Maximum Fitness

Anabolic Diet

maximumfitness — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 07:57:44 +0000

The Anabolic Diet in short is a diet that is composed of protein and fat with minimal carbs and no carbs from wheat, rice, potatoes or any starchy refined carbs.

This diet rips fat off the body I have no doubt about that because I have seen it happen to me and countless clients.

The downside is that you can’t eat sugar or starchy carbs, you can end up feeling like you’re just eating meat all the time.

You can get pretty inventive though.

Bacon burgers with cheese, sour cream, tomato and lettuce without the bun – I’ll have 5 of them thanks.

Lasagna with cabbage leaves instead of pasta? I’ll have the whole dish.

It works.

Velocity Diet

maximumfitness — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 07:41:22 +0000

I remember using the velocity diet as an experiment. Man it’s one badass diet, nothing but protein shakes and flaxseed oil for a week. My body became cut fast and I didn’t lose too much muscle mass by the time I started eating regular food again. Interestingly, after the first day I wasn’t really craving regular food anymore but perhaps this was because some sort of madness had set in!

In any case, it’s a good way of cutting up fast but it’s definitely not healthy. I remember some people trying to argue that it is but come on how can drinking nothing but protein shakes and flaxseed oil be good for you long term. Let’s just accept that it’s an extreme diet and then take appropriate care with it. If you’re going to try it do it for a week and see how you go and make sure that you’re getting enough protein and fat.

Raw Food Diet

maximumfitness — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 07:37:30 +0000

I went on the raw food diet for two year in the early 90′s. This is taboo to most bodybuilders as they lose too much weight but what I found was that after about 8 months my body adapted and I started to put on weight in the same way as I was when I was doing the 6 regular meals a day thing.

I felt great and very clear headed but the problem is that I enjoy having cooked foods too much. So 2 years was my limit.

My take on this is that it is possible to be on a raw food diet and gain muscle weight but it takes time to adapt and really it should only be for people who don’t really like eating cooked foods – otherwise, life is going to be hard!

High Volume Training

maximumfitness — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 07:32:05 +0000

The big scare of high volume training is that the body gets “overtrained.” Like anything though I’ve found that high volume training has its place, it just needs to be used appropriately. All this means is that the body has a chance to recover well.

I might throw in 2 months of high volume training immediately after 3 months of low rep, low set, high intensity training. I might do one week of medium intensity (8-10 reps, 5 sets each muscle group) and then go into high intensity training the following week.

The important thing is that you’re working those muscles but keeping them guessing and from adapting to your routine.

Isometrics or not?

maximumfitness — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 07:27:17 +0000

A lot of bodybuilders I’ve met seem to scoff at isometrics. This is strange to me because the strongmen of old seem to have been masters of isometrics. I guess goals have changed though because strongmen were more about getting strong where as to bodybuilders its more about big muscles and big muscles does not necessarily mean stronger muscles.

Isometrics definitely make the muscle stronger at static holds and over time I’ve noticed that this helps to lift more weight which helps to build stronger muscles. It also helps in breaking past sticking points in holds. Apart from that its just damn cool to be able bend coins and stuff like this.

Fascia Stretching for muscle growth

maximumfitness — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 07:20:17 +0000

There is mounting theory that for a muscle to grow the fascia that surrounds it has to stretch or grow too. For those that don’t know, the fascia is a layer of connective tissue between the skin and muscle that surrounds the muscle like a balloon. If the fascia is really tight and though then it can restrict the growth of the muscle. So stretching the fascia is important yeah?

The best way to stretch the fascia is to hold your body in a stretch position and then to massage along the muscle. This may be a little painful but it helps to stretch and loosen the fascia. Do it for about 60 seconds on the muscles that you want to help grow.

Here’s an experiment for you: Try doing the massage on the muscle on one arm but not the muscle on the other arm and see which one looks bigger after a week.

Super Slow

maximumfitness — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 07:12:52 +0000

Super slow weight training was pretty controversial for a while. Actually most of the comments about it seemed to be negative as far as muscle growth. The thing is though you can feel it working – it really burns the muscle.

My own experiences with super slow training and we’re talking really slow, somewhere in the region of 30 seconds up and 30 seconds down have been not too bad. It certainly feels like the muscle is working but as far as growth I didn’t notice a lot – at least not when used exclusively.

I experimented with super slow training and HIT training in the same session and well my results were better than HIT training alone.

I experimented with super slow training and high volume training at a regular speed and again my results were better than high volume training alone.

The way I’d do it is to do 1 or 2 sets of super slow and then do the same exercise using HIT or high volume training.

Now this is only a theory but my guess is that super slow training activates the nerves or muscle memory or something in a way that is unique. This may not be so great for muscle growth on its own but when followed with HIT or high volume training this latter training uses that nerve activation to its own advantage.

Anyway, that’s just a guess and the bottomline is to try it out and see how it goes for you. For me it resulted in a lot more muscle growth.

Keeping the muscle growth cycle going

maximumfitness — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 07:03:01 +0000

What keeps my muscle cycle growth going (and this has worked for most of my clients) is continually changing my routines every few months or so. This includes reps, weight ratios, training schedules, exercises – pretty much everything that can be changed.

I might change from HIT (high intensity training) to German volume training or some other high set training, partials or even static resistance training.

A one or two week layoff can also be great every now and then but sometimes instead of that I might do something that affects my muscles differently like isometrics or plyometrics. What I’ve noticed is that keeping the muscles guessing means that the muscles can’t adapt. When muscles adapt they stop growing so by keeping them guessing I maximize my growth cycles.

Changing the routine works really well even if you just want to maintain your current physique but it’s main forte in my experience is for keeping muscle growth going.

High Intensity Training (HIT)

maximumfitness — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 07:02:30 +0000

I was big on HIT back in the early 90′s after reading a lot of articles by Mike Mentzer mainly. The main principle of HIT is to use an amount of weight that only allows you to beat out 3-6 reps before reaching muscle failure.

HIT is all about maximum intensity and the practice as proposed by Mentzer was to only do 1 or 2 sets at most. He also proposed only using the big major lifts like squats, deadlifts, bench presses and rows.

I used HIT for about 2 years and put on a fair amount of mass but I did eventually plateau. I still use it intermittently on intuition for a few months at a time during my cycle.