Because You Should

by Karen Andes

Getting fit because we “should” isn’t a good enough reason. “Should” stirs up guilt, obligation, getting serious, buckling down. It’s our mother’s tone of voice, our father’s lifted eyebrow: the look that needs no words but says, “get in here right now young lady. Just what do you think you’re doing?” “ Should” the whip at our backs, is hidden beneath every self-criticism and resolution, runs counter to every craving, pits the taskmaster against the devil.

Some people thrive on “Should.” Rigid personality types who like routine, clear boundaries, and restrictions find it’s a turn-on because it structures their world. More carefree personalities tend to be oblivious to the concept, order another bottle of wine, eat the whole box of chocolates, and buy lavish gifts for friends. “Should” hardly enters into the vocabulary, but it probably “should” more often.

It’s nice to know that when we’re motivated to get fit “because it’s good for us,” our time is wisely spent. But let’s not suck the joy right out of it because we “should.”

A Woman's Strength

But I Don’t Want Big Muscles!
I know many of you have certain misgivings about working out with weights and/or exercising in a gym, and rather than try to convince you other wise myself, I will rely on one of your own to explain things in your own terms. I don't propose to understand your feelings or where you’re coming from and it would be pretentious of me to think I could. So here it is, straight from your very own, Karen Andes

Excerpted and paraphrased from, A Woman’s Book of Strength By: Karen Andes
(Great book by the way, you should read it sometime.)

Finding our way
Everyday in the gym I see more of them. They seem to wash in with the tide, shy newcomers in baggy t-shirts, clutching a workout card as if it were a map to a foreign country. They wander among the machinery trying to look inconspicuous and figure out what to do. By the looks on their faces, I can see they don’t know a dumbbell from a barbell or a set from a rep. I want to give suggestions and encouragement. However, I’ve learned from experience not to offer my services unsolicited. So Instead I watch and sometimes cringe at the way they tackle the exercises without much sensitivity, inward connection or obvious enjoyment. And I know chances are good that when the next tide washes out, they’ll float out with it and I’ll never see them again.

I’ve often wondered what it would take to change this. Ideally, I’d like to sit each woman down and find out what brought her here. I want to know what she wants for herself. I want to know what she does for a living, how much time she doesn’t have, if she’s got kids, a mate, a history of athleticism, any old injuries to be aware of, what she ate for dinner last night, lunch, breakfast, how she feels when she looks in the mirror, and how many voices run the show inside her head. If she’d let me, I’d study her posture to see where she’ rigid, collapsed or off-center, a clue to where she carries her pain. I’d like to show her how to make changes without feeling burdened by an impossible ideal, or pushed into exercise by guilt and fear. Ultimately, I'd like to present this experience as pleasure, a sanctuary from outside cares and her chance to take up the chisel and reshape both her body and mind.

Yet nine times out of ten, I know she’s going to say, ”But I don’t want big muscles. I just want to get rid of this.” (I note the phrase “get rid of” as if it were garbage.) I could give her the standard “ don’t worry” speech:
“Most women can’t grow big muscles, because they don’t have enough male hormones. Most of the big women you see in muscle magazines took steroids to get that way. But natural women’s muscles grow very slowly. In fact, even after years of training, our muscles don’t increase much in size, although they get stronger, shapelier and, when body fat is low, more defined.”

This journey into strength is not just about sculpting the body but how we can use the pathway of our bodies as a way to mine the strength in ourselves. For when external and internal strength are blended and balanced, the wires connect, the whole person wakes up, and that union of flesh and spirit is magnificent, radiant, a cause to rejoice!

For so many women, this pursuit of strength is new, awkward, controversial, even frightening. Many of us are still afraid of who we might alienate if we get too strong, and simultaneously afraid of the dark, dangerous fates that wait us if we don’t get strong enough. Or we may think that, in order to be strong, we have to sacrifice our fragile natures, become more like men, change the fundamental structure of who we are. Yet we can’t just put on the cloak of male strength and strut around. It doesn’t feel right because we didn’t create it, we might as well wear their shoes. We need to approach this on our own terms, using our own vocabulary if we need to, and taking our own time.

It would help if we had more role s. But there aren’t many, maybe an ancient goddess or two, a professional athlete, a movie star, Wonder Woman, few real women with lives like ours, who juggle responsibilities yet make time for a physical discipline, and spark in others the thought, “well, if she can do it, so can I.”

Starting this journey takes courage. It’s not easy to be a beginner and embark on something that could take a while. It requires keen vision to see beyond all the conflicting information out there, the jumble of various body ideals, and pierce through to the truth of what we want and how to get it. And it takes time invested to understand that the real trophies of strength aren’t found in strong muscles or winning competitions, but in the discipline of practice.

Why do we want strength anyway? It’s not for physical perfection; thank god many of us have let that one go. No, we are women of action, ability and substance and simply want a physical body that reflects how we feel inside. We have healthy appetites, sensual flesh. We don’t relate to the timid, anorexic-looking waifs that flood the fashion pages, and we certainly don’t want to be the She-Hulk either. We want a body that will see us through the decades of activity and still looks good at sixty, seventy, eighty, and beyond. And if it jiggles in certain places, so be it. We celebrate ourselves, regardless. However, the longer we keep up this discipline, the greater the chance we’ll get what might have gotten us started in the first place, tight buttocks, chiseled abdominals, strong upper bodies, muscle that ripple when we move.

Strong muscles aren’t just cosmetic. The truth is we need strength, perhaps even more than men do since it helps us fight some of our more difficult, feminine based struggles with ourselves. When our muscles are stronger, our metabolisms speed up, which helps keep body fat down. Without even moderate muscle strength, our skeletons sag, our posture crumples and therefore our stature tumbles as well. Over time, as muscles get weak, our bones weaken too. After menopause, when our calcium producing ability drops off sharply, we find ourselves at risk for osteoporosis, which becomes more severe if we haven’t kept our bones strong all along. Why settle for this when we can do something about it? Weakness takes a psychological toll as well, compounding feelings of helplessness, fear, flagging self esteem.

There are three key elements to getting and staying strong and lean: Muscular Strength, Aerobic Exercise, and Steady Eating Habits. Of the three, creating strength is the most complex, requiring the most detailed attention to posture, form, amount of weight and reps, and so forth. It’s also the most misunderstood. But it won’t work alone, and neither will any one or two of the three elements. It has to be all three. Therefore, it may call for a gradual shift in habits or creative scheduling. Obsession is not necessary. The time required isn’t impossible, just an hour a day of exercise, sometimes less, sometimes more.

The type of strength I present here certainly isn’t the stereotypical, ball-breaking, emasculating force conjured up by Amazon fearing warriors or by centuries of men after that. It doesn’t intend to threaten or intimidate. In fact, its purpose is just the opposite. It’s a compassionate, life-sustaining concept, a blend of warmth, kindness and security, for we are mothers, nurturers, lovers, creators, supple creatures who bend with the wind, defenders of the weak, feelers of deep emotion, seekers of truth, even the uncomfortable truth in ourselves. We also have boundaries; ethics, justified rages and we know when to say no. Strong, we inspire change, justice, and enlightenment. Weak, the flame inside us dies. Our generation is lucky to have a good picture of “health” and “self-reliance” and to know how to put it into practice. We can truly take the evolution of women forward a notch and pass on the benefits to other women, children and men.

Too many of us have been victims. We can recite in exquisite detail all the dramas and traumas that flattened us in the past, and we know every horrible little thing that’s ”wrong” with our bodies. But we aren’t so eloquent about out ordinary and extraordinary powers, the beauty and magic we already possess. Deep inside, we may sense its presence but we don’t know how to bring it out and use it. We’re shy about it, and schooled not to be boastful. But this “magic power” is a secret we possess, a bit of whimsy, a flair, our uniqueness, and the very thing that makes us know we’re special. It’s also the root of our strength, the key to our creativity and our best tool for making ourselves strong. This quality is like a muscle. With practice and attention, it too, can be strong.
The type of strength addressed here cuts to all levels, heart, mind, spirit, and body, and can be exercised in any area of life where resistance is met. But the work begins in the physical and remains firmly rooted there because in the world of matter and flesh, there is proof. The laws of cause and effect are visible, reflecting who and how we are on any given day. We need physical proof because our faith is often weak. Intangibles don’t always reassure us. We need something tangible. The results that show up in our bodies reveal the power of our thoughts and actions.

I have written this book for women (as well as men) because most weight training books simply advise readers how to put on muscle mass. Here, it’s safe to say that size is not the Holy Grail we seek. (Overall health profile and a low fat to lean mass ratio is more important on the outside and a strong spirit and will on the inside.) Honestly, I don’t see a difference between women’s and men’s exercises because we’re all dealing with the same laws of physics and most everyone is working with two arms, two legs and a torso. Although women have a slightly different body composition from men, the mechanics of motion are much the same. So, actually, the training information (and much of the internal information) can be just as valuable to men as women.

We’re lucky that many of us are novices with weights. This makes us better students, blank slates, free from the burden of pride or past performance. We don’t bring with us crusty old training methods and long-ingrained bad form or egos that need reassurance from hurling around heavy iron.

We don’t need to have had an athletic background, and it doesn’t even matter if we d school gym class or all types of sports. There’s no ball to put in a hoop, no opponent to fight (except oneself.) No one wins, loses, or even keeps score. We don’t even need to be strong since effective weight lifting requires less strength than sensitivity. And since muscles respond the same way throughout out lives, we can start this sport and benefit from it at any age.

To understand and master the practice of weight training, we must learn slowly. If, in fact, we could get the results we wanted tomorrow, we would have learned nothing and would take no satisfaction in our work. In our “gotta have it now” culture, I’d get much richer if I sold fat-melting cream or pills that build muscle while you sleep. But weight training is the only way I know and trust that creates both dramatic and short-term lasting changes, and can also help make us wise.

Finding our way isn’t done quickly or easily. It takes some searching and discomfort. And some days, perhaps for weeks at a time, we may see nothing at all. Off days, inconsistency and low energy are part of the formula and have to be figured in. Yet if we can return to our practice, especially on those days, and find our sense of play, then we feed our souls as well. Boredom, in fact, should be seen not as an adversary but a call to creativity, a message from the imagination saying, “look, you’ve got to make this interesting for me or I quit.” Some of the best discoveries are made on off days.

Woman’s Strength
Women who were once obese and have lost a lot of weight often claim that when they look in the mirror, they still see themselves as fat. In this same way, many of us still see ourselves as weak and dependent, even if on the outside we’re self-made and secure. So many times I’ve heard women yearn to be strong and lean and make a plan to get that way then let something, anything knock them off course. Why does this happen so often? Could it be we have an unconscious belief that if we’re strong, we might not be rescued? If it looks as if we’re stronger than that man over there, will he be afraid to ask us out to dinner? If we show too much capability, perhaps others won’t see our vulnerability and will assume we don’t need anyone to love (not true, of course.) Perhaps some of us associate being strong with ending up alone.

If we’ve always associated love with protection, then if we appear strong, who will love us? Yet when we’re weak in spirit, we’re more likely to fall into obsessive, dependent relationships, not mutually supportive ones. Of course, it’s possible to be strong in body and weak emotionally, and weak in body and strong emotionally. But when we are weak in both body and heart, we’re more likely to look for rescue and confuse it with love, because in times of desperation, it’s hard to see the truth. Yet when we set about to find the strength within ourselves first, whether in our bodies, emotions or both, then we can love from a place of strength and fulfillment, as a choice, rather than a need. This way we increase our chances of creating an equal partnership, not to mention the fact that in a gym or health club, we increase or chances of finding someone on a similar, healthy path.

Physical strength helps during times of weak emotional strength because it is tangible, measurable, and there to return to on bleak days when our doubts run high. Physical strength also informs the heart and mind how to handle a rough situation, if we can sit with the discomfort of a weight on our chest, we can also learn to sit with the times of desperation, loneliness, or crises. If we throw the weights away just as we get slightly uncomfortable, how does this mirror our behavior in other aspects of life, when times get tough? Here, we can actually see our behavior and learn not to whine, kick, scream, look away, and make excuses. We can transfer some of those some methods to dealing with the petty insults that occur in our lives and the great challenges to our health when we’re tested to the core.

One of the greatest lessons about weight lifting is the relationship with failure. I can think of no other place where failure is success, where the desired outcome is to go until we truly can’t go anymore. If taught well, we’re encouraged to march right up to the wall of failure, confront it, sit with it and absorb the sensation. We get to observe ourselves, either how we dance around in rebellion or remain silent, sit still and fail with “integrity intact.” When we learn to be unafraid this way, we alter our definition of failure, welcome it rather than fear or avoid it, make it part of the ingredients of success.

Getting In Shape By Training The Energy Systems

Have you ever noticed the ultra-lean, heavily muscled physiques of sprint type athletes (100m runners, running backs, speed skaters) and wondered why your training hasn't produced such a result? After all, you train with weights 3-5x per week to build muscle. And you do a couple of moderate intensity cardio workouts to burn fat. So why don't you look better than these athletes? All they do is spend the bulk of their time running around a track. So why are their pecs, arms, and abs better defined than yours?

Well, there are a few answers to these questions. The first answer is, as you might have suspected, genetics. While many athletes would have you believe that their hours of hard training have made them into the athlete that they are today, the truth is that they did get a kick start from their chromosomes. You see, successful athletes are born with great potential for their sport. Then, while playing, as a kid, they began to self-select certain sports that they are good at. Add in a solid training regimen and their inherent potential shines.

But there's another side to the question. Although these athletes are born with an advantage, one that allows them to develop muscle and burn fat more easily than most, we can't underestimate the importance of their hard training. By targeting the muscle fibers that contribute to e power as well as training the anaerobic energy systems (ATP-PC system and glycolytic system), these athletes can't help but get bigger, stronger, and leaner. And if you apply the tricks I'm going to teach you in parts 1 and 2 of this article, you'll get bigger, stronger, and leaner too.

The Anaerobic Energy Systems
First, let's define our terms. If you're familiar with the term "aerobic", you'll know that it means "with oxygen". Therefore, aerobic energy systems are systems in the body in which energy (ATP) is generated from the consumption of oxygen. Simple enough.

Now, the opposite of "aerobic" is "anaerobic" which, by definition, means "without oxygen". Therefore, anaerobic energy systems are systems in the body in which energy (ATP) is generated from non-oxidative sources. Now this is where it gets hairy.
From the aforementioned definitions it would appear that these two energy systems were mutually exclusive; only one is active at a time. And in fact, once upon a time, in a land far, far away, researchers believed that no oxygen was used to make ATP during anaerobic exercise. Thus the name. However, current research shows that even during the most "anaerobic" of events, the aerobic system (with oxygen) is also activated (to a small extent).

With that said, it's important to realize what determines the ability of the body to go "with" or "without" oxygen. Well, the main two determinants are intensity and duration. Here's an illustration of these variables in action.

As I'm sure that you all know, if you're on the track and you start to run really fast, for the first few seconds you'll feel quite explosive. But after just 3-10 seconds, some of that explosiveness will subside and you'll slow down a bit. Still pushing hard though, yet getting progressively slower, about 15-20 seconds into the run, your muscles will begin to burn and you'll have to slow down even more. Finally, due to the burning and fatigue, you'll either have to work your way down to a slow paced jog or you'll have to stop altogether. Why does this occur, you might ask? Well, check out the following chart:


Time To: ATP-PC Glycolytic Aerobic System
Peak Power/System <1sec. 20sec. 2-3min.
Maintenance of Peak 10sec. 20sec. 3min.
Total Capacity 10-30sec. 1-2min. hours
Full Time For Recovery 3min. 1-2hr. 24hr.-48hr.
½ Time For Recovery 30sec. 15-20min. 5-6hr.



The ATP-PC system is so-called because the provision of energy at very high intensities is dependent only on stored ATP already in the muscles and on the ability of the muscle's very limited amount of phosphocreatine (PC) to regenerate the ATP as it gets used up. Since these stores are limited, as you might imagine, as the ATP and the PC become depleted, the body has to slow down. Therefore, as you can see in the chart, this system has only a limited ability to generate ATP as the peak power of the system occurs at the 1-second mark and the system only has a capacity of 30 seconds. However, the rate of ATP generation is the fastest of the three and that's why this system is so important for high intensity exercise. When using the ATP-PC anaerobic energy system, you can generate a lot of power for a very short period of time. A 100m sprint is run within the ATP-PC domain.

The Glycolytic anaerobic energy system is so-called because the provision of energy from this system is dependent on muscle glycogen (carbohydrate stores). As you can see in the chart, the glycolytic system provides ATP generating power for longer than the ATP-PC system but it's ability to sustain high intensity exercise is also limited in that the total capacity of this system is 2 minutes.

So the bottom line is that in order to generate power during high intensity exercise, the anaerobic energy system first utilizes stored ATP, then PC, and then muscle glycogen. Well, hold on though! In looking at the substrates used during anaerobic work (ATP, PC, glycogen) you'll notice that fat is mysteriously missing from the list. Does that mean that I'm spending all this time writing about a form of exercise that burns no fat? No way! Listen up.

The interesting thing with anaerobic training is that although very little fat is burned during the short, high intensity efforts, quite a bit of fat is burned in the recovery time between efforts. Therefore by effectively training the anaerobic system (via interval workouts), you'll be dropping large amounts of fat as well.

The Benefits of Training The Anaerobic Energy Systems
While training the anaerobic energy systems is clearly be of benefit for enhancing athletic performance, there are many other non-athletic benefits as well:

1) This type of training is very calorie expensive. Short, 30-minute workouts can burn in excess of 400kcal during the exercise. While carbohydrates provide much of the fuel used during the high intensity interval, fat is also burned preferentially during the low intensity aerobic recovery period between the high intensity intervals.

2) The post exercise calorie expenditure is huge with this type of exercise. In some studies the resting metabolic rate remains elevated (by 15% or more) up to 24 hours after the workout. Interestingly, after exercise the body preferentially burns fat so this elevated metabolism is burning predominantly fat.

3) This exercise leads to an up regulation of aerobic, anaerobic, and ATP-PC enzyme activity. This means that all the energy systems of the body will operate at higher levels and become efficient at burning calories and generating energy.

4) The muscles used during this type of exercise will change their composition, shifting toward an increased percentage of fast twitch fibers. This increase in power-producing fast fibers comes at the expense of the weaker slow twitch ones. The shift is desired as the fast fibers grow more easily than the slow fibers.

5) There is an increase in specific muscle cell organelles (i.e. the sarcoplasmic reticulum). This leads to a better calcium balance and contractile ability.

6) There are short-lived increases in testosterone (38%) and growth hormone concentrations immediately after exercise. While this is debatable, these changes may contribute to an anabolic state in the body.

So What Are We Waiting For?
For the optimal application of anaerobic training in order to improve body composition, here is a that I've found particularly successful. I have also used this program for off-season conditioning in my athletes.

Day 1 - 1.5 hours of Resistance Training (Upper Body - Pushing Type Exercises)
Day 2 - *30 minutes of Anaerobic Interval Training (Rowing)
Day 3 - 1.5 hours of Resistance Training (Lower Body)
Day 4 - *30 minutes of Anaerobic Interval Training (Cycling)
Day 5 - 1.5 hours of Resistance Training (Upper Body - Pulling Type Execises)
Day 6 - *30 minutes of Anaerobic Interval Training (Running)
Day 7 - Rest
*The anaerobic training activities are varied in order to activate different muscles from one workout to the next.

In structuring your interval days, here are some suggestions.

1) Before beginning such a program, be sure to experiment with high intensity exercise. If you have never tried such exercise before, you are in for a surprise - it's difficult.

2) Use a 1:3 ratio of exercise to recovery (i.e. for every 1 second you sprint, rest for 3 seconds).

3) To maximally activate your anaerobic glycolytic system, your exercise duration should be 30s to 60s. As a result your recovery will be between 90s and 180s.

4) Intensity is key to the success of this program. If your intensity is too low during the exercise, you will not realize the full training adaptation. If intensity is too high, you won't be able to complete the workout. You'll have to play around with the intensity until you get it right.

5) Your exercise intensity should be more than double that of your recovery intensity for 60s bouts and more than triple for 30s bouts. For example, if running at 11mph for 60s during your exercise interval, you should be running at approximately 5.5 mph for 180s during your recovery interval. Likewise if you're cycling at 350 watts for 30s during your exercise interval, your recovery should be at about 100 watts for 90s during your recovery interval.

6) When increasing the intensity from one workout to the next, be sure to increase the work. Do not increase the exercise duration or decrease the duration of the recovery. If the exercise to recovery ratio drops below 1:3, you'll lose power during your exercise interval and the activity becomes more aerobic.

Here is an example of these rules in action from one of my client records.
Day 2 - Rowing 5-minute warm-up followed by 7 sets of the following:60 seconds at 250 watts*180 seconds at 125 watts
Day 4 - Cycling5-minute warm-up followed by 15 sets of the following:30 seconds at 300 watts (level 12)*90 seconds at 100 watts (level 2)
Day 6 - Running5-minute warm-up followed by 7 sets of the following:60 seconds at 11mph*180 seconds at 5.5 mph
*If it's easy to maintain the same workout output for the full 30 minutes, increase the work (watts or speed) for the next workout. Increase the intensity to the point that it becomes difficult to complete all the sets at the prescribed intensity. Just like with resistance training, use progressive overload to continually improve.So there you have it. A new for improving body composition that's very effective and doesn't involve boring hours of your life spent on the cardio equipment. Give this program a try and the next time you're admiring the physique of a well-trained anaerobic athlete, it may be your own.

Positions of Flexion by Steve Holman

This is really more than a post. This is the system which I have integrated into every part of all of my exercise regimens. This system, in part, has truly transformed me from a 160lb weakling into the 250lb man I am today. I can't say enough about the Positions of Flexion. Read it for yourself and incorporate it everywhere you can. -PJ

Positions of Flexion can be a giant step in helping you reach your muscular potential as quickly as possible. It’s a powerful muscle-building protocol that’s packed as much as 20 pounds of muscle onto bodybuilders’ frames in as little as 10 weeks. POF is a very logical and straightforward way to train, one that’s based on muscle function rather than convention, and it’s done near miraculous things for bodybuilders throughout the world. True, as the creator of POF, I’m biased, but I’ve seen it work and I believe it can make your dreams of a more muscular, shredded physique a reality without wasted time and effort, which is why I continue to sing its praises and explain its basic concepts.
POF’s mass-building power is a direct result of its basic premise: You should choose exercises that train each muscle through its entire range of motion to trigger maximum fiber recruitment, as well as other anabolic mechanisms, at every workout. That means faster, more complete development from fewer sets. Once you grasp its concepts, POF will change the way you train and gain forever.

Complete Stimulation, Full-Blown Pump
When the POF concepts and routines were first introduced in IRONMAN magazine, many bodybuilders were taken by surprise when they put them to the test, commenting that they thought their skin might tear because the influx of blood was so extreme. That’s a direct result of the inordinate muscle fiber recruitment that occurs when you train a target muscle through a full range of motion with specific exercises. POF protocol dictates that you use specific exercises to train the entire length of the muscle from full stretch to complete contraction. Before you can give it a test drive and send your own gains skyward, however, you need to grasp POF’s underlying concepts and principles—and that understanding starts with uncovering the roots of POF.

Jousting With Genetics: The Origins of POF
POF was a direct result of a number of trainees’ frustrations in the gym coupled with independent research at the University of Texas at Austin. That research was fueled by the ultimate goal of remedying some of the rampant in-the-gym frustration so many trainees were experiencing. I, for one, was obsessed with research because I wasn’t prepared to give up my bodybuilding dreams—lowly genetics or not, even though mine were at the bottom of the hardgainer barrel.

When I first started training, I weighed less than 120 pounds. Bad genetics? You bet. In fact, when my parents married in their early 20s, my mother weighed 95 pounds and my father weighed 115. Even with my genetically challenged predisposition, however, I never lost sight of the dream of stepping on a posing platform. I was obsessed and determined to find a muscle-building solution.

At the huge state university research materials available were plentiful, to say the least, and I was able to find some applicable physiological truths that helped my progress— but only slightly. I was determined to find a better way, so I continued to plow through books, abstracts and studies on anything even remotely related to muscle hypertrophy. My obsession fueled a relentless pursuit—and it did eventually pay off. After pouring over hundreds of physiology and biomechanics texts and abstracts, I came across a physiological phenomenon that occurs when a muscle is stretched and then forced to contract soon thereafter. That discovery had me incorporating exercises with a high-stretch component for every bodypart, and I made some decent gains as a direct result. Nevertheless, there was still something missing, and I didn’t start packing on real size until after I put the other parts of the puzzle into practice—properly combining stretch exercises with those that involve synergy, or muscle team work, and peak contraction. That combination constituted full-range-of-motion training that could be applied to every muscle group.

As I browsed through a muscle magazine, I noticed that Arnold used a similar approach for his biceps routine: dumbbell curls for synergy, incline curls for stretch and concentration curls for peak contraction. After I tried his program—with less sets, of course, because of my -free status—I realized that there was something almost magical about it. After I used his routine for a month, my gym buddies suddenly started asking me to hit arm shots every time I trained because my bi’s got more peaked each week. Then once they started using the routine, they got similar results, so I knew it wasn’t a fluke. There was something very powerful about that particular exercise combination.

With the help of some physiologists at the university, I eventually put together a complete training regimen for each bodypart, and with a prototype version of a POF-based routine my bodyweight shot up to 200 pounds—an 80-pound gain from my starting weight; damn good for a -free hardgainer—and I soon entered and won my first bodybuilding contest.
You may be wondering if you can make similar, or perhaps even better, gains. Absolutely, and the first thing you can do is make sure you’re using a stretch-position movement for each muscle group, such as stiff-legged lifts for your hamstrings, donkey calf raises for your calves, pullovers for your lats and overhead extensions for your triceps. [Note: A complete list of stretch-position exercises appears in the “Stretch” section of this feature.]
Ah, but if you’re a serious, impatient, muscle-hungry bodybuilder, you probably want the full-blown power of the POF method, not just one little piece, right? Let’s analyze each position so you can put all of the pieces into place and start building new muscle size with POF immediately.
Dissecting POF With the Austrian Oak
POF is a multi-angular bodybuilding protocol that trains a muscle in the three positions that constitute full range of motion (ROM). Understand that it’s not simply doing an exercise through its complete stroke, although that’s important too. It takes two to three exercises to work a muscle through its complete arc of flexion, or range of motion, which consists of three positions: midrange, stretch and contracted.

Arnold’s favorite biceps routine is a specific example of standard POF. He often did dumbbell curls, incline dumbbell curls and concentration curls, in that order, a routine that hits his biceps from the three key positions, or angles, for complete ROM:
•Biceps midrange: upper arms in front of the torso. Dumbbell curls hit the midrange position and train the biceps with synergy, or muscle teamwork, from the front delts. When muscles work together, the overload and fiber activation is much greater in most cases.
•Stretch: arms behind the torso. Incline dumbbell curls hit the stretch position and activate the myotatic reflex due to inordinate biceps elongation, and the muscle’s fiber stimulation is heightened.
•Contracted: arms up and away from the torso. Concentration curls hit the contracted position with resistance at the point of maximum contraction. Continuous tension in the fully contracted position provides a potent fiber jolt after the heightened fiber activation created by the previous stretch-position movement.

You can see why POF works, and why it creates a skin-stretching pump in only a few sets. You totally stimulate the muscle fibers by triggering the stretch reflex as part of a routine that trains each bodypart through its complete range of motion, or arc of flexion. Muscle physiology dictates that full ROM and the myotatic reflex will combine to ignite an extreme hypertrophic adaptation, especially after a compound, or midrange, exercise that overloads the target muscle due to synergy, or help from other muscle groups. Let’s start from the top, with the midrange position.

Midrange Position: Training the Mass of the Muscle Structures
The first exercise in a standard POF approach is a midrange movement. These exercises are known as the mass-builders because they train the majority of the target-muscle fibers with heavy weight, so it makes sense to give them priority most of the time. Midrange movements involve synergy, or muscle team work, which means that a number of muscle structures work together, with the target muscle as the prime mover. For example, the squat is a midrange exercise for the quads, and the glutes, hamstrings, lower back and even calves get in on the action to help the quads elevate heavy iron.
You can see why these exercises are at the core of every POF bodypart routine—they build mass, plain and simple.
Here’s a list of some of the best midrange movements for each bodypart:

Quads: squats
Hamstrings: stiff-legged lifts (also a stretch movement)
Lats: wide-grip chins to the front
Midback: behind-the-neck pulldowns
Delts: dumbbell presses
Chest: bench presses
Biceps: barbell curls or close-grip undergrip pulldowns
Triceps: lying extensions or close-grip bench presses
Abdominals: kneeups

Synergy allows you to cultivate tremendous power because muscles work most efficiently as part of a team. POF midrange movements all have synergy, and using those exercises alone for each bodypart can build phenomenal muscle size and strength. You can get even better results, though, when you follow your midrange exercises with movements for the other two target-muscle positions, stretch and contracted.

Stretch: Emergency Response to Revive Comatose Fibers
Stretch-position movements, the second exercise in standard POF protocol, activate the myotatic reflex. Training the target bodypart at its maximal point of elongation, for example incline curls for the biceps or overhead extensions for the triceps, can force an emergency response from the muscle and bring new muscle fibers into play. Here is how the phenomenon is defined in the book e Power by Health For Life:

The stretch reflex originates deep inside each muscle fiber with a structure called the muscle spindle. The muscle spindle is a complex construction of muscle protein, fluid and nervous system receptors. Within this structure is a special type of muscle fiber that does not have the contractile qualities normally associated with muscle. These special fibers, called intrafusal fibers, are wrapped with nerve cells that relay information from muscle to the central nervous system. When a muscle is stretched quickly, the tension in the intrafusal fibers stimulates these nerve cells, sending messages out to the central nervous system at great speed. In response, the central nervous system triggers a muscle reflex that generates a fast and powerful contraction. This myotatic, or stretch, reflex is a protective mechanism that provides an extra burst of strength to resist force encountered suddenly. When the reflex is triggered, a very large proportion of the muscle’s fibers suddenly contract.

When you use a stretch-position exercise, such as flyes for the chest or pullovers for the lats, the target muscle reacts with an emergency response, which can trigger more muscle fibers to fire. The reason an emergency reaction occurs is that you’re training the muscle in a somewhat vulnerable position—at a point of full elongation.

By activating more fast-twitch fibers in the target muscle, you stimulate faster development. Stretch-position exercises may also enlarge the fascia, or fiber encasements, so that fiber growth isn’t constricted and they also may trigger more anabolic hormone release. Stretch-position exercises are very important for optimal hypertrophic stimulation.
Here’s a list of stretch-position exercises for each muscle group:

Quads: sissy squats
Hamstrings: stiff-legged lifts
Calves: donkey calf raises
Abs: cable crunches with low-back support
Chest: dumbbell flyes
Lats: pullovers
Midback: close-grip cable rows
Delts: incline one-arm laterals
Biceps: incline curls
Triceps: overhead extensions

You’ll really feel these exercises in the target muscle, especially when you do them after a big midrange movement. The pump and burn will be unreal—and in some cases almost unbearable—but you’re not done yet. To finish off the target muscle and complete the full-ROM chain, you follow the stretch-position exercise with a contracted-position movement for that final growth jolt.

Contracted: Peak Contraction for a Searing Growth Reaction
The last exercise in any standard POF bodypart routine is the contracted-position movement, which trains the target bodypart at the point of complete contraction with resistance—for example, leg extensions for the front thighs. An exercise with resistance in the completely contracted position is the best way to finish off a target muscle after as many fibers as possible have been activated with the midrange- and stretch-position movements.
Here’s a list of contracted-position exercises for each muscle group:

Quads: leg extensions
Hamstrings: leg curls
Calves: standing calf raises
Abs: full-range crunches
Chest: cable flyes or pec deck flyes
Lats: stiff-arm pulldowns or pullover machine
Midback: bent-arm bent-over rows
Delts: lateral raises
Biceps: concentration curls or double-biceps cable curls
Triceps: one-arm pushdowns or kickbacks
Okay, let’s put it all together so you can start using POF programs at your very next workout.
POF: Total Target-Muscle Stimulation for Extraordinary Mass Gains

The underlying concept of POF is simple: If you hit a muscle from a number of angles, you stimulate more fibers, and if you use a stretch-position exercise correctly as part of the full-ROM approach, you bring even more of the muscle into play; however, if you understand POF, you know the angles shouldn’t be random—they should complement one another so together they complete the full-ROM chain.

For example, you saw that Arnold’s biceps routine trains the target muscle as follows:

•upper arms slightly in front of the torso, with dumbbell curls (midrange)

•upper arms back behind the torso, with incline curls (stretch)

•upper arm up and away from the torso with concentration curls (contracted)

Each position can involve different fibers and different recruitment patterns, which produce fuller development. It’s why advanced bodybuilders do more than one exercise per bodypart—to develop as many fibers as possible to extreme degrees. Keep in mind, however, that a lot of advanced bodybuilders use the shotgun approach when it comes to multiangular training, with no rhyme or reason to exercise selection, which can lead to overlap, wasted effort and overtraining. POF’s logical structure can help you avoid that pitfal. Top Full-range-of-motion POF training works because it produces almost complete target-muscle stimulation with the minimal amount of work necessary for the exercises that complete the full-ROM chain. If you’re still not convinced multiangular training is necessary, consider the following quote from Jaci VanHeest, renowned exercise physiologist at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado:

Muscles contract when tiny levers on myosin, a muscle protein, fit into grooves on actin, another protein, and push it forward exactly like a ratchet wrench. But myosin can latch onto actin in any of several positions, not all of them ideal. Only when the myosin heads are in the right register can the muscle have the optimal tension. But optimizing every actin-myosin pairing is less an achievable goal than a Platonic ideal. (Newsweek, July 22, 1996: “How High? How Fast?”)

You need more than one exercise to optimize as many actin-myosin pairings in the target muscle as possible, and full ROM training like POF is the logical answer to that optimization. Here is another example, with triceps as the target:

Midrange
Close-grip bench presses or lying extensions 2 x 7-10
Stretch
Overhead extensions 2 x 7-10
Contracted
One-arm pushdowns or kickbacks 2 x 7-10

You first work the midrange position with close-grip bench presses. Remember, midrange equals synergy, in this case teamwork from your front delts, pecs and lats. Next is the stretch position, which you train with overhead extensions. That exercise forces maximum elongation and triggers the myotatic reflex. You use kickbacks, a contracted-position exercise, last in order to work the triceps at the point of complete contraction with resistance. Note that it only takes one to two sets of each exercise—four to six total sets per bodypart—to train the target muscle completely and thoroughly. The low per-bodypart set total means that more of your recovery ability is available for ramping up recuperation and anabolic acceleration after your workout, while overtraining is kept at bay.
If you want to give your delts the full-ROM treatment with POF, try the following:

Midrange
Behind-the-neck presses 2 x 7-10
Stretch
Incline one-arm laterals 2 x 7-10
Contracted
Seated laterals 2 x 7-10

Notice that you train the lateral heads with synergy during behind-the-neck presses—your delts work in conjunction with triceps and traps to push the bar overhead—you work the medial head in the stretch position with incline one-arm laterals—your arm moves down and across your body—and you train the side head in its peak-contracted position against resistance with lateral raises. Your delts have no choice but to grow rounder and fuller with this type of multi-angular full-ROM approach. With the above suggestions, you should be able to grow faster and with fewer sets than with any training protocol you’ve ever tried.

The chest is somewhat more complicated. Due to its fan shape you divide it into two sections, upper and lower/middle; however, you can train two positions with one exercise.
For lower/middle chest flat bench presses train the target muscle with other muscle groups (synergy in the midrange position). Cable crossovers (or Nautilus flyes) train the pecs from full stretch to complete contraction, with resistance in the contracted position. Notice that the lower/middle chest takes only two precise exercises to hit the full arc of flexion. You can get the same two-for-one effect when you train the upper portion: Use incline presses for the midrange position and incline cable flyes for the stretch and contracted positions. Now you have a tremendously effective POF pec-building routine.

Middle/lower-pec section
Midrange
Bench presses 2 x 7-10
Stretch and contracted
Cable crossovers 2 x 7-10

Upper-pec section
Midrange
Incline bench presses 2 x 7-10
Stretch and contracted
Incline cable flyes 2 x 7-10

You have to realize that you need more than one exercise to optimize as many actin-myosin pairings in the target muscle as possible, and you want to choose the movements that together take the target muscle through its full range of motion. That means working from full stretch to complete contraction, plus training the muscle with synergy. To accomplish that it may take two or three movements, depending on the exercises you choose. Let’s look at one last example. Here are POF quad and hamstring routines with a bit more explanation than the other programs, just in case you haven’t quite got the full-POF picture yet:

Midrange position
Squats (synergy from glutes and lower back)
Do 2 light warmup sets first), then 2-3 x 8-12

Stretch position
Sissy squats or Feet-forward Smith machine squats
Quick twitch out of the bottom, when hamstrings touch your calves 2 x 10

Contracted position
Leg extensions
Hold for a count at the top to emphasize peak contraction 1-2 x 8-12

Hamstrings, on the other hand, only require two exercises for full-range training to fully optimize the actin-myosin pairings and stimulate inordinate growth. As you saw with chest, sometimes one exercise will cover two of the Positions of Flexion. In the following program, it’s the stiff-legged lift:

Midrange and stretch positions
Stiff-legged lifts (synergy from glutes and lower back, plus full stretch at the bottom of each rep)
Do 2 light warmup sets, then 2-3 x 8-10

Contracted position
Leg curls
Hold for a count at the top to emphasize peak contraction 2 x 8-12

You can develop your own POF routines for other bodyparts by taking an exercise from each of the lists in the sections above and doing one to three sets of each.

Positions of Flexion is undoubtedly one of the most logical, efficient muscle-building methods out there. It’s helped a multitude of bodybuilders push beyond their so-called genetic limitations, and it can do the same for you. Try it in its standard forms or one of its many hybrid protocols, such as Hypercontraction training or Compound Aftershock. If you’ve never tried POF, be prepared for some unusual soreness—and some exciting new muscle growth. You’ll soon see why it’s becoming an integral part of so many successful bodybuilders’ training arsenals the world over.

Editor’s note: Positions of Flexion was recently introduced to European bodybuilders via Steve Homan’s features and columns in Italy’s Olympians News magazine. Because of the overwhelming response many of Holman’s books have been translated and printed in other languages so bodybuilders all over the world can reap the mass-building benefits of POF. If you’re interested in the definitive Positions-of-Flexion training manual, get a copy of Critical Mass. It contains an analysis of each bodypart with routines, as well as a number of complete POF programs, from the Hardgainer POF Program to the POF Power Pyramid. It’s $19.95 plus $4.90 shipping and handling. To order with a credit card, call 1-800-447-0008, or go to our online store. For more books containing information on POF, see the end of the next section,

POF Overview.
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POF OVERVIEW

Positions of Flexion (POF) is a mass-training protocol based on maximum fiber activation through synergy, the myotatic reflex, peak contraction and full range of motion. It's designed to train each muscle thoroughly and completely for total development in the shortest time possible. Once you understand the POF protocol, your training—and the gains you get from it—will change forever.
Key POF Terms

Midrange position = Synergy.
Training the target muscle as part of a team of muscle structures. For example, you train your chest with synergy from your shoulders and triceps when you do bench presses; you train your quads with help from your glutes and lower back when you squat. Synergy allows you to cultivate tremendous power because muscles work most efficiently as part of a team. POF midrange movements all have synergy.
Examples of midrange-position exercises include: squats (quads), stiff-legged lifts (hamstrings: also a stretch movement), front pulldowns (lats), behind-the-neck pulldowns (midback), dumbbell presses (delts), bench presses (chest), barbell curls or close-grip undergrip pulldowns (biceps), lying extensions or close-grip bench presses (triceps), kneeups (abdominals).

Stretch position = Myotatic Reflex.
Training the target bodypart at its maximal point of elongation, for example overhead extensions for the triceps, can force what's known as the myotatic reflex. Here is how this phenomenon is defined in the book e Power by Health For Life:
"The stretch reflex originates deep inside each muscle fiber with a structure called the muscle spindle. The muscle spindle is a complex construction of muscle protein, fluid and nervous system receptors. Within this structure is a special type of muscle fiber that does not have the contractile qualities normally associated with muscle. These special fibers, called intrafusal fibers, are wrapped with nerve cells that relay information from muscle to the central nervous system. When a muscle is stretched quickly, the tension in the intrafusal fibers stimulates these nerve cells, sending messages out to the central nervous system at great speed. In response, the central nervous system triggers a muscle reflex that generates a fast and powerful contraction. This myotatic, or stretch, reflex is a protective mechanism that provides an extra burst of strength to resist force encountered suddenly. When the reflex is triggered, a very large proportion of the muscle's fibers suddenly contract."
If stretch-position exercises are performed correctly, they have the potential to activate more fibers in the target muscle, which can translate into faster development. They can also stretch the fascia, or fiber encasements, so that fiber growth isn't constricted, which can speed hypertrophy and trigger anabolic-hormone production and receptor activity.
Examples of stretch-position exercises include sissy squats (quads), stiff-legged lifts (hamstrings; also a midrange movement), donkey calf raises (calves), pullovers (lats), close-grip cable rows (midback), incline one-arm lateral raises (delts), dumbbell flyes (chest), incline dumbbell curls (biceps), overhead extensions (triceps), full-range crunches (abdominals; also contracted exercise).

Contracted position = Peak Contraction.
Training the target bodypart at the point of complete contraction with resistance. Example: leg extensions for the frontal thighs. This is the best way to finish off a target muscle after as many fibers as possible have been activated with the midrange- and stretch-position movements.
Examples of contracted-position exercises include: leg extensions (quads), leg curls (hamstrings), standing calf raises (calves), stiff-arm pulldowns or pullover machine (lats), Bent-arm bent-over rows (midback), lateral raises (delts), cable flyes or pec deck (chest), concentration curls or double-biceps cable curls (biceps), one-arm pushdowns or kickbacks (triceps), full-range crunches (abdominals).
Example POF Programs

For example, overhead extensions train triceps in the full-stretch position. Kickbacks work the triceps at complete contraction. All that's left is the midrange position, which you train with close-grip bench presses and synergy from your front delts. Standard POF order would be close-grip bench presses, two to three sets, overhead extensions, two to three sets, and kickbacks, two to three sets. That's a very effective POF triceps routine that hits the target through its full range of motion.

Take the chest as another example. Cable crossovers (or Nautilus flyes) train the pecs' from full stretch to complete contraction, with resistance in the contracted position. Begin your chest workout with flat bench presses to train the pecs with other muscle groups (synergy in the midrange position), follow bench presses with sets of cable crossovers and you have a great POF pec-building routine.

To understand why this multi-exercise, full-range-of-motion focus produces almost complete target-muscle stimulation, you must first understand how muscles contract.Here's a quote from Jaci VanHeest, renowned exercise physiologist at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado that helps explain this phenomenon:
"Muscles contract when tiny levers on myosin, a muscle protein, fit into grooves on actin, another protein, and push it forward exactly like a ratchet wrench. But myosin can latch onto actin in any of several positions, not all of them ideal. Only when the myosin heads are in the right register can the muscle have the optimal tension. But optimizing every actin-myosin pairing is less an achievable goal than a Platonic ideal." (Newsweek, July 22, 1996: "How High? How Fast?")

Obviously, you need more than one exercise to optimize as many actin-myosin pairings in the target muscle as possible, and full ROM training like POF is the logical answer to this optimization.

Standard POF and Its Variations
There is a logical exercise order that you should use when training with POF. During a standard POF routine you first train the target muscle with the help of other muscle groups in the midrange position. This muscle teamwork allows you to get the majority of the muscle fibers. Next you train the target at its full-stretch position to activate the myotatic reflex and reserve muscle fibers. Last, you train the target in the contracted position to finish it off with peak contraction to squeeze the last bit of effort from the fibers. This complete range-of-motion-training approach allows you to get the fullest development possible.

Variations include Compound Aftershock, which is using the stretch position movement as the first exercise in a superset with a midrange movement. For example, pullovers prior to pulldowns. This has the potential to pre-exhaust the muscle and may activate reserve fibers prior to the big midrange, or teamwork, movement. Isolation Aftershock is using the stretch-position movement as part of a superset with the contracted-position exercise to get a similar fiber-activation effect. For example, doing overhead triceps extensions supersetted with kickbacks. Supersetting is an important step up the ladder of intensity. In fact, new research states the muscle burn lowers the pH of the , which in turn stimulates more growth hormone release, and supersets are key for achieving muscle burn. Hypercontraction Training is an advanced POF method that places the stretch-position movement first in a bodypart routine, to not only warm up the target muscle, but also to put it in a state of emergency from the very first rep, and that means heightened fiber activation.

POF Fundamentals and More Routines
The fundamental concept of POF is correct exercise choice. You want to choose the movements that together take the target muscle through its full range of motion-from full stretch to complete contraction, plus you want to work the muscle with synergy. That may take two or three movements, depending on the exercises you choose. Here's a sample quad routine:

Midrange position: squats (synergy from glutes and lower back; do 2 light warmup sets first), 2-3 x 7-9
Stretch position: sissy squats (quick twitch out of the bottom, but no bouncing), 2 x 10
Contracted position: leg extensions (hold for a count at the top to emphasize peak contraction), 1-2 x 7-9

Hamstrings, on the other hand, only require two exercises for full-range training to take place:

Midrange and stretch position: stiff-legged lifts
(synergy from glutes and lower back; do 2 light warmup sets first), 2-3 x 7-9
Contracted position: leg curls (hold for a count at the top to emphasize peak contraction), 1-2 x 7-9

You can develop your own POF routines for other bodyparts by taking an exercise from each of the example sections above and doing the same set-rep scheme as the quad routine. For complete POF routines and variations, as well as more complete descriptions on how and why this mass-building protocol is so effective, see the following books and videos (Click on the title for a review):

Train, Eat, Grow: POF Manual: Complete POF bodybuilding manual with four four-week training phases centered around the amazing Positions-of-Flexion muscle-training approach. ($19.95)

Home Gym Handbook: Has a chapter on POF training in a home gym setting with a complete routine ($9.95)

Mass-Training Tactics: 2 Standard POF routines; 2 POF Pre-exhaustion routines plus 16 other complete programs (Free as a download to subscribers.)

Compound Aftershock (new revised and updated edition): More advanced variations of POF, including Compound Aftershock, Isolation Aftershock and Double-Impact training, plus nutrition and supplementation info and schedules (Free as a download to subscribers.)

10-Week Size Surge: step-by-step two-phase training approach, POF in the second phase, with complete diet, training tips and explanations. A weight-gain manual. ($9.95)

Fat to Muscle 2: routine is a five-day POF routine, training each bodypart directly once per week and indirectly once per week. Diets included along with fat-burning tips. ($9.95)

Hypercontraction Training video: advanced stretch-position-first POF protocol; includes Double-Impact training. One hour. ($24.95)

Critical Mass video series: "Critical Arms," "Critical Chest & Delts" and "Critical Legs & Back." Basic POF bodypart routines with live-action demos and explanations.

Granite Abs video: The POF approach to a ripped, etched midsection. Five POF programs designed around the science of abdominal-muscle function, plus diet tips and schedules. ($19.95)

Underground Mass-Boosting Methods: Unique and controversial ways to trigger new gains, including Negative Overload, Double Impact, Power Partials and R-P-M Training. These are advanced techniques applied to the POF protocol, so trainees need a bit more experience under their belts before they dive in. There are a lot of great plateau-busting tactics here. (Free as a download to subscribers.)
POF Training Tips

Use standard POF-exercise order most of the time. The standard order for the three positions is midrange, stretch and contracted. The midrange-position movement works the bulk of the target muscle with the help of synergist, or helping, muscles and warms up the target area for the more concentrated work to come in the next two positions. After the midrange exercise comes the stretch position, where you take advantage of the prestretch phenomenon. With a slight twitch at the bottom of any stretch-position exercise you can involve more muscle fibers and cause a more powerful contraction in the target muscle. Last is the contracted position, where the target muscle is flexed with opposing resistance—in other words, resistance doesn’t fall off at the top of the movement. These exercises give the target muscle an intense peak contraction after you’ve sufficiently warmed it up and worked it in the other two positions.

Do at least one light warmup set with 50 percent of your work weight for every midrange movement. Doing a second set with 75 percent may be even more beneficial for some exercises. Fight the urge to add sets. If you’re training to at least positive failure, two sets is plenty of work for any position, or angle, in most cases. A good rule of thumb is to never do more than 25 sets at any one workout—and less is preferable. Keep your form strict—two seconds up and two seconds down, the goal being to keep tension on the target muscle for 30 to 60 seconds—and rest one to 1 1/2 minutes between sets. You can rest slightly longer between sets of exercises that put a higher demand on your cardiovascular system, such as squats and rows. Always use a phase-training approach: four to six weeks of taking all sets other than warmups to at least positive failure, followed by two weeks of lower-intensity work, in which you stop all sets two reps short of failure. (See IRONMAN’s Home Gym Handbook for a complete discussion of phase training.) You can order any of the above books or videos online at www.home-gym.com.

Fitness Mythology

Allow me to first ask you to let go of your ankles, stand up straight, and pull your pants up. Don’t worry; it’s not your fault. You may not have even realized that you have been “taking it” from the fitness industry for a long, long time. Why should you even be suspicious, the people that teach college courses about weight training do this for a living! The personal trainers at your gym are “certified” which equates to fitness omniscience, right? So how can anything be amiss in the weightlifting universe?

My friends, amiss it is. And I’m here to expose some truths. But first, I must warn you. Much of the following information is contrary to popular opinion. So if you’re offended by anything that Oprah’s trainer doesn’t endorse - get out while you can, lest the waters of your fragile reality be stirred.

Myth #1: The Knee Shall Never Cross The Line Of The Toe
Every new trainer loves to spout this one off as a display of his or her biomechanical knowledge. They constantly scour the gym-goers movements on a noble quest to ensure patellar safety across the land. Unfortunately this unsubstantiated notion is perpetuated and accepted as fact in gyms everywhere. These are the same trainers that allow a gross deviation of the patella to the medial or lateral aspect during an exercise (the knee pointing a different direction than the foot), which actually is dangerous and degenerative.

If one were to assess knee injuries in athletic (read as: sport) environments, it becomes apparent that a high percentage of patellar trauma cases are sustained while the knee is beyond the all-sacred toe-line. In a misguided attempt to avoid knee injuries, the exercise community has therefore made this knee position taboo. In reality, the opposite reaction would have been preferential. Since this knee position is unavoidable in sports, or even in everyday life (try walking up or down stairs or a hill without your knee crossing your toe line) the proper way to prevent injuries is to strengthen the musculature around the joint by allowing the knee to travel into the “unsafe” zone in a controlled environment.

All joints contain feedback mechanisms inside the connective tissue and joint capsules called proprioceptors. These communicate with your nervous system to tell your brain what position your joint is at. This is how you can close your eyes and be aware of exactly what angle all of your joints are at without actually seeing them. To simplify a complicated issue, the more time you spend with your knee past your toe-line, the more you teach your nervous system to activate the protective soft tissue around the joint therefore PREVENTING injury during athletic situations (Supertraining, Siff & Verkoshansky, 1993). Close your eyes and think of a highly succesful strength coach. Yep, he agrees. Somehow, this news just doesn’t buy column space in Muscle and Fatness.

So remember this - the “golden rule” that the knee should never cross the line of the toe during any type of lunging exercise should be buried in the ocean with the lost city of Atlantis. (Of course, if this position causes consistent pain, then you should avoid this particular variation of the exercise).

Myth #2: Full Squats (below parallel) Are Bad For The Knees
More squat myths?!?
We’ve all heard it, if you dip below parallel during a squat, your kneecap will blow off and land in the front desk ’s mocha latte. Well it just ain’t true! What’s that, you need a little more evidence? Ok boys and s, its time for today’s episode of Fun With Musculoskeletal Anatomy.
The knee has four main protective ligaments that keep the femur from displacing on the tibia (ACL, PCL, MCL, LCL). These four ligaments are most effective at their protection during full extension and full flexion. Full extension would be when you are standing; full flexion would be when there is no daylight between your hamstring and your calf. When the knee is at 90 degrees of flexion (the halfway point), these four ligaments are almost completely lax and cannot exert much if any of a protective force at the knee (Zatsiorsky V. Kinematics of human motion. 1998 - published by Human Kinetics - p.301).

Unfortunately, the position where the protective ligaments of the knee are not doing any protecting is the common recommended stopping point of a squat. Therefore, as it as it turns out, this is the exact worst place you could reverse the motion under load.

If flexibility allows (heels staying planted, torso not flexing forward past 45 degrees), then a full squat where you lower yourself all the way to the ground is far safer on the knees than the traditional half squat. Guess what joint angle most leg extension machines start at? If you said 90 degrees, give yourself a pat on your healthy knee. This makes a full squat even safer than a leg extension machine (Wilk K et al. A comparison of tibiofemoral joint forces and electromyographic activity during open and closed kinetic chain exercises. Am J Sports Med; 24(4):518-527).

So am I telling you never to do parallel squats? No! Am I saying that you’ll injure yourself on a parallel squat? No, again! What I’m trying to do is simply make an argument for the safety of full squats, thereby relegating squat myth #2 to the fiery pits of hades.

Myth #3: It Is Unsafe To Squat, lift, Bench Press, Or Pick Your Nose Without A Lifting Belt
It has been brought to my attention that certain companies require their employees with labor-intensive positions to wear back braces/lifting belts.

When I run a company some day, whether we do labor intensive work or not, I plan to have my employees use standard issue bone files to grind away at each other’s spines.
Am I a monster? Maybe. But I’m being facetious in order to make a point. The point is that two scenarios above are about equally beneficial to overall back health!

You see, every man, woman and child on this planet has been given a lifting belt. That’s right; you arrived on this planet with one that was factory installed! It’s called a transversus abdominus or TVA. Unfortunately, most people haven’t used theirs since they were on the merry-go-round as a child. This muscle, the TVA, wraps all the way around your midsection like a corset, attaching to the thoracolumbar fascia, which then connects to your lumbar vertebrae or “lower back”. When contracted, it pulls at both sides of your spine creating something called hoop tension, which then sets off a waterfall effect of contracting the deep musculature of your torso. Once this has happened, your spine is rigid and fully protected, and your pelvic floor muscles contract, transferring stability to your lower body. Simply by contracting this muscle, you go from a noodle to a tank.

Now, since our TVA likes its very important job, it takes great offense to our silly attempts at replacing it. Therefore when we put on some sort of brace or lifting belt, our TVA decides to relax, robbing us of stability and spinal rigidity. (This has to do with the relaxation of our abdominals). Therefore, not only is wearing a belt unecessary, it can cause your nervous system to chronically inhibit your built in protective musculature. This can lead to spinal degeneration!
There, I said it! Wearing a belt can be worse for your back than not wearing one! So, if you take heed and decide that I may know a thing or two about back health, get rid of your belt. Or better yet, give it to one of your enemies. But do so gradually. If you’ve been wearing a belt for years, gradually taper yourself off of it, and get used to using your own muscles. Have someone knowledgeable teach you how to contract your TVA and you will be significantly better off.

Myth #4: Pressing Movements Should Stop At 90 Degrees To Protect The Shoulders
Ok, let’s talk upper body. This pressing myth is one is propagated by trainers at a certain health club that is gradually taking over the planet (hint, hint…they are open ALL day and ALL night).
It all started when an article was written with good intention by exercise therapist Paul Chek entitled “Big Bench, Bad Shoulders”. Chek referred to stopping the bench press movement at an individual’s passive range of motion (as low as you can bring your arms without holding any weight) while rehabbing a shoulder, instead of lowering the bar all the way to the chest. Unfortunately, Chek’s excellent recommendations for the injured were misapplied to a healthy population.

Somehow, this turned into “everybody should stop their bench press at a 90 degree shoulder angle, or the shoulders will be damaged and the chest muscles will shut off”.
Now, say it with me: “That just ain’t true!”

Once again, this little myth can actually do more harm than good. Here’s how: from personal experience with hundreds of clients and from statistical analysis, most people have some degree of internal rotation of the humerus along with protracted shoulders.

Go ahead, check yourself. Stand sideways to a mirror; relax your arms down to your sides. Now check yourself. Do your palms face directly towards each other, or do they face behind you? This is an indication of the internal rotation of your humerus. Too much internal rotation (hands facing back) indicates that your internal rotators are either much stronger than your external rotators or it indicates that the internal rotators are tight (and potentially shortened in their resting position) and the external rotators are potentially stretched in their resting position.
Also look at the position of your arms relative to your legs. Do your arms fall directly down the midline of your thigh, or in front of your leg? Can you see any of your upper back in the mirror? These tests are an indication of shoulder position (retraction or protraction). When standing relaxed, your arms should fall directly down the midline of the thigh and you should only be able to see your chest and shoulder, no upper back. The more of your back you can see, the worse off you are, you primate you.

Getting back to the point of this passage, these postural conditions can be exacerbated by stopping your pressing movements short of full range. This occurs due to your body’s adaptive mechanism of shortening the fibers in accordance with the range of motion you contract them in.
Take a look at powerlifters; their careers depend on their healthy shoulders. They lower the bar to their chest, sometimes even below the chest line using a cambered bar. A recent study in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning research listed powerlifting below badminton on injuries sustained per hours of participation. To make a long and complex story, if you have healthy shoulders and want to keep them, lower the bar all the way to your chest, slow and controlled. Most people would save their shoulders simply by adding in some external rotation work for the teres minor and infraspinatus instead of revamping their entire pressing program.

Myth #5: You Shouldn't Train Abs Before Legs
Didn’t know this one was a myth? Good! However, let’s discuss it anyway since I think this is an erroneous piece of fiction that my soon gain mythical status within the circle of infallibility known as the accredited personal training associations.

Credit Strength Coach Ian King for being the first one to really shed light on this one being a fallacy. At first glance, the theory holds water; if your abdominals are fatigued then they won't be able to stabilize the body or the spine, therefore leaving yourself open to possible injury, or at the very least weakness, during leg training.

But incorrectly assuming that the abs are one unit is the governing body behind this misnomer. The core of the body can be divided into two distinct groups of musculature; the outer unit, and the inner unit. The outer unit is made up of what you can see in the mirror, i.e. the rectus abdominus, external obliques, and spinal erectors. Traditional abdominal exercises such as curl-ups, knee raises etc. target the outer unit musculature almost exclusively.

The inner unit is made up of the transversus abdominus, the multifidus, the diaphragm, and the pelvic floor muscles. Spinal stabilization is provided almost entirely by the inner unit musculature, therefore any ab exercises done before a leg workout will cause no significant impairment of form or function. One should, however, avoid excessive inner unit work to the point of fatigue before a workout for said reasons. Inner unit work would include any woodchop type exercise, forward or transverse ball-rolls, or most stability drills, etc.

I'm sure some of you out there are saying "...but when I do abs before legs, I feel weaker, so now what do you have to say, you pickle kisser"? This very well could be the case, but that is due to your nervous system’s inability to preferentially activate your inner unit musculature during stabilization needs, and an over-reliance on using the outer unit muscles to perform this function. This is a problem that needs to be addressed!

Referred to as "Sensory-Motor-Amnesia" (Chek, P. 1998, Scientific Core Conditioning. Correspondence Course. Paul Chek Seminars), this dysfunctional inner unit can come from heightened tension due to hypertonic muscles, from an overreliance on external apparatus (see myth #3), or from a series of musclular imbalances that can be determined through postural analysis and other soft tissue testing.

In other words, get your core in order, dude! Learn to activate your inner unit musculature with control drills and exercises designed to hit those deep muscles. Then, when training outer unit musculature, you won’t be fatiguing your inner unit. In addition, you wont impair the function of the inner unit for stabilization purposes. Whether you choose to do abs before squatting or not, it’s important to recognize how the abdominal muscles are arranged and how to use the arrangement to your training advantage.

In conclusion, if one thing can be taken away from this , let it be to question advice. Blindly accepting the advice of “experts” can lead to mental atrophy and apathy. You become a slave to other people’s advice and never learn to think critically for yourself. Dig deep, do some research, and come to your own conclusions.

Comprehensive Beginning Weight Training Program

Self-Assessment: Evaluations
Before embarking on your fitness quest, find out if you’re a “high risk” candidate for training. A good personal trainer, for instance, would ask you these questions:
· Is your blood pressure greater than or equal to 160/90?
· Is your total cholesterol greater or equal to 240?
· Do you smoke?
· Do you have diabetes?
· Do you have a family history of heart disease?
· Do you have a family history of Cancer?
· Do you live a sedentary lifestyle?
· Are you over 50? (for females, for men it’s over 40)
· Are you pregnant?
· Are you on medications?
· Is your body fat over 30 percent? (for females, for men it’s over 25)
· Do you have a known disease?
· Do you have an old or recent injuries?
If you answered yes to two or more of the above questions, the American College of Sports Medicine recommends that you get your doctor’s clearance before starting.

Measurements
Find out your measurements and percentage of body fat. This gives you a more accurate picture of your body composition than just weighing in. Once you start toning up and shedding fat, body weight can often increase, since muscle weighs more than fat, and this can mislead you into thinking you’re not making progress when you are.
Start with these measurements, which you can update every 6 weeks to three months to chart progress:
· Date:
· Body Weight:
· % Body fat:

Measurements:
· Shoulders (from middle of the deltoid, across the back):
· Chest (pectoral, just above the breasts):
· Waist (at the belly button):
· Hips (at the hip bone):
· Buttocks (the biggest part, keep feet together):
· Thigh (uppermost section):
· Calves (the biggest part):
· Biceps (the biggest part):

Muscle Checklist
Next, try to flex each muscle (hardening and softening.) Do this as if you were showing off your biceps. Bend or straighten appropriate limbs to contract the muscles. The ones that fail to take your orders are the one that probably need your most attention.

What muscles fail to harden at your command?

Shoulders
Chest
Back (lats)
Lower back

Biceps
Triceps
Abs
Buttocks

Quads
Hamstrings
Inner Thigh
Calves

Do you have any old or current injuries that require nurturing and respect?
· Where?
· What sorts of physical activities do you do now? (Either athletic or not)
· What body parts or muscles do those activities use most?
· What parts, therefore, do you use least?
· What needs more attention?
Use your weak and neglected areas as focal points for training. Don’t simply start by favoring what you already do well. Fill in the missing pieces of your puzzle and a weak muscle can soon become a strong point.

For instance:
· If you’re a runner-walker, chances are good you only work the lower half of your body.
Add upper body strengthening to address neglected muscles. You might even need supplemental leg training to improve leg strength and endurance. Especially hamstring and quads for hip and knee stability. To sculpt buttocks, add exercises for that area and sprint up hills to improve both your shape and aerobic capacity. If you suffer from overuse injuries from running, run in both deep and shallow water. If it’s a serious injury, start in deep and work into progressively shallower water, where you weight more, so you gradually overload muscles and joints.

Posture
Next, try to evaluate your postural weaknesses and imbalances in a detached, preferably nonjudgmental way. If you can’t do this evaluation yourself, have someone snap a photo of you from front, back and sides, or have them do the assessment. Draw two bodies, one straight on and one in profile. Mark each area of imbalance with an X and R or L. for right or left.

Although all of the above details can touch at the heart of paranoia and make the head reel with self-judgment, the facts give you a place to begin. It takes a certain type of courage to embrace the less glamorous side of reality, but all improvements spring from there.
· Do you tilt your head to one side?
(Do you cradle a phone on your neck?)

· Is one shoulder higher than the other?
(Do you always carry a bag on the same side?)

· Do you tend to slump forward?
(Do you sit at a desk all day?)

· Does your chest sink in?
· Do you strain your neck forward when you read or write?
· Do you have a pronounced arch in your lower back (lordosis)?
· Do you have scoliosis?
· Do you know which sides of the spine are over-stretched or contracted, due to scoliosis?
· Is on leg longer than the other? Which one?
· Do you lean into one hip?
· Do your knees bow out or knock together?
· Do you lock your knees when standing?
· Do you wear high heals much of the time?
(If so, your Achilles tendons could become tight and “shortened.”)

· Do your feet roll in or out?
(Check the wear on the soles of your shoes to see.)

Some Postural Fixes
· Tilt head to one side
Stretch neck muscles on the “shorter side” and try to carry head straight

· Shoulders slump forward
Strengthen the “rear” part of the shoulder and upper back
· Arched lower back (lordosis) or weakness in lower back and the abdominals
Strengthen abdominals
Stretch (and strengthen) lower back muscles
Strengthen (and stretch) weak hamstrings
“Soften” locked knees
Lengthen and increase mobility of hip flexors with hip flexor stretches
Incorporate balance exercises (such as standing on one leg) to improve torso stabilizing muscles, posture and alignment

· Flat lower back with shoulders rounded forward (Kyphosis)
Strengthen rear shoulder and upper back muscles to correct slumping
Strengthen chest to open posture
Stretch (and strengthen) tight hamstrings
Strengthen hip flexors while maintaining flexibility in that muscle

· Feet rolling in or out
Possible candidate for orthotics (corrective inserts for shoes), particularly if you run or do any type of impact exercise, which would exacerbate the problem. Try focusing on centering your weight through the whole foot.

· Tight Achilles tendons
Try walking barefoot in sand. Alternatively, stretch your Achilles tendons by standing on stairs, lowering one heel and slightly bending the knee on that leg at the same time.

· To break the habit of always carrying a bag on one side
Switch sides or carry a back pack
· To minimize neck pain
Make sure you don’t cradle the phone in your neck. Get a headset or shoulder brace. Try a speaker phone

· If you slump at a desk all day
Treat yourself to an ergonomic chair with good lower back support

Workout 1
Here’s the resistance regimen. You may want to buy a yoga or workout mat on which to perform these exercises as most of them have you lying or kneeling on the floor. Workout 1 should be performed every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for three weeks. On the forth week increase the number of sets to three per movement and continue for an additional three weeks. At the end of this six week period most of the soreness should be gone and replaced by the normal temporary muscle ache which often accompanies resistance training. Now you are ready to add weights. I want you to go to your local sporting goods store and buy yourself a pair of 10-25 pound dumbbells, which ever weight feels the best to you. Remember, though, that you want it to be challenging and remain challenging for some time so don’t get the light ones trying to take the easy way out, you’re only cheating yourself. Now do the same exercises, using the dumbbells, for three weeks at two sets per exercise, then another three weeks at three sets per exercise. Also when adding the dumbbells, reduce all reps by five. You can add them back later, optionally, for added intensity.

Following these three months on the Comprehensive Beginning Weight Training Workout 1 you will be ready for one of three things:
1. You’ll want to move on to more challenging resistance exercises such as those found at a commercial gym.
2. You will want to continue more of the same but change up the movements to keep the improvements coming and keep it from getting boring.
3. Or you will be ready to simply add more sets per body part and make your body continue to adapt by changing things up and increasing the muscle load.

For the first option, you will need to contact me and I’ll set up a regimen planned around a commercial gyms equipment and your personal goals. For the second option, I will include an alternate workout regimen which can be used to “cycle” into your regimen as you see fit. Lastly, for the third option I will include such a regimen you can use to change things up and keep the results rolling.

My suggestion is to choose option 2 and complete it per the instructions below, then move on to option three. Following the completion of all three you can either start the cycle over or opt for alternative number one and head out to the commercial gym.

Muscle Group(s)
Exercise
Sets
Reps

Inner Thighs, Glutes
Plié Squat
2
15

Quads, Glutes
Stationary Lunge
2
15

Hip Flexor
Front Leg Raise
2
15

Glutes, Hams
Hip Thrust
2
15

Calves
Standing Calf Raise
2
15

Upper Back
Bent-over Row
2
15

Lower Back
Back Extension
2
15

Upper-ab region
Crunch*
2
30

Lower-ab Region
Reverse Crunch*
2
30

Chest, Delts, Tris
Push-Up
2
15

Deltoids
Over-head Press
2
15

Triceps
Over-head Extension
2
15

Biceps
Alternate Curl
2
15

*Alternate Crunch with Reverse Crunch every other workout.
(Note) Your goal should be to only rest for about 60-90 seconds between exercises. Any more and your muscles will start to get cold.

Well that plan looks great on paper, but how do you actually do these crazy exercises?
Lets dive in…

Plie Squat
Start Position:
Stand with your feet wider than shoulder-width apart and turn your toes out.
Execution:
With your torso up-right, bend your knees until your thighs are parallel to the floor. As you push back up, squeeze your glutes. Your knees shouldn’t extend past your toes. Hold a dumbbell in front of you for added resistance.

Stationary Lunge
Start Position:
You’ll need to experiment with foot spacing, but when you bring your right leg forward, your weight should be evenly distributed between your feet. Your back leg should rest on your toes.
Execution:
Stride forward with your right leg, bending your right knee to create about a 90-degree angle between your upper and lower leg. Try to lower your back knee close to (not touching) the floor, then come back up without changing your foot position. Squeeze your glutes and quads as you come up. Do all reps on one side, then switch. To add resistance, hold dumbbells at your sides.

Front Leg Raise
Start Position:
Lye on your back with your feet together and your hands palm down on the floor either next to your body or tucked slightly under your glutes.
Execution:
Keeping your upper body rigid and pressed against the floor, raise your legs (slight bend in the knees*) up to just short of 90 degrees (between 60 and 80 degrees).
* “Slightly Bent” simply means don’t keep your knees locked as this is bad for the delicate, complex knee joint and could lead to pain and possible injury.

Hip Thrust
Starting Position:
Lye on your back hands comfortably at your sides, palms down, or on your hips and with your legs bent and feet on the ground.
Execution:
Keeping your upper body stiff and straight thrust your hips up toward the ceiling. You should be pivoting from your shoulders so that only your head/shoulders and feet are touching the ground. Your hands should stabilize you but not help with the movement. At the top squeeze your hamstrings and hold before lowering slowly to the starting position.
Variation:
Execute as above only now place your feet up on the edge of a chair, bench or coffee table.

Standing Calf Raise
Start Position:
You can do these off a step, with either your own body weight or holding dumbbells for added resistance. The balls of your feet should rest on the step, and your heels should hang off enough to allow a full range of motion.
Execution:
Simply rise up on the balls of your feet, raising and lowering your heels, squeezing your calves at the top. You should lower your heels all the way down until you can’t stretch any further. (These are great for your achilles tendon.

Bent-over Row
Start Position:
Standing bent at the hips (torso parallel with the floor), feet shoulder width apart and knees slightly bent. Hands hanging straight down toward the floor.
Execution:
Keeping your torso still raise your elbows toward the ceiling squeezing your shoulder blades together. Your elbows and wrists should stay in one plane with your shoulders, and your knuckles should still be pointed at the floor. Squeeze and hold at the top before slowing lowering back to the starting position. Keep your eyes focused on one spot throughout the set so that your head is not moving around.

Back Extension
Start position:
Standing bent at the hips (torso parallel with the floor), feet shoulder width apart and knees slightly bent. Your hands can, optionally, be on your hips, crossed over your chest, or at your temples. (It is utterly important to keep the natural arch in your back and not allow it to slouch or “round over.”) Your shoulders should be back and your chest out.
Execution:
Simply stand up to the erect position squeezing your lower back and thrusting your pelvis forward at the top.

Crunch
Start Position:
Lie face up with your knees bent, feet on the floor and your hands either loosely grasping your head, or by your temples.
Execution:
Curl up a few inches, bringing your shoulder blades just off the floor. When you come down, stop just short of the fully resting position at the bottom. It helps to not think of the movement as purely up and down, but rather rolling your shoulders up and towards your hips.

Reverse Crunch
Start Position:
Lie face up with your knees and hips bent at 90-degrees and your feet in the air. Place your hands at your sides.
Execution:
Squeeze your abs in, then lift your glutes and hips off the floor by bringing your knees over your chest. Return to the start position in a controlled movement.

Push-up
Start Position:
Support your weight on your hands and knees and cross your ankles. Space your hands about shoulder-distance apart, fingers facing forward. Keep y9our abs in, maintain the natural arch of your back and look straight ahead.
Execution:
As you lower your upper body, try to imagine yourself as a lever; only your arms and elbows should be moving. Shoot for as many reps as you can do with good form. If you can do 20 on your knees, on your next set try to do a few full-body push-ups, then continue on your knees.

Over-head Press
Start Position:
Sitting in a chair, preferably with back support, grasp a pair of dumbbells and bend your elbows so that your upper arms are parallel to the floor, palms facing forward.
Execution:
With your chest out, press the weights up in an arc, squeezing your shoulders, then lower to the start position in a controlled movement. Don’t let the dumbbells touch at the top. For beginners, perform the movement the same as above, just pretend you are holding a pair of dumbbells and concentrate on squeezing your shoulders at the top of the movement.

Over-head Extension
Start Position:
Sitting in a chair, preferably with back support, grasp a pair of dumbbells and bend your elbows and raise your arms above your head so that your lower, or fore arms, are parallel to the floor, palms facing toward each other.
Execution:
Keeping everything else still, extend your hands up toward the ceiling squeezing the backs of your arms (triceps). Squeeze and hold in the (elbow) ”locked” position before lowering slowly back to the start position.

Alternate Curl
Start Position:
Grasp a pair of dumbbells with you palms facing in, feet together and knees slightly bent. Your elbows should remain fairly close to your sides throughout.
Execution:
Curl your left arm up (trying not to move your elbow outward or forward.) As you arm comes up, turn your wrist so that your palm faces up at the top of the movement. (This is called supination.) Squeeze your biceps at the top, then lower the weight and reverse the wrist twist. Repeat with your right arm and continue alternating.

Workout 2 (option 2)
Workout 2 should be performed every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for three weeks. On the forth week increase the number of sets to three per movement and continue for an additional three weeks. At the end of this six week period you are ready to add weights. Now do the same exercises, using the dumbbells, for three weeks at two sets per exercise, then another three weeks at three sets per exercise. Also when adding the dumbbells, reduce all reps by five. You can add them back later, optionally, for added intensity.

Muscle Group(s)
Exercise
Sets
Reps

Quads, Glutes
Alternating Lunge
2
15

Outer Thigh, Hip Flexor
Standing Lateral Leg Raise
2
15

Glutes, Hams
Standing Donkey Kick
2
15

Hamstrings
Butt Kick
2
15

Calves
Standing Calf Raise
2
15

Upper Back
Bent-over Flye
2
15

Lower Back
Back Extension
2
15

Upper-ab region
Crunch*
2
30

Lower-ab Region
Reverse Crunch*
2
30

Chest, Delts, Tris
Chair Push-Up
2
15

Deltoids
Lateral Raise
2
15

Triceps
Kick-Back
2
15

Biceps
Hammer Curl
2
15

Here’s the break-down…

Alternating Lunge
This is performed much the same as the stationary lunge except now you are going to alternate between your right and left leg every other repetition. So now you will lunge with your right leg, then stand back up to erect, lunge with your left leg, stand back up to erect, lunge with your right leg, etc. until you have finished all your reps.

Standing Lateral Leg Raise
Start Position:
Stand near a wall, chair, table, or something to hold on to that will stabilize your balance. Stand with your feet together, head up, and chest out.
Execution:
Keeping your upper body stationary, lift the outside leg straight out and up until you can’t lift it any further (about 45 degrees), then slowly lower it just short of touching the ground. Remember to squeeze at the top of the movement. You should feel it on the outer thigh near your hip.
Variation:
Beginners may optionally bend the knees 90 degrees if unable to complete the set. Also, you can use this technique at the end of a set to extend it to or beyond failure for increased intensity.

Standing Donkey Kick
Start Position:
Stand facing a wall, feet comfortably apart. You should be just short of an arms length from the wall. Place your hands on the wall at about shoulder level and lean your weight into the wall for support.
Execution:
Keeping the natural arch in your back, not letting it sag or round over, kick your heel back and up to the ceiling. Hold and squeeze your glutes at the top then slowly lower back to the start position (just short of touching the floor). Your upper body should move very little in this movement, and you should really strive to get some height in your heel kick. Try to kick the ceiling.
Variation:
You can also do these off the end of a bench, table, or bed for added support. In which case you can do one side then the other, alternate legs, or do both at the same time. This option also lends itself nicely to adding weight by placing a dumbbell between the feet and doing both legs at the same time.

Butt Kick
Starting Position:
Stand comfortably with feet apart.
Execution:
This is exactly what it sounds like. Alternately kick your heels up to your butt. You should be trying to get your heel to actually contact your glutes. Squeeze your hamstrings hard at the top.
Standing Calf Raise
Performed same as above.

Bent-Over Flye
Starting position:
Same as for the Bent-Over Row
Execution:
Nearly the same as for the Bent-Over Row. Instead of raising your elbows toward the ceiling, keep a constant bend in your elbows (about ten degrees) and raise your wrists toward the ceiling (palms down) pivoting from the shoulder. Squeeze your shoulder blades together at the top. Stop when the wrists are level with your shoulders, then lower back to just short of the bottom position. Your wrists, elbows, and shoulders should all be in one plane.

Back Extension
Performed same as above.

Crunch
Performed same as above.

Reverse Crunch
Performed same as above.

Chair Push-Up
Only move on to this advancement if you were doing regular push ups in workout 1. If not, then just start doing regular push ups in place of these.
Start Position:
Same as regular push ups except now your feet are up on a chair, bench, or coffee table.
Execution:
Same as a regular push up.

Lateral Raise
Start Position:
Sitting erect with your back supported, or standing with your feet shoulder width apart, hands at your sides, palms facing in.
Execution:
Raise your wrists up toward the ceiling until they are level with your shoulders. Squeeze your deltoids at the top and hold momentarily before lowering back down just short of the bottom position. Your elbows should hold a constant bend of about ten degrees. Be sure the backs of your wrists are toward the ceiling and lead the motion with your elbows. Imagine trying to touch the ceiling with your elbows, however the elbow joint should remain fixed throughout the movement.

Kick Back
Start Position:
Standing slightly bent over with feet about shoulder width apart and left hand supported on knee. Your upper right arm should be parallel to and pressed tightly against your upper body with a 90 degree bend in the elbow, palm in.
Execution:
With out moving anything else, extend your lower arm back straightening it out and squeezing your triceps at the end of the range of motion. Hold momentarily, then slowly return back to the start position.

Hammer Curl
This is performed exactly the same as the Alternating Curl except that you turn your wrist 90 degrees so that your palms are facing each other.


Workout 3 (option 3)
Workout 3 should be performed every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for three weeks. On the forth week increase the number of sets to three per movement and continue for an additional three weeks. At the end of this six week period you are ready to add weights. Now do the same exercises, using the dumbbells, for three weeks at two sets per exercise, then another three weeks at three sets per exercise. Also when adding the dumbbells, reduce all reps by five. You can add them back later, optionally, for added intensity.

Monday
Muscle Group(s)
Exercise
Sets
Reps

Chest
Push-Up
2
15

Chest
Dumbbell Flye
2
15

Lower Back
Back Extension
2
15

Upper Back
Bent-Over Row (wide)
2
15

Upper Back
Bent-Over Row (narrow)
2
15

Wednesday
Muscle Group(s)
Exercise
Sets
Reps

Delts/Traps
Upright Row
2
15

Delts/Traps
Lateral Raise
2
15

Biceps
Alternating DB Curl
2
15

Biceps
Concentration Curl
2
15

Triceps
Bench Dip
2
15

Triceps
Over-head Extension
2
15

Forearm/Biceps
Reverse Curl
2
15

Friday
Muscle Group(s)
Exercise
Sets
Reps

Quads/Glutes
Chair Squats
2
15

Quads/Glutes
Leg Extension
2
15

Hams/Glutes
Hip Thrust
2
15

Hams/Glutes
Lying Leg Curl
2
15

Calves
Standing Calf Raise
2
15

Calves
Toe Jump
2
15

Abdominals
Crunch
2
30

Abdominals
Leg Raise/Thrust
2
30

Here’s the break-down for this one…

Push-Up
Performed same as above.

Dumbbell Flye
Start Position:
Lying on your back on the floor or, preferably, on a bench, arms extended straight up over your chest with your palms in. Your elbows should maintain a slight but constant bend through out this movement. In other words, don’t lock your elbows out.
Execution:
Slowly lower your wrists toward the floor in an arc motion until they are about level with your torso, or until you feel a good stretch in your chest muscle, which ever comes first. Reverse the movement and squeeze your chest together, pulling your wrists back up to the start position without actually touching at the top.

Back Extension
Performed same as above.

Bent-Over Row (Wide)
Performed same as above.

Bent-Over Row (Narrow)
Start Position:
Foot and body position is the same as the Bent-Over Row (wide). The difference comes in arm position and motion, and therefore muscle group recruitment. Your arms should be hanging naturally straight down from the shoulder, palms in.
Execution:
In a sharp controlled manner, drive your elbows upward and back, dragging your arm along side your body. Squeeze your back at the top of the motion and hold briefly. Slowly lower back to the start position. Alternate arms until set is complete.

Upright Row
Start Position:
Stand upright with feet at shoulder width, chest out and shoulders back. Hands hanging naturally at your thighs, palms in.
Execution:
In a sharp controlled manner, drive your elbows upward and outward allowing your elbows to bend and hands to continue pointing toward the floor until your hands are between your chest and chin. Squeeze your shoulders at the top of the motion and hold briefly. Slowly lower back to the start position.

Lateral Raise
Performed same as above.

Alternating Curl
Performed same as above.

Concentration Curl
Start Position:
Sit with your feet wide apart. Place the back of your elbow on the inside of your thigh near the knee with your arm extended straight and palm facing up. Your shoulder and elbow should form a line perpendicular to the floor.
Execution:
In a sharp controlled manner “Curl” your palm upward toward your shoulder until they almost touch. Squeeze your biceps at the top of the motion and hold briefly. Your upper arm should continue to form a line perpendicular to the floor throughout the motion. Slowly lower back to the start position.

Bench Dip
Start Position:
Sit on the edge of a chair or bench grasping the edge with your hands. Your legs should be extended straight forward with your feet together. Move your rear forward off the edge of the chair or bench and lower your body down the front side of the chair or bench until your upper and lower arm forms a ninety degree angle.
Execution:
In a sharp controlled manner raise your body upward until your arm is once again straight. Squeeze your Triceps at the top of the motion and hold briefly. Slowly lower back to the start position.

Over-Head Extension
Start Position:
Sit in a chair or bench with back support. With your back pressed firmly against the backrest, raise your arms directly overhead with hands pointed toward the ceiling and bend your elbows until your upper and lower arms form a ninety degree angle, palms up.
Execution:
In a sharp controlled manner extend your lower arms upward toward the ceiling keeping your upper arms perpendicular to the floor and being careful not to move your elbows forward, backward, or to the side throughout the motion. Squeeze your triceps at the top of the movement and hold briefly. Slowly lower back to the start position.

Reverse Curl
Performed the same as the Alternate Curl and Hammer Curl with the exception that the palms should face the floor throughout. (Pronated)

Chair Squat
Start Position:
Stand in front of a chair or bench with your feet shoulder width apart, toes pointed slightly outward.
Execution:
Bend at your knees and hips as if to sit on the chair or bench. Lower your body until your buttocks barely touch the surface of the chair or bench. Do not sit down. Immediately reverse direction and, in a sharp controlled manner, stand back up squeezing your thighs at the top of the motion and hold briefly.

Leg Extension
Start Position:
Sit in a chair or on a bench grasping the seat with your hands to anchor you.
Execution:
Keeping your body still, in a sharp controlled manner extend your knees forward until your feet are level with your upper legs. Squeeze your thighs at the top of the motion and hold briefly. Slowly lower back to the start position.

Hip Thrust
Performed same as above.

Lying Leg Curl
Start Position:
Lye on your stomach, on the floor or a bench,
Execution:
In a sharp controlled manner, bend you leg at the knee and raise your foot until your leg forms a ninety degree angle. Squeeze your thigh at the top of the motion and hold briefly. Be sure your hip and upper leg does not lose contact with the floor or bench throughout the range of motion. Your hips and buttocks should remain completely still throughout the motion. Slowly lower back to the start position.

Standing Calf Raise
Performed same as above.

Toe Jump
Start Position:
Stand with feet shoulder width apart with your weight on the balls of your feet and heels lightly touching the floor.
Execution:
Explosively push off the balls of your feet and toes upward as hard as possible and try to jump in the air using only the power of your calves.

Crunch
Performed same as above.

Leg Raise/Thrust
Performed the same as Leg Raise above with the exception that at the top of the motion you then Thrust your feet straight upward toward the ceiling raising your hips upward off the floor as far as possible.