By Mike Berg

Looking for the perfect place to work out? This five-step checklist will help you easily choose a gym that fits your needs.

Finding a health club is a bit like dating. Sure, the first night out may be memorable — great looks, interesting conversation, completely compatible in your interests. Next thing you know, you’re on a second date, and a few weeks later you’re exclusive.

Then the real test begins. You find out your schedules don’t quite match up, her friends are a pain in the butt, and all that fun stuff you did on the first few dates were just a ruse. Action movies? Nah, really don’t like them — and bowling or the bar, forget it! Can’t we just stay in and watch “Sex and the City” reruns?

Now, picture this: You need a place to work out, so you open the phone book and head to the nearest club. You’re offered a quick tour around, and all the equipment looks shiny and new, the weight area isn’t really too crowded, and it seems to be everything you need. Before you know it, you’ve signed a year contract. Flash forward a few weeks. You realize the facility closes too early on weekends. Your workout is spent maneuvering around gabby nitwits on cell phones. On chest day, you’re often fighting for the one (and only) bench press station. That damn contract all of a sudden looks like a deal straight out of a Bear Stearns portfolio. We hope this doesn’t sound familiar, and we’ve caught you in time to offer you this five-pronged checklist on finding the right gym for you. Because where you work out is not only as important as finding the right significant other, it may be more important. After all, you could be a member of a gym for years — compared to that, how long has your average relationship lasted? Yep, that’s what we thought.

#1 LOCATION: While you don’t want to settle for the nearest gym to your house if it’s otherwise mismatched with your needs, the general rule is, the closer the better. Convenience is a huge consideration for your gym choice — there may be a spectacular club an hour away, but realistically, unless you’re a pro bodybuilder whose job it is to work out, how often can you give up two hours of your day just for your drive to and from the gym?

#2 HOURS: It would be nice, but not all fitness centers are open 24/7. A quick glance over the hours of operation isn’t enough: You’ll want to try the gym for at least a week so you know firsthand the hours are not only attuned with your schedule, but that the traffic on the gym floor isn’t overwhelming during the time you want to go. While at any club, the crunch times are usually 7-10 in the morning and 5-8 at night, some get much more congested than others, a simple equation of too many members converging on too little space. If it’s irritating for you at the start, imagine how over it you’ll be by month three.

#3 EQUIPMENT: If you’re an experienced trainer with a workout plan, bring it with when you visit, or at least make a list of the equipment you require. If you use a lot of free weights, make sure the weight area isn’t just some afterthought, tucked in a dank corner to make way for row upon row of all manner of machines. If you have specific pieces you swear by, take a close look — for instance, some gyms have phased out barbell military bench stations. Others may only have one Smith machine. Believe it or not, more than a few only have either a standing or a seated calf machine, not both. If you have a choice between two gyms that are otherwise similar, equipment may indeed make the difference between which one you ultimately select.

#4 CLIENTELE: If you’re a hard-nosed, serious trainer, trust us: You’re gonna hate working out among a bunch of WASPs and wannabes who spend more time chatting (while lounging on the equipment) than curling. When you try the gym, take a look around — no, you don’t have to make friends (although it helps when you need a spot), but if you’re ready for some good old-fashioned heavy lifting, complete with a grunt or two and maybe even a touch of chalk here and there, who wants to deal with the dismissive eye rolling and complaints to the manager?

#5 EXTRAS: Does the facility include a basketball court, pool, and cardio classes? This can go one of two ways: If you’re going to use them, then by all means try to find a place that has them. However, if cost is a principal concern, remember your membership is priced to pay for these amenities, whether you exploit them or not. There’s no need to sign up at a full-service, upscale health club if all you really want is a weight pit and a loud stereo, so keep that in mind.

Take this list and go into your tours armed with the questions and observations to make a smart buying decision. As a final hint, we urge this: Don’t ever sign up for a long-term deal on your first visit (and don’t ever sign up for more than a year). As suggested in #2, if the membership agent is unwilling to give you a pass to try out their place for a week or so, move on — any reputable club won’t apply a high-pressure sales tactic, and should gladly offer a test run. That way, you can find out firsthand, with no strings attached, just how compatible you and the gym really are before you make the commitment. Ahhh, if only your dates had the same policy.

By John Davies, Founder Renegade Training

A number of years ago, I began to realize I know very little about the mainstream exercise market. I had for the most part went about my career, consulting with clients, working with coaches and teams but virtually having no involvement with the modern “fitness facility”. I suppose I had assumed logical choices were being made for common training concerns. As you may have gathered from my tone, I certainly learned once again to never “assume” particularly when it comes to the modern iron-game.

Amongst the peculiar developments of the last twenty-plus years is the near abandonment of the notion of old-fashioned common sense. As it relates to strength training, selectorized equipment and machines were meant to assist training regimes. But I doubt anyone in the development of machines would have ever considered that they would in the future eliminate fundamental barbell movements. In a bizarre twist of the business, gyms are packed with countless rows of extremely expensive machines that cannot match the work performed with a single barbell.

It is never more glaringly obvious then with “back training”. Regardless of your intentions, whether you are a bodybuilder, an athlete or just someone trying to get in shape, proper back development is extremely important to all your goals. But oddly enough, the modern exercise industry has pulled you away from the most important exercises. Weight lifting is remarkably simple, you’re either pushing, pulling, pressing or squatting a weight (naturally lunging and extending as well). Likewise, weight (resistance) can move concentrically, eccentrically or remain constant. Yet as you move away from free weights, many of these simple movements become distorted, prone to poor movement patterns, and lack the desired training effect. The body’s stabilizing requirements used in free weights is essential in creating true “strength” because it implicitly works the “weakest link” in the bodies musculature.

Back training in the modern facility has gotten far off base and amongst the litany of expensive machines gleaming with chrome, you cannot beat the cold metal of a barbell and a high-bar. That’s where back training starts and for the most part where it should end. So whether you’re training in a finely appointed fitness facility or like me in a gym where you might do an oil change or two, there are three basic exercises that will get you the most bang for your training buck. These are:

• Deadlifts (regular and snatch-grip)
• Pullups / Chin-ups
• Bent-over-Rows

Each of these exercises are mainstays of training and should be used on a consistent basis. Depending upon your training goals or “split” their use can vary, although I generally use each of the barbell movements twice per week and pull-ups three times per week for a total of twenty-one sets per week. Complicated? Not at all, but it’ll get great results in an easy-to-follow system. If you follow this method using a basic five day training regime (”split”) you will use each of the barbell movements on days 1 and 5 with two to three sets each of approximately six repetitions in the 80 to 85% range with no greater than forty-five seconds rest between sets. High bar work should be done on days 1, 3 and 5 and vary between pull-ups (palms facing away), chin-ups (palms facing towards you) and even towel-chins (place a towel over a bar and grasp the ends of the towel, pulling your head to alternating sides of the bar) with a rep range upwards of six to eight reps. Equally with pullups it is important to vary the grip position with a narrow-grip pullup of one-hand width apart (tremendous bicep developer) to a modestly wide position roughly that of a “Snatch-grip” width, where you hands are spread the distance from elbow to elbow with arms held parallel to the ground. In the wide variation perform this movement by pulling up to front of the bar. As we advance in pull-ups I will present some extremely interesting and taxing variations. Please note that contrary to many approaches, pull-ups are not done in this manner to failure but in a controlled “volume development” approach.

For those specifically within athletic training goals, who utilize my Renegade Training™ protocols, you can use Deadlifts within either the “focus” or “supplemental” lift sections (for additional explanation please see the six part “Squat-Power” series at ProSource). In the event you are able to perform split work (i.e. Split Jerks or Split Snatches) at a high degree, I would include them as the final “focus” lift using a “snatch-grip” Deadlift variation and follow the typical protocols of four sets of six repetitions (total twenty-four reps) at sixty-five per-cent maximum rep, with heavy emphasis on bar speed and movement generation.

Finally make sure you combine all of the above work with the shoulder-capsule training (internal / external rotation, cuban press and rope pulls) found in my Mass Development article at ProSource, which also includes key technical issues on Deadlifting, Bent-over-Rows and unique variations on Pull-ups / Chin-ups.

Follow that plan and you’ll never have a question of back strength and size again.

Thanks again.

By John Davies, Founder Renegade Training

Over the past ten years Kettlebell Training has gained a great deal of popularity with the fitness and health industry. The resurgence of Kettlebells as a training medium is nothing short of a marketing miracle as while they have a very long history in the iron game, they haven’t seen this type of mainstream use at any time. However just like the term “marketing miracle” would suggest, there has been a lot of mysticism attached to a very simple training medium. My efforts in teaching proper Kettlebell techniques are to eliminate the over-hyped (and over-priced) mysticism so that professional trainers and coaches can teach it correctly and the public can make use of this highly effective tool.

Prior to getting started with our strength training work I strongly urge you to review Kettlebell Training for a solid background in proper exercise technique. Lifting with Kettlebells is not complicated at all but needs to be learnt properly. One of the enormous problems I see within the exercise industry is that even the self-appointed “experts” promote common errors as it relates to movement generation, posture and truly make this a much more complicated medium then it is.

As it relates to “strength development“, with KB’s we have a peculiar series of twists to navigate that you don’t have with other training mediums. With all other mediums you can simply increase the load as you develop but obviously as a fixed-weight our options are severely limited. In-fact for advanced lifters the use of KB training becomes extremely difficult in planning as it for the most part is relegated to generalized fitness work given that the resistance is not a sufficient demand compared to other mediums. However there are a variety of options for the advanced lifter and the new lifters for true strength training with Kettlebells that I use with great effectiveness.

Step one is to ignore the notion of simply doing more reps. Within my private practice I have consulted with numerous individuals who took the advice of others and increased their rep counts to incredible proportions (given the relative ease) only to find a series of serious long-term injuries set-in. By increasing your rep count infinitum you are merely doing “more reps” and sometimes more is simply more and not better. This occurs because individuals are performing exercises as their energy system tires and they become prone to a break-down of optimal or proper movement patterns. Equally by increasing rep counts to seemingly no end the ability to mathematically balance a program properly becomes an impossibility feat and the checks and balances of program design by professionals are eliminated.

With that said there are numerous options that I have used for strength training with Kettlebells. I have used them for myself and very advanced lifters.

First and foremost is the use of “doubles” where you have KB’s in each hand. The use of Kettlebells in each hand jump-starts this concern of strength-development like none-other in this medium. For those of you who watched my KB DVD “Deuces Wild” you’re accustomed to the advanced stimulus this provides as well as how it can be used in highly imperfect settings (lifting with ocean waves striking) for incredible results. I’ll be quite honest with you, as you follow the technical guidelines in the introductory article, with proper development of the legs and posterior chain, the hoisting (i.e. a Snatch Lift) of one of the heavier KB’s (i.e. 70 – 85lb) will be relatively easy. However one in each hand is radically different and while not “scientific”, I have found that with “doubles”, a individual is generally able to use 125-150% of KB weight when performing similar compound movements with a barbell. This is not a precise measurement and there will be variances depending upon level of expertise and experience but for the majority of individuals who would find a 250 lb Power Clean a solid goal, using KB doubles is a noteworthy option that equally provides training in a safe, controlled environment that is cost-sensitive and transportable.

Secondly, in KB strength work the use of training complexes, where typically doubles are used with “shock” (depth jumps) type training immediately, is extremely influential in development. Depth jumps induce reactive strength development by basically switching (reducing time in the “coupling” phase) from the eccentric to concentric phase. Typically I’ll use an eighteen inch box height with a one or two foot step or leap off to a “stick” landing. There are a number of variations that we’ll go through at a later date with specific training days.

Thirdly is the incorporation of “dive starts” where the lifter responds to a coach’s / trainer’s auditory call to execute the lift. With kettlebells on the ground (or box) and the incumbent in a “ready” position, upon a clap (or yes, a coaching whistle) the movement is executed with speed, power and precision.

Three great protocols for Strength Training with Kettlebells for your use. In the next installment we’ll look into the planning stages of KB strength work and the inclusion of important body-weight movements as well as “imperfection” training to increase the effect.

Thank you.

Get a Jump On Your Best Body Ever with These 8 Quick Fat-Loss Tips You Can Use Today

We would love to tell you that shedding unwanted pounds is easier than scoring touchdowns in the Arena Football League. However, if you’ve been studiously and furiously doing your cardio, lifting weights, and eating clean, and not seeing the physical changes you’re hoping for, you already know better.

Well, consider this story your TD — and two-point conversion — in the battle against fat. Here, you’ll find eight simple-to-implement tips and strategies to help you improve your get-lean game plan. It won’t be as easy as playing football in a 50-yard roller rink, sure, but your results may just prompt you to break into an impromptu end-zone celebration anyway.

1) VARY YOUR CARDIO:

Steady-state aerobic sessions — those where you maintain a constant pace throughout your workout — do not burn as much body fat as interval training, in which you fluctuate your pace between slower and near-max efforts. This can be as simple as doing a 15-second all-out sprint every minute during a jog, or can be slightly more complicated, such as the interval programs built into most treadmills, ellipticals and exercise bikes at your health club.

2) KEEP THE FIRE BURNING:

Some cardio options are better than others — at least when it comes to the calorie burn they promote after the workout is over. Yes, you read that correctly: certain forms of aerobic training elevate your metabolism higher and for a extended period of time long after you’ve stopped exercising. Methods to increase your EPOC (i.e. your excess post-exercise oxygen consumption) include doing cardio activities of 60 minutes in duration (versus 40 or less), weight training after your cardio, and using the interval-type training outlined in tip #1.

3) BREAK A SWEAT:

You may be doing cardio, sure … but if you’re not burning appreciable amounts of fat and your diet isn’t the likely culprit, you have to ask the question, Are you exercising hard enough? It seems so clear-cut, but take a look around the cardio room at your local gym and you’ll see plenty of people plodding along, not breathing all that hard and in no need of a towel. The truth is, burning fat and transforming your physique is hard, hard work. Sweat equity is the only viable road to a lean body, so put in the effort and push yourself as hard as you can.

4) BUILD MUSCLE:

The more lean muscle mass you have, the more calories your body burns, even at rest. So an effective weight-training program is key. And by “effective,” we mean this: Don’t follow misguided advice to up your repetitions to 15-20 or more per set in some convoluted effort to turn your lifting sessions into wildly inefficient cardio workouts. Instead, stick with the heavier-weight, 6-12 rep sets that are best for prompting muscular growth.

5) DIVIDE AND CONQUER:

How many meals are you eating per day? If it’s four or less, try this: Take the same amount of food and divide it over 6-8 meals, spaced two-and-a-half to three hours apart. (Make sure you include 20-30 grams of protein minimum with each meal.) This helps keep you fueled while lessening the chances that excess calories taken in will be stored as body fat.

6) INCREASE YOUR PROTEIN:

A recent study out of University College London found that Peptide YY, a hormone that travels to the brain from the gastrointestinal system to indicate satiety, increased in those who ate a high protein meal (65% protein), versus high-carb and high-fat meals. In basic terms, the high-protein meals led to a significant decrease in hunger pangs — and obviously, the less hungry you are, the less excess food you’ll eat. Not only does protein keep you feeling fuller longer than carbohydrates or fat, as the study suggests, it takes more overall energy for your body to digest, meaning it prompts calorie burning. Perhaps most notably, protein is the critical nutrient in ensuring you can successfully build muscle, which is important, as you learned in Tip #4.

7) QUICK TRICKS:

On their own, none of the following will make a monumental difference, but if you want to leave no detail to chance, try cold water (one study found that drinking two cups between meals raised resting metabolic rate by around 30% for over 60 minutes), add chili peppers to spice up meals (the capsaicin in chilis has fat-burning properties), and drink plenty of sugar-free green tea throughout the day (as green tea contains EGCG, which has been shown to have thermogenic effects).

SUPPLEMENT SMART:

When trying to shed pounds and get ripped, a host of powerful supps can help. The fundamentals include a caffeine/green tea formula, conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), citrulline malate, konjac glucomannan, 7-keto DHEA, pure South African Hoodia gordonii, yohimbine, glutamine, and protein powders and bars to augment a clean diet.

“How much do ya bench?” It’s arguably the most oft-asked question of bodybuilders and gym rats, and we’re here to tell you, the answer doesn’t matter all that much. In fact, concentrating too hard on the bench press to inflate your max to impressive proportions is counterproductive. The same is true of less celebrated but no-less-common exercises you may rely on workout after workout.

Blasphemy, you say? Read on, and see if we can’t change your mind - and improve your results.

Chest: Barbell Bench Press
We don’t lead off this list with the ever-popular bench press because it’s a lousy exercise. It’s not. However, it’s here because far too many people attribute way too much importance to it, performing it to the detriment of their overall chest development. Too much emphasis on the barbell press leads to thick meaty muscle in your middle chest, while the larger upper-pectoral area lags woefully behind.

Best alternative: To attack the most important area of your chest, Dumbbell and Barbell Incline Presses can’t be beat. Both also hit your middle chest (much more effectively than the flat-bench press hits the upper pecs), making them a solid anchor in any chest-training workout.

Back: Supported T-Bar Row
The T-bar row is a wonderful exercise, directly engaging the muscles of your mid- and upper back. However, a certain variation of the T-bar row includes a pad that you rest your chest on during the exercise. Bad idea - the heavier you lift, the more the weight compresses your chest (and lungs) against the pad as you lift. It’s a lot harder to maintain good form and continue a set to the point of failure when you’re struggling for a deep breath.

Best alternative: Thankfully, equipment manufacturers make a freestanding version of the T-Bar Row, without the pad, allowing you to breathe easy during your sets. You can also do T-bar rows the old-fashioned way, placing one end of an Olympic barbell in the corner and loading the other end. Just straddle the bar and get into position, and you can perform either one-arm or two-arm rows.

Shoulders: Reverse Pec-Deck Flye
The problem with the reverse pec-deck flye is that it’s a poor replacement for the more valuable bent-over dumbbell lateral raise. Try a set of reverse pec decks and you’ll see what we mean - not only are they relatively easy because of the mechanical advantage (due to the design of the machine and the fact you’re upright and not working directly against gravity), but most people find it difficult to focus the effort on their rear delts no matter how well they perform each rep.

Best alternative: Many people do struggle with their form on bent-over dumbbell lateral raises, mainly because they try to lift too much - think about how small the target muscles actually are, and you’ll soon realize that hoisting 50s is calling on more momentum and back muscles than the rear delts. Lighten the load, take each rep slowly and deliberately, and focus on contracting your rear delts on each rep, and you’ll get much better results from this exercise than even pec-deck flyes done with perfect form.

Legs: Leg Press
There’s a reason scrawny-legged guys can press hundreds of pounds on the leg press, but can barely eke out reps with 185 pounds on the barbell squat: The leg press has too much mechanical advantage inherent in its design. Impressive tree-trunk thighs are not forged on a steady diet of leg presses - to really get at the tough muscle fibers of the quadriceps, hamstrings and glutes, you need to challenge them fiercely, and the leg press doesn’t do that. It’s just too easy in comparison to other superior movements.

Best alternative: The barbell squat and hack squat are a much truer test of mettle for your thighs and glutes - in these two exercises, you’re not at a mechanical advantage, putting your muscles under maximal stress, which is the quickest way to muscle-building results.

Triceps: Dumbbell Kickback
Of all the excellent triceps exercises available to you - close-grip bench presses, dips, lying French presses, two-arm overhead extensions, cable pressdowns, among many others - why would you ever want to cycle in a less-effective move like kickbacks? People commonly bring the weight too far forward at the start of the repetition, taking stress off the triceps and generating momentum to lift the weight back up to an arms-straight position. If you eliminate this issue and stop the weight before your elbow gets to 90 degrees, you are working in a compromised range of motion.

Best alternative: Any of the aforementioned exercises would be better, but one that mimics the kickback closely is the One-Arm Overhead Dumbbell Extension. The bonus? You use gravity to your advantage, eliminating the growth-robbing momentum and the “dead zone” where the stress is taken off the triceps.

Biceps: Standing Barbell Curl
Although the preacher curl machine, with its one-size-does-not-fit-all handles and awkward range of motion, could easily get the nod here, the standing barbell curl has hurt the productivity of many more biceps routines over the years. Like the bench press, this exercise isn’t overrated because it’s a bad exercise - it’s on this list because many guys not only put way too much emphasis on it in their workouts, but insist on letting their ego dictate how much weight they pile on the bar. From there, it’s all about hip thrust and body contortion to swing the weight to the top.

Best alternative: The Incline Dumbbell Curl puts your biceps on stretch for a more forceful and complete contraction, and being on a bench takes away the opportunity to use excess body movement to generate momentum on the lift.

Ready to get back to the basics of growing? Here’s a simple workout regimen that only requires an adjustable bench, barbell and plates, perfect for home or the gym.

On a quick lap around the typical health club, you’ll likely pass a lot of shiny, complicated equipment - cables that adjust to every conceivable angle, multifunctional apparatus with space age levers and handles, and stations for each and every muscle group. Impressive, maybe, but here’s the truth: You don’t need any of it to build a great physique.

This program (which can be done at home or that aforementioned club) centers around the bare-bones basics you need to craft a strong, muscular body. If you’re just starting out and want to keep your cash outlay to a minimum, here’s the good news: All that’s required is an adjustable bench, a barbell with a set of locking safety collars, and a selection of weight plates. That’s it - no high-tech machines necessary.

With the major body parts broken over a four-day split, you can either train four days per week, resting the other three, or get more aggressive, starting over at workout #1 before the week’s up and only taking one or two rest days per seven. Below, we break down the four training days for you, and offer instruction on the more esoteric exercises.

Good Morning: Clean a moderately light barbell up from the floor and over your head so it rests across your shoulders, as if you were about to squat. Keeping your lumbar region tight and in its natural curve, bend at the hips to lower your upper body to a point where it forms a 90-degree angle with your legs (or as close as you can without rounding your lower back), then return to a standing position. Avoid the tendency to look up - your head should remain in line with your spine at all times.

Wide-Grip Push-Up: This is the same as a standard push-up, except place your hands outside of shoulder width, your elbows out and away from your body.

Hack Squat: Place a loaded barbell on the floor behind your ankles. Bend at your knees and hips to lower yourself, grasp the barbell with an overhand or mixed grip, and drive through your heels, engaging your thighs to get to a standing position. Then lower the bar to the floor and repeat. Your back should be tight and straight throughout the exercise.

Walking Lunge: Standing upright, hold a plate in each hand, or clean a loaded barbell up and over your head to your upper back. Step forward with your left foot and descend into a lunge - at the bottom, your left knee will be at a 90-degree angle, your right leg will be straight and out behind you. Now extend your front knee and come back to a standing position before stepping forward with your right leg. One step with each leg equals one rep.

Standing and Seated Calf Raise: For standing raises, grasp a barbell and hold it at your thighs as you step onto a raised object such as a block, your heels hanging off the edge. For the seated version, place the block next to the bench and put a loaded barbell across your lap (or you can place weight plates on your lap) for resistance.

Bust boredom in your workouts and get the most out of the common machines at your gym with these five unique exercises

Versatility isn’t an attribute limited to switch-hitting infielders and infomercial products. (Hey, who hasn’t needed their Ginsu knife to slice through nails and tin cans?) Indeed, at the gym, you can find this trait in an unexpected place - the typical machines that populate weight rooms.

For instance, did you realize you could do biceps curls on two different types of back machines? Or train your legs on an assisted pull-up machine? The following are five ways you can squeeze brand new benefits out of the same old equipment, thus giving you more options to keep your workouts fresh and your muscles growing.

1. Shrugs on a Standing Calf Raise Machine
Shrugs with a barbell or dumbbell are excellent trapezius builders, but both have one limiting flaw: the strength of your grip. Without straps, if your grip gives out before your traps, you’re forced to end the set prematurely. Doing shrugs instead on a standing calf raise machine eliminates this issue. And although a calf raise machine comes with a limitation of its own - the amount of total weight on the stack - a beginner or intermediate lifter who hasn’t advanced to super-heavy poundages can benefit from adding calf-raise machine shrugs to their regimen. Performing them is simple: Step into the machine, feet centered on the toe supports, body upright, back and abs taut, with your shoulders squarely under the pads. From there, shrug your shoulder caps upward as high as you can, then lower them deep and repeat. Make sure the machine is adjusted so the weight stack does not touch down at the bottom of each rep.

OPTION B: Another machine option for shrugging? If your gym has one, try using a flat-bench press machine, straddling the seat and taking a handle in each hand.

2. One-Legged Presses on an Assisted Pull-Up Machine
Outside of pull-ups and dips, the assisted pull-up machine may seem pretty limited in what you can do with it. But did you know you could also work your legs on it? By using the platform where your knees usually rest as a footplate, you can do presses one leg at a time - a handy option if a leg press isn’t available or if you’re just looking for an occasional twist to add to your usual leg-training regimen. To perform it, place one foot on the side support, the other in the center of the knee platform; you should also brace yourself by holding onto the rails with both hands. Then, flex the muscles of your thigh to press the platform down until your leg is straight, pause for a second and reverse, bringing your knee back up until your thigh is parallel to the floor before starting the descent into the next rep.

3. Lying Biceps Curls at a Seated Row Station
Biceps training can get tedious. After all, there’s only so many ways to do a curl, and curling is the one and only viable way to work your bi’s. So a lot of keeping your biceps routine invigorated is cycling in new exercises, and that’s where lying curls come in. For this exercise, you lie flat on the bench of a seated row station, feet firmly on the platforms, knees partially bent, holding a short straight bar or short cambered bar attached to the cable. From this position, bend your arms, doing a curl the same as if you were standing up, keeping your elbows at your sides throughout. The benefit of the lying curl is the reduction of body english - when you stand, you can use your hips to help swing the weight up, but in a prone position, it’s just your biceps versus the weight.

OPTION B: You can also do this lying on the floor in front of a lower cable pulley, which allows you to keep your legs flat and out of the way of the range of motion.

4. Overhead Curls on a Seated Pulldown Machine
Here’s another biceps curling option - sit in a pulldown machine, take an underhand, shoulder-width grip on the bar overhead and keep your upper arms alongside your ears. Now, curl the bar down behind your head, hold and flex your biceps for a moment, then slowly re-extend your arms.

5. Calf Raises on a Leg Press Machine
Of the five variations outlined in this article, this one is the most common. But if you haven’t tried calf raises using a leg-press machine, you’re missing out on an incredible way to attack your gastrocnemius, the larger, thicker muscle on the back of your lower leg. Here’s how you do it: Sit in the machine and place your feet at the bottom of the platform, your toes and balls of your feet on it, your heels off the edge. Then extend your legs to straighten your knees, release the safety latches, and start doing full calf raises. Be sure to work through a full range of motion, with complete flexion at the top of each rep and a deep stretch at the bottom. To give each calf undivided attention, this movement can be done one leg at a time.

OPTION B: Calf raises can also be done on a hack squat machine, by hanging your heels off the bottom edge.

When you glance at some of those old black and white pictures of Arnold Schwarzenegger, taken in the original Gold’s Gym in Venice on Pacific Avenue, what’s most noticeable about his physique is his massive chest. It is full and thick and when he does his side chest pose it swells up and seems to stick out a mile. Just standing there relaxed it appeared thick and dense like two massive slabs of beef sitting on his rib cage.

In fact a lot of the old school guys had thick chests back in the day, Lou Ferrigno, Serge Nubret, Franco Columbu, but it seems these days very few bodybuilders have that really impressive chest development. Thick, sweeping chest muscles have been overtaken by monstrous front delts making it obvious where all the pec muscles went.

When Arnold was growing up, everyone trained chest and biceps and didn’t pay as much attention to other muscle groups, like shoulders for instance. Since shoulder muscles were weaker, they didn’t take over all the work when training chest. Stretching the shoulder girdle and chest was a common practice years ago in an effort to expand the rib cage and increase the overall measurement of the chest. Inadvertently this created more flexibility through the chest and shoulders so when a bodybuilder performed a full range of movement on his chest exercises, his chest muscles were flexible enough that the load was not as easily transferred to the shoulder muscles which would then do much of the work.

When chest muscles are not very flexible they can only stretch so far before they will either tear or the load will be transferred to another muscle group or connective tissue in the shoulder joint. If you are doing dumbbell presses for instance, as you lower the dumbbells to your chest you will reach a point where your chest muscles cannot stretch beyond. If you continue to lower the dumbbells past that point then the shoulders will take over most of the work. If that happens you will feel tightness in your shoulders at the lower part of the movement and after doing the set your shoulders will feel pumped and burning. When you over-stretched at the bottom of the movement your shoulder muscles took over the workload. You thought you were training your chest and just doing your best to perform a full range of movement but instead you have just trained your shoulders, which explains why your shoulders grow but your chest doesn’t.

One obvious solution might be to perform partial movements when training chest (meaning not lowering the weight all the way down to your chest). While partial movements have their place in an advanced training program, your chest muscles won’t be getting much work if the range of motion is limited by inflexibility. The further a muscle group has to travel when performing an exercise, the more work it does and the more it will grow. Muscle inflexibility will stop your progress cold.

Increasing flexibility and Range of Motion is the goal

• Muscle tissue can be trained to be more flexible by stretching regularly. But it’s always important to ensure your muscle tissue is warm before you try stretching it. For the next 4 weeks, do 3 sets of pushups to warm up and stretch for a couple minutes between each warm-up set. For the first set of pushups just go 2/3 of the way down to keep your shoulders out of the movement until you are more flexible. After stretching between the 1st and 2nd set, the rest of your pushups should be full movements.
• Stretch between every set during the entire workout.
• Since your chest has not been doing all the work during your chest training you will have to teach those muscles to contract through the entire movement because they are used to your shoulders taking over at the bottom. Start with a weight about 50% less than you normally use and add weight each set. Be prepared to use a lot less weight than you have been doing because you will perform your reps slowly going the same speed up and the same speed down like a hydraulic piston.
• When you get to the bottom of the movement feel your chest muscles stretch and then don’t go beyond to the point where you feel your shoulders stretching. As you get more flexible you will be able to go deeper but you will always gauge the depth you go on your chest exercises by whether or not your shoulders are involved in the movement and not how far the weight travels.
• Don’t use weight training as a stretching exercise, stretch between sets and after you train. Using your sets to stretch your chest muscles will just involved your shoulders in the work.
• Finally, lay off your front delt training for 4 weeks while you do this chest specialization program. They could probably use a break anyway while your chest catches up.
• Train chest 2 times a week for 4 weeks then return to your normal training cycle.

Day 1

Day 2

Shock Treatment Series: Part I

It’s easy to think that bodybuilding is just about building big muscles and getting lean enough to show them off. It’s easy because getting big is easy and so is getting lean, or at least it’s easy compared to balancing all that muscle development so that your body is symmetrical and proportionate. The problem with easy is that one day you look in the mirror and realize you have lagging muscle groups that seem so far behind the rest of your body that you think they will never catch up.

Size for the sake of size is meaningless. We’ve all seen those guys with one or two incredible body parts and nothing else. Building a well-developed body that is both symmetrical and balanced is what bodybuilding has always been about.

That’s easier said than done because despite how much hard work you do sometimes, there are muscle groups that simply refuse to co-operate and grow. This series of training articles is designed to help solve any problems you may have with one of those stubborn muscle groups.

Build Those Stubborn Calves

Calves are the one muscle group that almost everyone trains incorrectly. Isolating the workload on muscle groups that have only one fulcrum (one joint involved in the exercise) like seated calf raises for instance is theoretically the most direct way to train a muscle group and in most cases that theory holds true. Calves are a different animal, pun intended, because of how the lower leg is constructed so just isolating the movement isn’t enough to necessarily make them grow.

The Gastrocnemius muscle or calf muscle is attached to a tendon that attaches on the other end to your heel (your Achilles tendon). The Achilles tendon is very strong and if you train your calves improperly it is very easy for some of that workload to be transferred from the muscle to the Achilles tendon. That will logically result in a lot of work with very little return in the way of calf muscle growth.

If you have calves like a homing pigeon and no matter what you do they refuse to grow, then try these four things for 8 weeks and just see if those calves don’t start turning into cows.

• Keep constant tension on the calf muscle during the entire set
  

  When you are training calves you want to avoid movement that will transfer the load onto your Achilles tendon from your calf muscles. The best way to do this is to keep constant tension on the calf muscle through the entire set by keeping your calf flexed as hard as possible through the complete arc of movement. This will be hard to do the first few times you try as you need to teach your muscles to stay contracted while they move through the movement of the exercise. It’s easiest to learn this by starting with seated calf raises. Position yourself in he calf machine and remove the safety placing the load on your calves. Reach down and feel your calves as you apply tension to your calf muscles by flexing them. Slowly raise the weight keeping your calves flexed. When you reach the top of the movement flex as hard as you can for a 3 count then slowly start to lower the weight while keeping the muscle tight (this is the tricky part). You will really need to go slow and concentrate on keeping your calf muscles flexed. By holding your hand on your calves you will be able to tell if the tension goes away or remains through the whole movement.

• Don’t over stretch during your calf exercises
  

  When you stretch your calf muscle as far as it will stretch under a load, it becomes hard to keep tension on the muscle and if you can’t keep tension on the muscle then it can’t contract as hard as it possibly can, stimulating growth while you lift the weight. If you over stretch on the bottom you will take the workload off the calf muscle and distribute it elsewhere which will result in a lot of work with very little calf muscle growth. You only need to lower the weight a little but not all the way to get enough work done to grow.

• Don’t bounce to get higher on your toes at the top of the movement
  

  So often you will see a bodybuilder bouncing at the top of the movement trying to get a peak contraction. Since the Achilles tendon and not the calf muscle is being used to lift the weight into position there is very little benefit from getting the extra height. At very best you perform an isometric contraction at the very top of the movement after the weight has been bounced into place and isometric contractions are not effective for building size. As you perform your calf raise with tension on the calf muscle through the whole movement you will reach a point at the top of the movement where you cannot go any higher without bouncing. Don’t Bounce! When you are at the top of the movement just hold the contraction for a 3 count then start back down again. Getting as high as you can on your tip toes by bouncing is completely ineffective for building calf size and just because your muscles are burning doesn’t mean they are being stimulated to grow, it just means you have a high amount of lactic acid in your muscles from metabolizing glucose. You can get a burn and not have stimulated your muscle effectively enough to grow.

• Keep your movement slow and steady – same speed up, same speed down
  

  By performing each calf exercise with a controlled, steady pace, it is much easier to keep constant tension on the calf muscle and you need that tension to be able to contract hard enough to stimulate growth. Think of your car for a minute. It will go 60 miles an hour but it takes a few seconds to get there. Your muscles will contract very hard but that is not instantaneous. If you keep tension on the muscle all the time it is much easier for that muscle group to contract near 100% of it’s capability much quicker. The harder you can contract through a movement the more that muscle group will ultimately grow. Theoretically, the purpose of weight is to force the muscle to contract harder by adding resistance but in the real world the load is not always handled by the muscle alone. Keeping tension on the muscle will help focus as much muscle building tension on those stubborn calf muscles as possible.

Sample 8 week calf program – train calves no more than 2 times a week for 8 weeks

Add a muscle-building twist to your next workout with these five innovative uses for the power rack.

You’re probably familiar with the power rack - a tall, metal-framed structure usually found in the free-weight area of the gym. It’s also likely that, if you include barbell squats in your training routine, you’ve done them within the confines of one.

However, outside of squatters, most power racks see about as much action as the local library on a Friday night. With this article, we at ProSource are hoping to change that, introducing you to five other exercises you can perform in the rack, for your back, chest, traps, shoulders and legs. There are many others - indeed, there are multiple options for every body part - and once you get a taste of its worth, we’re sure you’ll find your way to the rack in almost every workout. Sure beats an evening of amateur poetry reading, doesn’t it?

1) Bench Press Partials

The power rack can play a valuable role in improving your bench press max, allowing you to focus on a specific portion of the range of motion by setting the safety rods at a corresponding height. For example, say you’re having trouble getting 315 pounds through the midpoint of the rep to full extension. To work on it, place a flat bench in the power rack, and set the rods so they “catch” the barbell just below the midpoint. Then put 315 on the bar and try anywhere from three to five sets of 1-3 reps each in the upper range of motion, pressing the barbell from the supports to full extension. Rest the barbell on the rods between each rep. After a few chest workouts that incorporate these partials, you may find your strength has improved enough to allow you to get 315 on a regular bench.

2) Behind-the-Back Shrug

The power rack is a great place to do standard barbell shrugs. And it’s an even better place to do a variation favored by eight-time Mr. Olympia Lee Haney - behind-the-back shrugs. By setting the safety rods just below your typical shrug range of motion, an awkward part of the exercise becomes easy: Picking up the barbell to get into starting position. Simply bend slightly at the knees and grasp the bar behind you with an overhand, palms-facing-back grip. Another benefit of doing this move in a power rack? You can rep until complete failure, as you can put the bar straight down without having to maneuver it onto hooks or dropping it to the floor.

3) Seated Military Press

Seated barbell military press stations are quickly becoming a rarity in health clubs, both because of insurance reasons and an unfortunate lack of popularity among the lesser motivated among us. However, as long as there is a power rack present, you can still perform this excellent delt-building exercise. Place an adjustable bench that goes all the way up to a sitting position, or a low-back seated bench, in the rack. Set the two barbell support pins at a point above your head, where you can lift the bar off of them while seated, and insert the safety rods at a point just below the bottom of your range of motion. Not only can you do military presses in the rack, but you can do them without the need of a spotter, which is a necessity in a traditional military press station - if you fail, just drop the bar to the strategically-placed rods, and you’re free and clear. Heck, maybe the disappearance of military press stations isn’t such a major loss after all.

4) Three-Quarter Rep Deadlift

Deadlifts from the floor are one of the most effective exercises you can do for your legs, back and as a synergistic power generator through your whole body. But, similar to the bench press, you can work through the upper range of motion by setting the rods - in this case just below your knees - to help you improve your max. Three-quarter rep deads are also a solid stand-alone exercise for use during your back routine; this range is where your back sees most of the action in comparison with your legs, which generate much of the force needed to lift the bar from the floor.

5) Inverted Pull-Up

This back exercise, a variation of a traditional pull-up, resembles an upside-down push-up. Set the two pins at a height 6-12 inches above your hips and lay a barbell across them. From there, get under the bar in a plank position, grasping it overhand style. Your whole body, except the heels of your feet (which remain on the ground throughout), should be off the floor in the starting position. To rep, pull yourself up until your chest touches the bar, then lower and repeat.