people do, remember what Lisa went through. Then slap yourself.

A poster child for determination. Gates unlocked her courage and got back onstage.

www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 265

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Add NPC Shows: Onstage Tales

Coleman Classic Big men, big show, big state

Add Coleman

June Munroe

Teper

I finally met Brian Dobson, owner of Metroflex Gym in Arlington, Texas— A best known as priest and the iron shrine a star were where Ronnie in the house Coleman at the Ronnie crafted his Coleman Mr. Olympia Classic: midbod—when dleweight winDobson and ner Miguel Coleman Paredes (top brought me left), who’s a in to emcee Catholic priest, their annual The winners of the ’05 Ronnie Coleman Classic (from took off the left): Breean Loepp, Lorenzo Jones, Natalie Benson Ronnie collar at a local and Marie Tullos.

Coleman eatery after the Classic in April. contest. At left: Brian and wife Brandi are great folks, and they put on good bodyNPC bodybuildbuilding shows to boot. The Coleman Classic, held at the Hilton DFW ing ace Star Lakes Hotel, featured a slew of outstanding performers. Hats off to the Blaylock champs: Lorenzo Jones, who came back to successfully defend his showed up overall crown, Halle Berry look-alike Natalie Benson in figure (keep to visit L.T., an eye on this beauty with the 23-inch waist), women’s bodybuilding the emcee. winner Marie Tullos and fitness titlist Breean Loepp.

The most interesting story of the weekend, though, concerned middleweight winner Miguel Paredes. As it turns out, Miguel is the real Priest of bodybuilding. Originally from Colombia and now living in Austin, Texas, Paredes A PRIEST AND A STAR is indeed a Catholic priest. He informed me of that fact at a local eatery after the PLUS L.T. contest. As you would expect, I had Father Paredes take off his clothes and hit a few poses—causing stunned patrons to begin saying their Hail Marys and Our Fathers.

He may not have taken the overall crown at the RC Classic, but the man certainly owns the title of Best Built Priest in the Whole Wide World. Any doubters can contact me, and I’ll set up a posedown at the most convenient house of worship.

MORE COLEMAN CLASSIC

Metro Flexing

Hardcore’s the word at the House That Ronnie Built Close couple.

Brian and Brandi Dobson have got an iron dynasty going on.

Teper

Well, Ronnie Coleman didn’t actually build Metroflex Gym in Arlington, Texas, but that’s where the Big Nasty crafted his championship physique. The facility is the creation of Brian Dobson, and the guy loves it when you tell him how nasty looking his iron shrine is.

“We were rated the number-one hardcore gym in America,” beamed Dobson.

“A gym doesn’t need to be pretty to bring the best results you can get.”

Dorian Yates, who won his six Sandow trophies while training in the dungeonlike atmosphere of his home gym in Birmingham, England, and Coleman have certainly put an exclamation point on that statement, Brian.

I’ve always preferred the fancier, state-of-the-art facilities myself. More proof positive it ain’t the gym that makes the man. To find out more about Dobson’s intriguing establishment, check out www.metroflexgym.com.

266 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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Teper

Classic

U P, D O W N A N D R O U N D T H E ’ 0 5 N P C B O D Y B U I L D I N G . C O M J U N I O R C A L I F O R N I A C H A M P I O N S H I P S • PHOTOGRAPHY BY DAVE LIBERMAN Want a Dream Tan? See Mohamed Mohsen to get the job done.

Ron Avidan

for d Jay Cutler ed Kerry an Cheesecake rt Perry join na Be d de sa oo w Pa lly e th Ho ntest grub at some postco y. or ct Fa

Nutrinned the Labrada Dave Liberman ma did grab-shot duty. o als nd —a tion Booth

Wonder why L.T. isn’t nearly as breathtaking—and fit—as girlfriend Elsa Escobar?

Wonder no more.

NPC stando ut Guillermo Escalante an his World Gy d m, West Co vina, suppor the show. ted

Jimmy and Suzie Mentis, with Southern California District Chairman and promoter Jaguar Jon Lindsay.

Jeff Cohen was on hand to let the crowd know about his Gamma-O testosterone booster.

Mike Morris at the MHP booth.

Pro Fight’s Abbas Massouwi would give you the shirt off his back if you’d try his supplements.

Teper

Teper

Ron Avidan

Mary Jo Cooke (Max Muscle) and Bob Cicherillo (from title sponsor Bodybuilding.com) prettied up the lobby.

Timea Majorova and her mama Maria, who was visiting from Slovakia.

Ronnie Coleman, all 321 pounds of him, could barely fit into the booth at dinner.

Hey, Ronnie, are those french fries on your plate?

The folks from Sharkey’s of Pasadena, a lowfat Tex Mex Cicherillo and Getbig.com’s Ron eatery, were on hand to tell Avidan, who worked the Chamthe fans about their pion and Cytosport table. delectable cuisine.

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Ruth Silverman’s

PUMP & CiRCUMSTANCE J U N I O R N AT I O N A L S

MORE GUNS

And “smaller” physiques on the front burner

Comstock

The NPC Junior National Bodybuilding, Fitness and Figure Championships, the 2005 edition of which was held in Rosemont, Illinois, outside Chicago, on June 17 and 18, continues to grow under the helm of promoter Pam Betz. One hundred and sixty-six women came from the far corners of the country to compete in the three strong women’s events, including 35 bodybuilders.

Middleweight winner Shannon Young took the overall crown at that one, upholding the reputation her Gunfight at the OK Coral. Oklahoman Shannon Young hometown, Oklahoma City, brought her blazing guns to the Juniors. has gained in recent years, having produced a slew of standout flexers, including Tonie Norman, Sherry Smith and ’04 National champ Gina Davis. She beat out lightweight winner Jennifer Chehardy, light-heavy champ Alicia St. Germaine and heavyweight victor Bettina Kadet. Word is the judges were not rewarding the big-and-ripped look this year at this show. Stay tuned to next month’s report to find out if they stuck to their guns at the USA.

Grand Masters Flash Robin takes flight

Comstock

New Faces to the Fore

Speaking of smaller, Parker, seen here at the ’04 Nationals, earned her pro card with a much softer package.

Robin Parker, 51, won the ’05 NPC Masters National Overall Championships on July 23 in Pittsburgh.

Parker, who finished fifth in the lightheavies at the ’04 Nationals, made history, in addition to her new title, becoming the first woman to earn a pro card at the Masters. Way to go, Robin.

MORE JUNIOR NAT’S

Babes in Chi-town

Comstock

A.k.a. fitness and figure

June blooms (from left): Amy Peters, Tammy Pies, Jessica Paxson and Vallerie Waugaman.

Naturally, the balance of the female contestants at the Junior Nationals—126 if I counted right—came in search of the not-so-elusive pro figure card, four of which were awarded at the June event. They were a handsome bunch, headed by overall winner Vallerie Waugaman, an Amber Littlejohn-esque brunette from Cleveland who won the D class and overall crowns. Texas tootsie Amy Peters made the folks who were thinking pro card for her in ’05 feel pretty smart by winning the A class; ditto for ’05 Pittsburgh winner Tammy Pies, B class champ, who was featured in the August ’05 installment of this column, and Jessica Paxson, C class.

Speaking of having class. The fitness show brought out some class contenders, many of whom will be twirling and unfurling at the Team Universe in August and/or the Nationals in November in search of pro cards. Top of that lists is C-class and overall winner Bridgette Murray of Littleton, Colorado, but don’t count out A-class winner Jessica Rohm and B-class champ Corry Mathews either.

268 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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U P D AT E S

Déjà Vu

HOT SHOTS

BY JERRY FREDRICK

All over again

you So how exactly do al oil become the offici guy again?

Silverman

In the item on the ’05 Emerald Cup Pro Fitness competition that appeared in the August installment of P&C, I reported on a minor mishap experienced by East Coast tumbler-terrific Teri Mooney during her fitness routine. Imagine my shock and dismay when I read at Bodysport.com a few weeks later that what seemed to be nothing at all had turned out to be a whole lotta something.

An e-mail in early July from Mooney, who was, ironically, coming back from an injury incurred onstage in her Olympia debut last year when the mishap occurred, sets the record straight: “On my second tumbling pass, I landed perfectly but on a ‘dead part’ of the stage…and I actually heard my left foot ‘crunch’ in my sneaker.”

Have heart, will model. Friends and fans As she had at the Olympia, Teri kept looking to contact Ms. Mooney can write going. Finally, “I did a front flip to my to her at www.terimooney.com. butt, and when I landed, my right foot actually felt like it was no longer attached to my ankle. That is when I sat on the stage, and I started to untie my sneaker and cry.”

Mooney’s initial round of anger, embarrassment and self-pity passed when she saw the scores and realized that despite a last-place finish in the long routines, she had still come in sixth. Her diagnosis, after three weeks of MRIs and consultations, was not so encouraging. “I tore my Lisfranc tendon—which is the cornerstone of your whole foot—and my second metatarsal,” she said. That translated to the prospect of 1 1/2 to two years of surgeries and rehab “before I could even think of returning to fitness competition” and that “I may never be able to tumble the same due to chance of reinjury.”

The 31-year-old personal trainer was up and coaching clients—on crutches— 10 days after her surgery. “I am now five weeks post-op, and all I can say is that these past few weeks have been very challenging. I am learning that there is more to life than fitness.” Even so, she said, she is looking for booth work at the Olympia Expo and planning some new photo shoots for her fitness-modeling portfolio.

More irony: Mooney’s experience has had an interesting side effect on her physique. “People at my gym can’t believe how ‘tiny’ I am but that I kept all my definition,” said Teri, who hasn’t trained since before the Emerald Cup. “You gotta love it: The judges were always telling me to tone it down a bit, and all I really had to do was break something in my foot.”

piece of cardDang, even as a flat and white—Steve ck bla in and rd— boa w. sho the als ste ves Ree

J U S T A M O U S E C L I C K AWAY

For complete coverage of the ’05 NPC USA, Team Universe and Figure National Championships and the IFBB New York Pro Figure Classic direct your browser to IRON MAN’S Graphicmuscle.com. And don’t forget the www.

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“Welcome to person altraining hell. Time for your breathing squats supersetted with deadlifts.”

PUMP & CiRCUMSTANCE TESTOSTERONE CORNER

Arnold Notes

him to the United States in 1968, and, after all, he’s Arnold.)

The bill “would have required coaches to take a course in performance-enhancing supplements, created a list of banned substances for interscholastic sports and barred supplement manufacturers from sponsoring school events,” said the Times on July 14. “In his veto message, the governor said that most dietary supplements were safe and that [the] bill would have been difficult to implement. He also said the bill unfairly focused on ’performanceenhancing dietary supplements instead of focusing on ensuring that students participating in high school sports are not engaged in steroids use.’”

However you feel about the Big Fella as chief executive, it’s not a stretch to think that “Steroids bad; supplements good” is his honest opinion. Readers who want to have an informed opinion on this can Google the story for more details.

Meanwhile, back in Caulifornia, having fixed the problem—and given up his financial interest in Arnold Fitness Weekend—the gov. undoubtedly moved on to the more important things he had to do. Still the flak, from those who are looking for dirt on him and those who are calling for a change in state law, continued to charge the atmosphere as this Pump & Circumstance installment went to bed. That’s all beyond the scope of this column, of course, although, I must admit: I won’t lose sleep over the fact that the greatest bodybuilder who ever lived might now not be appearing so much in certain rival publications.

Balik

The headlines screaming from the Los Angeles Times in mid-July told the tale in a nutshell: “Gov. to Be Paid $8 Million by Fitness Magazines,” “Governor Defends Magazine Deal,” “Gov. Cancels Magazine Contract.”

The media frenzy stirred up by that purported scoop—that California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s contract with American Media Inc. subsidiary Weider Publications, which the Times had In many ways Mr. S. belongs reported on numerous occasions, did to all the musin fact involve money—actually cle magazines knocked Karl Rove off the front that have chronicled his page out here in Arnold-land. career, as this Point one: The ad revenues of classic John Weider pubs Flex and Muscle & Balik shot Fitness—as with IRON MAN and all shows. the muscle magazines—depend on the well-being of nutritional supplement companies. Point two: Last year the governor vetoed a bill that would have regulated performance-enhancing supplements. Point three: It was revealed (in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission in June) that the governor’s remuneration, including allocations to a tax-exempt physical fitness panel, were tied to ad revenues.

While the real-world news media were busy connecting those dots, folks who know Arnold well must have been sending a lot of LMAO e-mails regarding the notion that he had gotten himself elected governor in order to get involved in petty graft. If anything, perhaps a lesser sin applies: Could his mental set of greatness (see page 178) have kept him from noting the appearance of impropriety caused by his arrangement with the publisher? (It wasn’t against California law; he had been associated with the Weider magazines since Joe Weider, who sold them to AMI in 2003, brought

Will bodybuilding get its gov. back?

HOT SHOTS

BY JERRY FREDRICK

If this is a tag-team wrestling duo, sign us up for the first match!

suicide machine has Dr. Kevorkian's new you meet your that personal touch— ile on your face. maker with a big sm

270 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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And now you see why backstage passes are so valuable.

Whew!

DOINGS

O LY M P I A W A T C H

New Shows for Old

Empowering Woman Nita Marquez.

More interesting developments

Silverman

Trolling the Web to see what people are talking about the week before the NPC USA, I came across a bulletin board thread in which someone mentioned a “rumor” that the Olympia promoters were adding a last-minute Mr. Olympia qualifier on Friday, October 14, to the rapidly expanding schedule.

It was quickly confirmed by Shawn Ray—presumably that Shawn Ray, the one who was until recently the athletes’ rep for the pro men. When I went back to look for more on the subject, however, I couldn’t find the thread. After an hour of scanning through every topic Speaking of that 10 grand to the female flexers. In a letter to fans who protested that was remotely related to the subthe demotion of the Ms. Olympia, the ject—and flipping past a lot of amazing finals of which are scheduled for the pictures of Dina Al-Sabah—I narexpo instead of the Orleans Arena stage rowed it down to two possibilities: with the other women’s shows, the Either Shawn had spoken too soon and promoters said the raise was “part of our plan to continue investing in profes- the posts had been pulled, or I should sional physique athletes.” have bookmarked the page.

A phone call or two turned up the info that the show is for real. It will be a winner-take-all battle open to athletes who are not already qualified, all being $10,000 and the chance to compete in the big show the following day. And get this, it’ll probably take place on Friday night, along with the Fitness and Figure Olympias and a model search.

Yes, you read that right: The blows keep getting lower. The promotion team at Weider/AMI wants to replace the gnarly girlies of the Ms. Olympia with a lineup of big gnarly men. That’ll appeal to the people who might pay to see a model search.

Actually, this would be a great idea for boosting ticket sales of the Friday-night show if they’d made it an addition to the festivities instead of a substitute for the female flexers. How about it, guys? It’s not too late.

The real question is, Where is the the money for these financial upgrades coming from—sponsors? As always, the Internet was buzzing with speculation. The suggestion that Weider/AMI had recently freed up $8 million in its budget and was passing a bit on to the athletes was just too good not to pass on here.

Silverman

’04 Ms. O Iris Kyle.

Speaking of women who do what they say they’re going to do.

Phoenix fitness flyer Nita Marquez founded Women Empowering Each Other, an organization aimed at helping single mothers get on their feet, after she became one herself a couple of years back. In April WEE held its first fundraiser, a WEE Will Rock You concert to benefit a scholarship fund for a notso-wee $10,000 to be awarded to a deserving single mom. And that’s just the beginning, says Nita. For her next WEE project, Marquez, who used songs from her recently recorded demo in the fitness routine she was taking to the Team U, is executive-producing a CD of “easy listening music from a diverse lineup of musical artists.”

I can’t wait to see that routine, Nita.

For info on all things WEE, go to www.weeinc.com

M O R E U P D AT E S

One lower-Manhattan site I’ll be getting a gander at is Linda WoodHoyte’s new personal-training studio in trendy Tribeca. The NPC/IFBB Big Apple judge—and former Team Universe champ—opened Fitness Together in late March, and before you could say, “Give me five more reps,” her beautifully buffed body was seen demonstrating diamond pushups in the New York Daily News. When Wood-Hoyte got into the one-on-one training business in her home gym after a couple of decades plus as an executive in the communications industry, she promised she’d be going downtown big-time before long. The facility features three fully equipped privatetraining studios and an open cardio area.

“My clients are professional people, many from the corporate buildings in our area, and local residents. I have four trainers with marvelous backgrounds, a staff nutritionist and massage therapist.”

Located at 387 Greenwich Street (between Moore and Beach), Fitness Together is iron-clad proof that Wood-Hoyte is a woman who knows how to reach a goal. Let her help you reach yours. For more Information call (212) 226-0012, or you can take a virtual tour at www.ftnewyorkcity.com.

Bradford

of heading Another Openin’, Another Show Speaking to the Team U

Another step up the corporate-fitness ladder for Linda Wood-Hoyte.

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PUMP & CiRCUMSTANCE STILL MORE UPDATES

Sex goddesses

Neveux

Don’t we love it when women of muscle get recognized in the mainstream media as the goddesses they can be. Thanks to Bob “Strong-and-Shapely” Bonham for pointing my cursor to the feature at www.askmen.com on Melissa Coates, the Canadian cutie who roared out of Thunder Bay, Ontario, to win the middleweights at the Canadian Championships in 1994 and the whole shebang at the Jan Tana Pro Classic in ’96. The site, which calls itself a “5 million readers a month men’s portal,” included “pictures, biography, video, Melissa got the full treatment from Askmen.com. related news, vital stats, commentary and cool facts” about the one-time IM cover model in its Model of the Week piece on Coates, who’s now a professional wrestler and made her first appearance in a WWE stunt this past May. And don’t we love an opportunity to run a cool Mike Neveux shot of her right here.

To check out the article, go to www.askmen.com/women/models_250/291c_melissa_coates.html.

Challenge Round Watch Comstock \ Models: Dexter Jackson and Gustavo Baddell

Speaking of Online

F I N A L O LY M P I A N O T E

As we slip into amateur-focus time, a.k.a. the USA-Team U marathon, no announcement has been made by Olympia Central on this burning issue. Rumors of differences of opinion at the O.C. notwithstanding, my money’s still on it’s being O.U.T.

by October.

Neveux

Just Because

Silverman

Neveux

Neveux

Tuckered In? Ten-week-old Tucker Evans is so into his Prolab Training Paks, he emptied the bottle.

Can a creatine habit be far behind?

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To contact Lonnie Teper about material possibly pertinent to News & Views, write to 1613 Chelsea Road, #266, San Marino, CA 91108; fax to (626) 289-7949; or send e-mail to tepernews@aol.com.

You can contact Ruth Silverman, fitness reporter and Pump & Circumstance scribe, in care of IRONMAN, 1701 Ives Ave., Oxnard, CA 93033; or via e-mail at ironwman@aol.com.

You can contact Jerry Fredrick, ace photographer for Hot Shots and Hardcore Training, in care of IRONMAN, 1701 Ives Ave., Oxnard, CA 93033; or via e-mail at jerryfredrick@aol.com.

IRON MAN Hardbody

274 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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Belli-ssimo!

Federica Belli Is One Spicy Italian Beauty by the Editors Photography by Michael Neveux Hair and makeup, Kimberly Carlson

Federica Belli is Italy’s premier fitness model and a very busy lady—so busy, in fact, that we couldn’t track her down to interview her for our pictorial. Why didn’t we just postpone her feature? After seeing the absolutely stunning shots Michael Neveux got of Federica in the studio, we couldn’t wait to get them in our pages. In fact, Federica may be our hottest Hardbody ever—her Italian accent adding considerably to her exotic mystique, according to the crew at the studio— and we simply couldn’t deprive our faithful readers of the chance to see her photos right away. (Let us know what you think, folks. Encore?)

As for her interview, we’ll have that in a future issue—along with a few more photos of this European beauty. Now, isn’t that something to look forward to? www.ironmanmagazine.com \ OCTOBER 2005 275

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IRON MAN Hardbody

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Innovations in Iron

ne of the great myths in training, and in many other human endeavors, is that you make progress inch by inch, ounce by ounce, implying that if you’re on the right course, you can be assured of holding a steady course to your goal. It’s an enticing idea. Unfortunately, evidence indicates that the concept is little more than a fairy tale. In reality, progress in the weight room, just as in other activities, tends to come—when it comes—in leaps and bounds, and the path upward has more dips, twists and level spots than most people believe.

O

The MantaRay can give you a new squat variation, blasting new fibers for renewed lower-body mass and strength gains.

Neveux

IRONMIND

Mind

Creativity in the gym can get you bigger and stronger faster

That might leave the impression that progress is less under your control than you’d like. Don’t worry. The realization can point us toward keys to progress, even if they tend to be off the beaten path. For example, one of the most fruitful ways of boosting your gains is also one that’s very rarely mentioned: Be creative in your training.

Back in the infancy of modern weight training the prevailing view was that the best way to make great gains was to do tons of different movements, many of which, as you’d guess, involved fairly small muscle groups. Along came a guy named Mark Berry, who said something like, “Nope. That’s not how it works, boys and girls. Concentrate on just a few movements involving major muscle groups, and the results will blow you away.” Berry was considered a bit of a birdbrain because of that screwy notion, but when he made a convert in a small Midwestern town, the weight world was turned on its ear. Berry’s follower was a fellow named J.C. Hise, and he reported that by following Berry’s suggestions, he managed to gain 29 pounds in a month. That was back in the 1930s, when most people training with weights were happy to gain a few pounds in a year, so you can appreciate the revolutionary impact of Berry’s innovative training concepts.

Hise, by the way, was no creative slouch himself, and among his enduring contributions to training is the cambered squat bar—a bar that’s slightly curved in the middle. It sat on the shoulders much more comfortably and securely than a straight bar, enabling you to squat that much harder and make that much more progress. How’d Hise get the idea? The story is that his brother bent Hise’s lifting bar while working on his car. The rest, as they say, is history. Hise’s invention, by the way, is a perfect example of the widely accepted definition of creativity: It’s an unusual yet appropriate response. In other words, creativity uses an uncommon approach, and it has value because it offers a suitable solution to a problem.

Arthur Jones came along in an era when the pendulum had swung over to the side of doing a nearly infinite number of sets, and free weights were the dominant tool in any gym. Before Arthur Jones a state-of-the-art gym might have a lat machine, a leg extension/leg curl machine, a hack squat machine, a Smith machine and something for doing standing calf raises. Most gyms would have a lat machine and, maybe, a leg extension/leg

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Body curl machine. By A.J. 25 (after Jones) the weight world was so vastly altered that gyms were defined by their machines— machines for every conceivable purpose. Free weights became the exception in many clubs.

Similarly, for decades it was a nearly sacred concept that you lifted weights three days a week—Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Along the way there were side trips to split routines of different types, but the basic rule remained the same—three training days a week, each followed by a rest day, with two days off at the end of the week. Then the Bulgarian weightlifting coaches said something like, “Hey, coal miners work hard every day, and so do all the other laborers in the world. Why do these pantywaist weightlifters think they need so much rest?” You’ve probably heard the stories about Bulgarians training six days a week, with multiple training sessions each day, as a result of that analysis.

The first time I heard about how they trained, I was so stunned by their dramatically different approach that for days, if not weeks and months, I went around muttering, “It must be a mistake. They can’t really be doing that.” They were, though, and in the process they produced athletes who exploded world record after world record.

The moral of the story is that creativity and innovation aren’t limited to the world of art. They’re just as applicable in the world of science and the world of weights—and the rewards can be incredibly rich.

“So that’s easy,” you say. “I’ll just cruise along the creative side of the street from now on and plan on getting bigger and stronger than ever.”

That’s certainly the right idea, but it’s not as simple as it sounds. First, most people aren’t very creative. That’s one of the reasons innovation is so rare and so special. Second, it’s one thing to say you want to follow the creative path, but it’s quite another, and much tougher, to actually do it. Most of us need a tremendous amount of social reinforcement and, conversely, have little reserve for dealing with skepticism and criticism—especially when we’re doing something that’s different from what 99 percent of the population is doing.

Research has demonstrated that great intelligence and great creativity don’t have the high correlation most people assume. In other words, some really creative people are sharper than tacks, while others are dumber than doornails. To be sure, one of the most creative trainers I know gives the impression of having a room temperature I.Q., but his ability to generate creative training concepts would obliterate a room filled with blue-ribbon sports scientists. Research also indicates that creativity can be fostered environmentally—in other

Man Gland

Poison Your Prostate? nlarged prostate glands can mean slower and more frequent urination for older men, not to mention intermittent flow. Help may be on the way via food poisoning.

Italian researchers discovered that when they inject botulinum toxin, or Botox, which is a poison also used to remove wrinkles, into an enlarged prostate (ouch!), urinary frequency can be reduced by as much as 65 percent.

Warning: Eating spoiled food will do nothing for your peeing prowess.

—Becky Holman www.X-tremeLean.com

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words, if you’re given opportunities to be creative and are reinforced for your efforts, you’re likely to have your creativity enhanced.

Creativity and innovation are at the heart of each of the big steps forward in building size and strength. New ideas, usually considered revolutionary at the time, lead to major breakthroughs, producing results nobody ever thought possible before. Put that idea to work in your own training: Follow the herd for mediocre results; be willing to strike out on your own if you want something really special.

—Randall Strossen, Ph.D. Editor’s note: Randall Strossen, Ph.D., edits the quarterly magazine MILO. He’s also the author of IronMind: Stronger Minds, Stronger Bodies; Super Squats: How to Gain 30 Pounds of Muscle in 6 Weeks and Paul Anderson: The Mightiest Minister. For more information call IronMind Enterprises Inc. at (530) 265-6725 or Home Gym Warehouse at (800) 447-0008, ext. 1. Visit the IronMind Web site at www .ironmind.com.

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Bomber Blast

MIND/BODY

Neveux \ Model: Eric Domer

To Bulk or Not to Bulk

’m puzzled as I observe lean and lightweight gym rats inching along in their struggle for muscle and might yet resisting the adventure of bulking up.

Adding muscle is the point, but at the cost of the quivering striation in the pecs or the loss of that courageous vein tracing a solitary path across the biceps? Hmm. I dunno. Who wants to trade his minor six-pack for a major keg?

Gaining weight requires a few adjustments, and it would be a good idea to spend 10 minutes stirring up some basic Qs, like why, how, when and what? No doubt we can all learn from a review of the list.

“Why” can go around in circles and loops before the answer is clear. Inquisitive characters roving my mind line up to be heard.

The researcher: Mr. Wonder is curious, and his goal is to participate in and observe the bulking process, determine its possibilities of muscle-building success and failure and report his conclusions to the equally curious IRON MAN readers.

The bully: The big, bad and insecure child wants to growl and flex and get huge and strong, that’s why. Got a problem with that?

The enthusiast: The bespectacled fellow who writes the articles says, “It’s time to stir it up and stretch it out. Let’s prevent the workouts from freezing up in the winter. Let’s fire up the training before the spring. Let’s get huge.”

The bomber: “Let’s put some meat on those bones. Solid training under the power of bounteous wholesome food is the perfect combination for serious muscle growth.” Here we have the logical recommendation of a confident musclehead who inhabits the thin air of the cosmic Internet.

The eager beaver: This driven creature looks forward to blasting his way through the winter and building up his muscle stockpile for getting ripped in the spring.

The rebel: Cuts be darned. Bulking up is a welcome change, a hardy challenge, a worthy goal and a cool and fascinating experience; it’s healthful and healing, stabilizing and protective. It’s productive, unless you already register 30 on the BMI scale or have busted out your XXL sweats.

“How?” is straightforward. Eat often and well. Only a few

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choices are available at the captain’s table—the same meal schedule with bigger portions of protein and complex carbs.

Steak dominates the plate, and a pat of butter melts on the vegetables. Additional servings of fruit and cottage cheese are not denied, and the protein powder flies like sawdust in a lumber mill. Another meal might be tossed in just to be reassuring. A flagrant option (hold onto your lifting belt) could be the occasional inclusion of quasi-junk food like ice cream and cheesecake. I dunno, girls and boys...this is, like, weird.

Eating becomes a primary activity, shopping an event; food costs rise, muscles grow, and that’s that. Quality food and careful feeding beget a quality body and superior well-being.

Protein powder must be logically assessed as an integral part of the food budget, not as a supplement. Protein shakes are valuable pre- and postworkout feedings and inexpensive meals, not secondary snacks. Do what you have to do; cut your spouse’s allowance.

“When?” is sometime in November as the winter stands on its hind legs and paws at us like an angry grizzly. Five months of living in sweatshirts and sweatpants can be ugly but comfortable. In March and April the cocoon is slowly shed, and the morphed creature emerges. “What if I gained 15 jiggly pounds of fat, it’s stuck like pudding everywhere, and I can’t lose it?” Never happen...though life can be cruel.

How about the training? That will unfold as the food intake and the bodyweight increase. It can be similar to your current M.O. with an increase of the weight handled in most exercises. Strength and energy improve with the addition of nutritious foods and quality pounds. Motivation increases in direct proportion to the increase in muscle and strength. And, unless the mass gained is too much, too soon and too loose, endurance and energy rise favorably as well. We become ideal muscle builders with the perfect anabolic environment: fuel to press on and on, ingredients for extensive repair and construction, developing bodyweight to accommodate evergrowing muscle overload and the attitude amplified by inspiration to impel us forward. Stand clear of moving parts.

Seeking personal records in favorite heavy lifts (squats, deadlifts, dumbbell presses, thick-bar curls) that provide systemic stimulation will frequent the agenda. Risk of injury will be carefully monitored and overtraining avoided.

No peeking under the oversize sweatshirt—ride the spin bike for 20 minutes three or four times a week instead. Keep your eye on the springtime and your grip off the love handles.

Feel the power and pump and don’t scrutinize and criticize your tone and shape. You’re not scratching an itch or rubbing your nose. You’re a major work in progress, not a canvas to be unveiled. You’re a construction zone, men and women at work, a hard-hat area where machines and material are scattered around and in constant heavy use. Proposed date of completion: late spring, early summer, 2006.

Bulking up, packing on the pounds, and getting huge on big steaks and heavy squatting under layers of sweatshirts sounds like the master project for this winter. Beats making snowballs and catching a cold.

—Dave Draper

Web alert: For more from Dave Draper, visit www.davedraper.com and sign up for his free newsletter. You can also check out his amazing Top Squat training tool, classic photos, workout Q&A and forum.

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Go Cardio

Proper Pulse o many people talk about resting heart rate, but what’s normal? Although it varies from individual to individual, between 60 and 80 beats a minute is considered normal and average—no matter what your age or sex.

If you’re conditioned aerobically, your resting heart rate may be 50 to 60 beats per minute, and if you’re really a cardio fiend or a triathlete, you may have a resting pulse

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of as low as 40 beats every 60 seconds.

By the way, a high resting pulse upon awakening can mean you’re overstressed and perhaps overtrained.

—Becky Holman www.X-tremeLean.com

New Stuff

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Midsection Resurrection New ripping tactics can bring your abs out of hibernation t’s time to bring your abs out of hiding. The new X-traordinary Abs e-book, from the IRON MAN Training & Research Center, has all the chiseling tools you need. These ripping tactics are honed from decades of experience into precise advice that will help you achieve attention-grabbing abs—and the programs in this e-book take only about 10 minutes (now, that’s precision!). You’ll learn: • The max-force concept. How to make common ab exercises up to five times more effective.

•Ab analysis. Why standard crunches and hanging kneeups are lame ab exercises and how to alter and order the best moves to supercharge your results.

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And, of course, the X-traordinary Ab workouts, 10-minute programs that get the job done fast. (There’s even a freehand workout that’s more effective than most ab routines you see trainers using in gyms.)

Now’s the time to turn your midsection into a classic etching. The X-traordinary Abs e-book is your guide—and you can get it free for a limited time. All you have to do is subscribe to IRON MAN magazine for one year ($29.97), and the $19.95 abs e-book is yours free. Call (800) 570-IRON, or see page 193 to take advantage of this incredible special.

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New Stuff

MIND/BODY

Time to Go Beyond the Zone Better-balanced nutrition for better results et’s face it: The ultimate goal for everyone who works out is to increase lean muscle while reducing bodyfat. Yet many people follow diets that limit their musclebuilding potential and make all of their hard-training efforts go to waste. The huge media focus on low-carb dieting has led many to believe that it’s the only way to get lean. Unfortunately, you’ve probably found out the hard way that those diets don’t give you the results you want. Rather than looking big and hard with full, dense muscles, you often feel small, flat and weak.

The Zone diet, on the other hand, is a more sensible and effective approach. It’s based on a better balanced diet of 40 percent carbohydrate, 30 percent protein and 30 percent fat. While that’s much more effective for long-term weight loss, it still falls short for anyone who works out and is hoping to lose bodyfat while increasing lean muscle.

Now there’s a revolutionary new diet program designed to unleash the anabolic effects of food—Macrobolic Nutrition. Recent research reveals that your body needs precise nutrition to work at maximum capacity. According to new studies on performance nutrition and information revealed in the

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best-selling book Macrobolic Nutrition, eating foods in the precise balance of 45 percent carbohydrates, 35 percent proteins and 20 percent fats dramatically improves your ability to build muscle, burn fat and increase performance capacity. Macrobolic Nutrition goes beyond the Zone by taking into account the higher protein and carbohydrate needs of athletes. It also places greater emphasis on the selection and quality of macronutrient sources. Now you can get this precise nutrition in the convenience of delicious meal replacements and bars.

Macrobolic-MRP and Macrobolic Performance Bars by MHP are based on the revolutionary 45/35/20 diet concept and contain the highest quality sources of carbohydrates, proteins and fats available. Macrobolic supplements set a new standard in quality and effectiveness for performance nutrition. To buy or for more information, please visit www .MacrobolicNutrition.com, or call MHP at (888) 783-8844. —Gerard Dente

Muscle Growth Just Got a Big Boost! ust when you thought you were getting the most out of your supplements, the NxCare researchers have created a completely new way of maximizing muscle growth. While whey protein, creatine and nitric oxide stimulators are well known, the NxCare Research Team has developed something unique: the world’s first protein synthesis stimulator, AMINOVOL. AMINOVOL’s extreme anabolic formula is scientifically designed to dramatically increase protein synthesis, nitric oxide, lean muscle mass and strength by working through 10 distinctive proprietary complexes. In addition, AMINOVOL’s advanced amino acid technology delivers a sustained release of key aminos to keep you building muscle all day long.

One of the key benefits of AMINOVOL is that it wasn’t designed to replace whey protein and creatine but to be used along with them to make those muscle builders work even better. IRON MAN readers are now eligible to receive a free 20-day supply (while supplies last) simply by calling (866) 6922731. (Please include $5 for shipping and handling.) Look for AMINOVOL at GNC, Vitamin World and health food stores everywhere. For more information about this ground-breaking anabolic innovation visit NxCare.com.

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Etiquette

MIND/BODY

odybuilders starting out today have an enormous advantage over their predecessors when it comes to acquiring information, and it’s all because of the Internet. In days gone by novice bodybuilders had to explore libraries and bookstores to learn about anatomy, weight training and nutrition. If they wanted to ask a specific question of a Mr. America or Mr. Olympia, they would carefully compose a letter, then mail it in a selfaddressed stamped enveloped and pray for a reply. If a reply did come, it would often be several months later.

Things are much different now, given the vast interlinked computer system spanning the world. Web sites offer plenty of free information, and even books or courses for sale can be downloaded in a moment to your PC or delivered overnight to your home.

Still, there are times when you want to ask a question or two of a pro bodybuilder or an expert. Luckily, nearly all of the people you would hope to reach are accessible through e-mail. Of course, asking for advice doesn’t mean you’ll receive it. As someone who’s both sought and given advice, let me give you some tips to sway the odds of your getting a reply.

Be courteous. The tone of your email is crucial. Keep in mind that you’re asking a favor of a very busy person. You must not be rude or demanding or insinuate that the expert owes you something just because you want it. You don’t have to kiss this person’s ass, but you should be humble and polite. Try to keep in mind that you may someday be in this person’s position, and consider how you’d like to be approached for advice.

Keep it all business. Experts aren’t cold and heartless, but most of them don’t have time to correspond day after day with a host of Internet pen pals. Getting too personal with an expert or a pro bodybuilder puts him in an awkward position. Leave it to him to initiate friendly contact.

Respect the hard work it took for them to get where they are.

One thing that will guarantee no reply is discounting the hard work it took for someone to reach an expert level of accomplishment, as in: “I know you got your body from steroids, so why don’t you tell me your cycle, juice boy?” If you’re writing to someone who’s been training since before you were born, you need to recognize that

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he’s really paid his dues, whether drugs were a factor in his development or not.

Don’t expect Intimidated? Don’t everyworry, he’s probably thing for a nice dude—if free. We you’re courteous. all know the adage “Time is money.” It’s reasonable to expect an expert to answer one or two simple questions free of charge, out of the kindness of his or her heart. Many men and women in fitness and bodybuilding generously answer inquiries (I get 40 to 60 a day and try to answer each).

But if you’re asking for a personalized and detailed workout or nutrition program, you should expect to pay for it. Top personal trainers command $200 to $1,000 an hour, after all, so it’s reasonable for a phone consultation or individualized program to cost a little money. You get what you pay for, and if improving your physique has a value to you, that will make perfect sense. Finally, you need to understand that many experts earn their living helping people reach their physique goals. Just as you wouldn’t expect an auto mechanic to repair your car for free, you shouldn’t assume someone who can help you transform your body will do so for zero compensation.

Gratitude is great, but it doesn’t pay the bills.

Don’t ask for advice if you’re too lazy to follow it. The one thing that irks most experts more than any other is taking the time to give advice, only for the person to not follow it.

Nothing is more frustrating than to get the same types of questions from someone weeks or months after you have already answered them. Lazy people have no place in bodybuilding.

If you’re instructed to try training or eating a certain way and don’t feel like doing it, don’t have the audacity to come back asking for an easier method. If bodybuilding were easy, every schmuck in the world would look like cover material for IRON MAN. —Ron Harris

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Neveux \ Model: Jay Cutler

Asking the Big Dude

Serious Training

Sean Jones Photography by Jerry Fredrick Location: Gold’s Gym, Venice, CA

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MIND/BODY

Serious Stats Weight: 215 Height: 5’9” Age: 32 Age began training: 15 Bodypart split: Monday: chest, biceps, triceps; Tuesday: legs; Wednesday: off; Thursday: off; Friday: back, shoulders; Saturday: calves; Sunday: cycle begins again Sample workout (quads): Leg presses 3-4 x 8-12 Superset Leg extensions 3 x 8-12 Sissy squats 3 x 8-12 Factoid: He’s a gourmet cook. Also, he won the ’05 Muscle Beach bodybuilding contest in Venice, California, on Memorial Day weekend.

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Jerry Brainum’s

Bodybuilding Pharmacology

Forskolin for Fat Loss Supplements purported to promote fat loss are among the most popular sold today. The biggest-selling over-thecounter fat-loss supplements in recent years contained ephedra or ephedrine combined with caffeine. Ephedrine and caffeine promoted the release of catecholamines, such as norepinephrine, which help convert fat calories into heat. Ephedrine-based supplements also promoted thyroid hormone activity while helping to maintain lean mass. When used properly, ephedrine supplements worked well for most people, with a low incidence of side effects.

Activating catecholamines, however, also stimulated the heart and slightly raised blood pressure. In a person not afflicted with cardiovascular disease, the changes were minor and produced no adverse effects. The most common side effect was similar to that of drinking a few cups of coffee. Prominent warnings on the labels of every bottle warned that the supplements were contraindicated for those with certain medical conditions, especially any

cardiovascular problem.

Despite the warnings, some people either overdosed on the substance or should not have taken ephedrine supplements in the first place. A few suffered side effects, though in many cases the cause-and-effect relationship between ephedrine use and the onset of symptoms was never definitively proved. That didn’t stop avaricious lawyers from filing countless lawsuits against companies selling ephedrine.

The Food and Drug Administration eventually banned the sale of ephedrine in April 2004. A year later, however, a federal judge said that the ban had a weak scientific foundation and ruled against it. Still, don’t expect ephedrine or ephedra to return to the market. The legal sharks are still swimming, and the insurance rates for a company selling ephedrine would be enormous.

Since ephedrine and ephedra were removed from the market, other substances have been touted for their alleged fat-loss-promoting effects. Some of them, such as green tea, Garcinia cambogia and yohimbe, offer legitimate fat-loss effects under certain conditions. Other natural substances, however, have been overlooked or perhaps not recognized for their fat-loss properties.

One is forskolin, which is found naturally in a plant called coleus. The coleus, which grows in Nepal, India and Thailand—and on windowsills all over the United States— has been used in traditional Ayurvedic medicine to treat various ills, such as skin rashes, asthma, bronchitis and insomnia. The forskolin in the plant can activate cyclic AMP, which then initiates a cascade of biochemical events that result in everything from fat release to hormone release.

Forskolin differs from ephedrine in that it doesn’t interact with betareceptors in fat cells, so it has none of the stimulation effect associated with ephedrine. In effect, forskolin is a biochemical shortcut as far as fat release is concerned.

Several studies have shown significant fat-loss effects with human subjects who took a forskolin-based supplement. Unfortunately, they were sponsored by the company that holds the forskolin use patent, Sabina Corporation. While such sponsorship may not negate the results of the studies, it does engender a degree of skepticism, since Sabina has much to gain financially from them.

Some critics have noted that the mechanism through which forskolin works, activating cyclic

Forskolin doesn’t have the stimulating properties of ephedrine.

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AMP, can have far-reaching effects throughout the body. But toxicity studies have shown no serious side effects or any adverse changes in cardiovascular function. If anything, forskolin appears to offer beneficial effects by lowering blood pressure and increasing beneficial highdensity lipoprotein, or HDL. The most recent study found an additional bonus.1 Thirty subjects were divided into a forskolin group and a placebo group. The study lasted 12 weeks. Those in the first group took a supplement containing 250 milligrams of 10 percent forskolin extract twice daily.

Forskolin produced a significant improvement in fat loss compared to the placebo. But those in the forskolin group also showed a significant increase in levels of free testosterone, the active form of the hormone. Total T levels remained unchanged, but the elevatRaspberry ed free-testosterone levels may be a bonus of ketones have using forskolin. shown promise Another possible ingredient for an effective as a fat-loss OTC fat-loss supplement may be raspberry supplement. ketones, which are the compounds that impart the characteristic fruity odor and that new research shows exert a potent fat-loss effect.2 Raspberry ketones are already used as a fragrance Raspberry ketones differ from synephrine in that they in cosmetics and as a food flavoring agent, but scientists enhance norepinephrine-induced fat loss not by activatfound that they structurally resemble capsaicin (from red ing hormone-sensitive lipase but by promoting the relopeppers) and synephrine, found in the Chinese bitter cation of HSL from the cytosol of cells directly to fat orange. deposits. They also enhance brown-adipose-tissue therBoth capsaicin and synephrine have thermogenic mogenesis, though that is far more active in rodents than effects due to their stimulation of norepinephrine release. it is in humans.

Synephrine is a major ingredient in many current fat-loss Another new study found that an ingredient in licorice, supplements and is touted as the replacement for ephedglycyrrhetinic acid, fosters the loss of subcutaneous fat, or rine. Since raspberry ketones look a lot like those other fat just under the skin, when applied directly to the skin in compounds, scientists tested the fat-loss effects of raspa topical cream form.3 Glycyrrhetinic acid appears to berry ketone extract in animals. work by inhibiting an enzyme that increases cortisol levels The experiments clearly showed that raspberry ketones in bodyfat; increased cortisol promotes fat deposition. prevented the onset of obesity in mice even when the Another version of the same enzyme is promoted by glycyrrhetinic acid in other parts of the body, increasing cortisol levels and leading to a retention of sodium and a loss of potassium, which can result in rapid high blood pressure.

The other form of the enzyme doesn’t exist in fat, however, and applying glycyrrhetinic acid as a cream to fat can block the effects of the enzyme that does, thus preventing cortisol and fat buildup. Blocking the enzyme also leads to localized fat loss, as the study showed. Eighteen women ages 20 to 33 were assigned to a group that used a glycyrrhetinic acid cream of 2.5 percent (80 milligrams) or to a group that used a placebo cream. Both groups rubbed the creams on one thigh for a month.

At the end of the month measurements showed that the thighs of the women who’d used the active cream had lost subcutaneous fat. Only the top, or superficial, layer of fat was affected, however. That was good in a way, since it animals were on a high-fat diet. Using a higher percentage pointed to a lack of absorption into the internal organ of raspberry ketones (5 percent) prevented the increase in system. The mineralocorticoid receptors that are linked to blood triglyceride, or fat, that occurs after you eat a highpotassium loss and sodium retention don’t exist in subcufat meal. Raspberry ketones also prevented fat synthesis taneous fat, so no adverse effects occurred. when rats were overfed fructose, a simple sugar linked to None of the female subjects in this study were fat. The the current obesity epidemic. They appear to help prevent researchers think that the cream would produce more fat deposition—at least in rodents.

Glycyrrhetinic acid creams may be useful for people who want to reduce excessive fat in a specific location, such as the thighs or abdomen. They may be good for precontest purposes.

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Jerry Brainum’s

Bodybuilding Pharmacology In animals clenbuterol promotes a gain in muscle mass and a loss of bodyfat. In their enthusiasm over those findings, however, most athletes and various “drug gurus” failed to read the small print: The animals were given doses that would kill a human.

dramatic effects in those with heavier fat deposits. Obese people produce more of the cortisol-producing enzyme, which helps maintain and increase fat deposits.

Licorice itself also produces estrogenlike and antiestrogen effects in different tissues of the body. But they’re from components of licorice that weren’t in the cream used in the study. Licorice blocks androgen synthesis at the level of the adrenal glands, which is more significant to women than men. But that enzyme doesn’t exist in fat either, which makes it a nonissue with the glycyrrhetinic acid cream.

The authors suggest that glycyrrhetinic acid creams may be useful for people who want to reduce excessive fat in a specific location, such as the thighs or abdomen. The cream also offers some obvious bodybuilding benefits for those who experience difficulty in removing fat in isolated areas, such as the thighs and lower abs. You’d still need to diet and exercise to burn the deeper-lying, or visceral, fat deposits, but a glycyrrhetinic acid–based cream might be useful for precontest purposes.

Clenbuterol: Dangerous Even at Low Doses Clenbuterol is a beta-2 adrenergic agonist, which means that it interacts with adrenergic beta-2 receptors. In plain English, clenbuterol mimics the effects of catecholamines, such as epinephrine and norepinephrine.

Those hormones dilate bronchial tubes. Clenbuterol also dilates them,

explaining its primary use to treat asthma.

Although clenbuterol is available in other countries, such as Mexico, under various trade names, it was never approved for use in the United States and isn’t likely to be in the future. The lack of interest by American drug companies is related to clenbuterol’s long half life in the body. Unlike other beta-2 agonists used to treat asthma, which degrade in about six hours, clenbuterol takes nearly two days to fully degrade. That considerably increases the chances of side effects.

What’s more, clenbuterol isn’t superior to other available drugs for treating asthma.

Bodybuilders and other athletes became interested in clenbuterol after research showed that it promotes a gain in muscle mass and a loss of bodyfat in various animals. In their enthusiasm over those findings, however, most athletes and “drug gurus” failed to read the small print: The animals were given doses that would kill a human.

Despite that considerable problem, clenbuterol quickly gained a reputation as a muscle-building fat-loss drug. Users soon realized that its active life could be measured in just a few weeks. The beta-2 receptors that clen interacts with were extremely sensitive and shut down after about a month. When that happened, clen did little or nothing.

As the research continued, some disturbing facts emerged. Case reports pointed to clen as being the probable cause of such adverse effects as tachycardia (rapid heartbeat), heart attack and even kidney failure in athletes who abused it. Clen may have played a major role in the death of a popular pro bodybuilder a few years ago. That bodybuilder, who died

from heart failure, was known to have injected large doses.

Other animal studies showed that clen and aerobic exercise were a bad combination, since clen seemed to interfere with aerobic endurance.

Some animals had sudden heart failure when given clen and then forced to exercise. Autopsies of the animals found an abundance of collagen in their hearts, pointing to production of scar tissue, which in the heart is a signal of failure.

While much of the damage clenbuterol causes is ascribed to using large doses, a recent study that used rats as subjects found that even in low doses it promotes cellular death in both the heart and slow-twitch muscles.4 The implication is that there’s no such thing as a safe dose. Since the drug doesn’t promote muscle size increase in people and works only short-term for fat loss, you can safely conclude that there’s no rational health reason for any athlete to use it.

References 1

Godard, M.P., et al. (2005). Body composition and hormonal adaptations associated with forskolin consumption in overweight and obese males. Med Sci Sports Exer. 37:S39.

2 Morimoto, C., et al. (2005). Antiobese action of raspberry ketone. Life Sci. 77:194-204.

3 Armanini, D., et al. (2005) Glycyrrhetinic acid, the active principle of licorice, can reduce the thickness of subcutaneous thigh fat through topical application. Steroids. (2005).

70:538-42.

4 Burniston, J., et al. (2005). B-2 adrenergic receptor stimulation in vivo induces apoptosis in the rat heart and soleus muscle. J App Physio.

98:1379-86. IM

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Back to the

Rack The Baby With the Bathwater Part 4

by Bill Starr • Photography by Michael Neveux

F

ive years passed before the well-kept secret slipped out that Bill March, Louis Riecke and others connected with the York Barbell Club were using anabolic steroids and that the drug, not isometric contraction, was the real reason they were all making such spectacular progress.

Once on the iron grapevine, however, word spread rapidly.

Soon Olympic weightlifters in Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago, New York, Jacksonville and Winston-Salem found local sources for the Dianabol that would so dramatically improve their totals.

They also discovered that any routine, done consistently and diligently, produced startling results, as long as they took the little pink pills regularly. That’s when the systems of rack training that Dr. John Ziegler had developed and Bob Hoffman had so successfully marketed became passé. The weightlifting community figured that Hoffman had deliberately concealed the drug use of athletes who’d trained with isometrics and isotonic-isometrics just so he could sell courses and racks. Which was true.

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Model: Berry Kabov

Only the Strong Shall Survive

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The Baby With the Bathwater

part of weightlifting and bodybuilding. Garcy, March, Bednarski, Brannum, Whitcomb, Moore, Mielec, Glenney, Suggs, Pickett, Bartholomew and I used it till the end of our competitive careers, as did top bodybuilders like Bill St. John, Val Vasilef, Bob Gajda and Sergio Oliva. Perhaps it was no coincidence that Ziegler’s disciples were among the first used by professionalfootball strength coaches in the country: Riecke for the Steelers, John Gourgott for the Saints, Tommy Suggs for the Oilers, and I worked with the Colts.

When I took the position of strength coach at the University of Hawaii, though, I really got the opportunity to test the Ziegler system on a large group of athletes who were not using any form of steroids.

In the early 1970s you couldn’t get them on Oahu anyway. That’s changed, but during my island tour I had plenty of pure, willing subjects.

For isotonic-isometrics to have any real effect, the athlete has to be past the beginning stage. The longer he’s been training hard, the better.

My primary job was to work with the football team, and none of them had done serious strength training, so I didn’t put any of them in the rack until my second year there. I did find an ideal subject soon after I joined the coaching staff, however.

Rack training as designed by Dr. Ziegler might no longer have been considered beneficial, but it was a case of the baby going out with the bathwater. That’s because the system, when executed correctly, is extremely effective—especially the isotonic-isometric movements, in which you shift a weighted bar a short distance before locking it into a 12-second isometric hold.

Before I moved to York from Marion, Indiana, I improved my clean by 15 pounds and my snatch by 10 by using Ziegler’s system in the rack.

You’ll remember that rack training seems to have more influence on one area of the body than others. In my case the positions for the pull helped me more than the ones for the squats and presses.

Lifters who’d been taught by Ziegler or one of his students, such as Bill March, continued to use his system even after steroids became 314 OCTOBER 2005 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com

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Model: Berry Kabov

Isometric work in the rack can get you bigger and stronger fast.

Model: Lee Priest

Sales for isometric courses and all types of power racks fell like a missed jerk. I recall going to a room in an old warehouse in York to pick up back copies of Strength & Health to take to a coaches’ convention and seeing power racks stacked from floor to ceiling. They’re probably still there.

Model: Ray Campisi

Model: Mike Morris

I attended an Olympic meet in Honolulu, mainly to see Tommy Kono, Pete George and Harold Sakata, since there was no lifter of any note. All the lifters were Asian except one, a transplanted Pennsylvanian named Steve Dussia. He won the 181 class with a 220 snatch and 270 clean and jerk. After the contest we talked about mutual acquaintances, and I learned that Marty Cypher, one of the best coaches in the country, had introduced him to the Olympic lifts. Steve asked if he could train occasionally at the UH weight room so I could help him with his form on the split snatch, which was the style I used when I competed. I agreed on the condition that he assist me in teaching the football players and other athletes lifts like the power clean, overhead press, jerk and front squat.

Thus Steve became my unofficial assistant, training exclusively at the university. He’d been lifting heavy for six years, and I quickly found out that he was one of the rare individuals who could handle an enormous amount of work and still recover easily. He was a natural for power rack training. Two-and-a-half months after he started training with me, he competed in another meet.

Still a light heavyweight, he snatched 270 and clean and jerked 320. Everyone in the audience and all the offi-

cials were convinced I’d given him steroids (if I could have gotten my hands on any, I would have taken them myself). He was clean and had achieved the remarkable gains the old-fashioned way, through lots of hard work and sweat. Without doubt the isotonic-isometrics had helped a great deal. Steve continued to make progress for the three years I coached at UH. When you start using isos, keep in mind that it’s like any other physical discipline: There’s a learning curve.

The more you practice isos, the more proficient you’ll become and the more benefits you’ll derive. The first thing to understand is that you must be thoroughly warmed up before hitting your work set. If you apply yourself fully to that final isometric hold, which you have to do to get results, your muscles and attachments must be prepared for the stress.

Even though you may be sweating and puffing from a just-completed exercise, you still have to make certain that the groups you’re about to work with isos are ready.

For example, you may decide that you want to get your squats out of the way before doing some isos for one or more pulling positions.

Maybe your back got plenty of work during the squats, but it’s still prudent to do some movements for your back before proceeding to the rack. You don’t need to do much—a couple of sets of power cleans or high pulls. In fact, you don’t want to do much; you need to have plenty available for those work sets.

Even though you may be sweating and puffing from a just completed exercise, you still have to make certain that the groups you’re about to work with isos are ready.

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The Baby With the Bathwater

Model: Marvin Montoya

Back to the Rack

An alternative to free-weight movements outside the rack is to do a couple of warmup sets inside the rack at the position you’re going to use first: three reps, tapping the top pins on each rep but not holding it for a count.

Whenever you watch someone with iso experience doing a routine, it looks so simple. It is, but you have to do a lot of things perfectly for isos to be productive. To begin with, your grip, foot spacing, hip, back and shoulder placement must be exactly the same when doing an iso and the free-weight, full-range movement. Your form and line have to be identical to the one used on the lift you’re trying to improve with the isos, or you’re wasting your time and energy.

I often stayed with Tommy and Karen Suggs when they lived at Oyster Creek on the Gulf Coast in Texas. Over time I added several powerlifters to my list of trainees.

One of them made impressive gains, but he wasn’t winning any meets because he could never manage to lock out the deadlift he needed for the victory. The bar would explode to midthigh, then stall—really stall, as if hitting some invisible force field.

We trained at Billy Neel’s combi-

nation dive shop and gym in Clute (the hottest weight room this side of hell), but I asked him to come out to Tommy’s place so I could teach him isos in some privacy. There was a super power rack in Tommy’s garage gym. I wanted the lifter to do isos at only one position, the exact spot where the heavy deadlifts always stuck. I demonstrated the two warmup sets and the work set, stressing the fact that holding the bar up against the top pin was more important than how much weight he used. I suggested he do isos twice a week on the days he didn’t deadlift. He used good technique and agreed to add them to his routine.

He worked different shifts at Dow Chemical and went on nights right after I taught him isos, so I didn’t see him for weeks. When we met again, he said he hadn’t improved. That baffled me—until I watched him do his isos. He loaded the bar to 495 for

When you do it right, you feel an electric shock shoot up into your traps.

his work set, and when he locked the bar against the top pins he leaned way back for the count of 12.

I immediately understood why he hadn’t made any progress.

He was pulling the bar in a line that he couldn’t possibly use during the execution of a deadlift. I told him that if he leaned back the way he was doing, he’d fall over. It was also obvious that he’d been using a heavy weight to impress his training mates. That wasn’t the first time I’d observed someone letting his ego get in the way of correct technique on the rack. It’s a natural tendency to move away from the correct line during an iso hold because that particular position is relatively weak. But that’s why you’re doing an iso there—to make it stronger. So you must resist breaking form.

I had him lower the weight to 405, set him in the proper position with his frontal deltoids out in front of the bar and instructed him to maintain that form while doing the iso.

He held the bar against the pins, but just barely. I advised him to use only 385 the next time he did an iso hold at that spot and concentrate on maintaining the proper mechanics for the 12-second count. Within a month he was holding 455 on his work set, and his newly gained strength had moved his deadlift up 25 pounds.

Trainees doing isos for the bench press frequently alter their technique drastically so they can hold the bar against the pins for the required time. They press the bar in an entirely different line and set their elbows in a new position. I saw one powerlifter doing an iso for the middle of the bench who’d fixed the bar against the pins directly over his eyes. I told him the isos weren’t going to make him a better bencher because he never brought the bar back that far. If you don’t use the line on an iso identical to what you use for the lift, the rack work will be totally ineffective.

Sometimes a lifter honestly believes he’s using correct form on his isos, even when he’s not. So it’s valuable to have someone with a good coaching eye to watch you while you’re learning to do isotonicisometric contractions. A slight adjustment in mechanics can make all the difference. If you train alone,

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you can benefit from watching yourself in a mirror. When you see that your form is off, stop and make the necessary adjustments. If you’re unable to maintain proper technique with a certain weight, use less. Isos will improve a lift only if your form is perfect. Anything less than perfect is a waste of energy.

Which brings us to the factor of concentration. Since you’re doing only one iso at any position, you must focus on what you’re trying to accomplish and concentrate on the task at hand. You can waver on a rep during a free-weight exercise and still make the set successfully, but if your focus breaks down during an iso, you’ve failed. That takes some time to learn, and it’s one reason isos are more productive for those who’ve been practicing the system for a while. Experience is a great asset in that form of strength training.

Here are a few tips. Never jam the bar up against the pins in preparation for the isometric hold. Rather, ease the bar up and press it firmly against the pins, steadily increasing the pressure on the bar so that at the conclusion of the count you’re putting in as close to 100 percent effort as you possibly can. As you push the bar into the pins, don’t think about merely holding it there.

Instead, imagine that you’re pushing the bar right through them. That will help you steadily push or pull harder, and when you do, you can feel more of your muscles contract.

You might be surprised to learn that muscle groups you didn’t know were part of the exercise get involved in the contraction.

I’ve found that the top pull is the best position to use for teaching the technique; it’s a strong point for nearly all lifters and one on which they can rather easily maintain form. You’ve done your warmups and loaded a poundage that you know you can handle, though it may

be enough to push you to the limit.

Strap on, plant your feet firmly, and check your body mechanics, making sure that your front deltoids are in front of the bar. Now drive your feet down into the floor as you lift the bar in a smooth fashion up against the top pins. Lock it in place, and start pulling. When the count reaches five, apply more pressure to the bar. Every muscle in your body should be fully contracted, from your calves to your traps.

When you do it right, you feel an electric shock shoot up into your traps.

That’s what you’re after: a maximum contraction.

Keep pulling. Try to bend the bar.

Once you hit the 12 count, don’t let the bar crash downward. Instead, reduce the pressure, take a couple of deep breaths, and lower the bar in a controlled manner back down to the support pins.

Now we come to breathing. The rule is simple—you hold your breath for the duration of an isometric contraction. If you breathe, you diminish your ability to apply maximum force to the bar. That’s because inhaling and exhaling causes your diaphragm to relax, which creates negative intrathoracic pressure.

Take a deep breath as you lock the bar up against the pins, and hold in the air until you’ve reached the desired count. Then exhale.

That will make sure you maintain a positive pressure inside your rib cage. Holding your breath during an iso isn’t usually a problem, except with overhead lifts, such as presses, jerks and lockouts. Some lifters undergo what’s called the Valsalva maneuver—a forceful exhale effort while keeping nose and throat closed—while applying maximum exertion overhead. Usually harmless in healthy people, it hinders the flow of venous blood to the heart Model: Robert Hatch

Heavy partials and isometrics can make a good combo for building strength.

and can cause you to black out.

If you start feeling dizzy on any of the positions, be smart enough to use a lesser count—eight or 10 seconds instead of 12. Better safe than sorry; the original course recommends holding a contraction for six to 12 seconds. The reason I’ve always used 12 seconds for everything but overhead exercises is that it takes me at least six seconds to get to the point of pushing or pulling at maximum effort. I use the remainder of the time to gain the benefits of the exercise.

Don’t forget that the main reason you’re doing isos at certain positions on various exercises is that they’re your weaker points. So you’re not going to be able to handle big numbers initially. It’s a truism of strength training that it doesn’t matter where you start; all that matters is where you end up. Once you master the technique involved in isotonic-isometrics, gains will come steadily.

I’ll get more deeply into this subject next month.

Editor’s note: Bill Starr was a strength and conditioning coach at Johns Hopkins University from 1989 to 2000. He’s the author of The Strongest Shall Survive and Defying Gravity. IM

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Readers Write Cover Kudos on our walls, physiques we can aspire to. Not hand-painted fantasy junk.

Daryl Dawkins St. Louis, MO Editor’s note: A lot of times the magazine business is like bodybuilding training—you have to try different things to find ideas that work. Our pictorials are the perfect place to experiment. So far most of the comments have been positive. By the way, we also want feedback on the pictorial of female track-and-field athletes in our September ’05 issue and our Legends poster series. Are those things you want to see more of in IM? Let us know.

Although the entire June ’05 issue was great, the interview with Pavel Tsatsouline, “Red Zone,” was excellent. In fact, I may give kettlebells a try. My main reason for writing, however, is cover model Pauline Nordine. There are plenty of good-looking female bodies out there, but Pauline’s is absolutely beautiful [on your cover]. ’Nuff said.

Gerald Barton via Internet Editor’s note: That shot of Pauline was taken by Bill Dobbins. For more of his work, visit www.billdobbins.com.

Bodypart Art or Waste of Space?

I’ve been an IRON MAN subscriber since 1942, when I graduated from high school. I’ve worked out almost all my life, am in good condition, and I enjoy life. I attribute that to my lifestyle and what I’ve learned from IRON MAN. I also do some painting, so I have an appreciation for things artistic.

My opinion concerning Michael Neveux’s “Bodypart Art” pictorial in the July issue is positive. I find that type of thing very interesting. My vote is to keep trying new things like that.

Bob Heisel Murray, UT The “Bodypart Art” section in the July ’05 issue was a complete waste of space. I found it uninspiring and basically boring. Another Hardbody would’ve been better—or another training article. If you want to inspire readers, show photos of bodies we can pin up

I rolled my eyes when I got my July ’05 issue. “God, not another ab article,” I thought to myself. It seems like every fitness-oriented magazine has to have the token ab-training feature that says the exact same thing. “Out-of-Whack Ab Attack” was the last thing I read in that issue, and after I read it, I realized it was the first thing I should’ve checked out.

The information was exceptional and completely unique compared to all the other ab articles I’ve read. Great job! I’m applying that information at the gym, and I’m already seeing results. Thank you.

Jason Givens via Internet Neveux \ Model: Tamer Elshahat

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Ab Obsession

Editor’s note: You can find more of that type of unique ab-training info in the new e-book X-traordinary Abs. For more on that visit www.X-traordinaryAbs.com. You can get that e-book free when you subscribe to IRON MAN.

More Layoffs, Bigger Gains!

I wanted to report on my results experimenting with frequent layoffs. At the start, mid-March, I weighed 181 at 6’. I had been having trouble following the ITRC programs in the Train, Eat, Grow series without becoming burned out after two to three weeks. My progress would stagnate. I tried abbreviated versions of the routines, but my results weren’t too exciting. I decided to try following the current ITRC programs for 2 1/2 weeks—each of the three workouts four times—then taking seven days off. In three months my weight has reached an all-time high of 192—an 11-pound gain! And I’ve retained the same amount of ab definiton. My training poundages are also higher than ever.

These results are very exciting. I’ve been training for 20 years, since I was 13 and weighed 90 pounds. I think I’ve found a big piece of the puzzle—for me anyway. Steve Holman and Jonathan Lawson are inspirations. Keep up the great work!

Jess Perna San Diego, CA Vol. 64, No. 10: IRON MAN (ISSN #0047-1496) is published monthly by IRON MAN Publishing, 1701 Ives Ave., Oxnard, CA 93033. Periodical Mail is paid at Oxnard, CA, and at additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to IRON MAN, 1701 Ives Ave., Oxnard, CA 93033. Please allow six to eight weeks for change to take effect. Subscription ratesÑU.S. and its possessions: new 12-issue subscription, $29.97. Canada, Mexico and other foreign subscriptions: 12 issues, $49.97 sent Second Class. Foreign orders must be in U.S. dollars. Send subscriptions to IRON MAN, 1701 Ives Ave., Oxnard, CA 93033. Or call 1-800570-4766. Copyright © 2005. All rights reserved. No part of this magazine may be reproduced in any manner without written permission from the publisher. Printed in the USA.

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