motivation Archives

Age and Muscle-Building Rage

You know the stereotype of the grumpy old man. Sometimes it fits me like a glove.

Take this muscle-building thing, for example. Last October I significantly upgraded my pathetic home gym with a multi-functional cable unit. [Read more…]

Energy Cost and Muscle Growth

I do a lot of pondering—usually about my training and how to make it better. That doesn’t make great conversation at parties.

But it does allow me to reflect on my past training and efficiency-of-effort factors I missed. For example… [Read more…]

Q: In Old Man Young Muscle you have a Base Workout for upper body and one for lower body. Then you have a separate chapter on full-range Positions-of-Flexion [stretch-first] workouts. How often do you switch to that from the Base Workout?

A: First, in all of my workouts I emphasize the ideal exercise for each muscle… [Read more…]

Moment of Bodybuilding Zen 146: Bob Paris’ Motivating Muscle

Here are two interesting photos of aesthetic bodybuilder Bob Paris with some seriously motivating muscle. On the left is an artistic studio shot that showcases his symmetrical physique (looks like a Michael Neveux photo). On the right is Bob, guns blazing in a polo shirt, probably calling about a penicillin shot after touching a germ-ridden pay phone. [Read more…]

Jacked Physique: Easier than you think

Zac Efron, age 32, starred with The Rock in the movie “Baywatch.” Efron built an impressive, ripped physique for the role. Having to be shirtless next to The Rock jacks motivation, for sure… [Read more…]

Match Your Motivation, Build More Muscle

Q: I always have a problem making gains in the winter. It starts around Halloween, when the weather starts getting cooler and the bowls of candy start taunting me. Then it’s Thanksgiving, pumpkin pie, and it’s even colder outside. I lose the motivation to hit the gym, and my muscles usually shrink and get shrouded with a layer of fat. Is this just something I should accept, or do you have any solutions?

A: Definitely do not accept it—at least not completely—because if you regress in the winter and then start training hard in the spring, you waste a lot of workouts just getting back to where you were the previous year. (We speak from experience—it’s happened to us on more than one occasion). [Read more…]

Stage Sets for More Muscle Mass

We often look back through our ebooks for motivation and to find mass-boosting techniques we haven’t used in a while. We recently reminded ourselves about Stage Sets from our second e-book, Beyond X-Rep Muscle Building, which also discusses the X-Fade technique, Double-X Overload and X/Pause. When we first used Stage Sets and other X-hybrid techniques within the program outlined in that e-book, we each gained 10 pounds on top of our previous year’s great gains. Definitely something to add back into the mix once in a while when you have a training partner… [Read more…]

Moment of Bodybuilding Zen 59: Mike Mentzer Relaxed Mass

This impressive shot of Mike Mentzer was a poster that Steve had on his wall in his late teens for motivation… [Read more…]

Moment of Bodybuilding Zen 52: Bob Paris Relaxed

This standing-relaxed pic of Bob Paris is one that we cut out of an old Iron Man magazine and put up on our bulletin board for motivation… [Read more…]

New Home-Grown Mass: Slo-Mo vs. High Reps

Q: Your Quick Start Muscle 2.0 has renewed my motivation for home training. I’m stoked and starting the STX workouts next week. You have the first set in both workouts for slow-twitch exhaustion. Do you think that first set is better as a slow-mo set or as a normal speed high-rep set?

A: Either of those methods on the first set accomplishes the same thing: You fatigue the slow-twitch fibers, triggering more fast-twitch-fiber activation on the set or sets that follow… [Read more…]