Dear skinny bastards: This one's for you.
40 Pounds of Mass
Oh, I know, everyone is an expert on weight gain. The
Internet is flooded with 145 pound skinny-fat experts.
Here's a summary of their mass-gaining methods: Stick a bunch of
big words together in a row, or pull out a thesaurus and just jam
synonyms into every sentence. Bam! Your audience will instantly
grow bigger.
Recently at a workshop I was held hostage by a guy arguing that
back squats are superior to front squats because of hamstring
recruitment. The problem was that this guy, I was later told, had
never done a squat in his life. Another expert.
Actually, I'm a fairly good example of actual bulking. In a four-month period, without steroids (always a
caveat), I put on forty pounds, going from 162 to 202. What's
interesting about my four-month, forty-pound gain was what I was
doing before I started to gain size. Why? Well, it's
probably what you're doing now.
At a bodyweight of 162 pounds, I benched heavy and hard nearly
every day. At a bodyweight of 162 pounds, I did lat pulldowns, a
variety of curls, lots of ab work, and I moved from machine to
machine quickly. Then I met Dick Notmeyer and the scale began to
move.
At Dick's place, there was a bar on the floor and a squat rack.
Three days a week I walked over to the bar on the floor and moved
it overhead a bunch of different ways. Two days a week I squatted
the bar.
Soon, I was always hungry, so much so that I famously ate
sandwiches just before dinner so I wouldn't be hungry while I
was eating.
Dick had me weigh in every day, and it was shocking to watch the
numbers go up daily. I came home one day after working out and my
brother, who hadn't seen me in a few weeks, looked up from the
table and said, 'Holy shit!"
Folks, that's a bulking program.
If you miss seeing someone for a few weeks and they don't
recognize you, well, you have dialed it in. If, in two months, you
find yourself smaller than when you started: welcome to the club.
Most people who want to 'bulk" fail.
Why? Because:
1) They do too much of the things that get them tired, but not
big.
2) They do too little of the things that get them big and really
tired.
Read on and I'll explain.
The 3 Principles of Bulking
It's a formula you can bank on:
1. You must get stronger, but you can get there with any
intelligent basic program. I've fallen in love with Jim
Wendler's 5/3/1 program because, well, it works.
You need to do two things to get stronger: add weight and do
more reps. The answer has never been: lift light weights for
high reps, or lift heavy weights for few reps. The answer remains:
Lift heavy weights for high reps.
2. The other part of the formula is as old as the rack. You need
to do some serious squatting.
In the March 1980 edition of Ironman, Jack Kirwan offered
a short article: 'A Seminar by Tom Platz." The honesty
and candor of Platz was always his hallmark, and, if you
didn't notice, the size of his thighs. His answer to small
arms, small chest or whatever was simply to load the body up by
squatting.
To repeat: The answer is squatting.
3. Finally, you literally need to spend more time on the bar.
No, I didn't say "at the bar." Bourbon and squats don't mix.
I've tried that workout. Trust me on this. No, the single best way
I know to get more time with a bar in your hands is to use complexes.
As you've read about in recent TMUSCLE articles,
complexes involve cycling through a series of exercises without
putting the bar down, performing all the reps on one exercise
before moving to the next. It's tough. You'll whimper. Then
you'll want to do it again. (But not right away.)
Putting It All Together
The magic in a bulk-building program is putting these three
elements together and surviving the workouts.
First, let me say this: Ideally, the best way to get ready for a
bulking program is to lean out first.
Although it's counterintuitive, in my experience the athletes
who've made the best gains have just come out of something that ate
huge amounts of resources and time and energy and calories. The
body adapted to that load and was primed to gain size, to adapt to
any future crisis. That is why football players in December and
wrestlers in March tend to put on ten to twenty pounds seemingly
overnight.
How do you lean out? I think having you walk the Appalachian
Trail from Georgia to Maine consuming only protein and fats would
drive down your body fat levels. You might as well walk barefoot,
too, to regain the strength in your feet, toes, and ankles. Next,
you'd move to a warm, sunny place and begin the serious
training.
Not practical? Okay, fine. Leaning out can be done in a variety
of ways, but I refuse to ignore the Velocity Diet.
The great lesson of the V-Diet for me is that I didn't take in
enough protein previously. I also agree with Chris Shugart's basic
contention that the really important changes are psychological.
Now, I understand that few people will take my advice about
leaning out first. If you ever get a chance to actually try this
order — leaning out followed by bulking up — you'll be
amazed at the difference.
So, how do you put the workouts together? Like this:
Element #1: The Basic Strength Program
For getting stronger, I'd like you to consider doing four basic
strength movements. Jim Wendler recommends the back squat, the
military press, the deadlift, and the bench press. Use with a
low-volume approach with one serious set of 'as many" on
the last set.
We've tweaked it for our athletes like this during the
week:
Day One: Front squat and bench press. We do front squats
in the strength part of the workout. The back squats are for high
reps.
Day Two: Deadlift and military press.
It takes about fifteen minutes or so for the athlete to get in
some light warm-ups then do the three serious sets of each
exercise. The last set is 'as many" and that's the only
number we record. If your reps are moving up on a weight then
you're getting stronger (the word 'duh" can be used now),
but, for whatever reason, people miss this simple point.
If you're doing something else (and there are dozens of basic
strength programs) that's fine, but double check the amount of time
you're taking to get the work done. Basic movements and basic
training can be done much more efficiently. I had great success
years ago training only two days a week with simple movements.
Element #2: The High-Rep Squat
Now, during the bulking phase, the next exercise is the high-rep
back squat. Tom Platz recommended this:
Monday
135 x 10
225 x 10
275 x 6
325 x 3
345 x 3
345 x 3
275 to exhaustion
Friday
135 x 10
225 x 10
275 x 5
325 x 5
325 x 5
325 x 5
For my athletes, I allow a two-week breaking in period. Why?
Because if you're coming in from a sport (or that little six month
hike I mentioned) anything you do the first two weeks will increase
the number on the scale at the weigh-in.
Here's exactly what we do:
Day One: One set of 30 with 95 pounds
Day Two: Two sets of 30 with 95 pounds
Day One: One set of 30 with 95 pounds. One set of 30 with 115
pounds
Day Two: Three sets of 25 with 115 pounds
The ash-colored faces of my athletes on the week two workouts
'indicates" that something good is happening! From there,
we'll strive for one back squat workout a week with a heavier and
heavier weight and the other workout strives for more reps.
So, it could be something as simple as this:
Day One:
Warm-up
185 x 10
205 x 10
225 x 10
275 x 5
315 x 5
Day Two:
Warm-up
185 x 5
205 x 5
225 x 20 x 15
Day One:
Warm-up
185 x 10
225 x 10
275 x 5
315 x 5
335 x 3
Day Two:
Warm-up
185 x 5
205 x 5
225 x 25 x 20
So, there's no secret to bulking. You have to load the iron and
squat down. Then, come back up.
Give yourself about four weeks after the break-in period to
focus on the high rep squats. Then, stop. For clarity, two weeks to
break in, four weeks to push the weights and the reps up, then,
move on.
Element #3: The Complexes
We've had great success using complexes to really increase the
time under load for our athletes. If you're unfamiliar with them,
try something this simple:
1. Clean the weight eight times
2. Do eight military presses after the last clean
3. Lower the bar to the back of the neck and do eight back
squats
4. Pop the bar over your head and do eight front
squats
5. Lower the weight and do eight deadlifts
Here's a great hypertrophy complex. With two kettlebells, clean
and press the weight overhead. This is the starting position. Now
do this:
1. Press the kettlebells eight times
2. Clean the kettlebells eight times
3. Double front squat the kettlebells eight times
4. Deadlift them eight times
I suggest you use complexes to be your general warm-up two days
a week. For example:
Upright Row
Clean Grip Snatch
Back Squat
Behind Neck Press
Good Mornings
Row
Do this complex for 3 sets of 8 with a light weight.
Front Squat
Bench Press
Utilize the 5/3/1 Program
High Rep Back Squat:
One set of 30 with 95 pounds
Consume food.
Row
Clean
Front Squat
Military Press
Back Squat
Good Mornings
Again, do three sets of eight.
Deadlift
Military Press
Utilize the 5/3/1 Program
High Rep Back Squat Program
Two sets of 30 with 95 pounds
Consume food.
This would be a nice break-in workout.
The Bonus Day
I'd also strongly suggest one additional day a week. On this
day, warm up and do five sets of three with any of the standard
complexes striving to add weight each set.
Then, do any of the things you feel you missed, curls or
whatever. Get in a good workout and go home. No, I'm not going
to spell it out for you. If you choose not to do it, that is fine,
too.
Nutrition and Other Factors
1. Eat three meals a day. Snack three or four times a day. I'd
prefer each meal to be a meat, egg, fish, or poultry-based meal
with black, pinto, white, or navy beans and veggies, but you get a
little wiggle room on a bulking program.
Snacks? Well, you can get away with dietary murder on a bulking
program. Yes, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches work for putting
on weight. No, I can't believe I wrote that,
either.
2. If you really want to shock yourself, take fish oil. Now,
here's an odd 'secret" that I use for my extremely
motivated athletes: Continue to up the amount of fish oil capsules
you take until you get a bit 'runny." (If you don't
know what I mean, you've never taken too many fish oil capsules.)
From that number, back off one or two and that's the amount of
capsules you need a day. If you're taking Flameout™, it'll be a smaller
number than someone taking a cheap store brand because it's so
concentrated in fatty acids.
3. Recovery is important. You must sleep. It's okay to
watch movies and television on a bulking program. I never recommend
bulking programs to last too long, so it's okay to become like a
typical American for a few months.
Also, I really don't want you to play basketball and train
for a marathon and learn a new sport. Later, yes, of course, but
not now.
4. Do not try to perform your sport at an elite level!
You're focusing on something else for now. You may even find your
skill eroding. That's fine temporarily as you're focusing on adding
mass.
Wrap-Up
Bulking is basic. Remember that. If you try to do too much or
get too clever during the six weeks, you're not going to make the
kind of progress that I've typically seen.
Honestly, you can expect a surge during the first two weeks
that'll convince you that the simple combination of strength
training, high rep squats, and complexes actually works better than
something more exotic and sexy.
Remember, I didn't say it was easy, just simple.
