Natural Bodybuilding, Fitness, and Peak Performance

Working Your Body Can Turn a Bad Start into a Great Day

It was one of those mornings. You know… you get up and nothing seems to be going right. You seemed to have had a lousy sleeping dream that has your subconscious mind battling some unidentified demon. You stub your toe on the little castor at the bottom of the bedpost on the way to the bathroom. The first three minutes of a shower turns into an ordeal of counting your blessings after you nearly slipped and broke your neck stepping into that semi-hazardous space. And to top it off – you have a squabble with your spouse or significant other, just prior to inadvertently viewing the news after you’d vowed to reduce your frequency of doing so in recognition that there’s nothing ‘good’ reported.

Yesterday, I was having a morning like that. As I headed off to the gym to get a workout, my thoughts were mired in everything that seemed negative about my rocky start.

Luckily though, my body hadn’t been informed that the day started out badly. My muscles were, surprisingly, ready to perform and set me on the right track. Shortly after starting my workout, my mind was ‘anchored’ into a positive frame of thinking. There’s nothing like physical fitness activity to get you back to the basic foundation – your mind and body with their inextricable, invisible link.

It ended up being a fantastic day after all. Working the body, when done effectively, possesses a ripple-effect of resonating benefit.

The Secrets to Creating a Killer V-Shape

It’s a well-known fact that cannon-ball shoulders capping off a flaring taper of widely jutting lat muscles create a V-shape for the upper body. When you’ve acquired a respectable degree of such shape, it’s a terrific asset to possess. Nothing more effectively gives the illusion of a smaller waistline – even when one’s mid-section isn’t quite as small as it could be.

What isn’t as well known as the benefits of a V-shaped torso are the most effective use of tactics for bringing it about. Oh sure, most workout enthusiasts are aware that a transmogrification of their lats into wings and their shoulders into boulders would do the trick. Yet judging by their workout activity, an awareness of necessity for the ends doesn’t always translate into knowledge of an effective means. In other words, most people are lost as to how to build these two muscle groups.

From years of observation, I’ve noticed that many people over train both of these muscles and completely miss the boat in terms of proper workout form when training their latisimus dorsi muscles. These two factors combined are the biggest reason for frustrating results when attempting to build a V-shape. If good technique is adhered to and volume overload is successfully and steadily accomplished, then the widening one’s shoulder and back muscles is as predictable as a belch after a chug of beer.

Let’s start by addressing the prevalence of over training the deltoids. The reason this happens is that the shoulders are used in an indirect manner when training other muscles as well as in everyday physical movement. And because of their susceptibility to over training for this reason, you shouldn’t work them with any more than one exercise for each of the three deltoid ‘heads’. I personally do four exercises for my deltoids; one overhead pressing movement and three raising movements – one to the front, one to the sides and one to the rear. Any more than this would be a redundancy of exercise and lead to over training. Furthermore, I’ve found that this simple and intuitive sequence of only four exercises can get anyone’s shoulders to grow thick and wide if their training frequency and overload principles are soundly applied.

The ‘four-total-movements’ rule holds true for the lat muscles as well, with one major caveat; they require extra care and attention from the standpoint of exercise form. I choose two pull-down movements for width and two rowing movements for thickness – and then perform these exercises with a focus that makes my arms into nothing more than ‘connecting rods’ between the resistance (weight or straps) and my upper back.

I know what you’re thinking at this point: ‘What the hell does he mean by that?’ Well, I’ve never seen so many people cheat themselves out of good muscle development as I have watching gym members performing pull-down and rowing movements. And what they invariably do to the detriment of desired progress is use inertia and momentum to ‘jerk’ the bar to their chest rather than the unengaged lat muscles to move the weight. Nothing will engage the lat muscles like leaving the arms out of the picture entirely. And nothing will do this like concentrating on pulling the bar from your upper back region while thinking of your arms as merely connecting the weight to the lats – as if they’re an extension of the pulley on the machine.

In addition, you should perform these movements slowly and pretend that you are actually trying to touch your shoulder blades together as you bring the bar to your chest (as if that were possible).

If you simply follow these shoulder and lat recommendations, you’re upper body will start taking on that appearance of a much-sought-after and coveted V. When you further employ the recommendations outlined in my book ‘HardBody Success’, those results will happen even faster and easier.

Bodybuilding’s Misconceptions are revealed in everyday ‘gym-talk’

It wasn’t long ago that my frame was carrying roughly 30% body fat and was devoid of most of the muscle size that it currently holds. In other words, I was fat and if I’d merely dropped the weight – I would have been skinny. My recent "cracking of the code" of what it takes for a genetically-challenged, non-drug using bodybuilder to make impressive and ongoing muscle gains has dramatically improved my physique. Yet at the same time, it’s elicited the quirky peculiarities of comments and questions that can only be borne out of a pastime and/or profession that’s mired in a myriad of misconceptions and half-truths.

Let’s take one that I was hit with about a week ago as an example. I was leaving the gym after a highly successful workout (I judge my workouts by how successful they are – not necessarily by how hard they are) when an acquaintance stopped me with a compliment. "You’ve really leaned down and muscled up" he observed aloud. "You must be doing something right."

I turned quickly toward the voice, impulsively ready to reciprocate for the cool words. It was the guy behind the counter – a co-owner of the gym. "Thanks!" I said. "Now I’m about as lean as you are, Joe. And I seem to be gaining muscle even faster without the excess body fat."
Joe nodded with a smile. "Yea" he said. "…And now the muscle you’re gaining is ‘quality muscle’."

Quality muscle? That one caused me to outwardly cringe a bit. Then he said it again for reemphasis and I cringed a lot. I wondered what the hell he was thinking. Did he really believe there is such a thing as "non-quality muscle"? I also wondered where on earth I’d heard that before – because I knew it wasn’t the first time.

Another example: A month or so ago, I was approached in the gym by a co-member whom I speak with occasionally about training. This guy is in his early fifties and admitted to me that he’d used "the juice" when he was younger. Now he seems to be so attached to his ‘old-school’ methodologies that his ability to make progress has landed on the slippery slope of regression. After not seeing me for awhile, he noticed my increased arm size and became inquisitive. "Are you training heavy?" he asked.

"What?" I answered. I was honestly confused by the question. Let’s face it; ‘heavy’ is a relative term. Heavy compared to what? Compared to what I used to train with? Yes – most definitely. Heavy compared to the poundage Ronnie Coleman uses? Definitely not! If a trainee weighs 120 pounds and has 13-inch arms, then a workout weight of 135 pounds on the bench press might be heavy.

Maybe this guy was attempting to find out how many reps I’ve been using. Since I wanted more specificity before answering his question, I said, "What do you mean by heavy?" That invoked an expression from him like I was as dense as a doornail.

"You know…heavy." He replied. "Are you training heavy?"

"OOoooh…heavy!" I said in recognition. "Yea, I’m heavily in use of volume overload in increments to which my muscles need constantly adapt so that they consistently grow stronger and bigger."

Now his expression changed to one that looked like he’d wished he had never asked the question. I didn’t see him for the rest of my workout.

But probably nowhere are bodybuilding’s widespread misconceptions more aptly expressed than in the common two-word phrase: "gain weight" – as in "I want to gain some weight." This is often heard spilling from the mouth of a young male who’s fed up with his skinny body and simply sees any additional size to his physique as being a good thing. Too often, this leads to over-eating, over-training, and not much headway in his quest to eradicate the appearance of a skeletal frame deficient of sizeable musculature.

This can happen due to the simple lack of specificity in the notion of "gaining weight". Think about it: there’s a world of difference between the two kinds of weight a person can gain. If we eat more calories than we burn off, we store the excess as fat. Yet this isn’t even remotely similar to the cause-and-effect actions necessary for gaining muscle. Even so, many young guys think they need simply pile down calories and train like hell and they’ll eventually get a substantial gain in "solid weight". This haphazard approach can work for a while in some cases, but it inevitably ends in a frustrating progress plateau.

The blurred thinking that causes a person to lump all weight gain into a single concept is the same kind that leads them to believe there’s such a thing as "quality muscle". After all, it’s safe to assume that a person speaking of "quality muscle" is referring to muscle without body fat marbled in with it. But it’s only the erroneous notion that somehow these two tissues have an intertwining relationship that can fuel the belief that the presence of fat can affect the "quality" of the muscle. Muscle is muscle – and when you gain it, you’ve acquired something of quality. And even though marbled-in fat is generally considered an unfavorable condition, losing it won’t make the nearby muscle tissue of any higher quality.

Muscle tissue on the skeletal frame is a quality attribute. And on a side note – it takes a bit more specificity in strategy to pack it on naturally than simply "training heavy".

Why does one of The Best Bodybuilding Foods get a Bad Rap?

Years ago, I learned a simple secret to increasing my performance during my workouts. It was during a conversation with the owner of the gym I attend – who also happens to be a former National Level competitive bodybuilder.

"I don’t know why eating beef the night before a workout makes a person stronger." Rick professed earnestly, "…but give it a try and I guarantee you’ll notice a difference."

From the day following that conversation until the present, I’ve been an avid devotee of ‘timed beef intake’. I’d always leaned toward a carnivore-like tendency anyway, but my experience immediately following the advice that Rick imparted has made me a confirmed believer in the well-timed ingestion of this protein-dense power food. So added to the fact that I think it tastes good, I also enjoy utilizing it for strategic benefit (i.e. better workout performance resulting in better results). I eat between a pound and a pound and a half of top sirloin within two hours of going to sleep on the night before a workout. Since my workouts are relatively infrequent, this doesn’t pose a problem with over consumption.

Does this make a difference? You bet it does. I’m stronger and more aggressive on the days after eating it and there’s a concomitant edge in my workout performance. Nobody knows for sure why this happens, but I’ve heard theories and even come up with some myself. Some say it’s the relatively high level of creatine in the beef. Others say consuming it raises one’s testosterone levels. A few people suggest that it’s hormones in the beef – but I would assume those haven’t been biologically active since the cow’s been dead.

I’ve heard a compelling hypothesis from a fellow gym member as to why red meat consumption might increase testosterone levels. He figures it’s something connected with mankind’s distant past as nomadic hunters and gatherers. Because in those times a group of hunters might go days without a catch, the physical and cognitive demands of snaring a wild animal would cause the hunter’s testosterone to increase by necessity. This, over time, became a sort of physiological anchor between eating the meat of such an animal and having jacked up testosterone levels. His hypothesis seems as good as any. As a dose of anecdotal evidence: most guys, including myself, notice a marked increase in libido after a few days of eating significant portions of beef.

Recently, I’ve noticed the longevity gurus are out in full force pontificating about all the perils of eating beef. If it’s not the saturated fat that’s killing us, then it’s the higher iron levels in the meat that’ll do it. Never mind that we actually need some iron intake; if you listen to some of these people, you’d think we need to eradicate it.

I’ve even read one longevity doctor’s advice that said I shouldn’t take in any vitamin C around the time of eating meats that are high in iron because vitamin C causes more iron absorption. Well, if I add this piece of advice to everything else that he advocates, I’d prolong my years on Earth while sacrificing quality of life that depends on my not treating it like I’m tip-toeing through a mine field. Don’t get me wrong; I don’t believe in being reckless and I’m all for a reasonable quest for longevity. But keeping everything in moderation, I’d prefer to also be moderate in that quest.

But the current anti-beef brigade is even attempting to dissuade me from eating it by throwing the threat of Mad Cow disease in front of my face. Give me a break. I’m living in a world where my odds of dying in a car accident are somewhere around one in 250. There are terrorists around the world who want to kill me because I’m American. Hell, the odds of getting killed in a house fire are a lot better than eating some tainted piece of food. The British had to slaughter around… what… a quarter million head of cattle over that disease and how much of it was spread to humans? A tiny fraction. Although it's a tragedy that it spread to humans at all, a basic understanding of odds should tell you not to let anyone get between you and a juicy steak beccause of that particular reason.

What I do is have my cholesterol levels checked regularly. My overall levels are low and my ratios are good, so I keep with my intermittent beef intake protocol.

I’m not saying you should make beef a regular staple in your diet. That’s something between you and your physician. I will tell you, however, that with a personal yet rudimentary cost/benefit analysis for myself, I’m finding the current benefits of eating beef outweighing the costs. Here’s to one of the best bodybuilding foods I’ve found.

With that – I think I’ll go eat a one-pound cheeseburger.