Intervals: The bad- if you are training legs two or even three times per week, you can not do intervals more than once a week without overtraining. Let me rephrase that; you can but eventually it will lead to overtraining or at the very least slow down your strength gains. You can negate this slightly by keeping your leg training volume extremely low and doing your intervals on the same day as your weight training. You can’t do five to eight sets of legs two or three days a week and 30 minutes of intervals on top of it. That’s a dead end road.

You also have to remember to do your intervals on your training days and not on off days like you might do with other forms of cardio because that will lead to overtraining much quicker.

The ugly- if you choose sprinting as your form of interval training you could get hurt; it’s an ugly truth that has to be faced. The thing that will lead to even more injuries is following faulty interval protocol advice. Normally it is recommended to do 30-60 second intervals when they are being performed on a stationary bike. A lot of people take these recommendations and apply them to sprinting. This is a huge mistage! Nobody can sprint for 30-60 seconds. Ok, not nobody; but most average people can’t do it. World class athletes can sprint for that long, but not everyone else.

Don’t believe me?

Go try it. Warm up thoroughly and try to sprint for 60 seconds straight. Let me know what happens. We have all seen the Olympics and how winded guys are after sprinting the 100 which happens to last all of ten seconds. Most of us have seen guys run the 40 and not be able to catch their breath for at least a few minutes afterwards. And that takes five seconds or less. Not only is sprinting for 30-60 seconds impossible for most people but it also greatly increases the risk of injury.

When you keep your sprint distances and times very short, you decrease the risk for injury because you never hit top speed and instead spend most of your time in the acceleration phase. This phase has the least potential for injury. For that reason, most people should be running 20-50 yard sprints. This keeps you at top speed for a very short period of time; usually little enough time to maintain form and not suffer an injury. When you run at top speed for too long the chance for a break down in form and thus an injury is greatly increased.

I would never recommend that a non athlete ever try to sprint for 30-60 seconds straight and you should never take that advice from anyone. It is faulty and dangerous. To further reduce your injury while sprinting, use adequate rest periods between sets. Also, running with a sled slows you down enough to avoid top speeds and makes sprinting much safer.

Bottom Line- Intervals are a great tool for getting ripped, however when your main goal is to get big and strong and just keep fat gain to a minimum, they should be used sparingly if at all. I would recommend sprints above intervals on a bike and even then I wouldn’t do them in true interval fashion but more of a traditional speed workout with short sprints and adequate rest periods. This will still elevate your metabolism greatly and keep you lean. Just look at the physiques of Olympic sprinters for proof of this; that his how they train. Sprint, rest… no intervals.

Mike Mentzer’s basic ideas and theories were that we are all grossly over-trained in sets and overall volume but under-trained in intensity. He recommended somewhere between one and three sets per bodypart, once every 7-21 days. He also knew what I have since learned; that high protein diets are unnecessary and are just another scam perpetrated by the bodybuilding industry to force you to buy more protein powder and useless crap.

Many people thought Mike Mentzer was a genius and learned a great deal from him while making tremendous progress employing his advice. Others thought he was completely insane and needed to be committed.

I, personally, loved Mike’s attitude and rebellious nature. I also learned quite a bit from him and when I first read Heavy Duty way back in the early 90’s, it completely changed the way I thought about training. It also led to some outstanding results.

The problem was that at the time I was like many of you; constantly in search for the next best training program and always thought there was a better way of doing things. So I lost my way for a few years while experimenting with everything under the sun.
Sadly, you have to get off the right path and get lost for a while in order to realize that you were heading in the right direction all along.

It has been at least 15 years since I read Mike Mentzer’s training theories for the first time and I have experimented with quite a bit of different loading parameters and training methods since then. I can now state, unequivocally, that Mike Mentzer was a lot smarter and a lot closer to the truth than a lot of people I have taken advice from over the years.

Was he a genius?

No. But he was a smart guy and a rational thinker. He never just blindly accepted what everyone else did. He thought for himself and questioned everything.

Looking back I can say that Mike was a little off with his frequency recommendations and that the intensity he advocated was a bit too high and unnecessary. In fact, I think some of the extreme intensity techniques he advocated may have even been counterproductive. I also strongly disagree with many of his exercise choices.

But that doesn’t mean that Mike’s ideas weren’t effective. He is, after all, responsible for helping Dorian Yates win the Mr. Olympia contest.

Mike knew the dangers of overtraining and realized just how unnecessary and counterproductive all that useless junk volume really was. He knew that it didn’t take anywhere near as much training as most people think to produce dramatic gains in size and strength. Mike knew and preached to people that if they couldn’t get the job done in a fraction of the sets they normally used then they weren’t training hard enough. Or maybe they weren’t eating properly or getting enough rest… But whatever it was, their lack of progress was not due to their lack of training volume. In fact, their training volume may have been what was holding them back.

I respect what Mike Mentzer contributed to the strength training world and will always consider him a pioneer in our business.

To learn how I incorporated many of Mike Mentzer’s theories with my own (that are based on 20 years of in the trenches experience and endless discussions with renowned coaches and trainers) to create the best muscle building system available for drug free, genetically average lifters, go to http://www.ferruggiasmusclesecrets.com/ now.

If you are a beginner who also happens to be a ripped ectomorph who has to fight for every ounce he gains (e.g. a classic hardgainer), I suggest that you lay off cardio almost entirely for at least 8-12 weeks. Get your training and diet down and pack on some size. In that time you should be able to gain at least 15lbs of muscle if not 20+. After you have done that you can add in some cardio. I would start with three weekly sessions of twenty minutes of moderate intensity cardio; no intervals. Use a bike to limit the amount of eccentric stress or pounding on the joints. And remember there are actually things known as real bikes that go outside, not just stationary bikes that people park themselves on to watch Oprah. Although, if you choose that route, get one with a well padded seat that will not lead to the death of your sex life.

If you are beyond the beginner level you should always be doing some kind of cardio on a regular basis, be it intervals, moderate intensity steady state, or low intensity, long duration steady state. Again, don’t limit yourself to machines indoors; get outside and drag a sled, run sprints, jump rope or play a sport. That’s a lot more fun anyway. I think everyone should be doing something like this at least three days per week for at least 30 minutes. It’s healthy and prevents a host of health problems, not to mention that it keeps you in shape and looking good.

Contrary to what many people believe, cardio can actually be of great benefit to those looking to get bigger and stronger. Not only does it improve the cardiovascular system and thus improve the quality of your weight training workouts but it allows you to eat more muscle building calories while staying lean. To pack on 20-30 pounds of muscle you have to eat an inordinate amount of food. Doing some cardio will help ensure that you don’t get fat from all the excessive eating.

The bottom line is that everyone but absolute beginners should be doing some kind of cardio type activity at least three times per week for thirty minutes. This will not inhibit size or strength gains in the least but may actually enhance them. You should vary your activities and intensities as much as possible. You can do cardio immediately after you train, although I prefer to do it on non weight training days or later in the day after training because I am usually too spent after lifting to give it my all on the cardio. Doing it on off days is usually a better option anyway because it serves as an active recovery activity and also gets you burning some calories on those days.

In all seriousness if you want to gain 15 or 20lbs of muscle by March 2009 then you need Muscle Gaining Secrets (Naked Nutrition Approved).

Just kidding But check out this article (This Note is from Mike)

Everyone who ever picks up a weight soon develops the desire for a set of massive arms. It’s nearly unavoidable. Within a week after their first workout most guys are start for searching the secrets of how to get huge arms during every spare moment they have. Nearly everybody loves to stretch their shirt sleeves or even cut them off. Unfortunately, many people go about their arm training all wrong. One of the biggest mistakes you can make when training for big arms is using the wrong exercises. Kickbacks and concentration curls will do very little to develop a set of impressive guns. If you really want to know how to get huge arms, use my top ten biceps exercises and your arms will be exploding with new growth in no time.

Biceps:
Close Grip Chin Up- This is the king of biceps exercises because it allows you to use the most weight and move your body through space. Any time you can move your body through space, instead of just moving your limbs, there is a higher level of neuromuscular activation which leads to greater muscular development.

Barbell Curl- As far as isolation movements go, this is the best one there is when it comes to building big biceps.

Dumbbell Curl- Another isolation movement that is nearly the equivalent to the barbell curl. The added advantage is that when you can no longer complete another rep you can stop doing them simultaneously and switch to alternate curls to cheat a few more reps out.

Incline Dumbbell Curl- The added stretch here makes this a very effective bicep building exercise.

Hammer Curl- These target the brachialis muscle, which, when developed, can add a great deal of mass and thickness to the upper arm.

Triceps:
Parallel Bar Dip- You wanna know how to get huge arms? Train your triceps hard. Although everyone focuses on the biceps, the triceps actually make up 2/3 of the upper arm and can really make your arms look enormous if you train them properly.

When it comes to proper triceps training, there is no better exercise than the parallel bar dip. Again, this is an exercise where you are moving your body through space instead of just moving your limbs. If you need proof of the effectiveness of dips you need to look no further than the incredible arm development of male gymnasts.

Close Grip Bench- This is another compound movement which will pack slabs of muscle on the triceps as it allows you to use a ton of weight.

Half Range Close Grip Bench Press aka Lockouts- This exercise is done by setting the pins in the power rack so that they stop the bar about a third of the way down from the top. This greatly overloads the triceps and allows you to use extremely heavy loads. The end result is that you will build huge horseshoe triceps.

Angled Bar Pushdown- I prefer the angled bar to the straight bar for pushdowns because it is much less stressful on the wrists and much more comfortable to handle heavy weights with. This is a highly effective isolation movement which is pretty easy on the elbows; a rarity for isolated triceps exercises.

EZ Bar Lying Triceps Extensions- This is another highly effective isolation exercise for the triceps. Unfortunately, this exercise can lead to elbow problems. For this reason it should be used less frequently than the others and the reps should be kept a bit higher; preferably in the 8-15 range.

Stop wasting your time with any arm exercises that are not on this list, immediately. Use those listed above and hit them hard and heavy. You won’t be asking anything else about how to get huge arms if you do that.

For specific set, rep, rest and frequency recommendations as well as months of workouts and other priceless information that will show you exactly how to get huge arms, check out http://www.ferruggiasmusclesecrets.com/

From your neck to your calves, nearly every muscle in your body gets activated and receives a powerful growth stimulus from deadlifts

Not only is the deadlift the most effective mass building exercise there is but it is also the most basic and has the greatest carryover to the real world. There aren’t many times in life where you would lie down on your back and press a weight overhead like you would during a bench press. But hardly a day goes by when you don’t bend down and pick something up off the floor. And that is what you do when you deadlift. So it trains you for real life situations and helps to prevent the oh-so-common lower back problems that plague hundreds of thousands of adults

But the bottom line for all skinny guys and aspiring mass monsters is that if you want to know how to gain weight, you gotta learn how to deadlift

Although the deadlift works the entire body from head to toe, it is especially effective at building huge traps, upper back muscles, spinal erectors, glutes, hamstrings and forearms. Plenty of puffed up bodybuilders have the big pecs and biceps but a deadlifter stands out from the crowd, looking powerful and intimidating with the mountainous traps and thick, ruggedly muscled upper and lower back

To perform a proper deadlift, stand directly over the bar with your shins nearly touching it and feet approximately 8-14 inches apart. Squat down by breaking at the hips and pushing your glutes back. Keep your back tightly arched, chest up and head in line with your spine. Your upper body should be at a 45 degree angle in relation to the ground. Grab the bar with a vice grip and begin to pull up and back. As the bar passes your knees, drive your hips forward powerfully, push your chest out and pull your shoulders back to lockout the weight

When you lower the weight, be sure to begin by pushing your glutes back before you squat down. After the bar clears you knees, squat down while maintaining a tight arch in your lower back, allow the weights to touch the floor and repeat

Remember- a lot of deadlifts lead to huge, muscular physiques. If there was only one thing I could teach you about how to gain weight that would be it. Now get to the gym and start pulling some big weights.

Since the quads typically have a very wide variance of muscle fiber types you can use a great range of reps in your quest to build pillar sized legs. Often times, Tom and other lifters with notoriously huge legs, would go as high as fifty reps per set on squats. When I was young and painfully skinny, high rep squats were one of the most effective discoveries I ever made and helped me and my brother pack on size faster than anything we had ever tried to date. The old 20 rep squat programs from the golden era of the Iron Game made a massive man of many a skinny boy. For over 15 years I have used high rep squats with hundreds of clients, and without fail they have always gained enormous amounts of size and strength; not to mention several inches of raw mass on their thighs.

Although high rep squatting leads to massive and rapid gains, I usually recommend starting with a few heavy sets in the 4-8 range first. Sometimes I even add in a set of 10-15 after the heavy sets, and finally finish with one all out set of 20 (and sometimes 30-50). When you use this rep scheme you ensure that you hit all fiber types and stimulate the greatest amount of muscle growth possible

Another note that needs to be added here is that high rep squats shouldn’t be done until you have mastered squat technique with several months of low rep training. You need to build the strength, coordination, endurance and stability needed to safely complete picture perfect low rep sets of squats first before you can move on to the high rep sets

Beginners should squat three times per week, intermediates twice and advanced lifters should probably only squat once every 5-10 days, depending on a variety of factors and how much running and other extra curricular activities you participate in

When putting together your muscle building program, be sure that squats are the focus of your lower body training; if not the only thing you do. Once you have mastered “the king of all exercises” you can then begin to think about adding in stuff like lunges, step ups and glute ham raises. Until then, and until you have gained significant size and strength from a steady diet of squats, I expect you to be spending a lot of time in the power rack.

That you need to hit muscles from a multitude of angles for full development.

That you need a full dynamic warm up before weight training. You don’t. Before sprinting, yes; before lifting, no.

That bodypart splits are the most effective way to train.

Another misconception is that you need a boatload of supplements to make great progress. The bottom line truth is that most supplements suck and do nothing but drain your wallet.

Another sad misconception is that you can’t make great progress without steroids. This is a self defeatist attitude and is simply not true.

Question: Other comments that I have heard coaches say are that the only way to put on any muscle size, is really going to be based on genetics. So they are saying for example that skinny kids can’t and will never be able to put on size.

Answer: That’s the biggest copout under the sun and an excuse that really makes me sick. Genetics are responsible for how far you may eventually go but the fact of the matter is most people will never truly reach their genetic potential. If you use this excuse it shows the world that you have no heart whatsoever and are destined for failure. Using the hard-gainer excuse as a crutch will guarantee you sub par results in your training from now til eternity.

I have some of the worst muscle building genetics imaginable but I never let that hold me back. I have also trained some genetic misfits who made incredible progress and eventually were getting asked what steroids they were on. This is because they had the balls to train like they needed to and had the dedication to eat and rest as much as was needed. Most people simply don’t have what it takes; so the only genetic capacity they may be missing is mental toughness.

For a coach or trainer to say or write that is even worse than just the average trainee or athlete saying that. Making a comment like that shows that you have no heart and no balls, and in that case you should never, EVER be coaching or training ANYONE!

Question: It has been said as you get older it get harder and harder to put on size and strength. Some even say that it can’t be done. What do you say to older athletes or even coaches that say this?

Answer: This is just like the hard-gainer excuse; it’s nonsense. One of my good friends is named Mark Crook (his brother Paul played guitar in Anthrax for seven years and is now lead guitarist for Meatloaf) and we first met right after his 40th birthday when he came to me to help him get bigger and stronger. He took his bench from 155 to 275 in one year and gained over 20lbs of muscle. Mark’s enthusiasm led to a friend of his coming in to my gym a year later and he experienced similar gains. I have had several guys in their 40’s and 50’s experience tremendous gains in size and strength over the years.

It may not happen as fast and as easily as it does for a 20 year old but it can be done. You just have to take into account that your recovery ability may be a bit lower and as such you need to keep your volume lower and be very smart with your training.

Also, you have to remember that most guys don’t even hit their strength peak til sometime around 30 or so. Most of the biggest and strongest guys I know are all in their mid to late 30’s. So the day you hit 40, this doesn’t just do a complete 180 and you shouldn’t be on your training deathbed at 50. Just keep training hard and if you believe you will get stronger then you will.

Question: What should hardgainers do for their abs?

Answer: Hardgainers do not need any direct ab training. If you are doing a lot of big exercises like squats, standing presses, deadlifts and chin ups, what is doing a few sets of stability-ball crunches going to accomplish that hasn’t already been done? All of those compound exercises involve the abs and all of the core musculature tremendously. For hardgainers, adding in more volume in the form of isolation movements like crunches, reverse crunches, and things like that is just going to cut into your recovery ability and make it harder to pack on a ton of size. And remember, to see your abs your bodyfat has to be very low. That is only accomplished through proper training and diet and has nothing to do with what ab exercises you do or how many sets and reps of them you do. Don’t waste your time with thousands of reps of back breaking ab exercises in the hopes of getting a ripped six pack because it’s never going to happen.

Train hard.

When it comes to the question of how to gain muscle, there are many things you must know and do. But, often times what is more important than what you should do is what you shouldn’t do. With that in mind here are five muscle gaining mistakes you should avoid at all costs.

1. Training Too Often- In order to grow you must provide your body with the optimal stimulus and then back off and allow it time to rest and recover. Without ample rest time you will never grow to your maximal potential. For this reason I recommend that you don’t train with weights more than 3-4 days per week.

2. Training Strictly For the Pump- Far too often I see skinny guys in the gym pumping away 10-15 rep sets with weights lighter than my grandmother would use. Yes, high volume training leads to a great pump but a great pump does not always lead to muscle growth. You can get a pump by treading water for a few minutes but everyone knows that won’t turn you into a mass monster any time soon. Chasing the pump should only be a small concern in your workout; after you have gotten your more productive work out of the way.

3. Not Cycling Your Training Intensity- Overzealous skinny guys love to work themselves into the ground. They figure the harder they work the quicker the gains will come. The problem is that when you constantly train to failure you will eventually burn out your central nervous system and this will greatly slow down your recovery and thus the rate at which you build muscle. If you want to make long lasting gains you have to back off once in a while and give your body a break. After a period of reduced intensity you can ramp back up again and repeat the cycle.

4. Using the Wrong Exercise Order- One thing that is often overlooked by those interested in how to gain muscle is exercise order. Always start your workouts with the most demanding exercise. So if you are doing a clean or any other form of explosive lift or jump this exercise would usually come before squats or chin ups. If you are not doing explosive lifts or speed work, the biggest compound exercise should almost always come first. Therefore a deadlift would usually come before a chin up. Also, the heaviest, lowest rep sets should be done early in the workout and the higher rep work should be done at the end. There are exceptions to this rule and times when breaking it could actually be quite beneficial but for the most part his is how you should plan your training.

5. Not Using a Training Journal- If you want to get bigger and stronger you absolutely must record each and every workout you do in some type of notebook or training journal. This way you can know what is working and what isn’t and you can also measure your progress over time. The most important element of the training journal is that it gives you a quantifiable goal to beat every time you enter the gym. There is no way anyone (unless you have a photographic memory) can remember all of the details of every workout they do. So without a record of it you are just guessing and never know if you are doing more or less than the previous workout. And if you want to get bigger and stronger you had better be doing more; be it weight, sets or reps

Now you know how to gain muscle fast by avoiding those five deadly mistakes. Train hard and stay dedicated; you will be outgrowing your wardrobe before you know it.