Duration of this program is four to six weeks, then you can move on to something else. But before

moving on, we highly recommend you use a medium intensity week—no sets to exhaustion.

CHAPTER 4

Mr. America's Super-TORQ Mass Method

The more we experiment with density-style training, the more we see how important it is for muscle size—maybe even more so than heavy training. That flies in the face of what most believe—and it shocked our colleague Mr. America Doug Brignole, now age 53. He has found that emphasizing density training is creating some of the best size gains of his life. We call his method Super TORQ—tension overload repetition quantity. With it he has pushed his ripped bodyweight to almost 220 pounds, a place he's never been before!

After talking with Doug (you'll see the interview in a moment), we revised his method, using a 30-20-15 rep

sequence with 45 seconds between sets. We usually use that on one exercise for a bodypart with other exercises to complete the full-range POF chain, either as heavy sets or in 4X style (4x10), as in the workouts you've seen in the previous chapters. For example, we will do this for quads:

Mr. America Doug Brignole is making some of the fastest mass gains of his life using ultra-high-rep training.

Midrange: Squats (4X style), 4 x 10 Stretch: Sissy squats (heavy), 2 x 8-10

Contracted: Leg extensions (TORQ), 3 x 30, 20, 15 So what is Doug's method and why have we dubbed it Super-TORQ? Doug does only one exercise per muscle group, but he does a 50-40-30-20-10 sequence, adding weight on each set and with drop sets on the last (his program is on page 39). He will also often superset an exercise with another for an opposing bodypart, using the same rep count, for example biceps and triceps or chest and back. Unreal density for immensity!

To help explain his method, here's an interview Steve did with him to get the full low-down on Super-TORQ:

Steve: In the past you and I have discussed the fact that higher tension time builds muscle size, but you’ve taken it to a new level with high reps.

And you do only one exercise per bodypart, right?

Doug: Yes, one exercise per bodypart per workout. For each exercise I do five sets: 50 reps, 40 reps, 30 reps, 20 reps, and on the final set I start with 10 reps and follow that with two or three drop sets of 10 reps each—although sometimes I drop less weight and do only five reps.

Sometimes I’ll do four drops within that last set.

Steve: That’s a lot of reps—and you really get a lot of tension time. Do you train each muscle group only once a week?

Doug: On day 1, I superset chest and back, followed by supersets of abs and lower back. On day 2 I do side delts, front delts, rear delts and traps. Then I do forearms. On day 3 it’s biceps and triceps followed by legs.

I split those three workout days over a four-days-per-week plan, training on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. I just keep the rotation going.

It’s truly amazing how good a workout one can get with only five sets and one exercise. I’m sore for days after—

every bodypart. And I’m growing like a weed. Awesome pump.

Steve: Whoa—50 reps for chest supersetted with 50 reps for back. You must be breathing like a racehorse after running the Kentucky Derby.

What made you decide to switch to this style of extreme-tension training? I know you were doing 4X before but with a number of drops on each set and multiple exercises for each bodypart.

Doug: Exactly—and that’s why I was drastically overtraining. I was doing too many sets, with too much weight and not enough reps per set. I decided to simplify and pull back the set volume but increase the tension time with high reps.

And it’s working. At the rate I’m going, I’ll be weighing 230 by early January of 2014 and will easily be able to compete in June 2014 at 210 ripped. Happy days are here again. [Laughs]

Steve: Your new training sounds unorthodox, but a lot of recent studies back it up. One showed that very light weight and higher reps built muscle just as well as or better than heavy training. And another showed that not going all out on squats produced testosterone increases—

as long as the volume was more than four sets and the reps were fairly high. Excess muscle fatigue was believed to be the hypertrophic trigger. Wait. I just thought of something: 50-rep squats. Do you go there?

Doug: Not always, but I do every so often. For my leg workouts I alternate between what I call “isolation” days and “compound” days. So, at one workout I’ll do leg extensions supersetted

with leg curls; then I’ll do glute extensions supersetted with calves;

and inner and outer thighs supersetted.

At my next leg workout I’ll do squats or leg presses—no superset—

followed by hip flexors supersetted with calves.

In other words, I do either

squats or leg presses or leg extensions—only one of those in a workout. And, yes, I do squats and leg presses the same way: 50, 40, 30, 20, 10. Killer!

Steve: What about training to failure? Do you hit it on all sets or only the last one?

Doug: It depends. I go to failure at least on the last set, but sometimes it happens on set number one, or two, etc.

For example, let’s say I’m doing decline dumbbell presses for chest. Here’s my planned progression:

Set 1: 20s for 50 reps Set 2: 30s for 40 reps Set 3: 40s for 30 reps Set 4: 50s for 20 reps

Set 5: 60s for 10 reps followed by 40s for 10 reps, followed by 30s for 10 reps

As I said, that’s the plan. As I progress through the sequence, though, I’m reevaluating as I go. If I get the full 50 with 20s on the first set easily, I might decide to jump to 35s on the second set instead of the 30s; however, that might be overambitious, and I might not get the full 40 reps with that weight, so I fail at 36 reps. And so on.

By the time I’ve gotten to the fifth and final set, after I’ve done the initial 10 reps—or reasonably close to that, assuming I’ve failed—I’ll continue evaluating what that next weight will be. When I get to the last breakdown subset of the final set, I may end up doing 18 or 20 reps, simply because I could, and it’s the end. That last one is when I always push to failure.

My goal is to get as close as possible to failure, if not

actually experiencing failure. Also, to extend the time under tension as much as possible, or, more specifically, time under extreme fatigue and burn. Knowing I’m doing only five sets enables me to go all out.

No need to conserve fuel.

Spend it all. Blow it out.

Then I’m done.

Steve: Ah, but you’re supersetting the

chest exercise with a

back move. So the rest between sets is as long as it takes you to do the high-rep set of back work, correct?

Doug: When I superset between chest and back, or biceps and triceps, or quads and hamstrings, I go continuously. I don’t rush per se, but I don’t delay. It’s already been one or two minutes since I did the previous set for that bodypart, so I don’t need any more rest. But the emphasis is on burning out during the set, even if I got plenty of recovery between sets.

Steve: What about rep tempo? Do you strive for a certain up-down cadence?

Doug: In terms of rep speed, I try to use full range of

motion and a steady, controlled speed, without pausing between reps. When the fatigue builds to a fever pitch, and it feels “too painful” to continue, I begin doing a little game of three continuous reps, with one slight pause, or five continuous reps, with one slight pause, until the set is over or I fail.

Steve: And exercises—how do you determine which is the best? After all you only do one per muscle group.

Doug: One of the criteria I use is that the movement must be 100 percent comfortable and natural, without any joint distortion. That way all of my effort goes directly to the target muscle. The goal is to slam that muscle, without any distraction of excessive fatigue in an assisting muscle or pain in a joint.

Another criteria is that I try to use an exercise that has a resistance curve in which the resistance increases as the muscle elongates and diminishes as it contracts.

The reason is that muscles tend to have an elastic property, and as they stretch, the power increases;

as they shorten, the power diminishes.

For example, a standing cable lateral raise—with the pulley about hip high—vs. a standing dumbbell lateral raise.

The cable provides resistance right from the beginning of the movement, and it diminishes as the arm is raised to the point where it’s parallel to the ground—the point of

contraction for the side deltoid.

Conversely, the standing

dumbbell lateral raise starts with zero resistance for the deltoid, precisely at the point where it can best handle resistance and can derive the most benefit. Then, as the arm is raised and the deltoid contracts, the resistance increases to a degree that it would not be possible to pause there with any appreciable weight and lock into the contraction. Plus, because of the downward pull of gravity, rather than the inward pull of the cable, the trapezius muscles experience too much fatigue.

Steve: Is this the perfect workout?

Doug: I’m continuously perfecting it. After every workout I ask myself whether it was “enough” or “too much.” I question whether the bodypart had recovered enough from the previous workout before I slammed it again. I question whether the exercise selection was the “best choice” and why. I question the “indicators,”

or clues, that would allow me to determine whether the intensity was right. I reference the rate of growth—thus far—with this program, as compared to the rate of growth

I’ve experienced on other programs.

All good stuff!

Note: Brignole is co-author of the book Million Dollar Muscle. It is not a workout book, but a sociological look at the fitness industry—a very interesting read.

Why TORQ Training Builds Mass Like Crazy To understand why Tension-Overload-Repetition-Quantity training is a mega get-bigger trigger, you need to grasp optimal time under tension. Here’s a quote from strength and muscle-building expert Jim Stoppani, Ph.D. (from his book Encyclopedia of Muscle and Strength):

“The best TUT range for strength is about four to 20 seconds per set and about 40 to 60 seconds per set for muscle growth.”

Some researchers extend the growth, or hypertrophic, tension time to 90 seconds. But the thing to realize is that most bodybuilders rarely hit the LOW-end 40-second mark.

Look around the gym; the majority of sets last around 20 seconds, which is the TUT for strength, not size. (Perhaps that's why mass gains are so slow for most!)

So getting into the UPPER hypertrophic tension time, 60 to 90 seconds, has a lot of potential for triggering loads of new growth, primarily in the sarcoplasm. That so-called energy fluid in the muscle blows up best with longer time under tension. Anywhere from 20 to 50 reps, depending on rep speed, will get you there and stimulate incredible size gains.