I
‘m looking for a few good men (and some women too). Using some principles gathered from both research and experimentation that I’ve done, I feel pretty confident that I can create a pretty remarkable and foolproof method for increasing strength with basic exercises. Perhaps the best part is the miminal amount of exertion required to get this strength increase. My own benchpress has increased about 30 pounds in the last 6 weeks with just a couple minutes of total exertion. This 30-pound increase equals the increase in bench that I’ve experienced from age 14 to 34 with sporadic training, and a ton of total work overall, so I’m pretty psyched. Of course, a recurring theme here?is getting the most reward for the least amount of time, effort, and life disruption as possible.?
What I need to test this out is a minimum of 10 volunteers (I would prefer the group to be 50-50 men/women), who are willing to follow a rigid training protocol (just for benchpress) for 10 weeks/70 days. To volunteer you must meet the following prerequisites…
- You must have access to a gym that has a Power Rack
- You must currently be doing some regular weight training, and ideally be using as much or more weight for your chest press exercises as you ever have (thus, not rebuilding strength built at an earlier time in your life, but building new strength)
- You must be at least 18 years of age
- You must be able to test your?5 rep max strength before and after the experiment, and be comfortable with doing so
- You must be free of injury, particularly to the wrists
- You must be willing to avoid all other chest and tricep exercises during the 10 week experiment
- You must be willing to keep a detailed journal of your benchpress weight progression
If you choose to volunteer you will receive detailed instructions on how to perform the benchpress exercises effectively and safely, as well as a training schedule. Training begins January 21 and ends on April 1. There will be 13 workouts of 3 sets each during that time period.?I’m hoping to see’the volunteer?group increase 5 rep max by at least 30% in the 10 weeks. ?
If you are up for it, send an email to rob@180degreehealth.com with the subject “Volunteer” and we’ll turn you into a guinea pig in no time.??Deadline to sign up is January 15, 2013.
First! Haven’t benched in ages and perhaps never will again in my life. I can press from a frog stand into a hand stand though and perform a muscle up on rings.
Well, technically you wouldn’t have to do any bench presses other than testing your bench before and after. The training itself doesn’t involve actual bench presses in the traditional sense (although you will be lying on a bench, and yes you will be pressing).
I turn 18 in November and have access to a Power Rack at home… can I still be a guinea pig?
Okay fine. That’s close enough. I just didn’t want someone who is developing and gaining strength very easily to make up the whole group. Nah mean? But you had me at “Power rack at home.”
Before and after eating lots of sugar: No boobs to boobies!
The before picture: excessively dieting (lots of water, vegetables, fatty meats and organs, and bingeing on carbs) and running sprints and long miles for exercises.
The after picture: eating lots of carbs, saturated fat, and tons of sugar (drinking soda as my only liquid intake most of the time and eating a pint of Haagen Dazs for breakfast at least four times per week) and lifting weights.
nsfw http://tinypic.com/r/11cfbs2/6
Definitely some positive body recomposition there as far as I can see!
Congratulations!
Thomas (Seay) should be happy- boob pictures at last!! lol
LIKE. VERY LIKE, but I think you might have just got me in trouble at work. Will check again from home. Thank you for this gift :) and congratulations.
Thomas, as soon as I saw those pics I thought of how much you were going to love this and laughed rather uncontrollably.
Nice work on the breastimonial oh courageous B&A RRARF. I’m scrambling to come up with a clever nickname (B&A, T&A isn’t good enough). I think the most impressive change is that increased hourglass shape. Thanks for making me and Thomas’s day.
Definitely impressed with the hourglass.
Matt, let’s face it. B&A RRARF has raised the bar in terms of my expectations. We were talking about wet T-shirt contests and B&A RRARF went above and beyond the call of duty. What a honey!!!!! Great improvements in body composition but was already good to start off with in my opinion.
wait- but porn exists.
WOW that’s impressive! How much do you strengthtrain and for how long,and do you do lots of other physical stuff/moving around the rest of the week? and what do you do as a strengthtraining ‘program’?
Also,you mention eating icecream for breakfast,lots of carbs/sugars en sat.fats….so may I ask what you typically/on general eat in a day?(don’t mean calories,as calories never really said that much to me anyway…and I kinda want to stay ‘oblivious/ignorant’ towards calories&counting them)
I ask,bc I really don’t know what to eat anymore,what feels like a meal to me, or how to homecook for that matter!
Hey Dutchie! I’m pretty irregular with the weight training. Those pictures do not tell all. At first I gained fat from rarrfing as expected, and then my body started to shed off the fat. My body has really slimmed down in the past 2 months where I started to cut most PUFAs and exercised more. Hehe I was eating bags of pufa lay’s chips a lot and lots of cheap vegetable oil cookies before. After eating clean for so long and never drinking soda I vacuumed up all that bad stuff for rarrfing. Now soda is dear and near.
No program. Just maxing it out as safe and in the correct form as possible. In the past 2 months I’ve been hitting the gym four times a week. I curl 25 pounds, my max, as many times as I can, 5 curls per arm. Then I do my max for tricep extensions, penguin arm lifts, squats, deadlifts, kettlebell swings. For dips I try to slowly descend as many times as I can. I walk a bit maybe 2 miles a day. But I say nay to the running.
Always eat carbs for breakfast. Generally eat huge lunner and no dinner.
Cereal and coconut oil smothered in sugar bread items for breakfast. Both are great ideas of Matt, hell this whole thing is. Sometimes I eat half a pepperoni pizza with a large soda, breadsticks, and chocolate crackers at 2 am. Sometimes I eat 2 haagen dazs pints at 3 am.
I definitely feel you on the idea of what on earth should I eat at what time. But I realized my body takes care of it as long as I give it what it wants and exercise like a man. I eat lots of pasta, rice, bread, grass-fed ground beef, coconut oil, sugar and soy sauce. As for cooking things at home I literally will just add a few of the above listed ingredients in a pan, cook it and eat it.
Sorry about the length, but when I ask people questions I am curious to hear it all. Hopefully I answered yours, ask more if need be :)
No way B&A T&A- I don’t believe you!
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Haagen Dasz only does 14oz-ers these days, not pints. Haha
Anyway, second all those congrats both on the enhanced strength and warmth, and the hourglassy-ness. Right on and thanks for sharing
lol sadness just realized there were 2 oz off
No problem with length….the more detailed an answer the better!:)
So,you eat twice a day…..the not having dinner is something that’ll probably make me feel weird mentally for some reason…..as I feel ‘dinner’ is part of the day,unwinding or whatever.That’s the problem,my mind also plays lots of tricks on me regarding foods,what feels like ‘a meal’ to me,mealfrequency etc.
I wish you all the best on your endeavours:)
About 4 days a week I eat twice a day. I have dinner and I don’t worry about it. I just eat whenever I want to eat it.
and I the same, have a successful one!
Thanks guys! Thanks Matt for the great advice on your site!!
I feel like I hit every eating lifestyle before I hit yours. Definitely my biggest before and after improvement is my temperature. My hands and feet are always hot all day long. Another is that my feet went from being dry and flaky to soft and smooth. I like your nicknames, so I’m down for whatever.
I am excited to do this strength program.
Interestingly enough I did weightlifting every other day for a year in a weightlifting class and I went from 10 pound curls to 15. But after rarrfing, two months ago I went from 15 to 25. Holla to Matt and sugar!!
That’s amazing B&A! :)
My boobs have always been full, but have fluctuated depending on how much I weigh. When I was running long miles, they got smaller and now they’re huge-especially after RRARFing! They’re also not saggy, like I worried about them getting, which is awesome.
I’m interested to see what happens to them as I strength train and swing kettlebells (one of my most favorite fitness routines…) I won’t cut calories or cut down on my carbs though at all.
Back to the subject, yes I want to volunteer! I sent the email.
I am a rather experienced weightlifter and I signed up. Let me know if I should not. Second question: can “before and after rarrfing” be my training partner? I need somebody to spot me :)
I am much more interested in experienced weightlifters than non-experienced. If it works for someone who is already at their peak strength after years of training, then it is undeniably legit.
It’s legit
If I spotted you and you did slip you would die because you lift way more than I.
hmmm…tempting. I fit all those requirements, I have a power rack in my garage gym, and I do bench once a week (partials off of pins, followed by full ROM working up to a heavy triple).
I haven’t tested my 3rm lately, but I should be pretty close to my best bench strength. Testing 5rm is no problem.
I’ll send an email shortly.
That’s an interesting challenge,I’d love to participate in….as I found myself,usually skipping bench presses and such lately,bc it frustrated me that I didn’t notice any (quick) improvements in relation towards squatting. Which led me to the disaster that happened last week,bc I probably was overdoing it and going too fast and eating all kinds of iron-blocking/low-iron foods :s
Would love to volunteer but my wrists are unhappy so I am out, on a side note though…
I have been using eccentric exercise from SSoS and your Maximal Effort ideas together for just over 3 mths and have gone from 35kg to 75kg on the leg press,,,,,expecting very exciting results from this experiment
If Matt wrote this post, I thought he would have gained much more than 30 lbs in the benchpress from 14 to 34 years of age. 30 lbs with sporadic training over several years, plus an additional 30 lbs in 6 weeks seems easily doable with normal training?
A brief history with weightlifting…
Benchpressed about 145 entering high school. Lifted weights regularly and got that first 30 or so pounds from training for my first few months. Rest of high school made it to around 200. One guy doing the same routine ended up benching 330 – only about 25 pounds heavier than me. He was freaking huge and ran a 4.5 40. He ended up becoming a pro athlete but that fizzled out and he became a strength coach for a pro sports team. Point – it’s not always the methodology as much as it is the person who is doing it.
After that I pretty much worked out off and on. Bench max probably floated between 180 and 200-ish, but I never tested 1 rep max during that time. Most strength gains were restoring gains previously earned. Every time I start lifting I get back old strength and then plateau. I once worked out 9 months consistently and would say I might have been able to pull off 210 on bench if I tested 1-rep max, but I never did.
I think most people who lift weights, unless they are exceptional physically, gain strength for 2-3 months and then are lucky to add 5-10 pounds a year on their bench max. But working out all year for a 5-pound increase is pretty demoralizing. I think few who get such dismal results continue to lift weights consistently. I fit into that group. I have had many bursts of success with weights, but ended with burnout or injury only to get nowhere long-term. I have been lifting consistently since early September to get my former strength back. But I improved a lot more in the last 6 workouts than I did in the previous 40 or 50 since September. So I’m definitely interested in pursuing this methodology and find out how others respond to it.
Yeah, as an experienced weight lifter I agree..
After some initial fast gains come some l o n g plateaus, and minimal
hard won gains.
You have got me interested- but not ready to sign up yet!
I love benching and just sent rob an email…. however, i forgot to ask if it was that slow method whatsitsnameagain? because if it is im out. just because its too darn boooring :/
No. It’s not super slow reps a la Body By Science/HIT. In fact, each set is only a few seconds.
BA-TA girl: you look awesome. Interesting how extra weight improves your body composition. Brave of you to post pix; now maybe Thomas can stop whining.
For those who crave pufa-free potato chips: I ordered some olive oil kettle-style potato chips thru amazon. They are awesome. Wrapped up a box and put them under the tree for my teenage son for his “big gift” and he was quite happy!
Thanks! True, and you can see in the pics the fat on my thighs and stomach have decreased.
Haha I ate 2 bags of those chips in the past week. I actually am not too fond of chips anymore after plowing through bags of them when I first rarrfed. Things I thought were food cocaine have turned into just normal food.
I would soooo love to do this, but I just started lifting weights. And I am very excited to start an exercise program at the gym next week!
Very, very interestingly, I have a lot of body strength despite NOT being into a regular strength training routine. I can lift heavy things, I just don’t have the endurance to keep lifting. Also, I have a lot of core strength despite not doing any training for my core. I have pretty much been sedentary for almost a year, with a few fun hikes and walks thrown in, as well as a short stint at the gym when I overdid it with an ambitious trainer and was sore for weeks.
Can eating a ton of carbs and sugar grow muscles? I DO do regular housework and lift my kids, so maybe that can add to strength when eating more and eating more carbs?
Have fun with this research project!
Bizarre question: sorry, Matt, I don’t see any other place on your website where I can ask you this. Are you by chance dabbling in contract law? Just listened to a “Matt” on the web on this topic who speaks with the same cadence as you do. Anyway, I have a raw milk farmer friend who can use some help and I thought if you have expertise in this area, I’d give you a holler. Hard to know who to trust on the Internet.
Definitely not me haha.
Unfortunately I took a lot of time off from working out and am just starting to slowly begin again so for me it would be regained strength but I’m excited to hear about how it goes and what its all about later!!
Is it the Peter Sisco’s Static Contraction style bench presses, where you use heavy weight but you don’t have to move the bar more than an inch for a few seconds?
Yes but with a couple modifications.
Can you tell us what the modifications are? I would take part in this project but i am currently having some problems with my left forearm.
The modifications are just to work in more than just one point of the range of motion in hopes that more strength translates to a full-range repetition.
Ok, well I signed in!
If you can get a 30% improvement out of me it will be amazing, and some of the guys in the
gym will be spewing.. lol
Can anyone recommend what I can do exercise-wise to train the lower part of the body,as I can’t squat after ‘my accidence’of heavy-weigth squatting at the Smith machine (I’m now also kinda scared to squat) bc my lower back/spine hurts and the palm of my rigthfoot…..
Deadlifting is a total strain on my back,after watching so many instructional vids I somehow still can’t get it rigth with lifting the bar from the ground(though I really wanna be able to do this exercise correctly and become able to really progress&deadlift heavy),bc like I said I keep straining my lower back so with this injury now,it hurts double….
So the last couple of days,I’ve been doing isolated arm exercises at various machines (and tried bench pressing) but I can’t keep doing that,as it’ll overwork those muscles and arm-work didn’t increase in strength/stamina at all.
So,I basically want to workout heavy/hypertrophy bc my muscles feel stronger/like working out but it’s these aches that make it hard/prohibit it, but don’t know what to do…..yet I’ll keep on eating with my detrimental pattern out of pure frustration regarding lots of things and I’m just afraid to put on the pounds of fat without getting better :s
You can work in a limited range of motion. That’s still something. And you can still build tremendous strength without going into the dangerous portion of the movement (the weakest portion of the range). Maybe try leg press partials with just a slight bend in the knee with weight progression.
Nice seque into your Research Project…..
Wanted to add some PUFA free shopping advice.
Check out your local Aldi, if you have one. I perused their shelves last evening and came home with no 4 different snacks made with palm oil, butter fat, or coconut oil instead of other veg oils. There were several more varieties that I didn’t purchase. Many of them are seasonal, so they will be going bye-bye soon, until later in the year.
Examples:
–Cafe Bistro Spekulatius (these are outrageous and seasonal, so get them fast)
–Cafe Bistro Chocolate coated butter cookies
–Bugles
–Belgian Truffles (coconut and palm oil)
I’ve seen the truffles too,however the whipped cream in it contains carrageenan and the chocolate soy-lechitine…
Sounds like you are about to reinvent the wheel? :) Or then again, this might not at all be about isometrics or something similar that will max out the nervous system (hence produce rapid strength gains with infrequent workouts).
Question for the experienced Lifters over here…..as I’m still kinda recovering from the strained back.
I saw these guys at the gym who wear these belts,I know it’s for really heavy squatting/deadlifting but I was wondering if such a belt would be beneficial/wise investment for me/people who easily strain their back? if it keeps the back in check/rigth posture so I’ll be able to start deadlifting&squatting again….and being able to progress towards heavier weigths?….though I have to admit I’ve become kinda scared of it,to do it ‘freestyle’,after the accident at the Smith machine which is supposed to have some safety….if you can turn the barbell fast enough when shit seems to go wrong,unlike me….
Similarly I also love to be able to do bench-press (&overhead press) ‘freestyle’ but that really scares me as there is no safety whatsoever so the barbell would land on top of me. (Unfortunately,I don’t have a workout partner to assist) Bc I do believe lifting ‘freestyle’ without Smith-Machine is better in regards to posture but also to learn to balance these long barbells instead of a machine to keep it static.
Dutchie, a lifting belt is no cure for bad form and/or max-lift attempts. Simply put, stay away from it!
While at the topic of staying away from stuff…apply that behaviour to Smith-machines as well. :) Doing bench-presses or OHPs safely can be done with ease in a proper power rack. Just align the catchers to the proper level, e.g. where your chest meets the bar. If you fail you just lower the bar and you are all safe. Power racks are excellent for specific range work and in the OHP you could adjust the catchers to get the start position from the rack/hold position where you normally start pushing…or above if you suffer from limited ROM. That way you don’t need to clean the bar etc.
Cheers!
hey Dutchie
just wantd to throw you a little “advice in the rehab area… yes the belts can be useful but like the digestive (and just about any other) system if tou are proping up the muscles you can actually end up weaker in the damaged muscles
Healing takes time and it is really worth taking that time.
I would imagine you are having some physical therapy and I would like to suggst that you have the surrounding muscles targeted rather than just the damaged ones
for eg If I am treating lats or QL straind I actually start on psoas and diaphram , gluts and traps. basically everything that has spasmed out to keep you up right which allows the damaged areas to come back into use as it strengthens.
hope this helps …feel free to ignore :)
good luck
Beautiful photo of the little boy. I’m a mom of two boys and one of them has three boys of his own. Kinda partial to little boys and especially so since I grew up with one older brother and 3 sisters…and mostly girls for cousins. That photo is just fantastic. It should be entered in a photo contest…he is just beaming and free.