Archive for January, 2000

Imagine that a guy walks into my gym, and he’s looking to add 10 pounds of muscle — a simple and straightforward request. The first thing we do is go through a short checklist:

1. Is he lifting?
2. Is he eating enough, and eating enough protein?
3. Is he lifting often enough, heavy enough, and with good technique?

Obviously, if someone wants to gain size and he isn’t lifting weights, there’s no mystery about the first step. We get him on a training program, introduce him to the magic of progressive resistance, and watch him grow.

Since nobody is confused about the need to lift in order to gain muscle, let’s move on to the next two points.

You’d be surprised how many people lift weights but don’t eat enough total calories to reach their goals. Same with protein intake: It seems obvious, but some people do need to be told to eat more. So once we figure out what he’s eating and when, fixing the problem is relatively straightforward.

“Heavy enough” and “often enough” are subjective, of course, but once we understand what he’s been doing, these are easy variables to manipulate. Technique? Well if you’ve been to any commercial gyms recently, you’ll see a lot of underdeveloped guys lifting with really bad form. If our guy’s form on the squat and deadlift leaves a lot to be desired, we might be able to add size just by teaching him to use the right muscles on basic lifts.

But what if the problem isn’t so easy to detect and fix? What if he’s doing everything we expect him to do with his training and nutrition, but he’s still not making the gains he wants to make, and that we’d expect him to make, given the effort he’s putting in?

Our next step is to release the brakes.

When Pushing Harder Doesn’t Help

I got the “release the brakes” idea during a conversation with Dax Moy, a British trainer and gym owner. We were talking about “accelerating” client progress, and came to an interesting conclusion:

All of us in the fitness industry, trainers and trainees alike, have been brainwashed into thinking that the only way to improve results is to push harder. If you aren’t making gains, it’s because you aren’t training hard enough or often enough. Doesn’t matter if we’re talking about systemic gains in muscle size or body composition, or strength in particular lifts, or the size of individual muscles or muscle groups. The answer to every problem is to punch down harder on the accelerator.

But think of a car with the parking brake on. If you push harder on the gas pedal, you’ll only run out of fuel quicker, right? But if you take off the brake, the car will go farther and faster, and probably use less fuel in the process.

This leads to two important conclusions: First, removing the impediments to your progress will probably help more than adding another set of squats, bench presses, or sprints. Second, it’s pointless to increase load and volume while those impediments are in place.

So What’s Holding You Back?

A friend of mine went to see a chiropractor for a back problem. The problem: misaligned vertebrae in his lumbar spine. The culprit: heavy Romanian deadlifts.

My friend is strong as hell — he was using close to double his body weight in the lift. His glutes and hams could handle the load, but his lower back couldn’t. Since my friend’s goal is to get even stronger than he was before the injury, what’s his best strategy? Keep pushing, despite the fact his injured back has already shown it can’t handle bigger loads? Or design a program that releases the brakes by strengthening his weakest link?

We switched to a heavy emphasis on core training that allows direct loading of his lumbar area, along with heavy single-leg RDLs, which maintained the strength of his glutes and hams without the risk of a lower-back injury.

Core strength is often the underlying issue, whether we’re talking about something major like misaligned vertebrae or something that’s annoying but minor, like a lagging body part. The core muscles need to stabilize and protect the spine, particularly when the extremities are in motion. If those muscles aren’t strong or stable enough, the first clue could be a lack of size or strength somewhere else.

Quick experiment:

Stand up and hold a single dumbbell out to your right side, as you would in the finishing position of a lateral raise. What muscles are working? Obviously, it’s your right deltoid. If you’re a trainer or otherwise knowledgeable about exercise physiology, you can probably name a few other muscles in the shoulder girdle that come into play, but we can all agree that the prime mover here is the deltoid.

But think about how your torso stays upright with that dumbbell hanging out in space. Your center of gravity has been thrown off, so something besides your right deltoid must be working pretty hard to keep you from listing to the starboard side. In this case, it’s your left oblique. It’s working to stabilize your spine, allowing your right deltoid to lift that weight and hold it out there away from your body.

Now imagine that the oblique on your left side is weak, or recently injured. You wouldn’t be able to lift that dumbbell, since the muscles charged with protecting your spine aren’t prepared to do their job. Your body cares more about the health and safety of your spine than it does about the size of your shoulders.

Your best strategy, then, is to rehabilitate and strengthen your obliques, thus releasing the brake on your muscle development. Stomping on the accelerator by increasing the volume of your shoulder training wouldn’t do any good, and might make things considerably worse.

Let’s assign some completely hypothetical numbers to this example, and say your right deltoid can lift 30 pounds for 10 reps. To achieve overload and force growth, we have to train the deltoid to do one of two things: lift 31 pounds for 10 reps, or 30 pounds for 11 or more reps.

But let’s say your core muscles, either because of injury or disuse, can only handle 29 pounds for 10 reps.

A bodybuilder might say the solution is to find a way to overload the delts while bypassing the core. Maybe he’d use machines designed for that purpose, or wear a lifting belt for his lateral raises, or do something else that wouldn’t occur to me. Ultimately, the strategy is counterproductive; even if it works, it only exacerbates the imbalance, which makes the brakes work harder to slow your body down and keep your spine safe.

I’d take the opposite approach, and do everything I could to release the brakes. Here’s an example of how I’d train the core muscles twice a week. I’d use timed sets, rather than prescribing specific rep counts:

Day 1

Exercise	Sets	Time (sec)
A1) Side plank	3	60*
A2) Barbell, dumbbell, sandbag, or weight plate overhead lunge	3	60
A3) Dumbbell or kettlebell asymmetrical shoulder carry	3	60*

* Each side.

You already know how to do a side plank (although doing it for 60 seconds on each side might be a new experience).

The overhead lunge is just like it sounds: hold something heavy over your head with straight arms, and do lunges for 60 seconds.

The asymmetrical shoulder carry is also straightforward: hold the weight on one shoulder as you walk briskly for 60 seconds. Then switch to the other shoulder for 60 seconds.

That’s one circuit, which takes five minutes. Do a total of three circuits, resting as much as you need to in between.

Day 2

Exercise	Sets	Time (sec)
A1) Cable overhead isometric hold and squat	3	60*
A2) Side plank with legs suspended	3	60*
A3) Dumbbell or kettlebell asymmetrical farmer’s walk	3	60*

* Each side.

Cable overhead isometric hold and squat

If you’ve ever done the Pallof press, then you get the idea here. Attach a handle to the high pulley of a cable machine, and select a very light weight (trust me on this one). Stand sidewise to the machine, holding the attachment with both hands and your arms straight overhead, as shown in the pictures to your right. Squat down and hold for two seconds, then return to the starting position, keeping your torso upright. Repeat for 60 seconds, then switch sides and repeat.

Side plank with legs suspended

If you have a TRX, blast straps, rings, or a Jungle Gym, attach it to a chin-up bar, and secure your feet in the loops so they’re about 12 to 18 inches off the floor. Now do a side plank for 60 seconds on each side, as shown in the picture.

Dumbbell or kettlebell asymmetrical farmer’s walk

Nothing fancy here — just walk while holding a dumbbell or kettlebell at hip height. Go for 60 seconds on each side.

How to Find the Brake-Release Switch

Some brakes are easier to find than others. Let’s say your bench press is stuck, and you want to figure out if the problem is your chest or your triceps. A simple test would be to compare your one-rep max on the full-range bench press to your max on the five-board press.

If you get 315 pounds on the full-range press vs. 405 with the boards on your chest to shorten the range of motion, you can conclude that your triceps are a lot stronger than your chest. If the reverse is true — you’re stronger pushing the bar off your chest than you are locking it out — then the problem is probably with your triceps strength.

But what if the problem has nothing to do with the prime movers? Imagine a guy who comes to me a few weeks before he has to take a fitness test. He needs to be able to do 75 push-ups to pass the test, but can only do 50 right now.

The traditional advice is to do more and more submaximal sets, or use diminishing rest intervals to build capacity. It might work, if the problem is a simple matter of undertraining. But it’s also a crapshoot. If he isn’t undertrained, and the problem lies elsewhere, we risk wasting a lot of valuable time.

Before going to a volume approach, I’d want to know if the problem is with the strength and endurance of his arm and shoulder muscles, or if there’s an issue with his core muscles.

I’d use an exercise called the super plank, or plank walk-up. It works best if you have a training partner to watch your form.

Start in a push-up position, then lower yourself down to your forearms, so you’re in a plank position. Then come back up to a push-up position, keeping your core tight throughout the exercise. Do as many reps as possible, and stop when you or your training partner observes that your belly is starting to sag, indicating that you’ve lost core stability.

If you never get to that point — if your arms and shoulders give out before your core muscles — then you know the problem is a lack of strength and endurance in your prime movers.

But if the core gives out first, you see a different problem. You might have 60 or 65 reps in your arms and shoulders, but only 50 in your core. In that case, we’d pursue a core-training strategy similar to the one I showed earlier.

If, however, the problem is with the prime movers, I’d put together a workout that emphasizes strength training and suspended push-ups. It would look something like this:

Workout 1

Exercise	Sets	Reps
A) Dumbbell bench press (wave loading) Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4	6	8,6,4,8,6,4 7,5,3,7,5,3 6,4,2,6,4,2 5,3,1,5,3,1
B) Push-up	2	Max (timed)

Dumbbell bench press (wave loading)

Each “wave” consists of three sets using progressively heavier weights. In Week 1, you start with 8 reps. Increase the weight for the second set, which is 6 reps. Then increase it again for the set of 4 reps. For the second wave of 8, 6, and 4 reps, use more weight on each set than you used on the first wave.

So if you used 60, 70, and 80 pounds for the first wave, you might use 65, 75, and 85 for the second wave.

After Week 4, repeat the entire program, but use heavier weights to start out than you used the first time through.

Push-up

Do as many reps as possible, timing yourself to see how long it takes. Rest for the exact amount of time it took you to do your max reps, and repeat.

Workout 2

Exercise	Sets	Reps	Rest (sec)
A) Suspended push-up Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4	10	5	60 50 40 30

Suspended push-up

As with the suspended side plank described earlier, you’ll need blast straps, a TRX, or something else that will support your weight about 12 to 18 inches off the floor. Put your hands in the rings or straps, with your feet on the floor, and do your sets and reps with the rest periods decreasing week by week, as shown in the chart.

After four weeks, repeat the program, making the push-ups harder by raising your feet up off the floor or wearing a weighted vest.

How to Find a Lower-Body Imbalance

A structural imbalance between core strength and muscle strength is a little trickier to detect in the lower body. For example, suppose I’m training a young athlete who’s 5-foot-11, 162 pounds, and needs to gain size and strength. When we test his strength on a variety of lower-body exercises, we get this:

Back squat: 135 x 3
Front squat: 135 x 3
Split squat: 115 x 5
Romanian deadlift: 175 x 5

What jumps out at you? It’s a little odd that he can front squat as much as he uses in the back squat, but that’s not what I see as the big red flag. It’s also strange that he’s much stronger in the RDL than in the squat, but again it’s not the most important data point.

To me, the real anomaly is the fact he can use almost as much weight in the split squat — a static lunge with a barbell on his shoulders — as he can in the traditional squat.

When we further test his form on the squat and lunge, we find he has better range of motion and stability in the lunge pattern than he does with his feet parallel to each other. He gets lower and has better balance.

Now we need to know why. The action of the front leg in the lunge is doing something very close to the action of both legs in the squat, so logically you’d think he should be able to use a lot more weight with two legs than with one. We’d expect him to be able to squat at least 185 pounds for five reps.

We put him through three tests.

The first is a two-part test I described in this article. We’ll assess his form in an unloaded overhead squat, particularly looking for forward lean relative to depth. If he can’t get to normal squat depth (top of the thighs parallel to the floor, or just below that point) without leaning forward, we’ll move to the second part of the test.

To figure out if the problem is with flexibility or core stability, we’ll put him on his back on the floor and have him lift his thighs to his chest. If he has a normal range of motion in that drill, then we know his flexibility is fine, and the likely problem is core stability.

Next we’ll test his split squat for a left-right imbalance. For this test, he’ll hold a 57.5-pound kettlebell (or 60-pound dumbbell) on the same-side shoulder as his forward leg. So if the right leg is forward, he’ll hold the weight at his right shoulder. The offset load is much more challenging to his core, and we want to know if that affects one side more than the other.

Finally, we’ll test his strength in the good morning. We already know from his RDL numbers that he’s strong in the glutes and hamstrings, so the good morning tells us if there’s an imbalance farther up the posterior chain. If his good morning is close to his RDL, we’ll know his lower and middle back are proportionally strong enough.

In this example, he’s passed every test except the first one: His inability to do an unloaded overhead squat without excessive forward lean tells us there’s a real problem with his core stability.

Here’s how we go about fixing it.

Exercise	Sets	Reps
A) Plank and side plank	2-3	1*
B) Trap-bar deadlift	5	5,3,1,5,5
C) Asymmetrical lunge	2-3	8-10**

* 60 seconds per side.
** Each side.

Plank and side plank

First we want to get him to the point at which he can do 60-second holds for both exercises. Then we’ll add a load, either with a weighted vest or by putting his feet up on a bench or his elbows on a stability ball.

Asymmetrical lunge

As described earlier, we’ll have him hold a heavy dumbbell — 75 to 85 pounds — at either his shoulder or hip on the same side as his front leg.

Rx for Biceps and Lats

You’ve probably heard this bit of old-school wisdom: “You can’t shoot a cannon from a canoe.” If your biceps are lagging, and the problem isn’t lack of training emphasis, the brakes could be in your upper back, especially your traps. Those muscles aren’t big and strong enough to support more upper-arm size.

A solid program of heavy shrugs, deadlifts, YTWL raises, face pulls, and inverted rows will develop the upper-back strength necessary to support additional loading in curling exercises, leading to greater size and strength.

Another common strategy to increase arm size is to focus on using the arms in multijoint lifts as part of a movement chain that emphasizes the back or chest. That’s why close-grip bench presses and dips are great triceps-building exercises, and why chin-ups are usually effective for biceps.

But what if the chin-up is the problem? That is, what if you’re unable to do more than a few chins at a time, and the problem isn’t simply a lack of effort in that exercise?

The problem could be in your external rotators. The chest and lats are powerful internal rotators of your upper-arm bones, so your body may resist your efforts to increase strength in those muscles if your external rotators are weaker than they need to be. It puts the brakes on the stronger muscles to prevent injury. Face pulls and YTWL raises, mentioned earlier, will help alleviate that imbalance.

Here’s another common weak link in chin-up performance: lat strength in relation to glute strength.

In gym culture, the idea that the lats and glutes work together seems ridiculous. The lats move your arms and the glutes move your legs, and as any reader of Flex could tell you, those are entirely different body parts. But take a look at an anatomy chart. You can draw straight lines from the fibers of the latissimus dorsi on the left side through the gluteus maximus on the right side. Same with your right lat and left glute.

That’s why those muscles work together when you walk, run, or climb to stabilize your spine. (On the front of your body, your obliques share the same fiber orientation as the adductor muscles on the inner thigh of the opposite-side leg.)

If one side of this support mechanism is weak, your spine is at risk. So your body will resist your attempts to make one of the muscles disproportionately stronger.

As odd as it seems, you might need to work on your lunge or step-up strength to improve your performance in chin-ups.

You can also work around the problem, if you have it, by holding a Swiss ball between your butt and heels while you do chin-ups, as shown in the pictures at right. You’ll need a training partner to set the ball in place on the back of your legs, and then you’ll need to squeeze it in place by firing your glutes, hamstrings, and calves. With your glutes contracted, your body perceives that the spine is stable, and it releases the brakes, allowing your lats to work more effectively.

Wrapping It Up: Make or Brake

In business, those who’re ambitious are often told that they won’t attain a seven-figure income by doing more of what got them to a six-figure income. Chances are it’s not even possible — they worked at full capacity to earn the six-figure income in the first place. To reach seven figures, they have to think and act differently.

The strength-training version of that idea has been expressed by Dave Tate: Whatever you did to get from 200 pounds to 300 pounds in the bench press won’t work to get from 300 to 400.

My version of this idea is what I hope I’ve described in this article: Pushing the accelerator by eating more and training more can get you pretty far in the gym. You can build a body that’s bigger and stronger than most of the others you see around you.

But if you want to reach another level of development — adding size and strength systemically; bringing up a lagging muscle group; increasing strength or repetitions in a particular exercise — you need to think and act differently.

The answer isn’t always obvious; if it were, anyone willing to work hard could get a lot bigger and stronger than he is now. So once you’ve attempted the obvious solutions, like eating more or training the targeted muscles harder, you need to start looking for the brakes.

Those brakes could be hiding in a lot of different places: your obliques, your external rotators, your traps, your lats, your glutes. If there’s one thing those potential locations have in common, it’s this: They tend to be near the center of your body.

Or to make it even simpler, look at it this way: The impediment to growth in your arm muscles probably isn’t in your arms. You already know how to push down on the accelerator, and increase the volume and intensity of your arm workouts. But chances are progress will be brutally slow until you figure out how to release the brakes.

Hacking Your Strength Training
Alwyn Cosgrove

When I started out in the fitness-training field, the average client tended to be an active person who used gym exercise to augment the other types of activity he got outside the gym. Few of us specialized in fat-loss training, simply because it wasn’t the primary goal of the majority of our clients. It was a nice side-effect of solid workouts and a good diet, but it wasn’t the main reason our clients came to work with us.

Today, it’s the opposite. What we do with our clients in the gym may be the only exercise they get in a typical week. We regularly see clients who work 50 hours a week, not counting the two hours a day they spend commuting. Many of them can’t train on weekends because of work-related travel, or because it’s the only chance they get to spent time with their spouses and kids.

Since opening our facility in 2000, we’ve measured the body-fat percentages, abilities, range of motion, and posture of all our beginning members. I can say this unequivocally: The average beginner today arrives fatter and in worse shape than the average beginner just nine years ago.

That presents a huge problem for us. We have to address posture, strength, mobility, flexibility, elasticity, and cardio-respiratory endurance simultaneously. And we’re lucky if we get three hours a week to do it.

A traditional program won’t work for this population.

Now, before anyone counters with “dedicated people make time,” let me assure you that I’m talking about people who are dedicated. Let me describe two of my former clients:

Client #1: a professional motocross rider

• Races 45 weekends a year

• Flies out to the race site on Friday, competes Saturday and Sunday, and flies home on Monday

• Practices Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday

• Trains with me Tuesday and Thursday

• Starts all over again on Friday

This is a guy who’s married, with two young sons. Is he not dedicated? Do you see any additional room in his schedule that would allow him to train more than he does?

Client #2: a doctor

• Works 60 to 70 hours a week, and is often on call longer than that

• Commutes an hour to work each way

• Married with three kids

• Attends his kids’ soccer games, and tries to spend to spend as much time as possible with his family

• Trains with me three times a week

Is he not a dedicated person? Should he devote more hours to the gym, at the expense of saving lives or spending time with his family?

The solution: To give these dedicated but time-challenged clients the best possible results, we need to hack traditional training down to its most basic and fundamental elements.

Hacking 101

You may be familiar with the term “life hack.” Basically, it’s a time-management system in which you hack away the unessential stuff in your life to increase productivity.

If we define productivity as “maximizing results per unit of time invested,” we can see the benefits of it. The goal is to spend less time doing things that bring us little if any benefit, and more time doing the things that improve our income, prospects, pleasure, and quality of life.

Another way to look at it: maximize productivity by minimizing redundancy.

As a fitness professional and owner of a training facility, I realized I had to hack our training programs if I had any hope of keeping pace with the rapidly changing needs of our clients.

For example, it’s not uncommon to see programs that include three exercises or more for each body part. So for biceps, you might see the barbell curl, EZ-bar curl, and seated dumbbell curl — three exercises that are more similar than different.

Our first hack would be to switch to barbell curls and incline dumbbell curls. Now we’ve reduced the total number of exercises by a third, and we’ve also chosen a non-redundant exercise — the incline curl — to give us a different angle of pull and allow us to hit more muscle fibers.

A second hack would choose one of those exercises as our sole focus.

A third and final hack — the “max hack” — would eliminate the isolation work completely. Instead, we’d do close-grip chins, which would target the biceps effectively enough while also recruiting lots more muscle and building total-body strength.

Body by Pareto

The Pareto principle, also known as the 80-20 rule, is an important key to successful hacking of any type — whether we’re talking about training, running a business, or the overall management of our lives.

It’s named for Vilfredo Pareto, an Italian economist who in 1906 observed that 80 percent of the wealth in Italy (and every country he subsequently studied) was owned by 20 percent of the population. After Pareto published his findings, many others observed similar ratios in their own areas of expertise. In the early 1940s, an industrial-efficiency expert named Joseph Juran applied Pareto’s ideas to project management, describing the principle of “the vital few and trivial many.”

Tim Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Workweek, popularized the idea for my generation of entrepreneurs when he observed that 80 percent of his income came from 20 percent of his clients. So he hacked off 80 percent of his clients, effectively reducing his workload by 80 percent, and focused on the clients who accounted for 80 percent of his income. Yes, at first he took a 20 percent pay cut, but his productivity and income soared on a per-hour basis.

You can apply the Pareto principle to workout hacking with the assumption that 80 percent of the consequences come from 20 percent of the causes. Or, put another way, 20 percent of the exercises you do produce 80 percent of your results.

Let’s say you have a total-body workout with 10 exercises. If we hacked out eight of the 10 exercises, and just kept squats and chin-ups, would you expect to get just 20 percent of the results? Chances are it would be the opposite — you might get 80 percent of the results by focusing on just 20 percent of the exercises. So most of your results come from just two exercises, and relatively few results come from the other eight.

It’s easy to see why. Compound exercises recruit more muscle, allow you to use bigger loads, and burn more calories than isolation exercises. That’s why you want to build your program around them, and why your workouts should start with exercises like deadlifts or squats, the ones that produce the best results on a rep-by-rep basis.

Now, I’m not suggesting that you’ll get 100 percent of the results you want with a hacked program. The goal of hacking out what’s unessential from your training program is to free up more of your time without significantly diminishing your results. Don’t hack for the sake of hacking; you want to eliminate redundant or trivially beneficial exercises so you can accomplish other goals, in or out of the gym.

In the next few sections I’ll show you examples we’ve used successfully with clients in our facility. As you’ll see, there’s a sound basis in science for most of these hacks.

The Frequency and Volume Hack

Back in 2000, a study published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research compared equal-volume resistance training over one day or three days per week. [1] The participants in the study were experienced lifters. Group one performed the entire workout — three sets of each exercise — on one day. Group two performed the same volume of work, but spread it out over three days. So they did one set of each exercise in each workout.

The researchers found that the once-per-week group achieved just 62 percent of the strength improvements of the three-times-per-week group, and also gained less muscle. The men in the second group put on nine pounds of muscle, vs. four pounds for those in the first group.

This gives us an idea of how to start our training hack: It’s better to reduce volume per workout than it is to reduce frequency. So if you work out three times a week, it’s better to make those workouts shorter than to do longer workouts less often.

A review published in Sports Medicine in 2007 looked at several studies on strength training and hypertrophy across different populations.[2] It concluded that, for hypertrophy, it’s better to train each muscle group three times a week.

Anecdotally, we know that a lot of bodybuilders use an increased frequency to bring up a lagging body part. If the problem is that every body part needs to be brought up, then three total-body workouts should work better than a series of split routines in which body parts are hit just once or twice per week.

The Sets and Reps Hack

Now that we’ve settled on three total-body workouts a week, we have to figure out how to hack unessential elements of those workouts to keep them at a reasonable length. But we still want results, so we have to figure out how best to employ sets and reps to increase size and strength.

A study published in JSCR in 2002 compared two different types of periodization.[3]

Traditional linear periodization works something like this: In weeks one to four, you’d do eight reps per set of all your exercises. In weeks five to eight, you’d do six reps, and in weeks nine to 12 you’d do four reps. So you’d progress from a hypertrophy protocol to one that emphasizes pure strength.

Undulating periodization aims to achieve those goals simultaneously, so on Monday you’d do four reps per set, on Wednesday you’d do six reps, and on Friday you’d do eight reps.

The researchers found that undulating periodization was better than linear periodization for strength gains.

Thus, we’ll use three distinct ranges of sets and reps in our three total-body workouts each week. That brings us to the next big question: Which exercises should we use?

Exercise Hack

At the 2000 annual conference of the National Strength and Conditioning Association, researchers at Ball State presented a study that compared the effects of two different workouts on upper-arm circumference.[4]

One group did four compound upper-body exercises in each workout, while the other did those four exercises plus biceps curls and triceps extensions.

Both groups increased their strength and arm size. But in 10 weeks of training, the additional arm exercises provided no additional benefit.

So if you’re going to hack your training program to make it as efficient as possible without sacrificing benefits, you can eliminate direct arm training with isolation exercises.

Workout Duration Hack

Sir Charles Scott Sherrington won the Nobel Prize in 1932 for his contributions in physiology and neuroscience. Sherrington’s law of reciprocal innervation states that “for every neural activation of a muscle, there is a corresponding inhibition of the opposing muscle.” This means that when you work your chest muscles, the opposite back muscles are forced to relax, thereby resting.

It’s easy to apply this one: Instead of waiting two minutes between sets of bench presses, for example, you can perform one set of the bench press, rest for one minute, and then do a bent-over row. After you finish, you’ll rest for one minute, then repeat the sequence until you complete all sets of both exercises. In an average workout, this technique saves at least eight to 10 minutes without sacrificing performance.

“If you could only do one exercise … “

I hate questions like this. But I do have an answer: The snatch-grip deadlift probably works more muscle through a bigger range of motion than any other single exercise. (In other words, I’m not comparing the snatch-grip deadlift to a combination exercise like the clean and press.) So we’ll start with that as our primary exercise. Our secondary exercise will be the front squat.

I also like to do single-leg exercises, so we’ll create a second total-body workout in which we use dumbbell Bulgarian split squats to target our quads, with step-ups as a hip-dominant counterpart.

For upper-body exercises, we’ll stick to the ones that use the most muscle and avoid single-joint exercises. The big four here will be chin-ups, dips (or dumbbell bench presses), dumbbell rows, and barbell push presses. We’ll do two of them in each of our total-body workouts.

Program A

1) Snatch-grip deadlift
2) Dumbbell Bulgarian split squat
3a) Dip
3b) Dumbbell row

Program B

1) Front squat
2) Step-up
3a) Barbell push press
3b) Close-grip chin-up

Here’s how we’ll alternate programs A and B:

Week one:

Mon: Program A
Wed: Program B
Fri: Program A

Week two:

Mon: Program B
Wed: Program A
Fri: Program B

Sets and reps for A and B work like this:

Mon: 4 sets of 4 reps of each exercise. Rest 90 to 120 seconds between sets.
Wed: 3 sets of 8 reps of each exercise. Rest 75 to 90 seconds between sets.
Fri: 2 to 3 sets of 12 reps of each exercise. Rest 60 to 75 seconds between sets.

Select a load that’s appropriate for each exercise, given the rep range. You want to stop one or two reps short of failure on each set. Try this system as written for up to six weeks. You’ll do each program nine times, but only three times at each rep range.

Final Thoughts

Is this the perfect program? Absolutely not — the perfect program doesn’t exist. It’s just one way to hack out the unessential, trivial, and redundant exercises from your program, replacing them with the most effective exercises, and employing them in the most time-efficient way I know.

Does it work? Let me put it this way: I wouldn’t still be in business if it didn’t.

This article originally appeared at t-nation.com

Complexes for Fat Loss
by Alwyn Cosgrove

A Better Way

I’m a huge believer in using the “alternating set” system when training. For time management reasons, I tend to do exercise one for a set, rest 60 seconds or so, exercise two for a set, rest 60 seconds or so, and continue. This allows me to increase work density while still getting “true” rest.

In other words, I perform a set of squats, rest 60 seconds, perform a set of push-ups, rest 60 seconds, and repeat. So, in effect, I’ve almost tripled the rest period between squat sets (60 seconds plus time taken for push-ups plus 60 seconds) as opposed to using a straight set system. And for fat loss training, it’s unparalleled.

However, the biggest problem or complaint I get from clients who use commercial facilities is that it’s really hard for them to tie up two pieces of gym equipment at peak hours. I have my own facility, but I realize this can be a real problem elsewhere.

So I started experimenting with a few things — doing dumbbell lunges and push-ups for example, or step-ups and dumbbell bench presses — where I could use one set of dumbbells and one piece of equipment.

It was an okay compromise, but it started to somewhat limit my exercise selection. And to be honest, it still had the issue of people working in and possibly disrupting your rest periods.

So I went a step further. What if I created a fat loss or conditioning program based around one piece of equipment — where you stayed in the same spot, using the same load for the entire duration.

So I tried it. At first it was awkward, but after reading Steve Javorek’s stuff and talking with über-strength-coach Robert Dos Remedios, I started to implement different variations of combination lifting. I just hoped that it would work as well as alternating sets for fat loss and conditioning, or at least close enough that it wasn’t too much of a tradeoff.

As it turns out, it worked better! In fact, it worked so well that it became a cornerstone of my conditioning programs with several athletes.
The Definitions

Now I’m not the first person to ever use complexes. But after talking to Dos we couldn’t find any formal classification of what constituted the difference between combination lifts, hybrid lifts, and complexes. So we felt the need to define the term:

Combo lifts are broken down into three categories:

1. True Combinations: This is when two or more lifts are done together with a distinct pause between each. (Still, never put the bar down.) Example: Power clean + front squat.

2. Hybrids: In this category, there’s no pause or separation between the lifts. The movements flow into one another. In fact, the previous movement sometimes isn’t completed before the next starts. Example: Front squat into press.

3. Complexes: Still doing two or more exercises and still not putting the bar down, only now you complete all your reps with one movement first, then complete all your reps with the next movement. Example: When combining a squat with an overhead press, perform 5 reps of squats first, then 5 reps of overhead press without dropping the bar.

So why do they work? Well, quite honestly, it’s because they’re hard as hell! A five-movement complex x 6 reps has a total volume of 30 reps per set! But rather than do a 30-rep set of one exercise (and have to use the pink dumbbells), you’re only doing 6 reps before changing the exercise, so you can stay (relatively) heavy.

At only 100 pounds, that comes out to 3000 pounds of total work per set. Do four sets with about 90 seconds rest between sets and you’ll have moved 12,000 pounds in about eight or nine minutes.
Using Complexes

• Combo lifts are great for those who lack equipment or space. They can make good warm-ups, or can be used for metabolic work or for in-season athletic training because they’re time efficient.

• If you want to try combos, use familiar movements. Don’t put unfamiliar exercises together.

• The weakest exercise in the sequence determines the load you’ll use. Don’t use exercises like triceps kickbacks because the small load required is too limiting for the other movements in the combo.

• Use exercises that flow well together. Performing a deadlift to a Romanian deadlift to a high pull flows very well as the end point of one exercise overlaps with the start point of another exercise. Doing back squat to floor press clearly doesn’t flow.

Easy rule: If you have to re-grip the bar or adjust your grip at all, it has to be seamless and easy; otherwise the complex breaks down. The key is to be sensible. You can’t do a hybrid of deadlifts and curls for example — the difference in loading is too great.

To summarize, here are the four main reasons to consider combos or hybrids:

1. Time / Space / Equipment

Small facility + large group

Lack of equipment — Got dumbbells and/or barbells?

Only have your clients or athletes for limited time periods or sessions per week

2. Increase Training Volume

Add volume to your Olympic variations

A five-movement complex x 6 reps has a total volume of 30 repetitions per set. At only 100 pounds, this comes out to 3000 pounds of total work per set!

3. Change-up: Break-up Monotony (this is more for athletes)

Long in-season cycles

Off-season loss of focus

Break-up a long microcycle phase (i.e. hypertrophy, high volume)

Unloading phase

4. Metabolic / Conditioning Effect

Increase work demand, use more muscle groups

Increase caloric expenditure in fat loss programs

Increase EPOC/Afterburn effect massively

Increase work capacity

Complexes for Fat Loss

Be warned, these are pretty grueling. Perform the complexes at the beginning of your workout when you’re fresh. They’ll elevate metabolism beyond anything you’ve ever experienced before.

The most frequently asked question about complexes is how much load to use. Remember, it’s a metabolic stimulus, not a strength or hypertrophy stimulus, so be conservative. MMA pro David Loiseau uses only 85-95 pounds when doing the complexes I prescribe for him.

Now don’t go too light either. A good “Cosgrove rule of thumb” is that if you’re not questioning why in the hell you’re doing these exercises, or convincing yourself that twice around is enough, you’re not going heavy enough.
The Workout

Let’s get into it. Perform each complex once per week for four training sessions per week. Use the following progression:

Week One: 4 sets of 5 reps of each — 90s rest

Week Two: 5 sets of 5 reps of each — 75s rest

Week Three: 5 sets of 6 reps of each — 60s rest

Week Four: 6 sets of 6 reps of each — 45s rest. Then puke.

Complex A

Bent Over Barbell Row

Hang Clean

Front Squat + Push Press Hybrid

Jump Squat (bar on back)

Good Morning

Complex B

Romanian Deadlift

Hang Clean + Front Squat + Push Press (combo lift — perform one rep of each in series)

Reverse Lunge (alternate legs)

Complex C

Deadlift

High Pull (onto toes)

Squat Clean (clean the bar from the hang and then drop into a full squat on the catch)

Military Press (strict)

Jump Lunges (switch legs) — Insert my evil laugh here!

Complex D

Jump Squat

Squat

Squat and hold for 10s

Military Press

Push Press

Squat and Press (combo lift — perform one rep of each in series)

Note: Try to work all exercises at a speed of 1-2 reps per second.
A Final Warning

This isn’t for the faint-hearted or deconditioned. It’s not a beginners routine. If you’re coming back from injury or illness, don’t try this program yet. It’s brutal.

But if you follow this routine for four weeks you’ll see a very significant improvement in your conditioning and a massive drop in your body fat!

This article originally appeared at t-nation.com

A better way

I’m a huge believer in using the “alternating set” system when training. For time management reasons, I tend to do exercise one for a set, rest 60 seconds or so, do exercise two for a set, rest 60 seconds or so, and continue. This allows me to increase work density while still getting “true” rest.

In other words, I perform a set of squats, rest 60 seconds, perform a set of push-ups, rest 60 seconds, and repeat. So in effect, I’ve almost tripled the rest period between squat sets (60 seconds plus the time taken for push-ups plus 60 seconds) as opposed to using a straight set system. And for fat loss training, it’s unparalleled.

However, the biggest problem or complaint I get from clients who use commercial facilities is that it’s really hard for them to tie up two pieces of gym equipment at peak hours. I have my own facility, but I realize this can be a real problem elsewhere. So I started experimenting with a few things—doing dumbbell lunges and push-ups for example or step-ups and dumbbell bench presses where I could use one set of dumbbells and one piece of equipment.

It was an okay compromise, but it started to somewhat limit my exercise selection. And to be honest, it still had the issue of people working in and possibly disrupting your rest periods.

So I went a step further. What if I created a fat loss or conditioning program based around one piece of equipment where you stayed in the same spot, using the same load for the entire duration. So I tried it. At first it was awkward, but after reading Istvan Javorek’s work and talking with über strength coach, Robert Dos Remedios, I started to implement different variations of combination lifting.

I just hoped that it would work as well as alternating sets for fat loss and conditioning or at least close enough that it wasn’t too much of a tradeoff. As it turns out, it worked better! In fact, it worked so well that it became a cornerstone of my conditioning programs with several athletes.

Part two

Part two of the evolution of our fat loss programs came shortly after. I have always recommended interval training as a superior form of fat loss over steady state cardio. Interval training is essentially periods of hard work alternated with easier periods of work using a cardio exercise.

The problem—running a mile doing intervals involves about 1500 repetitions. For someone looking to cut body fat, and hit total body weight training two to three times a week, that is a lot of extra volume and potential joint stress. So I started thinking. Interval training is similar to weight training in that it involves sets (and reps) followed by a rest period (albeit active). What if I used a lighter version of traditional strength training and created metabolic circuits?

Timed sets

This is the simplest variation of metabolic work. Pick a load that is about 80% of your 10RM. Perform as many reps as possible at a constant tempo for a period of time (e.g. 60 seconds) and try to perform as many repetitions with as good form as possible. Rest for 15–30 seconds and perform another exercise.

Example #1

Barbell reverse lunge, left leg, 60 seconds
Rest 15–30 seconds
Barbell reverse lunge, right leg, 60 seconds
Rest 15–30 seconds
Barbell push press, 60 seconds
Rest 15–30 seconds
Repeat three times for a 12-minute routine.

Example #2

Kettlebell swings, 30 seconds
Rest 15 seconds
Push-ups/burpees, 30 seconds
Rest 15 seconds
Prowler push, 30 seconds
Rest 15 seconds
Repeat for five rounds for a 12-minute finisher.

Metabolic density training

This is a modified version of EDT as popularized by Charles Staley. However, Charles recommends two exercises performed as a superset for 15 minutes. In this case, we are going to use three exercises and work for ten minutes.

Example #1

Dumbbell bench pres
Alternating lunges
Swiss ball crunch

In this method, select a load that will allow 10–12 reps and perform sets of 6–8. There is no rest between exercises. Work continuously for ten minutes moving from one exercise to the next. The alternate version is to perform five rounds of 6–8 reps of each as fast as possible.

Complexes

Be warned, these are pretty grueling. Perform the complexes at the beginning of your workout when you’re fresh. They’ll elevate your metabolism beyond anything you’ve ever experienced before. The most frequently asked question about complexes is how much load to use. Remember, it’s a metabolic stimulus, not a strength or hypertrophy stimulus so be conservative. Now, don’t go too light either. A good “Cosgrove rule of thumb” is that if you’re not questioning why in the hell you’re doing these exercises or convincing yourself that twice around is enough, you’re not going heavy enough.
Let’s get into it.

Perform each complex once per week for four training sessions per week. Use the following progression:

Week one: 4 sets of 5 reps of each, 90 seconds rest
Week two: 5 sets of 5 reps of each, 75 seconds rest
Week three: 5 sets of 6 reps of each, 60 seconds rest
Week four: 6 sets of 6 reps of each, 45 seconds rest.

Then puke.

Complex A

Bent over barbell row
Hang clean
Front squat and push press hybrid
Jump squat (bar on back)
Good morning

Complex B

Romanian deadlift
Hang clean and front squat and push press (combination lift, perform one rep of each in series)
Reverse lunge (alternate legs)

Complex C

Deadlift
High pull (onto toes)
Squat clean (clean the bar from the hang and then drop into a full squat on the catch)
Military press (strict)
Jump lunges (switch legs)

Insert my evil laugh here!

Complex D

Jump squat
Squat
Squat and hold for 10 seconds
Military press
Push press
Squat and press (combination lift, perform one rep of each in series)

Note: Try to work all exercises at a speed of 1–2 reps per second.

Tabatas

A Tabata protocol is a very high intensity anaerobic interval program that involved eight rounds of 20 second work periods at 170% of your VO2 max with a negative recovery period of 10 seconds. The best way to use these with strength training exercises is to alternate one upper body with one lower body exercise. The second progression we used is to vary the work to rest ratio.

Beginner: 10 seconds work, 20 seconds recovery
Intermediate: 15 seconds work, 15 seconds recover
Advanced: 20 seconds work, 10 seconds recovery

A great pairing is squat jumps and running push-ups (a single push-up and two reps of mountain climbers in alternating fashion) in pairs.

Medley conditioning

This is similar to the other methods in that we are working for time, but we will use 15 seconds on and 15 seconds off and perform multiple rounds with different pieces of equipment. For example, an MMA fighter competing in five-minute rounds may use four exercises in a circuit and perform multiple rounds until the five-minute period is up.

Example #1

15 seconds, Prowler push
15 seconds, rest
15 seconds, squat jump
15 seconds, rest
15 seconds, sledgehammer or medicine ball chops
15 seconds, rest
15 seconds, kettlebell swing
15 seconds, rest

Keep working through the medley until the five-minute period is up

Finishers

Finishers are just short body weight or single piece of equipment only, 3–5 minute routines at the end of each workout.

Screamers:
3 push-ups, 1 tuck jump
6 push-ups, 2 tuck jump
9 push-ups, 3 tuck jumps
12 push-ups, 4 tuck jumps
15 push-ups, 5 tuck jumps
Continue to add three push-ups and one tuck jump to each set until you miss a rep. Then climb back down the ladder.

Leg Matrix:

24 squats
12 lunges each leg (alternating)
12 lunge jumps each leg (alternating)
24 squat jumps
(If you can complete this in under 90 seconds, do two rounds with no rest.)
Squat series:

20-second squat jump
20-second squat
20-second isometric squat
Repeat for three rounds with no rest.

Countdowns

Select two exercises (e.g. kettlebell swing and burpees or squat jumps and plyometric push-ups).
Perform 10 reps of each, nine reps of each, eight reps of each and so on. Each week start with one set of one more rep than your top set (e.g. 11 reps, 10 reps, 9 reps, etc.).

A final warning

This isn’t for the faint hearted or de-conditioned. They are not beginners’ routines. If you’re coming back from injury or illness, don’t try this program yet. It’s brutal. However, if you follow this routine for four weeks, you’ll see a very significant improvement in your conditioning and a massive drop in your body fat!

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To pick up a copy of the Metabolic Acceleration Training DVD — CLICK HERE NOW!

3 Ideas For Tougher Workouts
Alternative Methods of Progression
by Alwyn Cosgrove

Are you on exercise autopilot? After every set do you add a 10-pounder to each side of the bar before you can say, “Please spot me, Jamie Eason?” Then it’s time to consider some new ways to step up your workout. Alwyn Cosgrove has got some great ideas about the subject.
The Path To Progress

Most people use a single variable to progress in their weight training — load lifted. There’s nothing wrong with that, but eventually you reach a ceiling when you simply can’t add more weight to an exercise.

In a typical training program, we have exercise order, exercise selection, sets, reps, tempo, rest period and load. Here’s a small sample workout below. Let’s go over three progression methods and see how each changes the workout.

Sample Workout

1A) Squat — 3 sets of 6 reps (3×6) with 90 seconds rest, using 200 pounds

1B) Dumbbell bench press — 3×6 with 90 seconds rest, using 50 pounds

Workout Volume (sets x reps x weight): Squat 3600 pounds. Dumbbell bench press 1800 pounds. Total 5400 pounds.

Assuming each set takes a minute, the workout is done in 15 minutes.

Most people would just increase the load each week. But instead, we could add an additional rep next workout. Or add an additional set. Or maybe we cut the rest period down, and with the extra time we can add more exercises or even back-off sets.

Method #1: Add Reps

Add one rep to each set of each exercise.

1A) Squat — 3×7 with 90 seconds rest, using 200 pounds

1B) Dumbbell bench press — 3×7 with 90 seconds rest, using 50 pounds

Workout Volume: Squat 4200 pounds. Dumbbell bench press 2100 pounds. Total 6300 pounds.

Method #2: Add Sets

Add one set to each exercise.

1A) Squat — 4×6 with 90 seconds rest, using 200 pounds

1B) Dumbbell bench press — 4×6 with 90 seconds rest, using 50 pounds

Workout Volume: Squat 4800 pounds. Dumbbell bench press 2400 pounds. Total 7200 pounds.

Method #3: Reduce Rest Periods

Decrease the rest between each set.

1A) Squat — 3×6 with 75 seconds rest, using 200 pounds

1B) Dumbbell bench press — 3×6 with 75 seconds rest, using 50 pounds

Workout Volume: Squat 3600 pounds. Dumbbell bench press 1800 pounds. Total 5400 pounds.

Assuming each set takes a minute, the workout is now done in 13.5 minutes.

Let’s Put It All Together

Week one: Workout as described. 3×6 with 90 seconds rest.

Week two: Increase the reps on each set by one. 3×7 with 90 seconds rest.

Week three: Maintain the reps, add one set per exercise. 4×7 with 90 seconds rest.

Week four: Reduce each rest period by 15 seconds per set. 4×7 with 75 seconds rest.

This will take us from week one’s total volume of 5400 pounds in 15 minutes to a total volume of 8400 pounds in 18 minutes, with an increase in workout density from doing those two extra sets. That’s 55% more work in only three more minutes, or over 100 pounds of additional work per minute training.

Obviously this is a huge increase in the total work done without having to add any weight to the bar. So even if you’re in a situation where your home gym doesn’t have any extra weight, you can still make great progress. I haven’t even changed exercise order, exercise selection, rep tempo or load, yet I still managed to create a more challenging workout.

In Conclusion

Hopefully you see the benefits of implementing different methods of progression rather than just increasing load all the time. The key to progress is overload and there are various ways of getting there. Just make sure you’re moving forward every step of the way.

This article originally appeared at t-nation.com

Non-Sexy Training and Nutrition
by Alwyn Cosgrove and Mike Roussell

Eating the same damn food day-in and day-out isn’t a lifestyle that most people can maintain. Instead, it promotes eventual cheating on your diet. Not to mention increasing your risk of developing food allergies.

Having six pack abs for two weeks is cool, but having them for two decades makes you a stud. A greater variety in your diet makes it less likely that you’ll get sick of what you’re eating. Thus, leading to greater dietary compliance, and to long-term maintenance of a killer physique.

Parameters for Weight Training

Strength: Four to six reps with two minute rest periods.

Hypertrophy: Eight to twelve reps with 60 second rest periods.

Metabolic work: Twelve to fifteen (plus) reps with less than 60 second rest periods.

If your goal is strength, do three to four sets in the strength zone, with maybe one set of hypertrophy or metabolic work.

If your goal is hypertrophy, do three to four sets of hypertrophy work and one of the others in each workout.

You can train your core in about two sets of each.
Loading and Progressions: Weight Training

Try to increase your loads each week. There’s no need to “train to failure” but doing a set of six reps with a weight that you can hit twelve with won’t do much. Choose a weight that takes you into that “close to failure” zone.
Progressions

Most people progress in their weight training using a single variable — load lifted.

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, but eventually you’ll reach a ceiling. You simply can’t add any more weight to an exercise.

There are a few other methods of progression that can, and should be, rotated on a regular basis.

There are various ways to do this. In a typical training program we have exercise order, exercise selection, sets, reps, tempo, rest period, and load. Most trainees experiment with two to three of these at the most.
Sample Full-Body Workout

A1) Squats: 3 sets of 6 reps with 90 seconds rest using 200 pounds.

A2) Dumbbell bench press: 3 sets of 6 reps with 90 seconds rest using 50 pounds.

Total Volume: 3,600 pounds squatted + 1,800 pounds pressed = 5,400 pounds total.

Assuming each set takes a minute, the workout is done in 15 minutes.

Obviously we can progress the loading each week. Or we could add an additional rep each workout. Or maybe an additional set. Perhaps we cut the rest period, and with the additional time, we can add extra exercises or back-off sets.
Method One: Adding Reps

A1) Squats: 3 sets of 7 reps with 90 seconds rest using 200 pounds.

A2) Dumbbell bench press: 3 sets of 7 reps with 90 seconds rest using 50 pounds.

Total Volume: 4,200 pounds squatted + 2,100 pounds pressed = 6,300 pounds total.
Method Two: Adding Sets

A1) Squats: 4 sets of 6 reps with 90 seconds rest using 200 pounds.

A2) Dumbbell bench press: 4 sets of 6 reps with 90 seconds rest using 50 pounds.

Total Volume: 4,800 pounds squatted + 2,400 pounds pressed = 7,200 pounds total.
Method Three: Reducing the Rest Period

A1) Squats: 3 sets of 6 reps with 75 seconds rest using 200 pounds.

A2) Dumbbell bench press: 3 sets of 6 reps with 75 seconds rest using 50 pounds.

Total Volume: 3,600 pounds squatted + 1,800 pounds pressed = 5,400 pounds total.

Assuming each set takes a minute, the workout is done in 13.5 minutes.
Putting Them to Use

Week one: Perform the workout as described.
Week two: Increase the reps on each set by one.
Week three: Maintain the reps and increase the sets.
Week four: Reduce the rest period by 15 seconds.

This will take us from a starting volume of 5,400 pounds in 15 minutes, to a total volume of 8,400 pounds in 18 minutes. The training density is increased, but we’re doing two extra sets. That’s 55% more work in only three more minutes, or over a hundred pounds additional work per minute spent training.

This is a huge increase in total work done without having to add any extra weight to the bar. So even if you’re in a situation where your home gym doesn’t have any extra weight, you can still make great progress. You haven’t even changed exercise order, exercise selection, rep tempo, or load. Yet you’re still managing to progress.

So hopefully you can see the benefits to implementing different methods of progression rather than just increasing the load all of the time. The key to progression is overload and there are various ways of doing that. Just make sure you’re progressing.

Loading and Progressions: Nutrition

At the most basic level, you need to be in a caloric deficient to lose fat and a caloric surplus to gain muscle. The extent of these deficits or surpluses is very individual but there are some general guidelines.

If you’re looking to pack some beef onto your frame, then increase your caloric intake every two weeks by 300 to 500 calories. It’s important to consider your body type. Are you a skinny bastard? If so, then you’re going to want to stick to the higher side of that calorie range. If you’re a little soft in the belly, then you’ll want to stick to the lower end.

And if you’re on the heavy side, then you’re actually better off losing the belly before you start your quest to be the next Jay Cutler. This is because your insulin sensitivity will be better when your gut is gone, allowing for you to put on more muscle and less fat.

On the fat loss side of things, it’s best if you don’t reduce your calories too fast. Instead use exercise to create the bulk of your caloric deficit. This will help keep your metabolism up as long as possible while you’re dieting.

Initially you want to shoot for a 500 calorie deficit. Once you’ve maxed out the amount of exercise you can do and your fat loss has reached a plateau, start reducing your calories. First cut the starchy carbs, then total carbs, then all macronutrients equally.

Energy System Work

Again, three times per week seems to cause the fastest adaptations. Other than using cardio or other activities as plain old “calorie burners,” additional work doesn’t seem to result in a faster adaptation. Competitive endurance athletes may need more training sessions, but for the average fitness enthusiast looking to increase their fitness and look better, three times is pretty solid.

As far as progression goes, just try to cover more distance or burn more calories in the same time frame. A lot of trainees just switch off when it comes to cardio work. Think of the people you see reading a magazine when they should be busting their ass. You have to progressively challenge yourself!

Sequence this either directly after your weight training sessions or in a separate session altogether.
The Fantastic Four of Supplements

Creatine: You don’t need any sexy, designer creatine formulations. Micronized creatine may not be pH buffered, modified with ester groups, or bound to arginine alpha ketoglutarate. But damnit, it works!

Fish Oil: Flameout prevents inflammation, boosts your fat burning machinery, and keeps you the healthiest meat head in your gym. Take it. Every day.

Workout Nutrition: Dr. John Berardi taught us all about post-workout nutrition in his “Solving the Post-Workout Puzzle” series. You can read part one here and then wash it down with part two. David Barr put Surge to the test in The Naked Truth, an article about post-workout drinks.
Protein Powder: A common complaint from clients is that they have trouble getting enough protein in during the day. This is where protein powder comes in. A quality protein powder like Metabolic Drive will give you a blend of fast and slow absorbing proteins that are easy on your gut. Protein powder should be used daily to augment your protein needs.

The Wrap Up

The principles that we’ve outlined in this article definitely won’t be considered sexy, and you’re probably thinking, “This shit is simple.” But guess what? I bet you’re not applying all of these basic principles. Look at your training program. Look at your nutrition plan. Are you consistently applying all of the things we’ve outlined? If not, stop complaining and make it happen.

This article originally appeared at t-nation.com