Dedicated to Your Physical Transformation
Q: You’ve sent emails about specializing for lagging muscle groups. What is your favorite way to bring up the slacking bodyparts?
A: One of our favorite methods is one we borrowed from Arnold—with our own density twist…
We call it Staggered Density because we fuse Arnold’s staggered-sets method with 4X density. What does that mean? [Read more…]
Q: A lot of bodybuilders go all power in the off-season. They push for more strength so size will follow. I’m thinking about using the Phase 1 program in Size Surge for that purpose—mostly big exercises with heavy weights training three days a week so I get plenty of recover-and-grow time. Would that program be okay to use for the entire 10 weeks instead of moving to Phase 2?
A: You’re right, even Arnold used to do a two-to-three-month power phase in the winter—but it wasn’t heavy low reps on every exercise, as we’ll explain. That’s the problem with the way most trainees do it: They go heavy on ALL exercises all the time for too long and neglect critical sarcoplasmic size, which can be a big muscle-building mistake… [Read more…]
Q: I love Positions of Flexion. I’ve gained about 10 pounds since I started using it, but one problem I have is biceps. I just don’t feel the last exercise for contraction, concentration curls. I’ve tried them Arnold style, with my arm hanging free, and I’ve also tried them seated with my arm against my inner thigh. Is there another exercise I can use?
A: We usually suggest spider curls, which are basically preacher curls on the vertical side of the bench… [Read more…]
Q: You guys don’t seem to like training each muscle only once a week like a lot of pro bodybuilders. How come?
A: More muscle-training frequency is a BIG size stimulator, especially for drug-free trainees—if you do it correctly. Many pros can get away with training each bodypart with excessive volume only once a week because of genetic superiority and, of course, excessive drug use. In fact, if you look back at the best bodybuilders of yesteryear, when steroid use was minimal, training each bodypart THREE times a week was the norm prior to a contest. It’s a bit of a forgotten muscle-size trick… [Read more…]
Q: The incline one-arm lateral raise is very awkward for me. Is there another exercise I can use for the stretch in my [Positions-of-Flexion] delt routine?
A: That exercise was an Arnold favorite in his prime because it provides some stretch overload to the medial- and posterior-delt heads. Arnold knew instinctively that stretch overload triggered significant mass gains (this was decades before the animal study that produced a 300 percent mass increase with one month of stretch overload—Arnold just had a knack for knowing what packed on muscle). [Read more…]
Q: I heard someone at my gym say that Arnold used X Reps. Is that true? I thought you guys came up with the concept a few years ago, so how could Arnold have used it?
A: Arnold used X Reps and many of the concepts we discuss in our X-Rep e-books. We know that because we worked alongside John Balik, former publisher of IRON MAN and Arnold’s former training partner and nutritionist. We talked to John a lot about Arnold’s past training. [Read more…]
Q: Your Power-Density explanations and methods in the Power-Density e-book make total sense—and if Arnold used it, I’m in. [Positions of Flexion] also makes total sense, something I know Arnold used for his biceps, among other bodyparts. My question is, Can I use only the ending contracted-position exercise for each bodypart to get my Density quota? Like for POF lats can I train chins heavy, pullovers heavy, and then use stiff-arm pulldowns with 5×10 in 10×10 style for Density?
A: A lot of bodybuilders have tried something similar; however, after analyzing Arnold’s workouts, we think they are missing a key mass-building component by not using Density on a compound move as well… [Read more…]
Q: I’m using The Ultimate Fat-to-Muscle Workout and making great progress. I’m bigger, with veins, and my abs are coming in. I just picked up The Ultimate 10×10 Mass Workout for something different, so I want to go to that program next. My question concerns muscle damage. Getting trauma from slow negative-accentuated sets is what makes the Fat-to-Muscle Workout work so well, so when I switch to the 10×10 Workout, won’t I be getting less muscle damage and therefore less fat burning? I still need to get leaner, so should I add NA sets somewhere when I go to the 10×10 Workout?
A: You could add an NA set for each bodypart. We discuss how and where to do that in the 10×10 Q&A section; however, it’s not necessary for trainees who are doing 10×10 at every workout. Believe us, you’ll realize that fact after you try the 10-sets-of-10 method. The muscle soreness you get will tell you that your microtrauma goal has been met. [Read more…]
Q: First off, I just picked up The Ultimate Fat-to-Muscle Workout, and it’s fantastic. I learned so much reading it, which I did at one sitting. Great info and easy-to-understand-and-follow workout, just what I need to kick off a new training program. In the first chapter, you tell the story about Arnold getting ripped and vascular without cardio. Didn’t Mike Mentzer do the same thing but with a lot fewer sets? It’s interesting that their training styles were so different, yet they both got very lean without much, if any, cardio. Do you think a lot of it could be genetics, and us average Joes need more cardio?
A: While genetics could have something to do with it, it might not have as big an impact as you might think. As far as Arnold vs. Mentzer, The key to both of their [Read more…]
