Dedicated to Your Physical Transformation
Q: I have a hard time feeling some of my muscles working, especially short-range ones like abs. Should I go heavier, lighter, slower, or what? I know feeling the target muscle working is very important for the fastest results.
A: You can say that again. Getting in touch with the target muscle on every rep is a big key to muscle hypertrophy…
[Read more…]Q: I just got the Vince Gironda Legend & Myth anthology. Incredible info, but I’m wondering a few things. His drag curls and diver cable rows are cool exercises, but how do they fit into your Positions-of-Flexion system? Drag curls are similar to standing barbell curls, but you pull the bar up next to your body to your lower pecs, so the poundage is fairly low. Is it still a good midrange exercise?
A: Vince’s drag curl is similar to a regular barbell curl, but you keep the bar in contact with your body all the way up, so it’s much more isolated. And at the top, when the bar is at your lower chest line, your upper arms are more in a position that’s like the top of an incline curl, a stretch-position exercise. Now you’re probably really confused. LOL!
Q: I get confused. Should I try to change exercises at every workout to keep my muscle adapting and growing?
A: The problem is that your body really needs to adapt to a movement pattern over the course of a few workouts before you change exercises—at least that’s the theory… [Read more…]
Q: I don’t seem to see you guys talking about warm-up sets very often. Do I need to do any? I’m interested in building the most mass possible.
A: If you’re using something like our 4X mass method, you don’t need warm-up sets. The first easier sets prime the pump… [Read more…]
Q: I want to get strong over the winter. I heard that that’s what Arnold used to do. I know that if I get strong, I will eventually get bigger, which was how the Oak did it. What’s the best workout for that?
A: First let’s get some insight into Arnold’s winter training routine. Former IRON MAN Publisher John Balik was there, often training with Arnold, and this is what he had to say about it: [Read more…]
Q: I’ve recently had to cut back my workouts to three days a week and was looking back through many of the X-Rep e-books. I came across the Mass F/X program in 3D Muscle Building that looks fantastic. Just what I’m looking for. But I would like to use TORQ instead of the drop sets and rest/pause on tension-time days. Will that be too much work?
A: Tension-Overload Repetition Quantity is one of the best DENSITY training techniques we’ve found for blowing up the muscle with new sarcoplasmic size… [Read more…]
Q: Your Positions-of-Flexion [mass-training system] has helped me get huge with a lot of new muscle over the past six months. Thank you! One question I have is with hamstrings. In both the 3D Muscle Building e-book and The Ultimate Mass Workout, you have feet-forward Smith machine squats as the best midrange hamstring exercise. Don’t my hams get plenty of midrange work when I do squats or leg presses as my midrange quad move? Can’t I just skip the Smith squats and maybe do extra sets on stiff-legged deadlifts [hamstring stretch] and leg curls [hamstring contracted]?
A: We’d like to say yes, but, to be truthful, you don’t get a lot of hamstring innervation with free-bar squats or even leg presses with your feet high on the footplate… [Read more…]
Q: I’ve been reading about the 4X training and am wondering if you have any advice on how to use it with a full-body three-days-per-week routine. I just started using the 4X method for each bodypart. I do one exercise per muscle. Monday I do chest, shoulders, back, bi’s, tri’s, abs, legs. Wednesday I do the same body parts but in a different order and using different exercises. The same goes for Friday. I take the weekend off. I’m drug-free, so I think I’ve been overtraining till now. I’m hoping that 4X will help spark some new gains.
A: That sounds like a great plan for building more mass. First, skeptical readers need to realize that three-days-per-week programs can do incredible things. We discuss the Colorado Experiment in Size Surge 2.0 and 3D Muscle Building, a four-week research project in which Casey Viator gained 60 pounds of muscle… [Read more…]
Q: I love [3D Positions of Flexion training]. It makes sense and has helped me bring up my chest and delts with fewer sets. My question is about biceps. For the contracted-position exercise, which is best: one-arm spider curls or concentration curls? Or are they about the same?
A: In the X-traordinary Arms e-book we explain the in-for-out/out-for-in principle. For biceps that means that to focus on the outer head for peak, you use an inner-grip exercise. Concentration curls are about as “in” as you can get… [Read more…]
Q: I’m using the Anabolic Reload Mass Workout and really feel the high-rep set first on the big exercises, like bench presses. I’m only 30, but I’m wondering if a few weeks down the road I should try using stretch-exercise-first workout in Chapter 8 [The Over-40 STX Workout] to get some new freaky mass?.
A: New research says absolutely. Not only will that high-rep stretch set first help you activate more fast-twitch fibers on the heavier sets that follow, it will also trigger a unique layer of muscle mass… [Read more…]
