“HOW LONG SHOULD I BULK?: THINGS THAT ARE EASY AND THINGS THAT ARE HARD”

 

 

I have upset a lot of the internet with the following sentiment that I have expressed on numerous occasions: losing weight is easy.  It’s honestly probably the easiest thing in the world.  All you have to do is this: NOT eat.  That is INaction: the NOT doing of something.  Do you realize how easy it is to NOT do something?  Inertia is a powerful force: objects at rest stay at rest unless force acts upon them.  So for someone to lose weight, they simply have to just keep NOT doing something and then weight will be lost.  Hell, people NOT eat ALL the time.  Sometimes they even do it so much that they die from it.  Yes, that’s callused, but it proves the point that all these folks that try to dramatize losing weight as the most difficult thing in the world are significantly misunderstanding what actually is challenging.

Losing weight ranks somewhere along "dry pasta" at this event

Inevitably, someone will fire back at me and go “It must be nice for weight loss to be easy for you: I just LOOK at food and I gain weight.”  No you idiot: weight gain is easy too.  Gaining weight is another one of those stupidly easy things to do.  Want proof?  How about the fact that the majority of adults in the United States are overweight, and a significant portion of those that are overweight are even obese.  If the AVERAGE person can accomplish something, it’s not difficult: it’s, at best, of AVERAGE difficulty.  And, in truth, the average person is only going to put the bare minimum effort into something anyway, so if we really think about it, gaining weight is honestly stupidly easy to do.  Sit in front of the TV and pound away at some food that came packaged in a box until that box is empty.  Pick up a fast food combo on your way home from work.  Hell, just eat out ANYWHERE and eat everything that is served to you: portion sizes are ridiculous these days.  And much like NOT eating, gaining weight is another one of those things that people do so much that they die from it, as obesity related maladies are the #1 killer for the US.  In either capacity, the point stands: just because losing weight is easy doesn’t making gaining weight hard.  They’re BOTH comically easy.

 

So what IS hard?  Gaining MUSCLE.  No, not “lean muscle mass”: that’s a stupid phrase.  ALL muscle mass is lean: there is no fatty muscle.  Gaining actual muscle tissue is VERY hard, especially compared to losing fat.  This is why you see so many success stories about dudes losing 300+lbs and so FEW success stories about dudes WEIGHING 300+lbs with low bodyfat and being absolutely jacked out of their minds: building muscle is a VERY tough process.  Same reason there are so many ripped out of their minds dudes modeling on Instagram and so few folks with a decent amount of muscle.  Getting ripped takes months: getting jacked takes years.  I’d be sorry for all the brospeak if a cared, but honestly, I think in this instance, the vernacular is appropriate, especially since I’m about to use the word “bulk”, despite how much I hate it.

Check out that strength rating...just saying

 

But why am I going to talk about bulking?  Because the question “how long should I bulk” is a question that demonstrates that the trainee asking it has not fully grasped the DIFFICULTY of gaining muscle.  No one that actually understands the process of gaining muscle is going to ask that question, because someone with an understanding already KNOWS the answer: you bulk until you can no longer sustain it.  And that’s not some sort of stupidly dramatic “no pain no gain” thing, nor is it a license to “permabulk” (another REALLY stupid phrase): it’s an acknowledgement of the fact that muscle gaining phases of training are INCREDIBLY difficult and unsustainable.  It’s why so many muscle building programs tend to be 6 week long shotgun blasts: that’s about as long as a regular adult is going to be able to put up with a muscle building phase of training without some sort of break.    

 

What do I mean?  Just examine the logistics of it.  Again, we acknowledge that gaining muscle is different from gaining weight.  What’s the difference?  Presence of stimulus to cause the body to gain muscle.  Sure, if you just overeat you’ll gain a LITTLE muscle along with a bunch of fat, but if your goal is to gain a significant amount of muscle, this means you have to train, and you have to train HARD.  If you just perform a moderate amount of training for a moderate amount of intensity (understood to mean “effort” vs percentage of 1rm, for you nerds out there), you place no real demand on the body to grow.  You must, instead, train STUPIDLY hard and put the body in a severe state of recovery in order to force it to want to grow.  This is why muscle building programs are so ridiculously hard, like Super Squats, Deep Water, 5/3/1 Building the Monolith, 5/3/1 BBB Beefcake, DoggCrapp, Mass Made Simple, etc.  These aren’t maintenance programs, they’re not fat loss programs: they are INTENSE efforts intended to put your body in a compromised state so that you can feed it and it will grow.  This sort of training WILL break you if you run it for too long.  I legit had to throw away one of the t-shirts I wore during my Deep Water squat workouts because it was so saturated with fear sweat that it smelled like an open grave, and no amount of washing would get it out.  I would spend 13 days in between squat workouts just DREADING going into the gym.  I laid on my back in between sets 7 and 8 of squats and seriously contemplated quitting lifting and selling all of my equipment because I did NOT want to train anymore for the rest of my life.  You wanna ask how long you should bulk?  How about: how SHORT can I bulk?  That’s what the experienced dudes wanna know.

Alternative title was "How To Make 6 Weeks Feel Like Eternity"

 

And this doesn’t even take into account the OTHER logistics of gaining muscle: all the EATING you have to do which, unless you’re independently wealthy, ALSO means all the cooking and cleaning that goes along with it.  The gallon of milk a day is so popular for gaining because it doesn’t require any additional prep to get in 2k calories, and it sounds stupid to people that haven’t ever seriously tried to gain, but for those that have exhausted all other avenues it makes TOTAL sense.  Otherwise, eating basically becomes a second job, and your life revolves around food, because you need to keep eating in order to recover from the stupidly intense training you’re doing, and if you miss a single meal you’re suddenly behind the 8 ball and now you gotta do some serious triage work.  You’re treading water the whole time and just barely able to breathe.  It absolutely sucks.  And you wanna know how long you should bulk?  You’ll know when you’re done: believe me.  And I haven’t even gone into the simple reality that, on top of all of this, make sure to budget extra time on the toilet into your day, because more goes in and more comes out.  That seems to shock some people.

 

THIS is why young dudes in high school are constantly told to bulk: it’s not about “puberty is natural steroids” (holy cow another REALLY stupid phrase): it’s because you’ll never have a better lifestyle suited to sustain gaining muscle.  I realize high school kids love making their lives seem dramatic with AP classes and sports and social obligations and etc etc, but when you’re working full time and pursuing higher education with family obligations, you’ll look back at high school and remember fondly all that extra time you had.  Absolutely: some high school kids have it rough, but the AVERAGE kid has someone ELSE making their food, cleaning their dishes and taking care of all the finances and obligations in the house.  All a high school kid needs to do is not get arrested, graduate, maybe work a job, and otherwise they can dedicate themselves to eating and training.  If you’re OUT of high school, wait until you find periods of your life that remind you of high school living and make THAT the time you focus on gaining muscle.  If you have a period coming up where your life obligations are going to be low, stress is going to be reduced, and you have an abundance of time, you are approaching a period where you can bulk.  Bulk until you cannot sustain it.  Life will determine when it’s time to stop.

ON LIES

 

As much as I am a fan of living authentically, I think it’s worthwhile to discuss the value of lies and deception as it relates to getting bigger and stronger.  Before you begin thinking I’m talking about “e-stating” and rounding your bench to the nearest 100lbs when people ask, or calling yourself 12% bodyfat when you’ve got male breast tissue and love handles (or how, somehow, NO ONE on the internet is ever above 20% bodyfat), I’m not talking about lying to other people: I’m talking about lying to yourself.  And, of course, in order to appreciate that, one must have an understanding of the “self” being a separate entity than the body and, in many cases, the mind.  With that deliciously psychotic sounding intro, let me dive in to when and how lies and deception can be valuable for the trainee looking to get bigger and stronger.

 

The catalyst for this post comes from a recently performed 301 rep set of 135lbs on the high handle trap bar pull.

 

 

I’ve received MANY questions regarding that set, the primary one being “why”, which seems obvious to me: it makes me bigger and stronger.  But “how” is the second most popular question, and THAT is where lies and deception kick in.   Yes, I DID need to be strong and fit to accomplish this set, but many individuals are strong and fit (and strongER and fittER than me) and find themselves unable to accomplish sets like these.  That is because these people, most likely, lack the ability to lie to themselves like I can.

 

My previous PR on this exercise was 251 reps, set on Thanksgiving morning, in an attempt to make some room for some nutritional debauchery.  I felt VERY good that morning, and the 251 reps moved rather smoothly.  The day I set 301 did NOT feel that way.  I hit fatigue far earlier in the set than I did previously, and by rep 100 already knew I had made a mistake.  And that is when I told myself my first lie: I was only going to do 150 reps that day, and I would make it for it by taking fewer breaks at the top of the rep.  Well that was a lie, because we got to 150 reps and kept on trucking.   Observe my use of “we”, because yes, I DO consider my body, mind and self all different entities, and we’re all forced to work together on this awful group project I’ve come up with.

Like this, but more psychotic

 

But that first lie got me to 150 reps.  In the absence of that lie, I most likely would have quit at 100 reps, because it sucked at that point and I didn’t wanna do it.  I told myself we’d stop at 150 reps KNOWING it was a lie, but my body and mind can be pretty stupid, and they bit.  So 150 happened and reps kept coming, and I told myself “look: you’ve done 150.  What’s 50 more at that point?  That’ll be close to your first PR of 212, and then you’ll know you got good training stimulus”.  200 happened and I told myself “Are you really going to get to 200 reps and NOT set a PR?  It doesn’t have to be 300 today, but get at LEAST 252.”  252 happened and I told myself it was going to be 270: split the different.  And, of course, am I really going to do 270 and not hit 300?  And the cherry on top, of course, being, that ending at 300 JUST because it’s 300 is really stupid, so 1 more rep happened.

 

These sort of lies and broken promises are incredibly regular features in my training, and I know many endurance athletes that have laid claim to a similar approach.  The truth is: in times of duress, people are more willing to believe deception so long as it’s HAPPY deception.  People create more hope in dire situations, because it’s the only way to continue onward.  You can take advantage of that fact by openly deceiving yourself and having yourself believe YOUR OWN LIES.  It’s madness, but sanity never got anyone jacked.

See!

 

Other common lies in training: breaking high rep sets into smaller rep clusters.  A 20 rep squat is awful: counting 5 reps 4 times?  So much more manageable.  You’re at rep 12, but you’re TELLING yourself you only have 3 reps left rather than 8.  And you get those 3 and tell yourself you only have 5 reps left.  And Dan John turned me on to the idea of counting DOWN rather than up, which I found works really well too.  Running on a treadmill?  Keep telling yourself you’ll stop after the next quarter mile.  On a diet?  Promise yourself a delicious cheat meal at the END of the week.  Soul breaking conditioning workout?  Just 1 more round.  They key is, YOU have to know when you’re lying.  If you lie to yourself but then actually do what you lied about well, quite frankly, it was no longer a lie.  You told the truth, and that sabotaged your results.

 

Don’t feel bad about lying to your body like that either: your body sucks and lies to you ALL the time.   It’s always telling you that it CAN’T do any more, that it has reached its limit, that if you keep going something will break, or you’ll puke, or etc etc.  Bullcrap.  Your body has SO much more to give when you start pushing it.  Anyone that has ever done a set of Poundstone curls knows that the biceps start cramping around rep 30, but that, if you keep pushing it, the cramping goes away around rep 50-60.  So many trainees, saying they’re going to puke, upon being given permission to go do so, find themselves coming up dry.  The body lies to you because it wants to UNDERperform, because the body is lazy and only concerned about self-preservation and maintaining the status quo.  It’s not at all interested in getting bigger and stronger.  The body is a hedonist: it’s up to YOU to force it to do the things that will result in growth.  And that’s going to take a lot of lies and deception.

Even the great ones do it

 

And that’s no lie.

BOOK REVIEW: MARTY GALLAGHER’S “PURPOSEFUL PRIMITIVE”

  

My voracious appetite for reading about lifting stuff continues for some reason, and I just put away 692 pages of Marty Gallagher’s “Purposeful Primitive” in about 4 days. 

 

Let me start the review with the ending: this was a great read and I highly recommend it.  It’s only $8.50 on Kindle right now, which is what convinced me to get it in the first place.  I was originally looking for Steve Justa’s “Rock Iron Steel” book, which I intend to read soon, and this showed up as a suggested reading and when I saw the page total, cost and reviews I figured I had nothing to lose.

 

Unlike some of my other reviews, I did not take notes as I went, simply because, at nearly 700 pages, it would have made the reading process INSANELY long.  Instead, I’m just going to go over what I liked and what I didn’t like.

 

QUICK REVIEW OF THE BOOK

 

The book is divided into 4 areas of focus: lifting (iron), the mind, cardio and nutrition.  Each of the 4 areas are, in turn, subdivided into 3 sections: 1 that details the work and philosophy of the “masters” of that area, 1 that constructs a plan to implement the lessons FROM the masters for the reader to use, and from there a series of essays written by Gallagher regarding the topic.  I really enjoyed this approach to the subject matter, but it became a little obvious that the “essays” on the subject were just collections of previously written articles from Gallagher.  Nothing wrong with that necessarily, but I’m getting tired of “books” that are just a bunch of articles put together.

 

The iron section is the most expansive, taking up about a third of the book, but each section contains a large amount of information.  Nothing is skimped over or given lip service.

 

THE GOOD

 

Captain Kirk, being insane as usual

-This is clearly a labor of love, and Marty put a TON of work into it.  I’ve been reading a lot of different books from different authors recently, and it’s become easy to tell who just slapped something together to get a paycheck vs who really wanted to put out a quality product, and this is firmly in the latter.

-This is a completely comprehensive tome.  One of those books you could give to someone and be like “Ok, you wanna know how to train and eat for the rest of your life?  Here you go.”  I love books like that.  Sure, it’s 700 pages, but it’s still so much time and effort saved to have it all in one place.

-Along with that, it’s a VERY easy read.  Marty is a professional author, having written for many publications, and his chops show on that.  It’s not his first time stringing together sentences.  He can attempt to get a little too eloquent at times, but he’s still very talented at his craft.  But along with that, he has walked the walk, with an 800lb squat and various lifting titles earned.

-Every section is VERY fascinating.  Marty’s “Purposeful Primitive” approach is all about stripping out complexity and getting back to basics, which, in turn, ends up going in some VERY unique directions.  I found the nutrition section particularly fascinating, as it basically splits between a dichotomy of very frequent eating of small meals or intermittent fasting via “The Warrior Diet”. 

-To go further into the above, Marty is big on Taoism and, in turn, duality.  His nutrition protocol fits right in there, but much of how he approaches training does as well.  It’s very much about how opposites compliment each other, and works itself out through some old school periodization. 

-Because of Marty’s unique position as an interviewer for magazines as well as a coach for some of the greatest strength athletes ever, he allows readers a very deep “insider look” ito some unique characters.  I’ve relayed this book as what Jamie Lewis’ “365 Days of Brutality” was supposed to be, because while Jamie wrote about what he’d read/heard about great athletes, Marty wrote about what he actually personally witnessed.

 

THE BAD

 

Swing and a miss

-On a few occasions, Marty tries to emphasize how badass he and his friends are in the lifting world, and it just comes across as either cringey or douche-y.  One particular section talking about New Years Resolution “mullets” was really just plain old off putting.  Paul Kelso did a much better job in Powerlifting Basics talking about how we all need to come together as iron brothers, and this was too much “us vs them” stuff.  It’s not often enough to detract from the overall quality of the book, but there were times I felt like abandoning the essay portions because I didn’t think there’d be anything worthwhile with that nonsense in it.  I was happy to be proven wrong.

-Marty sees cardio primarily as a fat burning device and is very big on employing a heart rate monitor to ensure one has their heart rate in the correct zone to employ this.  That’s a fine use of cardio, but as an athlete it didn’t gel with me.  Never cared for heart rate monitors, and my big emphasis is improved conditioning.

-The mind section contains a lot of helpful tips for how to psyche up for the big set in your training, and that truthfully goes against everything I’m about.  I save psyching up for competitions.  Marty’s claim is that you get more out of your training by tapping into this potential, but I find it’s a recipe for burnout.  In turn, I didn’t get a whole lot from the mind sections.

 

SHOULD YOU BUY IT?

 

Unquestionably yes.  No qualifiers.  Anyone with even the slightest interest in physical training should own a copy of this book.  You get a ton of value for your dollar, get to read about a bunch of different experts in different fields, and will be presented with at least ONE new idea, or find out you were mistaken about one you held before.  I thought I knew what the Warrior Diet was, and honestly, after reading the book, I genuinely want to give it a try someday, despite how much I’ve chided intermittent fasting.  I loved learning the logic behind it.  Same holds true with learning about how and why the great ones trained and ate the way they trained.  Add this one to your collection and share it with a friend when you are done, because it’s worth getting out there in circulation.

ON LEMONADE

  

“When life gives you lemons, make lemonade” is one of the most stoic pithy phrases out there that people are willing to drop at a moment’s notice whenever a bit of misfortune occurs.  However, the truth is, this expression could be SO much more inspiring if people were willing to look a little deeper.  Specifically at the fact that life will NEVER give you lemons.  And by that, I don’t mean in some grand cosmic sense that all of your bad luck and misfortune is self-generated and that life only seeks to provide for the good and it’s merely how you respond to that stimulus that causes you misery ala what Marcus Aurelius wrote in “Meditations”: I mean lemons literally do not exist in nature.  It’s true: the lemon as we know it is a hybrid of a bitter orange and a citron.  Someone or something OTHER than life MADE the lemon, and then, after we got done making lemons, THEN we made lemonade.  Just imagine how much more powerful the expression has now become: “When life DOESN’T give you lemons, go make lemons.  Then, go make lemonade.”

As usual, Bender is right

 

I honestly really dig this because it can go in a couple of different directions.  First, let’s tackle the obvious: this is about genetics.  Anyone who has read my blog knows how much I love to discuss this, primarily because it’s the immediate go to for those who fail to accomplish anything in training.  Trainees with a whopping 3 months of off and on training will instantly bring up how awful their genetics are and THAT’S why they can’t grow.  I already wrote in my last post about how you’ll get no sympathy from me, but folks: it’s time to go make some lemons.  You can’t control your genetics, nor can you control the genetics of others (I mean, you can genetically engineer things now, but that’s getting off topic), but you CAN control how hard you apply the things you have.  I’ve always said that some dudes are gonna be bigger, stronger, faster and better than me, but I’m not gonna let any mother f**ker be CRAZIER than me.  Life didn’t give me the lemons of natural athleticism, and it takes me a LONG time to grasp very basic physical skills, I have zero explosiveness, I am long limbed with a short torso and a slight frame with a shoulder that slips out of the socket if I turn over funny in my sleep or shampoo my hair too aggressively and my left ACL is actually a harvested portion of my hamstring while I’m missing 20% of that meniscus, but I can still make the choice to push myself harder and further than anyone else will willingly push themselves.  That’s my lemonade.

 

But going further than that, we understand that the original phrase of “when life gives you lemons” refers to receiving adversity from life.  Well when we turn the phrase to say “when life DOESN’T give you lemons, make lemons”, what we are discussing is the notion of MANUFACTURED adversity.  Adversity and hardships are opportunities for growth, and quite often it is those exposed to the greatest of hardships that demonstrate the greatest of growth.  Is that survivor bias?  Absolutely!  I don’t care about the non-survivors: they were going to not survive no matter what.  But I take significant interest in those that experienced, endured, and grew.  I recall Bill Kazmaier lamenting at a seminar how tough it must be for those strongman competitors that DIDN’T have a rough upbringing to try and make it in the sport, because those dudes that had it rough their whole lives were going to eat them alive in competition.

You don't get eyes like this from a normal life

 

All that said, sometimes life won’t GIVE us the lemons of adversity in order for us to make lemonade.  Sometimes we have to go MAKE some lemons so that we can make lemonade.  Just as adversity is an opportunity for growth, life is an opportunity to create adversity.  Try putting yourself BEHIND the 8 ball every once in a while.  It’s why I am so vocally and vehemently AGAINST pre-workout supplements: the last thing you should be doing in TRAINING is stacking the deck in your favor like that.  Don’t get me wrong: in a competition, I’m sucking down Rockstars as good as anyone else, but before I train?  Hell no.  I’m not going to come in with an ADVANTAGE: I’m going to come in hurt, tired, hungry, sore, and in a bad mood.  Why?  Because when I thrive in THAT environment, I absolutely KILL it when things are going my way.  Meanwhile, I’ve seen dudes completely fall apart in competition because they were so used to everything being optimally configured for them in the training hall that, the instant they couldn’t have EXACTLY 4 minutes between warm up sets, or they had to lift in the morning when they ALWAYS train in the afternoon, or McDonalds ran out of McMuffins and they had to get a biscuit instead and it totally threw off their pre-workout nutrition ritual, they crumbled and performed well below how they did in training.  Training is the worst place to set your PRs, because no one cares.  PR in competition, because then you win something.

 

And I’m just talking pre-workout prep there.  There are unlimited opportunities to go make some lemons.  Choose to train with inadequate sleep, poor nutrition, stomach too full, not properly warmed up, too many days in a row, 2 a days without adequate recovery between sessions, etc etc.  Make yourself so many lemons that you can open up your own lemonade stand.  I genuinely don’t know how that metaphor shakes out: those of you playing along at home can probably make something of it.  But the point is that those who sit around waiting for opportunities to present, for good OR for ill, are going to get passed by by those that are out there making lemons so that they can go make some lemonade.  Sometimes, life isn’t going to give you what you need to make lemonade: sometimes it’s gonna fall on you to make something that wasn’t there before.

 

 

 

NO SYMPATHY

 

 

Let me just start with a screenshot from one of the greatest movies of all time: Major Payne, starring Damon Wayans.

 

 

In the instance that this image has failed (which occurs often with my blog), here is the relevant quote from the image.

 

“You'll get no sympathy from me! You want sympathy, look in the dictionary between sh*t and syphilis! That's where you'll find my sympathy!”

 

The entire movie is full of amazing quotes and is just a classic staple of the 90s.  You owe it to yourself to watch it (along with “Heavyweights”, but that’s another story for another blogpost), but today I want to specifically discuss the sentiment behind that quote, because I absolutely love it.

 

This is the exact quote that goes through my mind every time someone tries to generate my sympathy for them as it relates to the “hardships” of training and nutrition.  I’ve heard it all: “I don’t have time to eat or train”, “I train SO hard and I don’t see results”, “I have bad genetics”, “I don’t have access to X”, etc etc.  Here is the reality: no one cares.  It’s true.  Put yourself in the other person’s position: would YOU care if someone told YOU this information? 

 

We all have our own sh*t to deal with, and all of us DEAL with it.  You’re not special.  Things are hard for you?  They’re hard for everyone.  We all get the exact same 24 hours a day to spend doing whatever it is we choose to do: it’s simply a question of what you decide to prioritize during those 24 hours.  That is legitimately the “secret” to success: prioritization.  Whatever you prioritize as the highest is what you’ll succeed at.  In turn, EVERYONE is successful: it just so happens that some people are successful at things that most people DON’T want to be successful at.

 

What do I mean?  Some people are the absolute champions at procrastination.  It’s what they prioritize, so it’s what they do, and they totally crush it!  These are the people that can watch 16 hours of youtube videos a day and totally neglect their personal health and hygiene, live in squalor, produce nothing of value and contribute nothing to society.  They chose their priorities, set on the path to realize them, and met them.  Other people are champions at video games, eating poorly, social media, binge watching, partying, etc etc.  No one is failing: some people are just winning at a game no one else wants to play.

Some people are living a Superman 64 kinda life

 

In turn, the people you see achieving physical greatness are simply those people that PRIORITIZED being physically great, and, in doing so, they prioritized it OVER other things.  They chose their goal: be big and strong, and then did the things it took to realize it. This meant DE-prioritizing those things that got in the way.  They slashed away television, video games, yummy food, alcohol, late nights, etc etc, because those things simply weren’t as important to them as the goal of getting bigger and stronger.  Because the truth is, you will always do the things that are the most important to you, DESPITE what it is you tell yourself.  Your actions will relay the truth of your intentions. 

 

Which is why I have no sympathy when people beg me for it: all you’re doing is informing me that you have different priorities.  What am I supposed to do with that information?  Winners find a way.  No time for training or cooking?  That’s crazy, I FOUND that time: it was by shaving off 2 hours of sleep.  Don’t have access to a piece of equipment?  Damndest thing: I found someone would SELL it to me: I just had to save up my money to be able to buy it.  That one in particular bugs me, because I grew up in an era where the only thing you could buy was whatever they were selling at your local sporting goods store, and now there is a wide world of internet out there where you can buy ANYTHING.  Injured?  You’re really gonna make me chuckle with that one.

This was the Rogue of the 90s

 

Am I going to pretend like some people DON’T have it rough?  No: of course not.  But those people ALSO don’t have the time to go online and complain about it, primarily because they’re too busy DOING those things that make life rough.  The person working 3 jobs as a single parent while going to school part time?  Yeah: they don’t have time to train or eat right (although some folks STILL make it work too), I get that.  But that is the thing: THEY have chosen a priority right now, and it’s most likely the “right” one as far as being a functional human goes.  Being big and strong is a luxury for most folks: survival should come first.  But on that discussion of luxury, some luxuries are going to take priority over others.  I got myself a Playstation 4 last year, and I’m still playing Fallout 1 on my PC because I flat out won’t prioritize the time it takes to learn how to play new video games these days.  That sucks, but instead of going online and complaining about how games are too complicated these days, I make peace with the decisions I’ve made as far as prioritization goes and enjoy my decision.  Are you really expecting me to have sympathy for you because you’re struggling with your hobby?

 

Quit looking for sympathy: it’s not going to do you any good.  Even if you get it, what the hell are you going to do with it?  It does nothing to change your circumstances or your outcome.  What works will work irrespective of your circumstances.  You don’t have time to train? Well sucks for you: those that can find time are going to surpass you pretty quickly.  Don’t like vegetables?  One: it’s time to grow up, but secondly, good luck on getting some micronutrients while the adults eat a basic human meal.  All of these “issues” are just instances of you choosing one thing to prioritize over another, and you should be granted zero sympathy for employing your autonomy like that.  This should be celebrated!  How outstanding: you are a human, making decisions and experiencing the outcome of those decisions.  The system works!

 

No one is holding out information from you.  There are no secrets.  You saying “it’s SO hard to eat enough to grow” isn’t going to unlock the super secret strategy from the gaining gods where they tell you about the one magical shake recipe guaranteed to put on size and not fill up your stomach (ok, you got me: it’s the “Get Big Drink” from John McCallum’s “Complete Keys to Progress”.   Enjoy!).  You’re simply learning the truth about life: we all succeed at those things that we decide to dedicate ourselves to.  Some are going to be champions at getting bigger and stronger, some champions at COMPLAINING about not getting bigger and stronger, some champions at eating cereal while binge watching television, etc etc.  Either way, you’ll get no sympathy from me because you are upset at what you chose to prioritize.  If it upsets you that much: choose something else.

BOOK REVIEW: LOUIE SIMMONS' "IRON SAMURAI"

 

Full disclosure: I was, am, and will always be a Westside Barbell fanboy.  I started lifting in 1999, and when I started “researching” on the internet, the ONLY way to train for strength was to “do Westside Barbell”, so that’s what I grew up with and it will always hold a special place in my heart.  Because of that, when I saw that Louie Simmons had released a 306 page book detailing his life and the story of Westside Barbell AND that it was on sale, I legit just pulled out a credit card and paid whatever it cost to have.  Along with that, having followed Louie for so long, I’m VERY familiar with his particular brand of insanity as it relates to writing and speaking, so I was able to look past a lot of things in this book that will most likely be completely unbearable to a new reader.

 

All that said, let me start with the conclusion: if you’re NOT a fan of Westside barbell, I’d skip this book.  This is pure fan service: going into drama, behind the scenes stuff, crazy stories, stats, facts and figures.  Hardcore powerlifting fans, and specifically those of Westside, will get a kick out of it, but those that are just fans of lifting in general hoping to “learn from the master” aren’t going to get much for the price point.  There is SOME gold in this regarding training for powerlifting, but you gotta mine the hell out of the book to find it.

 

That said, I read the whole thing in 3 days of casual reading.  It’s an easy read and I found it pretty enjoyable.  Because Louie is so scatterbrained, it actually makes the book well paced, because Louie will start on a boring subject but out of nowhere tell a story about a guy kidnapping a dog and getting 100 days in jail before switching back to talking about band tension calculations.  It keeps you on your toes.

 

Below are the notes I took as I read the book, to give you an idea of what I was thinking/feeling at the time.  Enjoy!

 ---

* Written all on the third person: Louie’s alter ego talking about Louie.

* Written in Louie’s delightfully insane “steam of consciousness” writing/speaking style.  If you’re unfamiliar with it, it will be jarring.  If you’re familiar with it, it will still be jarring, but you’ll be used to it.

* Holy hell, Louie does a subtle callout of Ironmind early in the writing: accuses them of stealing the idea of the “magic circle” and Super Squats.   As a rabid Ironmind AND Westside Fanboy, I’m vexed.

* In general, Louie doesn’t go easy on anyone in the book.  He’ll praise people for strengths and speak matter of factly about their weaknesses (so and so was a bad squatter, so and so never did well in the sport and went on to become a ref, etc etc).  When I went to Kaz’s seminar, it was very similar.  Don’t know if this is a generational thing, a “being one of the greatest of all time” thing, a “I’m too damn old to worry about being nice” thing, or just a thing, but it’s honestly pretty cool to have no doubt about the thoughts of the author.

You could certainly do worse as far as company goes

* Louie’s “The Ball or the Sword” story gives the reader a solid understanding of why he is the way he is.  The quote “Louie believes that if a powerlifter doesn’t want to invest his or her life into powerlifting, he or she shouldn’t waste their time” is why he uses the methods he uses.  It’s also why he’s so into unlimited ply, and only cares about the biggest numbers period dot: because THAT is powerlifting.  It’s not about who is the best with an asterisk (raw, under 40, 2 hour weigh in, drug tested, etc etc), but simply who can put up the most.

* Louie’s age shows primarily in the things he thinks are acceptable to write.  If you are sensitive to social issues, it’s most likely not going to go over well for you.  I’m 73 pages in, and have encountered one homophobic slur (not said by Louie, but relayed by him as something one lifter said to another) and his advocacy of “Lucha Underground where men beat the hell out of the hot women; it’s twice the fun.” I’m old enough that I “get” his generation, and after reading Dick Marcinko’s “Rogue Warrior” I doubt anything an author writes can be offensive to me at this point, but it may be jarring to other readers.

* “but Louie, in 1982, would not read any scientific studies from an American author.” Man can I dig that.  Paul Kelso was speaking illy of the state of exercise science in the 80s in “Powerlifitng Basics Texas Style” as well. 

* “Louie first found the importance of the Dynamic Method. Most lifters divided training days from heavy to light. But strength is measured in velocities, not heavy or light. Instead, it is measured by fast, intermediate, or slow.” I feel real stupid for having not thought of it like that before.  And part of that is most likely because I’m not a speedy lifter to begin with. 

* Louie is unapologetic in how much he despises how US Weightlifters are being trained these days.  The topic comes up a LOT in the book.  I imagine it’s a result of him coming from a weightlifting background: we never forget our first love.  I am so vocally against powerlifting these days, and it’s because that’s where I started and it’s rough for me to see the state it’s in right now.  Of course, I’ve also said that we do so poorly in weightlifting that we may as well give Louie the reigns and see what happens, but I am a fan of chaos.

Case in point: best Batman

* Louie misspells the names of a lot of lifters in the book.  Just ran across “Glen Pendley”, and I know I’ve seen more throughout the book.

* “but that the real key was the special single* joint exercises.” People don’t get this about Westside.  They think it’s just DE and ME, but that’s only 20% of the training.  EIGHTY PERCENT is Repetition Effort.  THAT is where the magic happens.

* “Producing the rule book and training qualified referees were the key focus of the IPF. Louie did not agree that an IPF qualified referee status could be achieved in two months of studying a rule book when it took three to five years to be an Elite level lifter” Love it

* “To this day, Louie believes that if an athlete is subject to being tested, then everyone connected to the federation should be checked, including refs, spotters, officials, meet directors, and the guy who collects the door money.” Also love it.

* “Also, the IPF had drug testing, and lots of people were opposed to having their civil rights invaded” as a political science guy, this stuff always bugs me.  Your civil rights cannot be violated by a private organization: only the government can violate your rights. 

* There’s a whole section on federation drama, if you’re into that.  Oh powerlifting.

Sport of kings

* “It is hard for Louie to understand why powerlifters bad mouth each other instead of uniting together” ok, that is a comical lack of self awareness given how the book has gone so far.

* Nice to see Louie write positively on Chuck V.  Their relationship was strained for a while, but seems to be in a good place.  And really, anything written about Chuck is awesome.  He’s a goddamn sasquatch in all ways, because along with being huge and scary, there’s SO little out there about him, because he doesn’t talk.

* I’m at a part in the book where Louie talks about a buddy of his throwing his food on the floor at a restaurant and assaulting the cooks because they put onions in his food.  This is one of many stories of downright psychopathy.  I can’t tell if Louie attracts these kinds of people, or if there are just more of these folks out there than I realize.

* Tons of stories start with “so and so knew a 13/14/15 year old kid that was really strong and he started lifting at Westside and etc etc”.  I find it a little off putting how so many of these adult men are just hanging out with these teenage boys.  And maybe it just shows how uninvolved I am with my local community, but it just feels weird reading it so much.

* “Ryan Cannelie” for Ryan Kennelly.  Ok, this book was clearly never edited or proofread.

* I feel like someone may have tried to help Louie at the start of the book and then eventually gave up, because around page 135 or so Louie’s rambling style of writing really starts to take off.  Again: if you’re familiar with it, it’s not bad, but if this is your first exposure to how Louie presents ideas, you’re in for a ride.

* All criticism aside (so far), I’m 165 pages in and all I can think is “This is what ‘Westside vs the World’ SHOULD have been”

* “a bodybuilder is at his or her weakest and smallest at contest time. In contrast, however, a powerlifter is at his or her strongest and biggest at contest time.” That’s honestly a pretty interesting revelation.  Something to be said about the razor’s edge of health/performance a powerlifter is on for a meet peak though. 

* “Sue came to Westside overweight. She wanted to powerlift to get into shape. Most of the time, this does not work” I hope people are taking goddamn notes here!  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen a 300+lber start lifting to “get in shape” and then put on a bunch more bodyweight because they’re “naturally talented” at heavy lifting.  No dude: you have mass, and mass moves mass.  You started exercising to get healthy: get healthy, THEN put on mass.

* “Also, normal people can only give you normal results.” DING DING DING.  People are in such a rush to normalize things, but that’s the whole point: you gotta be and do things differently to achieve different results.

No

* “He thought it would take a weight gain to do it, so Louie pushed up the volume and added more calories.”* Straight from the master’s mouth folks.  Quit trying to bulk on Starting Strength: up the volume, up the calories.

* The “Nightrider” section is brutal.  Just a long list of callouts by Louie on former Westsiders.

* Don’t skim the book, because Louie’s crazy mind throws things in at random spots.  The section on Chuck V under world record squatters suddenly turns into a seminar on how bands work.

* Louie throws some shade at EliteFTS, clarifying that they are separate businesses.  It’s gotta be tough to be Louie’s friend I am sure.

* Louie writes that he will never watch “Westside vs the World”.  Good call Louie.

* It was heartwarming to see how positively Louie speaks of Jim Wendler. 

* Page 214 and now the homophobic slur IS coming directly from Louie.  It’s a quote from the 90s, and I get times were different, but still, it just takes a book that reads like a kindly old man retelling stories from the past and puts a lot of ugliness in it in short order.

* Louie refers to Dave Hoff as the strongest geared lifter of all time, which is honestly a shock for Louie.  I’m used to him not differentiating between gear and raw, just referring to lifters as lifters.  Wonder if he’s finally gotten sick enough of the politics to feel the need to clarify at this point.

Still some solid credentials

* Some of these stories about Westside personalities are just painful to get through.   Helpful reminder that being a good lifter doesn’t mean being a good person.  Often, it can even be necessary to not be one to be the other.  This is a selfish hobby.

* I remember in 07 when I wanted to “Do Westside Barbell training” and the common question was “can I still do it if I don’t have a GHR/reverse hyper”, and guys like Tate and Wendler would say you don’t need that stuff and would offer up old school movements like GHRs and RDLs and back extensions.  But when you read this book, you realize just how important all the crazy crap Louie developed is for the success of Westside.  And yeah, Westside may have STARTED with just the basics, but it’s clearly evolved, and the idea that you can follow the program without all the specialty equipment is really getting silly now.  20% of the training is ME/DE, and the rest is all super specialized bodybuilder work.

* “For some odd reason, lots of Louie’s friends go to jail” at least Louie is aware this is weird.

* “The Curse” is an awesome section of the book that describes why Louie will set out to help anyone in the world of lifting.  Very touching.

* So far the last half of the book is basically Louie listing names of people and lifts that they did/how those lifts improved while training at Westside.  This is pretty typical Louie Simmons stuff.  His articles are all like this too.  What’s crazy is Louie will screw up the spelling of the name of someone he’s known for 25 years but will know down to the POUND how much that person squatted at a meet in 1996.

* Louie advises a rubgy coach to have his players wrestle in the off season to cut down in season injuries.  Goddamn do I love that suggestion/solution. 

Hioefully you won't go against this guy

* I’m on page 273 of 306 and the book is just running completely off the rails.  Any semblance of organization is gone, and it’s just Louie finding jumping off points to rant about people and things.  Which isn’t to say that it’s not entertaining, but again, for those that prefer structure: you won’t find it here.

* Ok, now the homophobic slur isn’t a quote from the 90s or a quote from someone else.  Come on Louie.

* There’s a story about a lifter not knowing what order a powerlifting meet runs in (as far as order of lifts) and then going on to set a pro total.  There’s a lesson there about how being super academic about your sport probably doesn’t matter as much as simply being strong.

* So many of Louie’s stories about lifters end with “they died much too young”.  Probably something to take away from that.

* Last 10 pages of the book are an excellent example of the need for competition in powerlifting in order to get stronger.  It can’t just be going against a spreadsheet.  Competing against a real human drives us to get stronger.  Also, at the very end, it says Louie banned all the members of the night crew of Westside for life, which included Dave Hoff.  Man, I can’t keep up with the drama.

 

SALT THE EARTH

“Stimulate, don’t annihilate” is a phrase that’s commonly employed amongst those looking to build some muscle, and was popularized by Lee Haney who, by all conceivable measures, was quite accomplished at doing exactly that.  It’s hard to argue with such credentials, but thankfully, I don’t care about that, because I’m here to simply offer an alternative: salt the earth.  This is the phrase I’ve taken to employ in my most recent round of training for hypertrophy coming off of my most successful fat loss phase to date, achieving a level of leanness I’ve never seen before.  And while stimulating without annihilating can claim Lee Haney for credentials, salting the earth comes via Genghis Khan who is simply a much greater badass than Haney, so I’m going to steal from him.  Anyone, allow me to continue to ramble.  You honestly have no choice anyway, since it’s my blog.

One of the perks of being the bad guy is uninterrupted speeches.  Plus, this guy actually succeeding in salting the earth.

 

“Isn’t salting the earth a dumb term to come up with if the goal is growth, since the whole point was to make sure nothing ever grew again?”  Yeah, the irony has not escaped me either, but look, I’m not a smart man: it’s why I gotta be strong instead.  Because life is hard, but it’s even harder when you’re stupid, so you better be tough if you’re not smart.  Anyway, I’ve co-opted the term more to refer to methodology vs outcome, because I operate under the principle that the only way to make the body grow it to subject it to such significant trauma that, as a survival mechanism/response, it FORCES muscular growth to occur.  My issue with “stimulate don’t annihilate” has always been that, for many trainees, the degree of stimulation they generate in an attempt to not annihilate ends up being NOT enough to cause muscle to grow, which is a waste of a training session AND, when paired with a nutritional program based around growth, results in simply the accumulation of fat rather than muscle.  When one “salts the earth”, they have no choice BUT to grow, assuming enough recovery resources are provided (food and rest).

 

Alright, so what the hell is “salting the earth?”  I employ in my current training “salt the earth sets”, done at the end of a workout or a specific exercise.  There’s nothing magical about these sets: they’re simply sets that employ intensity modifiers in order to get to the absolute end of one’s limit on an exercise.  Let me share a video example of a recent salt the earth set wherein I employ a many level strip set on high handle trap bar pulls before finishing with 111 reps.

 

 

This can also be done with conditioning, like this round of keg carries I do

 

 

I’ve also employed one for squats, wherein, at the end of a tough squat workout (been doing Dan John’s “Litvinov Sprints” for a while now), I’ll do front squats with 135lbs until failure (typically hitting somewhere in the low 20s), then immediately switch to having the bar on my back and continue squatting until I hit failure there.  I’ve also taken to belt squat stripsets without lockout to hammer the quads, and when I had access to a leg press machine during a work trip took to doing a 150 rep set followed by a dropset for another 50 reps without lockout.  For benching, I’m using DBs and going to failure, then throwing on a reactive slingshot and going to failure, then throwing on a Metal Catapult (stronger resistance) and going to failure, then using lighter dumbbells and repeating the whole thing all over again.

 

In all of the above, the method remains the same: I’m going until there is simply NOTHING left.  I’m “salting the earth” with this workout, not leaving any reps in reserve, not leaving anything for the swim back, etc etc.  And it seems to be working pretty well.

 

 

Thanks "1 set of curls a week!"

One of the other benefits of this is that I’ve been able to eat copious amounts of food with no discernable fat gain.  This is placing a significant demand on the body, which means a significant demand on recovery, which is great for those of you with voracious appetites.  And for those of you LACKING in the appetite department, this is HOW you get an appetite.

 

But there’s a reason I’ve adopted “salt the earth” as my terminology here: it’s a testament to how there are NO half measures when it comes to this.  If you bail once things start getting tough, you’re basically training for nothing.  You could get a more effective workout by using intelligently programmed sub-max training if you intend to not push to the limits: 5/3/1 and many other such programs out there are proof of concept of that.  If you go easy on an intensity modifier based exercise, you’re just using light weights for no reason.  But if you push as hard as possible, well past the point of pain, well past the point of your body wanting to shut down, well past the point of your brain telling you that it’s time to quit, you’ll find something pretty amazing on the other side.  I’ve even taken to referring to these as “toothpaste sets”, because it’s like trying to squeeze every last ounce of toothpaste out of the tube: you just keep grinding and grinding and finding more and more in you until you’re FINALLY empty.   Before I get under the bar for those squats, I tell myself “salt the earth”.  It may seem goofy, dramatic, cringe worthy, etc etc, but getting your head straight and knowing your purpose before you set out on something like this goes a LONG way toward ensuring your success.  And, in truth, I’d rather be big, strong and cringe inducing than small, weak and respectable.    

Suits me JUST fine

 

So go gather your hordes, light your torches, take no prisoners, and salt the earth.