The Author at a high bodyweight.
That should scare off the fitness types.
I hope.
Thanks, John!
"For bulk, do nothing but squats and pullovers."
How often have you heard this?
Well, needless to say, it's true. Squats are the key exercise for gaining, and that no one will deny. But what if your legs are already large enough for your frame and yet your chest is still too small?
Let us suppose your rib box is large and spacious from all the leg work you've done while on the bulking routine, but still the muscles thereon are shallow.
What to do? Which exercises to follow? How long a routine? Where are my socks? These answers, my friends, are what i am going to try and pass on to you here in this article.
My chest, expanded, was 53.5" last month, so I guess I am well suited for giving you chest and back specialization tips.
I have always used the bench press in my training and also the bentover row. These two muscle makers are simply great for giving you a massive upper body in a short, short time. If you do not perform these movements, do so. If you do, then all is well.
For the upper pectorals and deltoids I would advise you to use the incline lateral, handling tremendously heavy poundages. Work up to at least a pair of 100's. That's right, I said 100's!
Another great movement for the back, the trapezius in particular, is the power clean. Any champion weightlifter should be able to give you an example of trapezius size in direct relationship to the cleans and power cleans they perform.
This last movement has really given me tremendous results and I use it extensively . . . it is called the Straight-Arm Pulldown on lat machine. In this exercise I kneel in front of the machine, with my two arms stretched straight above my head and with both hands touching each other I can just reach the pulley . . .
From here, I take a deep breath and pull (or push, you might say) the handles down until they reach my thighs. All the while my arms are kept rigidly straight. After a few sets of 6-8 repetitions, my chest and back are pumped to the limit and I can then go on exercising other parts of my body.
While on this routine I would advise you to do very little work for the other body parts. Work them just enough to let them coast by. Then when you are satisfied with the results this routine can give you, you can then follow a more complete program.
Remember to use low sets of 3 or 4, and low repetitions of 6-8. These five exercises, followed as I have outlined, will enable you to not only increase your size, but your shape and strength will improve too. And also, be sure to eat like it was going out of style!
Note: Recap . . .
Bench
Bentover Row
Heavy Incline Laterals
Stiff Arm Pulldown
3-4 x 6-8.
Minimal schtuff for the rest of your phyzeek while specializing, and
do eat abundantly of the foods children on Youtube tell you to.
Enjoy Your Lifting!
I would have been happy to use a pair of 100's for incline presses for 3-4 sets of 6-8 reps. A pair of 100's for incline laterals would pull both arms out of my shoulder sockets.
ReplyDeleteRight out of the sockets! Thereby increasing chest size. No. Wait. He may have gone way over the top with that pair of 100 pounders line there alright. I once saw a photo of Tom Platz extending his range of motion on flat flyes by digging a hole in the gym floor and having a training partner stand on each of his forearms. These guys will write pretty much anything at times. John McCallum and his "Hepburn uses two adult dehorned rhinos for this and so must you."
DeleteStill a very clever workout; the power clean hits the overall body including the legs and then two compound exercises and two isolation exercises. For 1968, Anthony Ditillo was way ahead of his time in sensible programming. In 2024, it's still a very clever workout.
DeleteIn your photo, given his bulk and leverages, he probably could have used 2 x 100's for incline laterals.
The Weider Cheating Principle taught us all that is not only permissible but necessary for champion results.
DeleteAs the Master Batur - - er, Blaster explicitly described the principle, which he of course originally invented, all the chumps, er, champs employ body english, loose style, sleight-of-hand, er, slight handling, intense peddling er, pedaling, farced, er, forced reps, et cetera, ad infinitum, ad nauseam, in order to maximize profits, er, progress.
So, if anyone wants to gain thirty pounds of pure muscle in the next thirty days, guaranteed, he'd have to be taking some kind of freakin' enhancing, er, hallucinating drug to expect to do so without employing this unfailingly profitable advanced principle.
And, NO, it's untrue that Hoffman's Irregular Training Principle involved zero dietary fiber and more hersheys chocolate.
Incline laterals=incline flys?
ReplyDeleteYes. Working up to 100 pound dumbbells, sir!
DeleteGiven the target poundages suggested, I am now thinking it is probably not performed with straight arms, but rather with bend in the stretched position i.e. the forearm angle is just past the vertical.
DeleteThis short video might show what Anthony Ditillo was suggesting? The instructor points out the arms are not meant to be straight:
https://youtube.com/shorts/kIpagzRxFPo?si=3LzThwxNWN3PEfGs
I don't own a copy, but Bill would have surely provided instructions in his magnificent "The Keys to the Inner Universe". I did a quick google search. There's a photo on page 12 of Bill Pearl's booklet called "Complete Chest Development". It looks like the technique in the video above.
For sure. I'm guessing a lot of arm bend, a looser style and heavier bells. We need a longer link to these demo photos . . . https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjM-Dy1n1lwaOEpkdDsab2Ph2_-Cnz-uVPjiEdny1He3mzVdZuz1bfAmlF_QTtTLBpdXZmiqlWq57VdqeDDxIRb5nSkqt-uNd6jqzHyV83lzXZUKTgudeSGejjEhaIjDukeygTVWH6fENbnFdRXb5RHc4P-Lb82lSxzWHsw_VF2M_oHtouEs3dOjwcqMIU/s320/Screenshot%202024-03-13%20143156.png
DeleteI've heard them called "power flyes"
DeleteAlmost certainly what Ditillo calls here incline laterals are what Bill Pearl referred to as bent arm laterals in his book "Keys to the Inner Universe" and what has been rediscovered/renamed more recently as the barrel press.
DeleteI like that name, Barrel Press! It's about the amount of bend at the elbows and when they're straightened. More bend, more weight used. I've seen rebounding lying laterals, er, flyes before, but the bend at the elbows allows for more weight with these I figure. It's interesting, pretty cool that before a lot of movements were named people were doing them regardless. I got rid of my "Keys" books, the "to Progress" and the "to the Inner Universe" a while back. The Bill Pearl book is quite large, and could have been quite small without all the illustrations and listing of minor changes you can create for yourself with a little thought. I mean, you know the drill . . . squats, for example. Start listing the variations available for a back squat. Try to get back to me in a week 'cause there's a lot of 'em once you start combining styles. Bar placement, stance width, depth, what bends first knees or hips etc., etc., etc. The Pearl book gets a lot of heft, but for my time and space it's too big and repetitive for what's it's worth.
DeleteThe McCallum series, The Keys to Progress . . . several people figured an "update" would be something to put a little time into. Take the whole series in order, start with "The Time Factor" and see what people think could be changed for the better using what we know now, and maybe make some of it a little clearer and see the reasons behind why the layouts are what they are, as well as ways to alter the diet recommendations given. At the Drapers' IronOnline site a few of us had fun with that, and there's some half-decent thoughts in that long thread that links to each article in order here on this blog. A six-page thread that petered out as we went through the series, but I learned some good stuff from being part of that one. https://www.davedraper.com/fusionbb/showtopic.php?tid/34966/tp/1/
DeleteIf anyone's into it, we could use that to do the same here. Look at the series and see how it could be improved, what can be taken away from the various progressive layouts, update some of it, create a less gut-creating Get Big Drink . . . that sort of stuff.
DeleteCome to think of it, I only got to "Maximum Effort, Part Two" in putting the series up here. There's more following that. Yippee! Things to make and things to do! I love it! Might as well put the rest up.
DeleteTurns out I got to Maximum Effort, Part Three. Next is "Vitamin C" which I won't be doing. I'll skip that and to go to the four-parter on "The Causes of Failure."
DeleteBut yeah, it starts with "The Time Factor" and anything centered on what could make the series, article by article, more productive or how it could be altered individually and still keep the goal and approach close to the same could go in the comments of each article.
Delete