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.