APRIL 2007 / IRON MAN MAGAZINE—
WE KNOW TRAINING
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HIGH-INTENSITY TRAINING • THE LOST MIKE MENTZER INTERVIEW
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APRIL 2007
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www.ironmanmagazine.com \ APRIL 2006 261
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150 DECEMBER 2009 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com
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• Key Exercises for Big Gains
• Intensity Tactics That Pack On Mass
• The Ultimate Fat-to-Muscle Method
• Perfect Rep Speed to Boost Results
April 2007 Vol. 66, No. 4
Delt Detonation,
page 198
FEATURES
58
TRAIN, EAT, GROW 90
More Power/Rep Range/Shock tweaks for bigger, stron-ger physiques.
88
MIND/MUSCLE EXPLOSION
Peter Siegel teaches you how to push your belief thresh-old higher for mega gains.
106
GROWTH ZONE
Dwayne Hines II revs you up to push to the limit and beyond for mind-numbing size.
114
PARTIALS, BURNS AND X REPS
William Litz’s take on extending time under tension for extreme growth—and he’s got before and after photos to prove his point.
132
REP-RANGE RELOAD
Chris Pennington plays the numbers game for a bigger bench and massive pecs. X-Files is here too.
142
MAGNESIUM
Jerry Brainum explores the research on the so-called muscle mineral. (Can it help pump you up big time?)
158
A BODYBUILDER IS
BORN 21
Rise of the machines. Ron Harris
explains why free weights aren’t always the answer.
166
CARDIO AND CARBS
From Bodybuilding.com: Shannon Clark explains why bodybuilders need both, whether massing or ripping.
180
HEAVY DUTY
Part 1 of a lost Mike Mentzer interview from 1986.
198
DELT DETONATION
Eric Broser takes you through a shocking shoulder workout that’ll swell ’em like melons!
216
CHAD MARTIN
The ’06 Junior USA winner talks bodybuilding, life and leg training.
230
ANABOLIC FIRESTARTERS
Certain vitamins, minerals and compounds can create a hypertrophic firestorm. So says George Redmon, Ph.D.
268
HARDBODY
Nancy Di Nino shows the bod that weight training built.
282
ONLY THE STRONG SHALL SURVIVE
Bill Starr on how to get your body back after a layoff.
HIGH-INTENSITY TRAINING • THE LOST MIKE MENTZER INTERVIEW
Get Your Body Back
Reclaim Your Size and Power!
™
APRIL 2007
Please display until 4/6/07
$5.98 $7.98 in Canada 070992 373901 04> www.IronManMagazine.com For Olympian Muscle Size •Rep-Range Reload •X Reps and Burns •Rest/Pause •Power/Rep Range/Shock GROWTH ZONE TRAINING PLUS: •Anabolic Firestarters •Carbs and Cardio—the Truth •Mind/Muscle Explosion! HardBody Hotness!
Nancy Di Nino
The Muscle Mineral
Are You Getting Enough?
Deltoid Detonation
Shoulder-Blasting Workout
C1_r3-aprl2007_F.indd 1 1/30/07 1:35:24 PM Jay Cutler and Nancy Di Nino (inset) appear on this month’s cover. Photos by Michael Neveux
We Know Training
Growth Zone,
page 106
Mind/Muscle Explosion,
page 88
FEATURES
™Partials, Burns and
X Reps, page 114
BEFORE AFTER
In the next IRON MAN
Next month we’ll have an in-depth look at stretch overload that will change the way you train for-ever—if you want to get huge! Contraction is great, but progressive-resistance stretch may be the real key to growth. We’ll present part 2 of the lost Mike Mentzer interview, in which he discusses his body’s response to steroids and the 45-minute training program he used to become Mr. America. We’ll also switch on the recorder with Flex Wheeler, who has some eye-opening views on bodybuilding and the too-huge crew. Watch for the mind-bending May
IRON MAN on newsstands the first week of April.
Train to Gain,
page 28
News & Views,
page 246
A Bodybuilder is Born,
page 158
28
TRAIN TO GAIN
Knee-wrecking wrap-up and drop-set solutions. Joe Horrigan’s Sportsmedicine covers a new grip aid.
42
SMART TRAINING
Charles Poliquin discusses eating out and ripping up.
48
EAT TO GROW
Protein and muscle resizing, glycemic-index insights and more beta-alanine benefits (that stuff works!).
74
CRITICAL MASS
Steve Holman on the adaptation-confusion theory. Plus, creatine dosing and eating tips for leaning out.
78
NATURALLY HUGE
John Hansen cranks on the competition ignition—advice for the newbie bodybuilding competitor.
246
NEWS & VIEWS
Lonnie Teper’s got a fever, and the cure is the pro-sea-son openers. Plus, Jerry Fredricks’ Hot Shots are back. Let the gargoyle games begin.
252
MUSCLE “IN” SITES
Eric Broser takes a look at bodybuilding Web sites from legends Ed Corney and Lee Labrada. And his always popular Net Results Q&A has answers on supersets.
258
BODYBUILDING PHARMACOLOGY
Does testosterone kill brain cells? Jerry Brainum explores the newest research and also checks out whether ana-bolic steroids help endurance athletes.
262
PUMP & CIRCUMSTANCE
Ruth Silverman’s review of ’06 continues with a look at what went on in the amateur femme-physique ranks.
292
MIND/BODY CONNECTION
Randall Strossen, Ph.D., explains why progress is your responsibility. Dave Draper chimes in with muscle-building attitude, and a couple of hot Graphic Muscle Stars will inspire you to hit the gym.
304
READERS WRITE
Jenny is worth every penny—Timea too. But Great Scott didn’t get a shot.
Anabolic Firestarters,
page 230
WEB ALERT!
For the latest happenings from the world of bodybuilding and fitness, set your browser for www.IronManMagazine.com
and www.GraphicMuscle.com.
DEPARTMENTS
Hard Body,
page 268
Contents_Apr_F.indd 24
Contents Apr F indd 24 1/31/07 5:01:00 PM1/31/07 5:01:00 PM
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26 APRIL 2007 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com
Dreams, in the sense of visualizing the future, are as personal and unique as the dreams we experience while we sleep. Ev-erything starts with the dream. Whether it’s a home at the beach, the physique you aspire to or anything else, it all starts with a dream. I love the quote from computer scientist Alan Kay that Ferrari has been using in its ads: “The best way to predict the future is to in-vent it.” Only a few words but they have life-changing power.
I just reread a book I first came across in the late 1960s, The Magic of Thinking Big. Don’t be put off by the hokey title. Life’s
ac-complishments—be they family-, business- or bodybuilding-related— are all about being able to see yourself as you want to become rather than the way you are. As a testament to the book’s power and truth, it has been in print for more than 40 years. Buy it, read it, and then reread it. It will be time well spent.
When James Cameron won the Academy Award for Best Picture for “Titanic” in 1997, the presenter—I believe it was Kathy Bates—asked him in wonderment, “Who gave you permission to create a project of such impossible proportions?” Cameron’s simple but profound answer was that he gave himself the permission. The fact is, we all give ourselves permission to become who we are and what we do. It is the irrevocable law of accountability.
In January my daughter, Lilli, and I had the honor of attending Arnold Schwarzenegger’s second inauguration. His vision for the state of Cali-fornia, as projected in his inaugural speech, was a masterful example of thinking big. (You can hear the speech at IronManMagazine.com.) I was struck by the elegance and power of his vision and got to thinking about the way his vision propelled him from Graz, Austria, to the center of the bodybuilding stage and beyond to become one of the most recognized celebrities in the world. None of that happened by accident. Now he has moved to the world stage in politics as the leader of the world’s sixth largest economy. He calls California a “nation state.”
It was interesting the way people reacted to Arnold’s vision. On the radio the next day three Sacramento pundits were commenting on his speech, and two of them did what negative people always do—they started to go through the litany of why Arnold’s ideas were riddled with obstacles and why the speech was overly optimistic. The third person observed that while the speech might have been very optimistic, he believed that anything Arnold puts his mind to, Arnold believes he can do. As Arnold used to joke in the gym many years ago, “It’s mind over matter—if you don’t have the mind, nothing matters.” Arnold has had a lifetime of impossible dreams that he made possible because he never gives up until the impossible has been obtained.
There is only one Arnold, but the same rules apply to all of our dreams. IM
Publisher’s
Letter
John Balik’s
Big
Dreams
Founders 1936-1986:Peary & Mabel Rader
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 Art Director: Aldrich Bonifacio Designer: Emerson Miranda
IRON MAN Staff:
Vuthy Keo, Mervin Petralba, R. Anthony Toscano 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, John Little, Stuart McRobert, Gene
Mozée, Charles Poliquin, Larry Scott, Jim Shiebler, Roger Schwab, Pete Siegel, 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, Ron Avidan, Reg Bradford, Jimmy Caruso, Bill Dobbins, Jerry Fredrick, Irvin Gelb, Isaac Hinds, Dave Liberman, J.M. Manion, Gene
Mozée, Mitsuru Okabe, Rob Sims, Leo Stern
Director of Marketing:
Helen Yu, 1-800-570-IRON, ext. 1
Accounting: Dolores Waterman Subscriptions Manager:
Sonia Melendez, 1-800-570-IRON, ext. 2 E-mail: [email protected]
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 self-addressed, 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 specifi cations for submissions.
IRON MAN is an open forum. We also reserve the right to edit any letter or manuscript as we see fi t, 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: [email protected] Steve Holman, Editor in Chief: [email protected] Ruth Silverman, Senior Editor: [email protected]
T.S. Bratcher, Art Director: [email protected] Helen Yu, Director of Marketing: [email protected] Jonathan Lawson, Ad Coordinator: [email protected] Sonia Melendez, Subscriptions: [email protected]
PubLtr_Apr07_F.indd 26
PubLtr Apr07 F indd 26 2/1/07 4:54:24 PM2/1/07 4:54:24 PM
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28 APRIL 2007 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com
SIZE MATTERS, SO…
Wrapping your
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knees for singles
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rep sets it could do
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Knee-Wrecking
Wrap-Up?
Can knee wraps
do damage?
P R E V E N T I O N
Knee wraps were once used almost exclusively by powerlifters, but lately more bodybuilders can be seen on leg day wrapping up their knees before getting under a heavy squat bar. Some guys wrap their knees before every set of leg presses and hacks too.
You could see it as a prophylactic measure. The wraps keep the knee tight and
warm. That sounds good, but is it? Some top bodybuilders don’t think so. Dave Henry, runner-up at the ’06
IRON MAN Pro, believes wraps don’t
belong in a bodybuilder’s gym bag. “They compress the patella, which can’t be a good thing,” he says. “There’s a reason there’s space and fluid behind the patella—because it acts as a sort of shock absorber. Taking that shock absorber away so you basically have bone grinding on bone sounds like a recipe for disas-ter in the long run.”
Another pro who gives knee wraps the thumbs-down is Art At-wood, who’s managed to build some seriously enormous quads and hams without using wraps. “I’ve only seen two guys tear their quads in my entire life,” he explains, “and they were both using knee wraps when they did it.”
Here’s a final word on knee wraps from six-time Mr. O Dorian Yates, a laconic champion who spoke only when he had something meaningful to say. Once a fan was urging him to start using knee wraps, arguing that they’d enable him to handle more weight on squats. “I could also stick a big spring in my ass too,” Yates replied, “but what good would that do me?”
The bottom line is that knee wraps can be a worthy training aid, but
probably more so for powerlifters, who do squats as heavy as possible for singles, doubles and triples. For bodybuilders, who tend to do higher reps for com-pound leg movements, wraps might be something you can, and possibly should, do without.
—Ron Harris
Neveux
When Dorian Yates
When Dorian Yates was urged to use knee was urged to use knee wraps so he could wraps so he could squat with heavier squat with heavier weights, he said a weights, he said a big spring in his ass big spring in his ass would do the same would do the same thing—with the same thing—with the same zero-muscle-building zero-muscle-building effects.
effects.
Neveux \ Model: Derik Farnsworth
Train1Apr_F.indd 29
Train1Apr F indd 29 1/25/07 8:49:36 AM1/25/07 8:49:36 AM
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He was big. He was pissed. And he wanted to kick my butt. There was no way out, so I extended my arm for the opening hand shake— and then I crushed his hand like a Dorito. Fight over thanks to the Super Gripper.
If you’re after huge forearms with the crushing power of an industrial vise, get the Super Gripper. It’s the ultimate forearm- and grip-building tool on the market because it provides your muscles with the two essential requirements they demand for awesome size and strength: specifi city (mimics gripping action) and progressive resistance.
You’ll develop a bone-crushing grip fast by adding one or a number of power coils for that critical progressive-resistance effect. Remember, when you wear short sleeves, it’s the lower arms that are exposed for all to see. You’ll want your forearms to be huge and vascular to match your thick, beefy upper arms—and now they will.
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30 APRIL 2007 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com
B I G G E R B O D Y P A R T S
W H E E L S
Lower-back injuries are about as common among bodybuilders as tribal tattoos. As a result, many in the iron crowd shun squats in favor of the leg press, in which the back is fully sup-ported. Overall that’s a good thing, as the leg press enables you to train heavy without putting your lower back at risk, especially if you have a his-tory of injury to the area. The trouble begins when you’re lulled into a false sense of security, mistakenly believing that it’s impossible to injure the lumbar spine on leg presses.
IFBB Pro Chris Cormier discovered just how wrong that assumption is. Chris was just beginning his prepara-tions for the ’06 Mr. Olympia, a contest he desperately wanted to do well at in order to redeem himself after his 13th-place finish in ’05, the only time he’d missed the top 10 in as many appearances at the O. The Real Deal has a history of
lower-back prob-lems going back 15 years, so he often uses the leg press as a tool to craft his phenom-enal legs. On that particular occasion he was using the vertical leg press, feeling fantastic and going heavy.
His training partner noted that he was going deeper than usual on reps. Though Chris felt no pain then, by the next afternoon he was lying on his back on the floor, unable to move. He spent two weeks in the hospital.
Looking back, Cormier realizes that lowering the weight too far was the culprit. “With any leg press, but even more so the vertical type, you can’t ever let your tailbone curl up toward your torso, which is what happens if you lower too far.” Chris had herniated two disks in the past, and now he’d compressed another two. If someone with Cormier’s training experience and savvy can make a mistake like that, so can any of us. All it takes is one rep— taken too deep with enough weight loaded up—to bring about lower-back disaster. So go ahead and use the leg press, but always keep safety in mind, and descend only to parallel or just a bit below.
—Ron Harris www.RonHarrisMuscle.com
What is it about the back muscles that makes them so neglected? Much of the blame has to go to sheer ignorance. In my high school lifting years, not only did I not train my back, I had no idea I could. Occasionally I’d jump on the chinup bar to challenge myself, but I didn’t realize the exercise was anything more than a means of testing strength or getting in general condition for sports or military boot camp. I was far from alone in my naiveté.
Recently I was speaking with USA light-heavyweight runner-up Peter Putnam, who’s currently playing catch-up with his own back as he strives to bring its de-velopment in line with the rest of his thickly muscled physique. “My early years of weight training were as a high school football player,” he said. “The main goal was to improve our explosive power so we could keep driving forward down the line. We did a lot of bench-pressing, military presses and squats but not a single row, chin or deadlift.”
Even when his emphasis shifted to bodybuilding a few years later, he failed to give his back the work it needed. “I had no guidance and wasn’t even reading the magazines yet, so I just put all my effort into the muscles that I could see in the mirror.” Putnam believes he’s been training his back as hard and heavy as he should for only the past three years and that the improvements he’s making are satisfactory. “It’s only a matter of time now before it’s a very good bodypart for me.”
Back neglect is so common in gyms and health clubs that there ought to be a hotline to report it—800-LAT-LESS. Few gym rats have any desire to develop their lats, traps, spinal erectors and the smaller upper-back muscles like the rhomboids and teres major and minor. Even many who identify themselves as bodybuilders give short shrift to back training, knocking out a few unenthusiastic sets of cable pulldowns and cable rows every once in a while when the mood strikes. They may have no desire to compete—yet. But many a competitive bodybuilder recalls a time when he or she could never imagine getting onstage and flexing in a skimpy little posing suit. So there may come a day when you start to wonder how the phy-sique you’ve built would fare against others. You don’t want to realize at that point that you have a huge area like the back to develop to match everything else.
Work your back just as hard as the rest of your body, with productive move-ments like chins, deadlifts and barbell and dumbbell rows. You’ll be glad you did, whether it’s when you’re in a lineup of bodybuilders onstage and are asked to turn around, or walking away from a group of girls and hearing the gasps of apprecia-tion at the powerful back in their view. —Ron Harris
RonHarrisMuscle.com
The Red-Headed Stepchild of
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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 upper-body 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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Q: Can you explain why I should stretch after working out with weights?
A: It is very important, especially as you age. First, if you do everything correctly from a stimulation standpoint with weights—from refueling to getting proper rest and recovery— the result should be some muscle growth. Now, when mus-cles are growing, they’re actually shortening to a degree. So as they hypertrophy, they’re also getting shorter and tighter.
If you weight-train for years on end and then attempt a very fast motion, such as throwing a baseball hard, the tendon at the lower biceps insertion can rupture. That’s because you’ve trained the muscles and tendons at a slow speed and with heavy resistance. Once they encounter a fast, lighter form of movement, the unique stress can cause a rupture. You should incorporate other types of exercise so that your muscle won’t develop one dimensionally—and that includes stretching.
Stretching can also positively affect the myofascia, which encases the muscles. Think of the skin on a chicken. Beneath the skin but on top of the meat is a thin, whitish layer. That’s the myofascia. It can become tight and thick when the body is under too much stress or at rest too often. Stretching can help loosen the tissue, but a more aggressive remedy is myo-fascia trigger point therapy. If you’re feeling tightness in odd places, like the neck, lower back or top of the pecs, you may have fibromyalgia. It was once thought only people who were
inactive got fibromyalgia, but it’s now known to hit anyone at anytime (provided a certain predisposition gene is exacerbated by stress and some other immune factors). The likelihood of this disease happening to a bodybuilder is slim; however, having myofascial problems is common for those who use their muscles daily. If stretching and some recovery time don’t relieve the problem, take a trip to a good physical therapist.
One last point on injuries: Near-max attempts can cause problems. I have seen bodybuilders rupture the pectoral-deltoid tie-in and the vastus lateralis, the outer part of the quadriceps, where the muscle attaches near the knee. The ruptures are usually due to steroid use, which can result in lifting weights that are far too heavy for the body’s frame and tendons and ligaments. Smart bodybuilders never use weights that can’t be pushed (or pulled) for a minimum of five to six perfectly smooth reps for the upper body and eight to 12 for the lower body. Staying with moderate, low-end rep counts will almost ensure a rupture-free bodybuilding career.
How to stretch will be the topic next month—and you’ll be surprised at my recommendations. —Paul Burke
Editor’s note: You can contact Paul Burke via e-mail at [email protected]. Burke has a master’s degree in Integrated Studies from Cambridge College in Cambridge, Massachu-setts. He’s been a champion bodybuilder and
arm wrestler, and he’s considered the leader in the field of over-40 fitness training. You can purchase his book Burke’s Law—a New
Fitness Paradigm for the Mature Male, from
Home Gym Warehouse. Call (800) 447-0008, or visit www.Home-Gym.com. His “Burke’s Law” training DVD is also now available.
TRAIN TO
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Stretch
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I N T E N S I T Y
Drop-Set
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Q: The drop-set concept you rec-ommend works! I’ve already put on about 10 pounds of muscle in two months. My question is, How do I do drop sets on dips and chins? I only use 20 pounds on those exer-cises, and that’s not a big enough poundage reduction to enable me to get more reps on a subsequent drop set.
A: Try using a similar exercise for your drop set. In other
words, make it a superset instead. For example, after you fail on dips, do pushups—that is, if you’re working chest. If you’re using dips for triceps, go to bench dips when you hit failure. For bench dips you set two flat benches parallel to each other a few feet apart. Position yourself face up, hands on the edge of one—behind your back—and heels on the edge of the other. Now dip. Bench dips are much easier than bar dips, so you should be able to knock out at least eight to 10 immediately after your weighted dips.
As for chins, go to pulldowns when you hit failure. If you don’t have a pulldown machine, you can do undergrip barbell rows. Those actually work very well with chins because the undergrip rows train the lats in their contracted position, while chinning with an overhand grip is midrange work for the lats. You’ll feel a searing burn in your lats during undergrip rows, guaranteed. —Steve Holman
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S P O R T S M E D I C I N E
Foam rubber grips have been used in heavy bench press training by bodybuilders for ages. The idea is that extra padding protects the nerves in your hands. Some trainees re-port numbness after many sets of heavy regular- or reverse-grip bench press-es. The foam pads seem to help somewhat. Some trainees have used gloves in training to prevent cal-luses. Sports performance catalogs carry denser, thicker grips to use when bench pressing. They also carry “fat” bars to spread out the force on your hand.
There may be other reasons that having some-thing to grip or squeeze can improve the perfor-mance of a lift like the bench press. There are theories in kinesiology and in neurology that activating the gripping muscles can
improve the strength in the kinetic chain. Kinesiologists refer to that as the transfer of strength from one bodypart to another.
I recently came across a new product simply called Grips. E.J. “Doc” Kreis, D.A., head speed-strength and conditioning coach at UCLA, gave me a pair to try. The grips caught my attention immediately.
Dave Pearson, Ph.D., director of the strength research laboratory at Ball State University in Indiana, had quite a bit to say about the purpose of the grips. “The grips do not re-place gloves. The grips are a performance aid. The flexors of the hand and wrist isometrically contract around the Olympic bar. I have gripped the bar since I was 19 years old. It’s never changed in 40 years. I noticed when I used the grips, I began to knock out one more rep in the pullups and pulldowns. The best explanation we have thus far is the fact that the grip di-ameter was changed, and this produced new joint angles. This would change the strength and recruitment of the muscles of the hand and wrist.”
Kreis added, “The grips won’t work as well with other mate-rials. The material is durable and will not unbalance the hand. People have tried using other materials, such as leather and canvas, without as much success.”
From what athletes are reporting, it appears that lifts in which two arms are used are most affected. That includes pressing, pulling and rowing.
Kreis added, “Female and smaller male athletes can’t use fat bars effectively, due to the diameter of the bar. Fat bars also can’t be used for power cleans, which are a key exercise. Female athletes in water polo and softball started using the grips and liked them.” Athletes reported improved throwing velocities.
Pearson chimed in, “These are anecdotal reports and re-sults. These types of reports always precede research.”
Why do the grips ap-pear to help trainees get at least one more rep out of each set? There are sev-eral ideas. Pearson noted, “There is enough data on muscle recruitment and activation with isometric exercise to support the idea that changes can occur with a change in the diameter of the bar with the grips. That may have a significant impact on the racquet sports—baseball, hockey and tennis. The baseball bat is bigger than an Olympic bar. The added grip diameter is a good idea for performance.”
If the grips only prevent-ed calluses, no one would be excited, but these grips fall into the performance-enhancement category.
“We can see the change in a single use of the grips,” he continued. “That implies a neurologic effect be-cause the muscle isn’t stronger yet. Rather, more fibers were recruited. Female athletes gain strength through recruitment rather than through hypertrophy. Therefore, the female athletes respond faster than male athletes to the use of the grips.”
On the other hand, he said, “We don’t believe the grips are useful in a ballistic exercise like power cleans because the bar must rotate just right, and too much grip force is not useful in that lift.”
Pearson concluded, “I spoke with one of our biomecha-nists, and he stated that each person’s hand has an ideal grip diameter. For example, gripping a pencil is overkill, but grip-ping the thick end of the baseball bat is too much. The range is somewhere in between. If a trainee has used the Olympic bar for years and now uses the grip, he or she will have the feeling that his or her grip sinking in. I think coaches who are looking for subtle change will be interested in the grips. I also think tennis is a great choice too. There’s so much overreach-ing and overuse in tennis, leadoverreach-ing to the development of ten-nis elbow. The grips may turn out to be a great training aid. Perhaps the best part is there isn’t any real downside to the grips.”
For more information or to order, visit www.lynxpt.com.
—Joseph M. Horrigan Editor’s note: Visit www.softtissuecenter.com for reprints of Horrigan’s past Sportsmedicine columns that have ap-peared in IRON MAN. You can order the books Strength,
Con-ditioning and Injury Prevention for Hockey by Joseph Horrigan,
D.C., and E.J. “Doc” Kreis, D.A., and the 7-Minute Rotator
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36 APRIL 2007 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com
How to Avoid
Injury
In the last issue I gave you the first 10 recommendations for how to avoid injuries. You simply can’t make bodybuilding progress if you keep getting injured. Many bodybuilders seem to constantly struggle with injuries—one injury after another. Follow the recommendations in this series, and you won’t get injured.
11) Use the right weight for you. Use weights you can handle with correct technique. Most bodybuilders use more weight than they can handle correctly. That leads to cheating and a loss of control.
12) Choose safe exercises. An exercise that’s safe for some bodybuilders may not be for others. If you’re a beginner, your intensity and poundage will be low, so you’ll be able to maintain correct technique. But be-cause of physical anomalies, accidents or other injuries, specific exercises may be problematic, especially if you’re not a beginner. Don’t use exercises that aren’t suited to you. If an exercise irri-tates a joint or causes sharp, stabbing or sudden pain, don’t persist with it.
13) Avoid high-risk lifting. All types of weightlifting can be dangerous if not done correctly, but some forms carry a higher risk than others. For example, rock lifting and handling other awkwardly shaped objects carry a far higher risk of injury than barbell, dumb-bell and machine training.
14) Don’t follow the examples of the genetic elite. A few bodybuilders can withstand training abuse that would cripple most bodybuilders. But eventually even they pay a heavy price. Don’t take liberties in the gym—you’ll pay for abuse.
15) When using machines, follow the manufac-turers’ instructions. For some exercises you may have to line up a specific joint with the pivot point of the machine. The right setup is critical. Changing the seat’s position (and thus your position) by just one peg, for example, can make a differ-ence in the comfort of a given exercise.
To accurately line up a given point on a machine with a given point on your body, your eyes need to be at the same level as the points being lined up. That usually isn’t practical, so ask someone to help line you up. Once you have the right setup for a specific exercise, make a note in your training log of future settings you require, for reference.
If you’ve used a machine as the manufacturer advises (often through instructions fixed to the equipment) and have tweaked the setup to suit you and have used smooth rep speed, and yet the exercise still irritates a joint, substitute an alternative exercise.
16) Don’t squeeze machine handles more than necessary. On some machine exercises, such as the leg curl and the leg press, you need to stabilize yourself by hold-ing onto handles or other grip supports. Don’t squeeze the handles more than necessary to stabilize yourself. Intensive squeezing increases blood pressure.
17) Be safety conscious. Never begin an exercise without having first checked safety considerations. Check that bolts are tight, cables aren’t frayed, cable connections are secure, rack pins are securely in position, adjustable weight saddles are fixed in place, locking pin(s) for
adjust-able benches and seats are secure, and benches are stable and strong. Never use dumbbells without checking that the collars are securely fixed. A dumbbell coming apart while you’re using it, especially overhead, could be disastrous.
Remember, just one accident could stop you from training for a long time. Be careful.
18) Avoid singles and low reps. Any exercise performed in any rep range will hurt you if you use poor technique. If you always use correct technique, all rep counts can be comparatively safe, at least in theory. Your body must, however, be accustomed to the rep count you’re using before you start to push yourself hard. That especially applies to singles (one-rep sets) and low reps (sets of two to four reps). If you get out of the ideal groove during a maximum single, you’re more likely to hurt yourself than if you get out of the groove during a set of medium or high reps. That doesn’t mean high reps with reduced weights are guaranteed safe. If you use poor technique, you’re asking for injury no matter what rep range or pound-age you’re using. Beginners should avoid singles and low-rep work. Stick with medium or higher reps.
19) Don’t train when you’re very sore. Sore and tight muscles are easily injured, although a little local soreness, especially for beginners, shouldn’t prohibit training. When you’re training following severe soreness, reduce your effort level a little and build on it over several workouts to prevent a repeat of the excessive soreness. Keep in mind that when you’re sore, you may be more prone to injury. Give yourself extra rest before you train the sore area hard again. Low-inten-sity aerobic work gets blood flowing and can ease soreness somewhat. Massage may help, as may a hot bath. Paradoxi-cally, another bout of the exercises that made you very sore— but done very light and easy—may help relieve the soreness.
20) Don’t train when you’re fatigued from a pre-vious workout. If you’re systemically wiped out—which may or may not be accompanied by muscular soreness—rest for an extra day or two. Then when you’re back in the gym, reduce your training volume or intensity and build it back over several workouts to give your body a chance to adapt. If you get wiped out again and the components of recuperation are in order, there’s something amiss with your training. Modify it; abbreviate it.
—Stuart McRobert
www.Hardgainer.com Editor’s note: Stuart McRobert’s first byline in IRON MAN appeared in 1981. He’s the author of the new 638-page opus on bodybuilding Build Muscle, Lose Fat,
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Part 2
TRAIN TO
GAIN
H A R D G A I N E RSore muscles are more prone to injury.
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38 APRIL 2007 \ www.ironmanmagazine.com
A recent study, which I discussed in a previous issue, showed that muscle gains come quickly when a person starts weight training. Most exercise physiology texts say that initial gains are usually in strength rather than muscle size. Your brain develops more efficient communication with your muscles, or, to put it in scientific terms, you develop neuromuscular efficiency. As the brain and muscles work in tandem to recruit muscle fibers, changes occur, such as increased muscle protein synthesis, that result in muscle size gains. According to the texts, though, that doesn’t occur until after an average of two to three months of regular training.
Recently, however, researchers found that college stu-dents who did leg extensions were able to add muscle to their front thighs in as little as two to four weeks, far faster than previously believed. The authors cite the rapid response of anabolic hormones induced by the training.
A new study expands and confirms those findings and suggests that exercise intensity is the major factor respon-sible for rapid initial muscle gains. Seven healthy young men trained for 35 days doing leg extensions on a special flywheel-based machine. The design of the machine made it gravity-independent, which maximizes both the raising (concentric) and lowering of the weight (eccentric) during the exercise. Maximum stress was applied to the exercised muscles.
Past studies may have overlooked early signs of muscle growth because the equipment used was incapable of exam-ining the muscle changes occurring at a molecular level. For example, more recent investigations of muscle growth show that satellite cells, or progenitor muscle stem cells involved in the hypertrophy and repair processes after exercise or trauma, begin to proliferate within four days of a single weight workout. Muscle protein synthesis increases 60 percent within 4 1/2 hours of a workout featuring both concentric and eccentric muscle contractions—the usual style of bodybuild-ing trainbodybuild-ing.
The men training on the leg extension–flywheel apparatus showed a rate of front-thigh muscle growth of 3.5 to 5.2 percent after only 20 days. That translates to a 0.2 per-cent increase per day. Maximum muscle strength rose by
38 percent by the end of the training period. Since the cross-sectional area of the front thighs (an indicator of muscle increase) increased by 7 percent, the strength gain largely came from neuromus-cular changes,
confirming long-held findings.
On the other hand, the gains in muscle size surpassed previous expectations of the time required to acquire gains. The maximum voluntary muscle contraction improved signifi-cantly in only 10 days, detectable before any size increase. That points to increased muscle efficiency.
At the molecular level the training rapidly led to produc-tion of intramuscular growth factors, mainly insulinlike growth factor 1 and its cleavage form, mechano-growth factor. The upgraded production of IGF-1 signals a biochemical cascade resulting in increased muscle protein synthesis, which in turn leads to muscle hypertrophy, or growth. The authors think that the flywheel design of the machine maximized every rep done by the subjects, and it was the maximal effort that promoted the IGF-1 response.
Another interesting finding was that a muscle’s internal architecture changes with the onset of exercise. The purpose of the change is to prepare the muscle for growth. Structures in muscle called sarcomeres are lined up in an orderly pattern conducive to muscle growth. As it happened, the flywheel apparatus provided more stretch—which facilitates the lineup of sarcomeres within muscle—than usual machines.
While the authors suggest that some of these changes occurred because of the unusual design of the machine, the principles could be applied to any type of resistance train-ing. For example, since the machine imparts more muscle
damage due to a potent emphasis on both raising and lowering the weight, that aspect should also be emphasized in any exercise. The stretch aspect can be duplicated by using a full range of exercise motion, including a prestretch at the start of every rep. Again, that lines up the muscle sarcomeres, not only lead-ing to a stronger muscle contraction but also acting as a precursor of the muscle architectural changes that precede actual muscle growth.
—Jerry Brainum
Seynnes, O.R., et al. (2007). Early skeletal muscle hypertrophy and archi-tectural changes in response to high-in-tensity resistance training. J Appl Physiol. 102:368-373.
Fast
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Stretch lines up the muscle sarcomeres for a number of mass-building effects.
Neveux \ Model: Michael T
u
rcotte
Train3Apr_F.indd 38
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