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Quick Tips
Gung fu is based on simplicity; all techniques are stripped down to their essential purpose without wastage or ornamentation, and everything becomes the straightest, most logical simplicity of common sense. Being wise in gung fu does not mean adding more but being able to remove sophistication and ornamentation and be simply simple — like a sculptor building a statue not by adding, but by hacking away the unessential so that the truth will be revealed unobstructed. True refinement seeks simplicity. — Bruce Lee
If we had 10 minutes, and we knew we would never see you again the rest of our lives, here is what we would tell you about losing body fat and building a beach-ready body. Keep in mind, there are many different effective methods, this is just what we believe to be the most efficient. If you feel strongly otherwise, “it’s no sweat off my sac”, or Kalai’s ??? We wish you the best in your journey either way.
I. NUTRITION GUIDEPOSTS
Dropping fat is more about what you DON’T eat (sugar, transfats, refined foods, etc.) than about what you DO. There is a definite fat loss hierarchy, and food choices stand atop the list. All else — total calories, macronutrient ratios, meal frequency, food distribution — is important, but secondary. The modern diet is full of crap. 90% of the foods available to us aren’t good for health or physique enhancement. Just because we like certain foods doesn’t mean we were meant to eat certain foods, and by continuing to do so we are paying the consequences. Sorry Cupcake Wars, you gotta’ ruthlessly cut the crap (except on cheat days, then all is fair game, hide your small children please). If you can do that, you’ll be well on your way.
OVERVIEW
- Cut out most modern, man-made, refined, processed, and packaged foods.
- Cut out PROCESSED “health” foods — whole grain breads and cereals, fruit juice, refined oils.
- Think “Caveman Nutrition” as the basis of any diet geared towards improving health and/or fitness — if it was around in caveman times, you can eat it. If man made it, don’t eat it.
- For essential nutrients and micronutrients, emphasize real, whole, natural foods — lean animal proteins, vegetables, and whole fruit.
- For energy nutrients, eat whole food fats (for low carb, healthy fat-based diets): nuts, avocado, coconut, OR low fructose, no gluten, natural starch foods (for lower fat, carb-based diets): yams, sweet potatoes, potatoes, rice.
- A lower carbohydrate, Paleo-style Diet is a good template for sedentary, obese, insulin resistant/type II diabetic populations.
- A carb-based, traditional Japanese-style diet is a good template for active strength trainers/anaerobic athletes.
DETAILS
- Cut out concentrated sources of fructose — high fructose corn syrup, sugar, fruit juice, honey, agave nectar, and molasses.
- Cut out trans fats/hydrogenated oil — processed snack foods, margarine.
- Cut out refined vegetable oils.
- Cut out fried foods.
- Cut out refined fats in general — butter, cream, most salad dressings, and oils (even “healthy” oils).
- Cut out gluten — wheat, rye, and barley.
- Cut out sources of lectins — soy, wheat, beans, lentils, corn, and peanuts.
- Cut out sources of phytates — “whole grain” cereals and breads, seeds.
- Cut out refined flour — bread, pasta, and pastries.
- Cut out dairy products — milk, cream, cheese, and yogurt.
- Cut out artificial sweeteners, preservatives, chemical food additives, etc.
- Eat lean animal proteins — fish, poultry, game meats, leaner red meats, and eggs.
- Eat unlimited non-starchy vegetables — spinach, broccoli, mixed greens, lettuce, etc.
- Limit fructose consumption to 1-2 pieces of whole fruit a day — berries, orange, apple, etc.
- Get the majority of your dietary fat as by-product of your lean animal proteins.
- Obese, sedentary, and insulin resistant populations may respond best to low carbohydrate diets, with healthy fats as the primary energy source.
- If your diet calls for “added” fats, emphasize whole food fats in their natural state and that come along with protein and/or fiber — nuts, avocado, coconut. Don’t eat refined oils.
- Strength trainers/anaerobic athletes may respond better to lower fat (fat as by-product of protein sources), moderate-to-higher carbohydrate diets with primary energy coming from starch foods. Unlike the sedentary person, these athletes run through cycles of depleting and replenishing liver/muscle glycogen stores.
- If your diet calls for concentrated sources of carbohydrates, stick to low fructose, low “anti-nutrient” (gluten, phytates, lectins) starches — yams, sweet potatoes, rice.
- If you have high calorie demands, you may need to spread food intake out over 5-6 meals a day.
- But for most people, eating 3 meals a day is the most convenient, realistic, and sustainable approach.
- And, we believe the most functional and sustainable plans are the ones in which the majority of calories and starchy carbs are eaten at night. This is our natural, evolutionary tendency.
- Drink NO calorie beverages only — water, green tea, and black coffee.
- Be realistic. Work your way down the list as best you can, at your own pace.
- For sustainability and sanity, eat a cheat meal of whatever you want once a week for both psychological and physiological benefits.
II. TRAINING GUIDEPOSTS
While there is overlap, training to improve sport performance is DIFFERENT than training to improve physical appearance. This is the core of our philosophy. Most training programs these days are geared towards neural overload (functional training/balance training) or cardiovascular overload (boot camps/cross training). As such, most trainees are improving performance parameters like strength and endurance, but are not changing their physical appearance. In other words, people are getting better at “doing” these activities, but their bodies aren’t changing that much. That’s fine if that is your goal. But if you want to change how you “look”, muscular overload (hypertrophy training) is the scientifically researched, and anecdotally proven, most efficient method to shaping your body and, along with diet, dropping fat. It may not be as cool, but it works. And I don’t know about you, but I am more interested in getting a six-pack than in performing a certain number of convulsion-like pull-ups, doing a one arm – twisting- squat thrust – curl or some other complicated exercise, or improving my crawling skills or sprinting speed. But that’s just me, I’m a vain piece of sH#t.
- If you are severely overweight, sedentary and/or de-conditioned, eat a lower carbohydrate, Paleo-style diet and walk daily. Most people can reach a natural, healthy bodyweight with proper nutrition and walking alone, no gym or formal exercise sessions necessary. Trainers stop cursing our names, you know its true.
- But, you won’t build a beach-ready physique that way. Reaching a healthy weight is different than getting ripped. All else below is for the non-lazy who are willing to work for higher-level physique development.
- Cut out (or at least limit) long distance, low-intensity endurance training (jogging, stairmaster, eliptical). While “traditional cardio” is necessary when trying to improve sport performance, it is totally inefficient and highly overrated for fat loss. Fat loss will be the result of your clean diet and appropriate caloric intake. Building lean muscle through strength training will provide your body with its definition, shape, and tone. You can’t make up for a poor diet with more time in the hamster wheel.
- However, non-formal, outdoor walking is cool. Walking is what we are meant to do evolutionary-wise, and gives us many of the benefits of traditional cardio activity (extra calorie burning, improved cardiovascular functioning, etc.) without the drawbacks (joint wear and tear, increased cortisol, impaired hormone functioning, muscle loss). Take a walk on your off days for general health, or daily during peaking phases.
- Make anaerobic activity — strength training — the foundation of your exercise program.
- Strength train 2 days a week (full body split), or 3-5 days a week (body-part splits).
- Give yourself 2-3 days off from training a week to prevent burnout and to optimize recovery (although outdoor walking is cool).
- Keep workouts to about 30-60 minutes. Intensity (how hard you work) is more important than duration (how long you work).
- With body-part splits, train 1-3 muscle groups per session.
- Frequency — Train each body part once every 5-7 days, allow at least 72 hours between training the same muscle groups.
- Perform 2-4 exercises for large muscle groups, 2-3 exercises for small muscle groups.
- Perform 2-4 sets per exercise.
- Perform 5-15 reps per set most of the time.
- Rest 30-120 seconds per set.
- Focus on basic exercises – lunge and squat movments, dumbbell and barbell rowing and pressing motions, pull-up/dip movements, etc. The human body is a simple lever system and does not need “complicated” or “innovative” exercises to produce results.
- Focus mostly on free weights as your foundation, use machines to supplement.
- Train from a stable base. DON’T train on unstable surfaces (balls, wobble boards, standing on one foot, etc.). Wobble boards build balance, NOT muscle.
- Don’t get sucked into fitness trends, and cool-looking “innovative” stuff you see in the gym or TV. Much of the fitness industry is geared towards what sells, not what works. The basics are the basics for a reason — THEY WORK. This is why they have stood the test of time, while the fluff comes and goes. To put it another way, do you want to be “cutting edge” or do you want to be “cut”?
- Keep the rep tempos (speed at which you lift/move the weights) around 2-0-2-0 (2 seconds up, 2 seconds down) or 3-0-1-0 (3 seconds down, 1 second up). Lower weight under control, lift under control or with a controlled, but forceful contraction, and don’t pause or lockout to rest in between reps. Don’t cheat by swinging or using rebound/momentum. Keep CONSTANT TENSION on the muscle. Sports are explosive, and training for sport performance should reflect accordingly. However, training for development is different, and should be centered around tension and overload.
- So focus on stimulating and overloading the muscle, not just how much weight you lift. This is better for the muscles, better for the joints, and better for overall safety.
- Focus on feeling the muscle work during the set, not just on moving a weight from point A to point B. Think of this as bodybuilding or body shaping as opposed to power lifting. Check your macho (or diva) ego at the door.
- Switch training variables — within the confines of the overall parameters — regularly (exercises, order of exercises, reps, interest rest, etc.) in order to vary the training stimulus and prevent boredom/training plateaus.
III. MOTIVATION GUIDEPOSTS
Changing the world, saving a life, influencing a generation, building a business, or establishing a legacy all require unique skills, incredible courage, and an extraordinary spirit. Getting a six-pack just requires the right knowledge, some daily practical application, and a little bit of discipline. Don’t make it out to be more (or harder) than it truly is.
- Other than a few special circumstances, genetics is not an excuse, so stop whining about them. We have skinny-fat dude and fat chic genetics. Learning, and then applying consistently, makes up for a lot of shortcomings in life. You may not become a world champion, but we believe anyone can improve from where they are at and build a decent physique. In other words, if we can do it, you can do it too.
- Set a short-term goal with a concrete time frame for motivation. This will prevent procrastination, and the ol’ “stopping and starting over” again and again.
- START NOW, there never will be a better time. Something left undone today will remain so for an eternity.
- Tell at least one other person about your goals or intentions so someone else is holding you accountable to their pursuit. Its harder to give up when you know someone else is going to bust your figurative balls if you quit.
- There are no REAL excuses. If something means enough to you RIGHT NOW, at this moment in time, you will find the willpower and the way.
- Getting in shape is a PROCESS you must go through, not a PRODUCT you can buy. There are no shortcuts or magic pills, so stop looking for them. The answers to all of your problems has, and always will, reside in you, not in some outside entity. Accurate knowledge and consistent application is what you need.
- Know your kryptonite, know the situations that throw you off track and pull you further away from your goals. Avoid or reduce your exposure to them. We both have Irish blood, so we stay away from the bars when its time to reach peak shape.
- Overcome negative inertia. The greatest amount of leverage and effort are necessary in the beginning to break bad habits and make tough changes.
- Harness the power of momentum. The hardest part is getting started. Once you get going, it does get easier.
- Make it automatic. We believe success (or failure) all comes down to establishing good (or bad) habits. Discipline is finite. The more healthy training and eating habits become automatic, the less you have to think or struggle with it, and the easier they are to maintain.
It is not how much you have learned, but how much you have absorbed in what you have learned — the best techniques are the simple ones executed right. — Bruce Lee.
That’s pretty much the overview of what we know, believe, and apply every day (except for cheat days), about building a beach-ready physique. Sure, there are more details and individualization with personalized program design, etc., which we’ll cover in articles and posts, but that’s the bulk of it.
Notice, we say it is simple, NOT easy. The “what to do” is simple. As my friend and colleague Shawn always likes to say, “Its all right there on a damn sheet of paper.” Actually doing it is the hard part. We’ve presented what we feel is the ideal scenario, its up to you to find your own comfort level and compromises. Deep down, I think most of us KNOW what we need to be doing.
So why is there so much information overload in the fitness industry, why are there so many bogus fitness scams, why are there so many coaches and trainees alike trying to make the process much more complicated than it is?
- Cutting edge, innovative, new, and complicated all sell well. It distracts us from the tasks at hand that we are all trying to avoid.
- People are lazy, and don’t want to change their negative habits. I am too with most things in life, but being in shape means enough to me to buckle down and do what is necessary.
- People are always looking for the magic pill or an easier way. Again, effective programs are usually simple (in theory), NOT easy (in execution). You can’t make up for hard work with complicated program design.
We hope these quick tips help you see the truth, and help you reach your physique goals. Maybe you’ll want to join us down at Da Beach some day. I’ll be the one prancing around in my Euoropean Man-Thong like an idiot (gosh, I hope you know that is a joke). Take care.
Content, Content, Content
What’s up my friends?
Well, its been awhile since my last post. But its not because I’ve been sitting on my a$$. I’ve been busy creating a bunch of content, both for this site and for some of the other fitness outlets I am associated with. So here is everything that has been going on:
1. I think 2 new articles went up on T-Nation since we last talked. I’m starting to build an audience over there and it is really helping me get my name out in the industry. Here are the articles:
New Starchy Carb Food Pyramid
5 Ways to Improve Insulin Sensitivity
2. We’ve started and have been filling out the video exercise library. Here it is:
3. Coach Shawn Toussaint and I were guests on Whole Body Talk, a weekly fitness podcast. We talked about natural bodybuilding and the ins and outs of body composition transformations. Here is the link:
Whole Body Talk: Shawn and Nate on Natural Bodybuilding
4. Kalai and I are going to stop running the other site we had started — Fat America Fit America — and just focus on this one. Which means Kalai is joining this site and will be posting up content as well.
5. I’m taking a month off from training after next week to focus on finishing my book. Hopefully by the end of that process I’ll have all of my theories — both science and practical strategies — all in one comprehensive place.
Alright. Until next time, take care. And thanks a lot for the continued support!
Principle #4 – The Riddle of Iron
Thulsa Doom: Ah. It must have been when I was younger. There was a time, boy, when I searched for steel, when steel meant more to me than gold or jewels.
Conan: The riddle… of steel.
Thulsa Doom: Yes! You know what it is, don’t you boy? Shall I tell you? It’s the least I can do. Steel isn’t strong, boy. Flesh is stronger! Look around you. There, on the rocks, a beautiful girl. Come to me, my child…
Thulsa Doom: [coaxes the girl to jump to her death]
Thulsa Doom: That is strength, boy! That is power! What is steel compared to the hand that wields it? Look at the strength in your body. The desire in your heart — I gave you this! –Conan the Barbarian
As Conan slashes his way to revenge, we learn two universal truths via his character arc/journey. (1) A man is in complete control of the weapons he commands. (2) A man’s spirit is far more powerful than any weapons he stands against.
That’s why two were able to stand against many in the final battle scene. Conan didn’t need Crom. He only needed his sword, some personal accountability for making his own destiny, and belief in himself. With that realization, he fearlessly jumps into battle and conquers his enemies with a warrior’s fury, despite the seemingly insurmountable odds. This lesson can be applied to all things.
Do I understand that others may potentially find it sad or pathetic that I’ve learned important life lessons from fictional characters? Yes. Do I care? Not really. Whatever can motivate you and help you become a better athlete — or man/woman in general — is valuable regardless of the source. Red Sonja motivated me in a whole other way…
In Conan’s world, it was the riddle of steel. In our world, it is the riddle of iron. What is the answer to the riddle? The twofold answer is the same as what Conan discovered:
1. A man is in complete control of the weapons he commands. You can use the iron for whatever you desire: to get stronger, to get bigger, to get faster, to get shredded, to rehabilitate an injury, to let out some aggression, for personal sanity in a chaotic life, and everything and anything in between. Don’t let others try to dictate what is the right way, or push their personal goals onto you. Don’t follow the trends or conventions if you don’t believe in them.
Training needs to be a personal, individualized endeavor. Simply identify your personal goals at this moment in time — whatever they may be and regardless of what anyone else thinks (especially society), find the right coach/mentor, and commit 100% to an appropriately designed program.
2. A man’s spirit is far more powerful than any weapons he stands against. A spiritless man/woman may crumble before plastic-coated, pink weights. But no bar, no matter how many plates or pounds are loaded onto it, is any match for a real man/woman. Attack your training with confidence, not with fear.
Borrowing from another warrior culture — the samurai — remember this, “No matter what it is, there is nothing that cannot be done. If one manifests the determination, he can move heaven and earth as he pleases.” — Hagakure.
Until next time, crush your enemies — the squats, deadlifts, rows, and presses that stand before you.
Principle #3 — Know Your Enemy
Know their strengths and their weaknesses precisely. Learn from them, adapt your approach to take advantage of their weaknesses, and then defeat them before they realize that you have changed your tactics. — Samurai Strategies.
The ancient Chinese military sage Sun Tzu taught that one of the primary principles of victory in war was to know your enemy. — Samurai Strategies
The phrase, “win first, fight later,” can be summed up in the two words, “win beforehand.” — Hagakure.
Skill can only take you so far, especially at the higher levels of competition or combat. But skills combined with superior strategy? That equals unlimited success. The most crucial aspect of designing an effective game plan or battle strategy is to know your enemy inside and out: their strengths, weaknesses, habits, tendencies, instincts, and psychology.
Miyamoto Musashi is widely recognized as the greatest samurai warrior of all-time. He was a ronin — a masterless samurai — that wandered the land engaging in duels with the best warriors of each province, school, and town. There were many reasons for Musashi’s unparalleled level of success, but probably the greatest factor was his in-depth knowledge of his opponents.
Up until his time, samurai warriors fought with only a single sword. Musashi, however, never believed in following traditional dogma. He routinely broke away from established traditions, found his own path, and used whatever tactics he could to give himself an advantage over his opponents.
Part of this involved creating his own unique fighting style called “Niten Ichi-ryu”, which involved fighting with two swords. This strategy evolved from understanding his enemies’ conventional fighting style, taking advantage of its weaknesses, and exploiting its limitations. This made him an unbeatable adversary. In fact, when Musashi laid down his two swords for the final time, he was undefeated in over 60 individual duels, not to mention the other full scale regional wars and battles in which he was a participant.
The way I see it, there are two types of warriors in the Iron Game, and both can benefit from the practice of studying their enemies.
COMPETITIVE ATHLETES
There are a wide variety of competitive athletes: bodybuilders, power-lifters, sport-performance athletes, mixed martial arts fighters, figure and fitness competitors, etc. These athletes engage in actual competitive events, and thus must literally study their opponent’s strengths and weaknesses to design an effective strategy that gives them the best advantage.
There are numerous examples of how this can be practically applied:
1. Bodybuilders: If the strength of your competition is their sheer size, then maybe you blow them away with your ripped conditioning.
2. Powerlifters: If your competition is weak in the deadlift, then maybe you make it your strength so you gain points in the overall totals.
3. Strongmen: If you know you are weak in a certain event (no matter how hard you try to bring it up — maybe its just leverage factors), maybe you concede a lower placing in that event. You save your energy for your stronger events where you can make up the point deficit.
4. Mixed Martial Artists: If your competitor’s weakness is ju-jitsu, and that is your strength, take that dude to the ground.
5. Performance sports (this case football): If you know the opposing QB crumbles under pressure, and you have an aggressive defense with a maniac safety, blitz the hell out of that them.
You, your training partners, and/or your coaches should design these targeted attacks.
NON-COMPETITORS
There are many Iron Warriors that live the lifestyle and love to train, but don’t necessarily want to compete in any particular event. That’s cool. You are just as much of a warrior in my book, as long as your dedication and commitment remain on the same level.
For non-competitors you have 2 enemies:
(1) The Iron — the dumbbells and barbells that wait to challenge your mind, body, and soul. There is not much to know about this enemy, other than that they will always be waiting for you. They never sleep, they never eat, and they will never stop, just like the Terminator. Their mission is to break your will and destroy your spirit, and they will succeed unless you fight back with everything you’ve got, every time you train.
(2) Yourself. To truly know this enemy can take a lifetime to learn, but it is a worthy endeavor. Being humble, and admitting you have weaknesses and faults can be highly valuable. Once you identify problems, you can develop a strategy to fix them. This pattern of honest self-assessment and vigorous self-improvement can go a long way in helping you maximize your potential. This is true not only in strength training or physique development, but also in business, and life in general.
5 WAYS TO KNOW YOUR ENEMY
1. Take a picture of yourself: If your goals are bodybuilding or appearance related, take a picture, because unlike the mirror, pictures don’t lie. Don’t look at your strong points, which everyone does. Identify your weak points in development. Get an opinion from someone you trust, or even better, an expert in the field.
From there, you can come up with a strategy to improve your weak points. Lets say you need more upper chest development. Now you can do things like starting with incline work first in your training, changing the plane of motion through which you press, altering technique to improve motor unit recruitment of the target muscle, eliminating rebound and lockouts to maximize muscular tension, avoiding “shoulder and triceps” pressing, maybe including some extra upper chest work that overlaps with other muscle groups on a different training day (70 degree incline press with medial rotation on shoulder day), etc., you know the drill. The solutions exist, but it all starts with identifying the problem.
2. Perform strength/performance tests — If your goals are strength or performance-based, perform sport-specific tests. Do you need to improve your deadlift, vertical leap, or correct some strength/muscle imbalances.
Write down the results from these tests. Are your scapulae retractor and rotator cuff strength miles behind your bench press strength? Can you squat a house, but only pull a broomstick? Design a program that prioritizes your weaker lifts, and fix the imbalances.
3. Film yourself — How many people would you say train with bad technique in your gym — 70%, 80%, 90%? Now, how many of them do you think know they train with bad technique – 0% right? Nobody purposely goes to the gym to train with crappy form, waste their time, or injure him or herself. Many people are just uninformed, or don’t have an objective eye critiquing their mistakes. Maybe your technique sucks and you just don’t know it.
If you are not working with a qualified coach, then the next best thing is to film yourself during some of your lifts. You can play it back and watch your own exercise execution. This is an objective instructional tool that is highly valuable. Maybe by watching yourself on video you discover that you are not using a full range of motion, you are using too much momentum or rebound to lift a weight, or you’re rounding your back too much during a lift.
4. Keep a 7-Day Food Log — If you can’t take a couple of extra minutes each day to write down exactly what you eat, at what times, and in what portions, etc., you are a lazy, and you really don’t care as much as you think you do about changing your physique.
This simple exercise will probably unveil numerous hidden enemies that are ambushing your strength and physique development. You may be eating more or less than you think. You may be dramatically off from your prescribed calorie/macronutrient totals. You’ll see what nutrient timing patterns you follow, and how those impact your energy levels and recovery. It all starts with writing it down, and seeing your true dietary downfalls right in front of you on a damn piece of paper (or computer screen).
And 7 days because you need to see what is going on during both the weekdays AND the weekends. If you eat like a machine all week, but are downing whiskeys and ice cream on the weekend, you are not maximizing your athletic or physique potential. Save it for the off-season, or when your priorities shift.
5. Identify Your Kryptonite — You are a bad ass. We know that. Superman is a bad ass too, but even he has one weakness that he must stay away from to maximize his superhero powers.
As an elite strength or physique athlete, chances are you have the commitment and discipline of a warrior. But each of us has our own kryptonite. There is one environment or situation that has the potential to pull us off track more than anything else. We know we have immediate short-term goals we are working towards, but if we are exposed to our kryptonite we are powerless to its draw. This takes us off the most efficient path to achieving our goals.
For me, it’s the booze. I don’t sip to socialize. I drink to get drunk. And it’s not because I have a physiological need or am unhappy or need to drown my sorrows or use it as an escape from dealing with the world. I just like to let loose and party every once in awhile. It’s fun. I’m a happy drunk, I like to goof around, and if you and I have a drink together some day I’ll tell you how much “I love you, man”.
But I also know that when I drink, I eat like crap. It’s a trigger. I feel like crap the next day, and I train like crap the next couple of days. If I’m trying to peak for something or achieve an athletic goal, the answer is simple. I stay away from the bars and clubs. I know my kryptonite, and I don’t put myself in situations where it will overtake my otherwise rock solid discipline.
Identify your kryptonite — the situation(s) that always seem to pull you off track. Be honest with yourself. With a short-term goal in mind, maybe it is time to avoid those situations for a little while so you can stay focused on the task at hand — getting strong getting ripped, performing at a high level, etc. Sometimes you have to make sacrifices, hard sacrifices, to reach the top of the mountain.
WRAP-UP
The summary of The Iron Warrior Principle #3 is this: Know your enemy. Learn your competitors’ weaknesses and exploit them, and learn your own weaknesses and correct them.
Kaizen for Fitness
Throughout your life advance daily, becoming more skillful than yesterday, more skillful than today.
This is never-ending. — Hagakure
There is a tendency in other cultures for most people to stop training, to stop trying to improve, after they reach a certain level of skill — and this is one of the reasons why the Japanese have had an advantage in virtually everything they do. They have been culturally conditioned to never stop training. — Samurai Strategies
Make at least one definitive move daily toward your goal. Aim at perfection in everything, though in most things it is unattainable; however, they who aim at it, and persevere, will come much nearer to it than those whose laziness and despondency make them give it up as unattainable. — Bruce Lee
Kaizen is a Japanese word that literally translates to “improvement” or “change for the better”. But Kaizen is more than just a word. It is a lifestyle philosophy incorporating a focused effort to strive for constant and continual improvement in all areas of life. In modern Japanese culture, it is most often applied in the business setting — the never-ending pursuit of improving the productivity and efficiency of your business.
Of course, this principle can be effectively applied to the health and fitness setting as well. I’d even go so far as to say that kaizen — whether it is consciously applied or subconsciously practiced — is what separates the elite from the average. How are you better today than you were yesterday? No matter where you currently fall under the spectrum, if you constantly strive to improve, you will see results.
Beginners — how can you improve on your consistency? If you are skipping workouts and really only getting to the gym two days a week, can you make a concerted effort to improve and bump that up to three? Can you find ways to increase non-exercise specific activity (i.e. walking to do some errands instead of driving)?
Advanced athletes — have you reached some kind of a plateau? How can you bust through it? The answer lies in the details. Can you be more regimented with your diet, or up the intensity in the gym?
Strength coach Charles Poliquin frequently talks about this concept in its relation to progressive overload. He discusses how the idea of constant and continual improvement can effectively be applied to protocols designed specifically for increasing strength.
The application is simple. With each successive training session, the lifter should attempt to add one more rep to the set or a little more weight to the bar. This ensures constant improvement. Charles specifically talks about adding the smallest plates in the gym (2.5lbs) to the bar each time you train. This sounds like nothing, but small increases made consistently over time add up to big improvements. In a twelve week training cycle, a weekly increase of 5lbs total on the bar nets a 60lbs increase in your lifting total. Not bad, especially for an advanced lifter.
This mentality should not stop with just progressive overload. I believe the Kaizen principle can extend out to all aspects of the fitness game, and can bring you closer to reaching your goals. Here are some practical examples:
• Lifting Technique: Better technique can reduce rebound, momentum, cheating, or using other, unintended muscle groups to complete a lift. This maximizes tension on the target muscle, which of course leads to optimal overload and development. Better technique can also leave you less susceptible to traumatic injury, reduced wear and tear on the joints, and chronic pain. Can you look for ways to perfect your technique? Can you slightly improve your exercise form in some way?
• Nutrition: If you eat 5 meals a day, that totals 35 meals in a week. How many of those meals are bringing you closer to your physique goals? How many of those meals are taking you further away from your goals? Can you improve on that ratio? If you are eating good 85% of the time, focus on increasing that to 90%.
• Alignment/Muscle Balance: Do you sit at a computer all day? Do you have terrible posture as a result? Are tight muscles inhibiting your range of motion or causing chronic pain? Are lengthened, weakened muscles making your posture or performance suffer? Can you look for ways to improve muscle imbalances or lifting discrepancies? Can you add some daily stretches to improve your computer posture?
• Recovery: Are you living more like an athlete or more like a rock star? If you are going out partying every night, drinking, doing recreational drugs, etc., you are not providing the best environment for your body to improve its appearance. Can you find ways to reduce the “sexy time” and focus more on your fitness goals?
• Sleep: This is one of the most overlooked components of development. Proper sleep can help reduce cortisol levels, increase growth hormone levels, recharge the nervous system, increase cellular repair, etc., all leading to better development. Can you skip watching American Idol to get an extra hour of sleep?
• Hydration: Virtually every cellular process in our body requires water. Can you improve your hydration levels? Can you drink 2 liters of water instead of 1? Here’s a fun game — can you make your pee-pee look more like water or lemonade than iced tea (yeah, I know I’m a little off my rocker)?
• Meathead Status: Can you dudes somehow improve on your current meathead status? What about grunting or screaming more during your warm-up sets, wearing sunglasses in the gym, wearing tighter spandex, coming up with cheesier pick-up lines to use on the gym bunnies, acting macho(er) staring at yourself in the mirror more, etc.?
• Diva Status: Can you girls somehow improve on your diva status? What about avoiding strength training and spending three instead of two hours on the cardio machines, taking more pointless, phooh-phooh “exercise” classes, wearing more make-up in the gym, wearing tighter spandex, acting stupid(er), staring at yourself in the mirror more, etc.
I think you can see that the list could go on and on forever. There are always ways in which we can improve — as athletes, as coaches, and as people.
The summary of the kaizen, then, is to never be satisfied with your current level of skill or development. Always try to improve, in every aspect of your life. There is always someone out there who is stronger, fitter, or more skilled than you are. If you are starting at the bottom of the mountain, that’s the only way to climb to the top. And even if you happen to be at the top of the mountain now, remember kings and queens fall, and heroes rise to take their place.
Fear Factor
Fear is the one human motion that can hold us back from more than anything else in our lives. Fear paralyzes us, and prevents us from taking meaningful action. It shatters our self-confidence and spirit of adventure. It can prevent us from doing the things we really want to do, trying everything we want to try, and from becoming who we really want to become.
Most of us don’t pursue our dreams and aspirations in life because we are afraid of failing. “Well what if this or that happens? What then?” We may have a life we envision for ourselves in the back of our heads, but we’d rather play it safe, not take chances, and take the easy path to mediocrity. We bury our dreams and passions and settle for the grind of every day life.
FITNESS FEARS
So you want to get in shape, huh? You want to lose some weight, reduce disease risk factors, dazzle in a dress, turn some heads at the beach, look good naked, etc. So why haven’t you? Why are you still just dreaming and thinking about it and not actually doing it?
Well, it is that ol’ fear factor creeping up on us and controlling our actions. Fear can be a major roadblock that prevents us from working towards our health and fitness goals. Often times, fear is the underlying cause that prevents us from doing the things we know we need to do to reach our goals — things like exercising more, eating less junk, and controlling our portions.
For many of us, this fear is subconscious. We don’t understand that it is fear that is holding us back. We think its because of a multitude of other reasons: we don’t have enough time, work is too busy, there is too many other responsibilities at home, we don’t have any support, we’re too stressed, we haven’t found the right diet or supplement, our genetics suck and we’re just born to be fat, we’re best friends with the Keebler Elves, etc. But in the end, it all boils down to the fact that we’re just scared to make some tough changes and get started on our health and fitness journey.
FACE YOUR FEARS
Nothing in life worth having comes without some risk. If something doesn’t scare you a little bit, it’s probably not worth pursuing. All heroes, all legends, have taken risk along the way to get to where they’re at. But that’s why there are so few heroes; most of us mortals hate taking risks. We’d rather watch other people do it, and read about their success stories, than do it or experience it for ourselves. For most of us, the fear of failing is far more powerful than the chance at succeeding.
But what if you decided to make a change, instantly. What if you decided you were going to stop being afraid, or at least face and overcome your fears? What if you decided you were going to take a chance, chase your dreams, find your passions, find some happiness, and live the life you’ve always imagined? Doesn’t that sound like a much more exciting way to live. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather fail at what I really want to do than succeed at something I hate. At least I know I’ll enjoy the journey.
THE FIVE FITNESS FEARS
If fear is holding you back from achieving your goals, and most fitness fears are subconscious, then we need to identify what those fears are and give you some psychological tools and new ways of thinking to get past those fears. This is the only way you are going to finally be successful with your long-desired, but long-ignored health and fitness goals. Until you admit your fears and face them head on, you are destined to repeat your ill-fated fitness attempts.
1. Fear of Failure
This is the most obvious one. We are afraid of failing. We are afraid of setting goals, committing to an exercise and nutrition plan, working hard, and still not getting results. We are afraid that even if we make sacrifices and put in our best efforts, we might not reach the goals we have set for ourselves. We have doubt. We have reservations. We don’t believe in ourselves 100% or have the self-confidence to trust that we can achieve what others have achieved. Because we feel we are so far away from where we want to be, we fear that we will be unable to complete the long journey ahead of us.
The Solution
To me, this fear is also the easiest to overcome. Whenever the fear of failure is preventing you from taking action, just ask yourself two simple questions.
The first question is what’s the worst that could possibly happen if I fail? In most cases, the absolute worst possible outcome is not so bad: I’ll look a little stupid, I’ll embarrass myself, I’ll take a shot to the ego, I’ll lose some money, I’ll lose a little time and effort, I’ll have to put up with some comments or criticisms from my family and friends, I’ll just have to go back to what I was doing before. None of that is really that bad is it?
The fear of failing is usually way worse than what happens when you actually fail. Trust me, I’ve failed at a lot of things in this life. I’ve failed way more than I’ve succeeded, but my life never ended. I’ve always managed to pick myself up, dust myself off, and try again.
The second question is what’s the best that could possibly happen if I succeed? Yeah, that’s what kickstarts my heart and motivates me to get moving. Man, it could change my life forever. I could do something great for myself, I could help and/or motivate a ton of people just like myself along the way, I could gain respect and admiration, and I could move one step closer to becoming the person I truly want to be.
The worst that could happen is not really that bad, but the best that could happen could be life-altering. You know how they tell you to balance risk and reward when making life’s decisions. Well in most cases, especially with health and fitness, the reward far outweighs the risk.
2. Fear of Fate
What happens if you implement the best training and nutrition programs, give them your best effort, consistently adhere to them, but don’t succeed? If you had the best plans, gave it your best effort, and still failed, does that mean you are destined and doomed to be overweight and out of shape the rest of your life? Those questions are what ultimately lead to the fear of fate.
Many people put off pursuing their fitness goals because of this fear of fate. At least if they don’t try now, there is still the hope that one day in the future their situation will be better and they will be able to get into great shape. If they try today and don’t succeed, then it feels like it’s game over. All hope is lost. It is the hope that in the future things will be different that helps us get through the day, and keeps us moving forward. People don’t want to give that up. They live by the “sometime down the road” mentality instead of taking a shots at what they want today.
The problem with this, of course, is that most just end up waiting forever. “Sometime down the road” becomes “in the next life”. There is always a reason to keep putting their goals off. But in reality, it is just the fact that they never get to the point where they truly believe in themselves.
The Solution
Have faith. You must have faith in your plan and your abilities. You must believe that if you put forth a reasonable amount of effort, good things will come. You must have faith that you are not doomed to any fate, you just have work smart and hard enough to change. If you let doubt or fear control your spirit, you ARE doomed to fail before you even start.
You know the things you want for yourself today? Don’t put them off for tomorrow, because you never know what tomorrow may bring. Your life can change in an instant. If you want something for yourself today, you have to take it today, because you never know if it is going to be available tomorrow.
3. Fear of the Process
There is the fear about how hard the process is going to be. “Oh man, exercising is going to be so painful. Waking up in the morning is going to suck. Giving up Pop-tarts, or Twinkies, or cookies (my personal favorite) will be way too hard and the cravings will be too much.”
Most people have several bad habits, and they fear how difficult it is going to be to break those bad habits and start new, more positive ones. They fear the pain, the sacrifice, the discipline necessary to make real changes in their health and physical appearance.
The Solution
Let me ease that fear right now. In the beginning, it IS going to be rough. So you shouldn’t make it even more difficult by adding worry on top of it. Any time you make changes, big or small, there is some type of transition phase that is difficult. It is not easy to break bad habits. If it were, everyone would be walking around in phenomenal shape. The reality is you are going to have to work a little bit to achieve your goals.
But once you power through that transition phase, work hard to break bad habits, form good ones, and get things rolling, it DOES get easier. What you have to do is harness the power of momentum, instead of allowing it to control you. Right now your momentum is heading in the wrong direction. The most difficult phase is putting on the breaks and making a U-turn. Once you get it going in the right direction, its smooth sailing.
In other words, toughen up you wimp.
4. Fear of the Peer
There are many fears associated with how you think your friends and family will react to your newfound health and fitness goals.
Will they support you? Sometimes we are scared that we will have no help through this tough journey. We fear our friends and family won’t give us the support we need to succeed. They may not understand when we are tired or moody. They may not get the difficulties of going through a transition phase into a radically different lifestyle. They may make fun of us or ridicule us for trying to make a change of if we struggle initially. They may even unknowingly be working against us with their actions or words.
Will they be resentful? If you have to get up early for a workout or are trying to clean up your act and remove yourself from counterproductive situations, it may mean less time hanging out and socializing. It may mean less time at the usual restaurants, coffee shops, or bars where you can’t overcome the temptations to cheat.
Will they be jealous? If you do start to succeed and make positive changes in your life, will they be jealous that they are not doing the same thing for themselves? Will your ambitious goals put a strain on your relationships?
The Solution
I think a lot of times we underestimate the care and love that our peer group has for us. A lot of times we just communicate with our peers on a surface level. “Hey what’s up, how are things going, how are the kids, etc.” A lot of life is just the little things, so it’s easy to forget that there are people around us who will do anything for us if we just ask.
But if you truly open up, tell them how you feel, and tell them how important this whole getting healthier and in shape really is to you, I believe they will be supportive. Sometimes you have to ask for what you want/need. I believe if you express how you feel, there are people in your circle who will go out of their way to be supportive, and will be truly happy when you succeed.
If not, then maybe you need to think about making some new friends.
5. Fear of Success
As funny as it sounds, there is also the fear of succeeding. What happens if you do toughen up, make it through this fitness journey, and achieve outstanding results? What then? Most of us fear the new and unfamiliar, even if it is for the better.
Many of us have been overweight for so long that it is just part of who we are. We cling to our identity, and fear having to reinvent ourselves. What happens when you are not the fat girl anymore? Are you then all of a sudden one of those annoying fitness chicks? We are scared of exploring new aspects of who we are or who we can become. It’s easier to keep things the way they are, even if it’s not what we really want for ourselves. Change is always intimidating, even if its what we want.
The Solution
You have to learn to embrace change, not just in fitness but in life. Why? Life is constantly changing. You have to learn to flow with it. You have to learn to be flexible like water, and just roll with the punches.
Deep down you know you want to make some changes, and you know those changes are going to have a positive impact on your life. So don’t fear the new and unexplored aspects of yourself, in the end it will all work out for the best.
CONCLUSION
Anyone who tells you they don’t have fear is lying to you, putting up a front, or trying to act tougher than they really are. I’m a fitness professional and I have a ton of fitness fears. All great athletes get the butterflies. Even lions, Queens and Kings of the Jungle, have fear.
But it is not whether you experience fear. It is what you do with that fear that matters. Successful people in all aspects of life use fear to their advantage. They use it to motivate them. They use the excitement and nervous energy to perform. They actually welcome a little bit of fear because they know that’s when they are at their best.
I know you’re scared about making some tough changes and improving your physique. Up until this point, your fear has been holding you back from achieving your goals. But now, you have the tools necessary to take that fear and use it to your advantage.
Even Simpler Nutrition Advice
I like to write. I guess in the real world that translates into I like to hear myself talk — which I really don’t, I’m usually the wallflower at parties. So something must get lost in the translation. But I do like to write. And sometimes when I write, I go off on tangents about science or the state of the fitness industry or some other random topic (90% of the time related to sex).
I know you’re not supposed to do that as a professional writer, but hey, that’s me. The only way I know how to do things is with full authenticity. I don’t write to fit into conventions. I write what I think and feel at the time, in the manner in which I talk, and hopefully to teach you a few of the things I’ve learned from over ten years as an athlete, student, and trainer in the fitness and natural bodybuilding worlds.
With that being said, I realized that sometimes the practical information/fitness tips I want you to apply, preferably TODAY, don’t always immediately get across to all of you — my family and friends. And yes, I consider my private clients, and even my online readers, as my friends. I guess that’s something I’ve always believed in, and it helps me stay a real, authentic, dude. Treat everyone you meet, and interact with, and give advice to, like they are a part of your family. Some of my training clients might be thinking to themselves, “but wait Nate, you can be a real dick sometimes.” Well, all I can say is that at times, tough love and the cold, hard truth, is the best way to ultimately help the people closest to you.
You see, here I go again on some random tangent. Let’s (meaning me) focus.
I need to give you some straightforward, practical nutrition tips you can apply in the real world. With the nutrition tab/summary on my homepage and the Barebones Fitness Nutrition Plan article, I thought I had already done that. Most people seem to get the theories and concepts, but I’ve found that many people are still having a hard time using that information to implement an everyday, practical nutrition plan. Maybe you are just lazy — hey, that’s on you. But I realize that it also could be that I need to give you more clear, concrete, simple user-friendly tips to follow — that’s on me.
In addition to research studies, academic textbooks, and multiple certifications, I’ve also read a bunch of commercial diet books. One of my favorites is Body-For-Life by Bill Phillips. It’s not necessarily because of the actual nutrition advice (his plan is similar in structure, but I believe you can make better food choices), but I think the true value is the simplicity of his practical application strategies. He basically says combine a serving of this with a serving of that 5-6 times a day, and that’s it. Simple as shit.
You can check out the Body-For-Life book. He also has a free website where he goes over how to construct any meal or snack (just Google it). Since my nutrition advice is slightly different (and I’m not pushing nutritional supplements) I figured I’d give you my own version of that. I want to give credit where credit is due. I didn’t make this up. This is essentially his practical advice with my own personal food selection recommendations (and minus the EAS/Myoplex supplement marketing push).
*This assumes you are exercising at least 3 times a week. I recommend a completely different approach (lower carb, Paleo-style diets) for inactive, sedentary folks.
STEP 1: Select a serving of lean protein (about the size of a deck of cards) from the following choices:
Skinless chicken breast, Skinless turkey breast, Fish (any kind — salmon, halibut, cod, sole, tuna, etc.), Shellfish (any kind — shrimp, scallop, crab, etc.), Lean pork (loin, tenderloin), Lean red meat (top round, London broil, eye of round, sirloin, filet mignon), Lean buffalo (same as red meat cuts), 90% or leaner ground meats and poultry, Egg white/egg mixtures (6 egg whites, 1 whole egg with 5 whites, 2 whole eggs with 4 whites), various protein powders.
STEP 2: Combine your protein with a serving of a select few complex carbohydrates (about the size of a fist) from the following choices:
Potato (any kind — russet, red, yukon gold, etc.), Sweet potato (any kind — garner, jewel, japanese/oriental, etc.), Rice (any kind — brown, white, basmati, long grain, short grain, etc.), Plain rice cakes, Whole fruit (any kind — apple, orange, banana, berries, etc.)
STEP 3: Add plain raw or cooked vegetables to any or all meals (but at least two) in unlimited amounts.
Lettuce (any kind), Spinach, Broocoli, Cauliflower, Cucumber, Onions (any kind), Tomato, Green beans, Peppers, Cucumber, Carrots, Celery, You get the idea…
STEP 4: Since this plan is moderate in carbohydrates, limit dietary fat intake to that found as by-product of your protein sources in step 1 (the dietary fat found in fish, eggs, and lean meats). No added fats — not even “good fats” — from oils, sauces, nuts, and butters (read the rest of my articles before you bitch and moan about the benefits of healthy fats — I recommend different diets for different folks — sedentary vs. anaerobic athletes).
STEP 5: Add no/low calorie herbs, spices, and condiments to flavor as necessary:
Garlic, Onions, Salsa, Pico de gallo, Mustard, Wasabi, Sea salt, Paprika, Cumin, Oregano, Pepper, Cinnamon, Lemon, Lime, You get the idea…
STEP 6: Stick to the following beverages:
Water, Black coffee, Black tea, Green tea, Herbal tea. Artificial sweeteners are crap. Don’t load your body with a bunch of man-made chemicals.
STEP 7: To me, there is no difference between a meal and snack. So follow the above steps to construct a meal/snack 3-5 times a day.
STEP 8: As much as you can, cook your own foods, eat at home, pack your lunches, etc. so you are in direct control of what goes into your meals.
A good fitness-oriented meal like home-cooked lean chicken breast, rice, and steamed vegetables may not be such a good fitness meal in a restaurant. The way most restaurant foods are prepared these days it’s probably loaded up with fat and sugar from butter, oils, and sauces. There’s a reason it tastes so much better in a restaurant than at home.
TO SUM IT UP: Basically combine a serving of lean protein with a serving of complex carbohydrate at each meal and snack. Don’t add fats, get your essential fats as by-product of your protein sources. Cook most of your meals so you know exactly what is going into them, and are not at the mercy of gourmet chefs who liberally use sugar and oils.
If that doesn’t make sense, there may be no helping you (again with the tough love thing).
Body Composition Training 101: Intensity
Intensity: Qualitative measure of your effort level in the gym, how “hard” you work out.
Recommendations: Push yourself to momentary muscular failure on most sets.
TOUGHEN UP!
Here is the tough love truth — most people just don’t work out hard enough, or use enough discipline with their nutrition plans, to get noticeable physique transformation results. Trust me, it takes work, it takes A LOT OF WORK, to build a fit body. Sure, many people may be following an intelligently designed plan or program, but they are just going through the motions. They check off this exercise and that exercise like it’s a grocery-shopping list, never digging down and exerting anything close to maximal effort. They don’t challenge themselves or push beyond their limits. They do just what is comfortable. That ain’t body composition training to me.
BAD -> DECENT vs. GOOD -> GREAT
Here’s the deal. Barring psychological issues beyond the scope of this article, it’s relatively easy to go from severely deconditioned, overweight, and out of shape, into decent shape. You clean up the diet, implement some basic fitness nutrition principles with some moderate level of consistency, walk more, and strength train using body composition-based training principles. It takes breaking some bad habits, building some good habits, and kind of just showing up and going through those new motions. You don’t have to challenge yourself too much to get the ball rolling in the right direction.
But to go from decent/good shape into great shape, that’s a whole other ball game my friends. Going from 40% body fat to 20% body fat is one thing. Going from 15% body fat to 5% body fat is another. It takes an incredible amount of discipline, consistency, effort, and intensity. Part of that entails going beyond your comfort zone and pushing your body to the limits with your training program.
This is nature. As human beings, we are not meant to be obese. It’s not healthy, it’s not functional, and it’s not natural. In the Information Age, the prevalence of this condition is so high because we have moved so far away from our evolutionary past. We eat too many processed foods, have never-ending access to an abundance of food, eat ridiculous portion sizes, and don’t move enough. Move closer to our past by eating more natural foods in moderate amounts and exercising/moving more, and you can maintain a more natural, decent weight without a ton of effort.
But at the same time, it’s not natural to be ripped at 5% body fat. It goes against our genes. Keeping a certain amount of body fat for energy reserves was advantageous for survival in caveman times, and our bodies have held on to this natural survival mechanism in the modern era. If a group were stranded in the desert, the fitness model would be the first to die due to lack of energy reserves, the overweight person would be second (because they couldn’t defend themselves or travel far to try and reach safety), and the person with just an average weight and build would have the best chance at survival.
We are training against nature to get ripped to the bone. If you have these higher aspirations of top-level physique development, than at some point you will be going against nature’s intentions. This means incredible discipline with the diet. And for the purposes of this article, it means incredible intensity in the gym. In other words, it means busting butt to push your body well beyond what you think it is capable of.
People who have never attained low, single digit body fat percentages severely underestimate how difficult the process really is. Oh just pop a couple of fat burners and protein shakes, and pull out the “get shredded in 6 weeks” training program from the latest fitness magazine, and presto, you’re on the cover of said fitness magazine. Dude, or sista, I wish it really were that easy. Most fitness athletes, models, and bodybuilders (minus the genetically elite) have been training their whole lives to build their bodies. What makes you think you can do it in 6 weeks by just by showing up and going through the motions?
TRAINING TO FAILURE
The real road to “rippedville” starts with knowledge. Through this article series, I hope I’ve provided you with the base knowledge necessary to train specifically for cosmetic enhancement. But all of that knowledge is meaningless unless it is applied consistently, and applied with a warrior’s level of intensity.
Getting ripped is about maximizing your lean muscle-to-body fat ratio. It’s about building lean muscle levels higher than what nature intended. It’s about slashing body fat lower than what nature intended. This means asking your body to do what it is currently unaccustomed to. In other words, you need to train to failure on most of your working sets to force your body to respond.
If you just do what you are already capable of in the gym, there is no stimulus for your body to change. The body prefers homeostasis, or to remain in its current state of development. If you want to reach the upper echelon of physical appearance, you have to consistently force your body to adapt to higher and higher levels of training stress.
INTENSITY ASTERISKS
1. Intensity is not just about a quantitative measure like how much weight is on the bar. It’s more of a qualitative measure about how hard you push your body. It sounds counter-intuitive, but many people actually reduce training intensity by increasing their training weights, due to the deterioration of proper exercise form. Conversely, many people would benefit by reducing their training weights and focusing more on true muscular overload.
Remember this is not powerlifting or ego training. It is about building and shaping your body. Don’t worry so much about the weights you use, focus on squeezing every last ounce of effort out of the target muscle. The weights you use should be secondary to the effort exerted within the set.
2. People often misinterpret what training to failure really means. In regards to strength training, we are talking about momentary, localized muscular failure. We’re not talking about system wide collapse where you crash to the ground and can no longer move. Simply train to the point where the muscles lose the ability to complete the task at hand with a given resistance.
3. Never sacrifice form for more reps or more weight. That’s not training to muscular failure, that’s cheating, incorporating other muscle groups, and/or using momentum; all which take tension off the muscle. Real failure training means training to the point where you can’t complete another rep with proper form. Anything beyond that is counterproductive.
To summarize lift, lift hard, maintain good form, challenge yourself, and tell nature’s whole body fat survival mechanism to kiss your ripped ass.
Body Composition Training 101: Inter-set Rest
Inter-set Rest — the amount of time you rest in between sets
Recommendations — 30 – 120 seconds
Did you think I would leave any training variable to chance? We get down to every little detail in regards to physique development, including interest rest. Applying sound principles to every step of the process is called proper program design. That’s the way to use scientific knowledge to our full advantage. That’s the way to come up with the most efficient training strategies for body composition enhancement. That’s the way to build THE optimal plan for your goals.
BACK TO THE CHALKBOARD
According the National Strength and Conditioning Association:
The length of the rest period between sets and exercises is highly dependent on the goal of training, the relative load lifted, and the athlete’s training status (if the athlete is not in good physical condition, rest periods initially may need to be longer than typically assigned).
Their rest period length assignments based on individual training goals are as follows:
- Strength: 2-5 minutes
- Power: 2-5 minutes
- Hypertrophy: 30-90 seconds
- Muscular endurance: <30 seconds
In addition:
The use of appropriate exercise intensities and rest intervals allows for the “selection” of specific energy systems during training and results in more efficient and productive regimens for specific athletic events with various metabolic demands.
Their work-to-rest period ratios based on exercise (set) time and primary physiological systems stressed are as follows:
- Phoshagen (5-10 second sets) = 1:12 to 1:20 work:rest ratio
- Fast glycolysis (15-30 second sets) = 1:3 to 1:5
- Fast glycolysis and oxidative (1-3 minutes) = 1:3 to 1:4
- Oxidative (>3 minutes) = 1:1 to 1:3
*Fast glycolysis is the primary systems we are using in strength training programs designed specifically for physique development.
*So a typical 30 second hypertrophy set would necessitate a 90-to-150 second rest period.
You can see that even with the time you rest between sets, training for performance (either endurance or strength) is different than training for appearance. That’s why your training program, and ALL of its individual parameters, needs to be tailored to fit your specific goals.
THE CIRCUIT TRAINERS
There are a lot of training programs based on the principle of go-go-go, with no rest between sets or exercises. Examples would include circuit training, cross training, boot camp style workouts, hot dog eating contests, and the Miyaki Brothers at an all-you-can-eat sushi joint.
As you can see, however, this style of training is more appropriate for building muscular endurance than it is for building actual muscle (hypertrophy) — the most important part (training-wise) of the physique transformation process. With circuit training you’ll be going through a lot of sets and exercises, but you won’t be maximizing muscular development. It’s like going to work, doing a lot of busy-work, but getting nothing done.
Many trainees mistakenly believe that rapid training improves training efficiency. Efficiency, however, involves two factors — doing the best job AND doing it in the least amount of time possible. Rushing through workouts covers “the least amount of time possible part”, but it’s not doing the best job in terms of cosmetic enhancement.
It’s time to dispel a widespread training myth. Despite what you’ve heard, circuit-style training does not help you burn more body fat. This is misguided thinking. Well, because of fuel dynamics, maybe it helps you burn a small fraction more during your actual training. But remember, visual fat loss is not about how many calories you burn while training. It’s about all of the calories you burn in the recovery and repair process in between training sessions. In other words, its not about how many calories you burn in the one hour training session, its about how many calories you burn in the other 23 hours of the day.
How do you increase that number? The best way is to build metabolic-boosting muscle. And how do you accomplish that? By implementing a strength training program that is designed around established hypertrophy principles. Your weight training workouts should never be about “burning fat”. They should always be about building muscle. Lean muscle will IN TURN coax your body into burning more body fat over time.
I guess part of the problem is that we are an attention deficit disorder generation. People need to be moving all of the time, and just want to rush through their training programs. These days they’re so wired up on 32oz coffees or Red Bull’s wings they can’t sit still for a second, let alone thirty-to-ninety.
THE SOCIALIZERS AND STRENGTH GUYS
On the other end of the extreme you have the people who do a set, and then walk around cruising the scene for ten minutes before they do their next set. They are talking with friends, telling everyone about their life, making plans for the weekend, etc. Or, they are staring at the chic’s or dude’s asses, whatever you prefer, trying to make a move, and are more interested in turning the gym into a nightclub scene than they are actually working out.
And the vain meatheads and diva’s, listen up. If I can stare at the mirror and fall in love with myself in less than 90 seconds, anyone can. Besides, you can go right back to the mirror for another 90 seconds after your next set, but you have to get the job done too. You have to stay focused on the task at hand.
In all seriousness, there are ATHLETES who do benefit from longer rest periods — power and strength athletes. Longer rest between sets can be beneficial for two reasons: (1) The nervous system takes longer to recover than the individual muscle fibers (2) Complete resynthesis of ATP stores, the compound that fuels muscular activity, seems to occur within 3-5 minutes. Full recovery equals more strength and better lifting totals, which is the name of the game in these sports.
But remember, training for strength and sport performance is different than training for development and physique appearance.
THE MIDDLE GROUND FOR HYPERTROPHY
As you now know, we have a lot of training parameters we must follow to get the best body composition transformation results. We have lower limits of training volume, lower limits of training load to produce an adaptive response, and upper limits of training duration. The only way to accomplish all of these goals simultaneously is with moderate interest rests.
Rest periods that are too short limit training load. The body needs a certain amount of time to clear lactic acid (a by-product of anaerobic metabolism) from the blood and resynthesize ATP, the compound that fuels muscular contractions. If you try to jump back in too soon, your performance will suffer, and you will not be able to achieve the same amount of muscular overload in successive sets. Lactic acid will inhibit muscular contraction. A sprinter would not be able to perform a 100-yard dash at maximum capacity, and turn around and do it again at the same intensity level without some sort of rest.
Ultra-short rests limit training load, makes your weight training more aerobic in nature, and predominantly uses slow-twitch/endurance muscle fibers to complete the near-continuous tasks. This limits fast-twitch fiber recruitment and overload, which is the key to physique development. You become more fatigue-resistant and build muscular endurance, but you won’t drastically change your physical appearance. Training for growth needs to be more intermittent/interval-based. This allows the system to recover so you can maximize tension and overload with successive sets.
Rest periods that are too long force you to either (a) reduce the amount of training volume per muscle group or (b) exceed training duration recommendations. Neither of these scenarios is optimal for physique development. We need a certain amount of volume to maximize muscle growth, but also need to limit training duration to prevent overproduction of cortisol and muscle oxidation (muscle wasting). This involves finding the sweet spot for interest rest.
Remember for pure strength development, we should rest longer between sets because the nervous system takes longer to recover than the muscular system. But as physique athletes we are not trying to maximize strength, we are trying to maximize development. We can jump back in a little sooner to further overload the muscular system without waiting for full recovery of the nervous system. We are training our body for development, not our ego for maximum lifts. And many believe that training for growth involves some degree of incomplete recovery, oxygen debt, and accumulation of fatigue.
If you’ve made it this far in the series, you probably are beginning to understand that hormones play a critical role in the physique development process. Much of our program design is geared towards maximizing anabolic/fat burning hormone output and minimizing catabolic/fat storing hormone output. Well, moderate rest periods, right around one-minute, provide the biggest increases in acute testosterone and growth hormone output. This is a large reason why these rest periods are associated with maximizing the hypertrophy response.
In short, don’t rush through your sets and circuit train, rest, but don’t rest too long.
Body Composition Training 101: Exercise Form
Exercise form: The manner in which you execute/perform a particular lift
Recommendations: Use various tempo prescriptions, always with a controlled negative/lowering phase. Most common: 3-1-1-0, 3-0-1-0, 2-0-2-0, 2-0-2-1.
If I was forced to put a number on it, I’d say that 75% of the average gym population is exercising improperly. A good percentage of those people are just plain exercising dangerously. You know what I’m talking about. The heaving, limbo barbell curls. The sternum crushing, bouncing barbell bench press. The swinging, hip thrust pull-up. The knee shredding, lower back crushing rebound squat. The list goes on and on…
POINT A TO POINT B, OR SOMETHING MORE?
You see people do all kinds of body contortions to complete a lift, solely thinking in terms of moving the bar from Point A to Point B. This builds the ego, not the body, and predisposes trainees to injury.
Appearance-based training, as opposed to Power lifting or Olympic lifting, is all about stimulating and overloading the muscle, it is less about how much weight is actually on the bar. We are not trying to get better at various lifts for competitive purposes. The lifts are simply a means to an end. They are tools we use to achieve our ultimate goal — physique transformation.
Your muscles don’t know the difference between 50lbs and 500lbs (ok yes they do, but for educational purposes just bear with me), they only know if the workload they’ve been given has forced each and every motor unit and muscle fiber to fire to exhaustion. This is what causes muscular overload, and a resulting adaptive response (muscle growth). For some, that very well may be 500lbs, for some it may only be 50lbs.
Cheating, using momentum, etc. reduces tension and workload on the target muscle and allows it to shift to the other muscles and/or joints. At best this is ineffective for physique development. At worst it can predispose you to training injury.
Coach Scott Abel talks a lot about this in his various works on bodybuilding and fitness training. He advises body composition athletes to think in the following terms, “train the muscle, not the movement.” In other words, we are using the barbell biceps curl to overload the biceps and force biceps growth. We are not barbell curling just to get better/stronger at barbell curling. For physique development, you are better off using 60lbs with proper form (controlled negative, no rebound, etc.) than using 100lbs with improper form (dropping the weight, heaving it up with knees, shoulders, lower back, and everything else EXCEPT the biceps).
Now don’t misunderstand me. We DO want to get stronger. The hypertrophy process is somewhat dependant upon progressive overload and strength development. We just don’t want to see strength as the be-all-end-all (there are other factors involved in the physique development process), and sacrifice proper form for strength increases at all costs.
EGO TRAINING
You should train for yourself, to develop our own body, not for anyone else. We all fall at various places under the strength spectrum. And I can guarantee you this. There is always someone out there who is stronger than you are. At the same time, there is always someone out there who is weaker and more uncoordinated than you are. So don’t even worry about it. Where someone else is at and what they are lifting in the gym makes no difference on what your body is capable of.
Besides, it’s not about where you are at; it’s about where you are going that matters. Feel free to give me a hug in spirit right now.
Despite this, there will always be the strong urge/inclination to ego train, especially when a hot chic (or dude, whatever you prefer) is training right next to you. “Slap a few plates on Joey. Gotta warm up.” So here are a few errors to keep an eye out for:
1. Using momentum/rebound to lift the weight.
The best example of this error is the barbell bench press. The person barely controls the weight down and rapidly and violently bounces the bar off the chest to lift it back up. Not only is this dangerous for the sternum and shoulder joint (most pec and rotator cuff injuries happen this way), it is ineffective for chest development.
The chest fibers are maximally stimulated in the stretch-to-midrange position. The top third of the movement is all triceps. By bouncing the bar off the chest, you are eliminating most of the lift that overloads the chest muscles. For physique development you are better off lightening the load, controlling the negative, and using pure pec power to lift the weight up.
2. Incorporating other muscle groups
The best example of this is the barbell curl. The biceps contract to flex the arm at the elbow joint, pulling the forearm towards the upper arm. What kinesiology tells us, then, is that only the forearm should be moving with a proper barbell curl, at least a barbell curl specifically performed for maximizing tension and overload on the biceps.
If any other body part is moving, you are incorporating other muscle groups to perform the lift, thus reducing tension on the biceps. You are starting to train the movement, and moving away from training the muscle.
Slight cheat would be upper arm movement. Muscles generally work on the insertion point, and thus initiate movement on the limb beneath it. Biceps contract and shorten to move the forearm. If your upper arm is moving, it is being initiated by shoulder contractions.
Major cheats would be lower back swinging, possibly combined with knee movement.
3. Not using a full range of motion
The two best example of this are the squat and leg press. Trainees will load up a bunch of plates on the bar, I assume to try and impress the rest of the gym crowd, and then proceed to barely budge the bar or sled ¼ inch. That does nothing to build the legs, and stresses the knee joints and lower back.
4. Letting gravity do all the work
People think of weight training as “lifting”, but research shows a lot of the structural damage that triggers the repair and growth processes occurs during the “lowering” or negative phase of the lift. If you lift the weight, and drop it down without using the target muscles to control it against gravity, you are missing out on many of the physique enhancing benefits of weight training. You certainly are not maximizing your development, and you are predisposing yourself to either traumatic injury (muscle, tendon strains) and/or chronic pain (join wear and tear).
TEMPO TRAINING
If I could give just one piece of form/technique advice to the average gym-goer, it would be this — slow it down — just a little bit. Not excessively, as with super slow training, which is meaningless for physique development, but just a little bit.
Tempo training is one of the best techniques to teach people proper form without actually being there to correct all of the little technique errors. It’s also a great way to ensure you are overloading the muscles, and not using too much momentum or rebound to initiate lifts.
To get your beach bod, you gotta use good form. Tempo prescriptions (made famous in the strength training world by Charles Poliquin) help trainees accomplish this goal. There are four numbers in the system. I change tempos all of the time but I think a great one to start with is 3-1-1-0.
The first number (3) is the negative or lowering portion of the exercise — when you’re muscles are elongating and working to resist gravity. You should lower the weight under control in three seconds, instead of just letting it drop towards the ground.
The second number (1) is the transition phase between the negative and the positive (lifting) — bottom of the bench press. A one second pause eliminates momentum and forces the target muscle to initiate the movement.
The third number (1) is the actual lift. You don’t want to sling the weight up, but you do want to use some controlled force to stimulate fast-twitch muscle fiber recruitment. Super-slow training (10 second lift) reduces the workload too much and is ineffective for muscle development. That’s why they call it weight lifting, not weight budging. So power the weight up in a controlled fashion without cheating or using other muscle groups to get the job done.
The fourth number (0) is the lockout phase. A good example is the top of the bench press where your arms are extended. Most people lock out their joints, rest for a second between reps, and allow the target muscle to rest. This prolongs the set but reduces tension on the muscle — not what we want for physique development. Stopping just short of locking out and immediately starting the next rep without a rest is the best way to overload the target muscle.
ONE FINAL THOUGHT
If you can’t feel your muscles working during a set, you probably are not doing it right. Look at slowing things down until you can feel the target muscle(s) working, especially with isolation movements. Think slow stretch and controlled, but forceful contraction with each rep. Remember, you are there to train and develop your body, not just sling weights around.
natemiyaki
Kalai Diamond
