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We’re all anxious to get what we want. Still, we need
to exercise patience and persistence in the effort to obtain
it. Good things come neither easily nor quickly, and that
includes muscle.
When people first become interested in bodybuilding, they
tend to dive into it, to push very hard for a few days or
weeks and then quit. “Why,” they ask themselves,
“do I have nothing to show for all my hard work?”
Why haven’t they gained? Where are their muscles? After
all, they’ve immersed themselves in training. “I’ve
done more in the past few weeks than most bodybuilders do
in a year!” they say.
And that’s the problem. A year’s training must
be distributed over a year’s time. You cannot rush results.
It’s true that weights will provide the fastest, most
effective means of physical development, but you have to use
them intelligently.
Very few people who begin weight training continue with it
for the long term. Often, it’s because such people can’t
accept the need to work out systematically, over time, so
they make gradual progress. Instead, they want instant muscles
and strength.
When you see someone who has an impressive physique (assuming
that it was built naturally and not with drugs) you’re
looking at a person who’s worked hard for a longtime.
He’s impressive now, but he didn’t get that way
by training madly for a few weeks.
Realistically, there’s only so much training you can
do without diminishing your returns. The late great Peary
Rader once noted that he couldn’t see any difference
between the physique of a man who trained for about an hour
at a time and that of a fellow who spent half a day at it.
After a good, basic workout, stop. You’re not going
to speed up progress by cramming a lot of work into a short
time, and you may bog down if you’re not blessed with
enormous recuperative powers and great hereditary potential,
and most of us aren’t. Overwork will not alter hereditary
potential. Nothing will.
Both Mr. Universe and Mr. Average Trainee can get all the
muscle-building work they need in a one-to-two-hour session.
Mr. Average might do two sets of eight presses with 80 pounds.
Mr. Universe might do three sets of eight with 150 pounds.
They’ll both take about the same length of time to do
the work, however.
The real secret to success in training is regularity. Step
by step, over weeks, months and years, the successful bodybuilder
keeps training. He doesn’t train in spurts. The fellow
who goes hog wild, frantically over-training, for a couple
of weeks feels that he’s training up a storm and really
getting somewhere, but he’s not. When he quits, he’s
right where he started. The body develops at its own pace.
As one of my heroes, Harry B. Pascall, once wrote, “Mother
Nature will not be pushed around.”
The fellow who sets aside 30 minutes three times a week for
training and sticks with it will be way ahead of someone who
trains according to whim. A guy who begins squatting with
100 pounds will, if he adds just 2 1/2 pounds a week, be squatting
with 60 percent more weight in six months. You might not feel
that you’ve increased the resistance by much, but a
60 percent increase indicates substantial development. Whatever
your starting weight, that kind of improvement can be yours,
if you work out patiently and sensibly.
Contrast that with the sort of approach one so often encounters:
Desperate for gains, a young man dives into training, forcing
himself to use 110 pounds as a startup weight. It’s
agony, but he wants muscles now. Week 2 sees a whopping 10-pound
increase. Imagine, he’s squatting with 120 pounds while
lazy, slow Mr. Systematic is only handling 102 1/2 pounds.
Why, he’ll have fabulous development in no time at all.
By the fourth week the systematic trainee is squatting with
107 1/2 pounds. His energy is through the roof. He feels like
Mr. Universe, even if he doesn’t look like him yet.
He looks forward to his workouts, which leave him feeling
wonderful. He’s filled with optimism about his potential.
Mr. No Patience, on the other hand, is trying to move 140
pounds, but it’s too much. His muscles simply haven’t
developed in step with the exorbitant demands placed on them.
He hates training. He can’t continue the workouts.
By the fifth week the systematic trainee is using 110 pounds.
He feels fantastic, and his physique is visibly improving.
The other fellow has quit.
Sound uncomfortably familiar? Accept the fact that you are
who and what you are. Start from there. Set up a reasonable
schedule that will let you, over time, realize your potential.
You can and will achieve your optimum development if you train
correctly. That means basic, regular, hard workouts that develop
you rather than deplete you.
Be patient. Take your time. Add weight, yes, but only in small
amounts and only when your body has acquired the strength
to benefit from the additional effort. If you’re strong
enough to train properly with 35 pounds, that’s the
weight you should use. Once 35 pounds ceases to cause too
much effort, put a bit more on the bar. Over time, you’ll
make excellent, safe, very satisfying progress.
I can never know the exact mental state of readers when my
words reach them. Wherever you are, though, you cannot go
wrong with this approach. It works. Do it.
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Bodybuilder
Bodybuilding For
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