Is Mike Mentzer advice valid for NATTY lifters?
I switched standing barbell curls to seated dumbbell curls because he said barbell curls suck ass and it was unironically great advice Goated bicep exercise
All these fags are charlatans.
>>76668728does he look natty retard?
>>76668728You should always train by trial and error. Take what works for most, measure it against what you like and works for you. Mike Mentzer is an extreme way to train, very controversial even today, and you should never start out that way, because it most likely will not work for you. Try out the middle approach first, then see what side you want to lean on.
>>76668787I know he was not natty, cunt And so are not 99.9% of fitness influencers
>>76668728Just try it yourself and find out lolTom Platz had it right, all our bodies are different and what works for some won't work for others. He said Arnold's high volume approach didn't work for his mesomorphic body type - he got weaker and lost muscle doing that, while taller and leaner Arnold actually improved by doing high volume. All you can do is experiment and see what approach to training gets you results bro>>76668743He also said ez curls are shit because the hand position means they don't work the biceps, which I found is absolutely correct. Everyone talks of calves but for me biceps are the muscle which was an absolute bitch to grow, and ditching ez curls for straight bar, or doing seated dumbbell curls as you mentioned, finally got them movingt. 18" arms as a 180lbs natty
Low volume/high intensity works alright for me, but when I stay in a relatively low rep range, I always progress too fast and eventually get injured.I stay away from it now because I'm fairly sure I'm not that far from becoming a cripple if I keep pushing myself with intensity, but if you're sturdy, it should definitely work for you. Maybe not the last protocols that Mentzer produced, but the general idea of low volume/low frequency/high intensity.
>>76668728NoHe built his body on traditional methods
>>76668842>while taller and leaner Arnold actually improved by doing high volumeHe didn't actually He lied to keep his enemies off
>>76668842Post arms or you're full of shit. Mentzer himself never claimed anything above 15 arms
>>76668883Mentzers arms were quite clearly bigger than 15" retard
>>76668877Yeah nobody mentions Arnold's powerlifting background and how Arnold used to train absurdly heavy with Franco pretty often.
>>76668728>Mike Mentzer advicetake massive amounts of steroids and lecture people about fitness
>>76668743Me too
>>76668967My fitness advice is to learn to communicate with your body. Everyone is real focused on telling it what to do by working out (stimulus). But hardly anyone spends the time necessary to listen to it. So what happens is people go to the gym and either do too much or too little, so the next day or two they're either "recovering" from nothing or not recovering from something.Go in the gym, work out what feels right, wake up the next day and ask yourself what's sore and what's not, and then tailor your workouts accordingly. And of course, do the same with your diet> source, I look DYEL, but people keep telling me I look ex-special forces so you make of that what you will
>>76668967>take massive amounts of steroids and lecture people about fitnessMost of his final approaches to training and building muscle came into existence after he stopped competing and started training normal people. Especially his emphasis on rest between workouts. He literally had the data in his hand as he would train people and could see the progress in weight lifted, reps, or plateaus, and adjusted as needed.
>>76668883>15That's very small
>>76668728I made very good gains following some of his stuff.
>>76668914Pretty much everything Arnold said back in the days should be taken with a grain of salt.Actually even today that guy still lies about his training and diet
>>76668787Meth isn't natty?
>>76669052>Pretty much everything Arnold said back in the daysCame straight from the (((Weider))) brothers.
>>76669086Why?
>>76669086Yup, that's how he became so successful in movies and then politics. He knew which (((cock))) to suck.
>>76668728He has some good advice like ignoring all the high volume guys and that intensity of effort is the most important thing for gaining muscle. He just went off the rails with his later default recommendations of the 3-5 exercises once every 4-7 days though. Unless you're built to be permadyel, you can train much more frequently than that. His 4-7 day recommendations really come from that. The people who were actually doing serious bodybuilding were training 2-4 times a week with him. And then we have the fact that he was partly thinking of the average guy who just wants to look good on the beach, you don't need to maximize the growth in every muscle group for that. But for bodybuilding, doing only flat press or incline press will not be enough. You will need to work a few angles. His ideal routine is too minimalistic for that. He also never said that more than one set doesn't do anything. He's only said that one set is the logical place to start rather than starting with five, and then to add a set or two if you think you need it. Maybe if you were training with someone who could push you to maximum effort, maybe one set is enough. I'd take his best routines to be his ramp up routine for beginners, three full body days per week where you just progress linearly or so from light weight. Then the routines he actually did; AB split twice per week and the Colorado routine three full body day per week routine. For natties just train once every other day on an AB split. Once every 72 hours on a full body routine. You don't need to do the same exercises every session btw.
>>76668743>he said barbell curls suck assHe never said that. In fact, in his books he recommends it as an alternative exercise and personally did it as a staple of his routine. He recommends reverse grip pull downs as the default bicep movement. He was instead against EZbar curls as he believed they were all brachialis and no-biceps as was the belief originally by Arthur Jones not true though. EZ bar curls and even wrist angles all the way to hammer curls will use the bicep significantly enough to get growth.
>>76668728Yes, it's all about fatiguing the muscle fibers. The thing is that most people are not going nearly as hard as you need to if you want his style to work. You need a training partner, and you need to go past failure every time.
>>76668728Yes.I do it.Won't post body
>>76668728yea. every lifter needs deload weeks sometimes
When I rest 3 weeks, I come back much more strong
when im pushing hard on the last rep i sometimes like to imagine the ghost of menzter helping me doing a forced rep
>>76668728Some of his earlier stuff is. Both him and Arthur Jones were both fruity nutcase who did too many drugs. But of the two of them Jones was the more competent. When Mentzer started the whole Heavy Duty thing he was largely copying Jones who wasn't publishing. The bare bones structure of that looks a bit like2 sets per group 1 compound 1 accessory taken concentric failure without at any point unloading the muscle for the duration of the exercise. Preferably with high stability lifts and more ideally with a machine that has a resistance curve that matches the strength curve of the muscle to ensure proper loading throughout the entire rep. Every 3-5 days. Maybe a couple warmup sets if you're pushing big numbers.This almost inarguably the best it can get for general population natty lifting. It's less optimal for body builders or competitive lifters but for someone who works, likely drinks, probably smokes, eats like crap and probably sleeps like it too this will do a lot for improving their strength and musculature.
>>76668728Yeah. The only thing is you can't do much to stimulate muscles with one set when you're starting because you're weak as fuck, so give it 6 months of high volume AND high intensity first.
His logic from his seminar totally makes sense>We do not know at what workload threshold you get maxium muscle growth. Is it 60% muscle stimulation? 70%? 80%? 90%? 95%? 100%? Why on earth would you risk going 70% of maxmium effort, if the sweet spot is 80% or 90% or 100% for maxmium growth. >Now if science could tell us we'd just need to do 70% effort for maxmium gains, and everything else would be marginal, we'd do it. But it can't, so we don't know if its 70% or 82% or even 98% Why risk aiming at a lower intensity, when the sweet spot might be higher. It might be lower too, but if you're hitting 95% intensity and the threshold for muscle grow is 70% you've made it!
>>76669090Arnold was sponsored by Weider, and he was willing to do whatever the fuck they wanted, and what they wanted was to make millions of dollars selling supplements and fitness kit to the ignorant masses. They couldn't do that as easily if not for the testimony from pro bodybuilders, like Arnold, that claimed they achieved their success in bodybuilding by using all the shit Weider was selling.Body building was just a marketing tool for the Weider brothers, and Arnold was one of, if not THE, best salesmen they ever had.
>>76668728I like a similar protocol for heavy compounds.(Squats, Hack Squats, Db bench, dips, rdl, barbell and db rows) i feel like it won't work for barbell bench and deadlifts, more sets for 3 or so reps.Smaller stuff like upper body isos i like 3-5 sets depending on how fatiguing an exercise is. I am a fat powerlifter with a shit bench tho so pinch on salt.
>>76668842Tom Platz aso said if you're always chiseled and fit you won't be able to make more muscle. maybe it's something people are going for tho. I mean you don't have to be a fatass power lifter or anything
A few days ago I came to conclusion that MM take might be good for natty lifters training legs. I'm about to train my legs for 3 months every second week. I want to try this because I'm completely fed up with leg days and I feel that the cause of it isn't in my motivation, but a subconscious signal my body gives me, that once a week at my age (38) ISS too frequent to regenerate. And I'm not saying that after Avery leg day I'm sore for week, cause I'm not. I thing that after the soreness phase, our muscle need extra time to regenerate damaged fibres. Justlike with bruises and cuts - when you were a kid that things regenerated in days, but now it takes waaay longer to be fully healed.
>>76668728student of mike mentzerJohn Heart>Mr America overall winner 2013>2x Light Heavyweight Mr America 2012 & 2013>Natural Mr Universe (Tall) 2001
>>76668728IMHO if you look it from the lense of the genpop, if you do heavy duty/HIT + proper nutrtion, you will be in the top 15% body/aesthetic wise. Also his training style would allow to be easily incorporated for the genpop schedule (low amount of training days, focus on intensity, recovery maxxing).people extrapolate his advice for every aspect, notability for bodybuilding, in which he was an unicorn. But read carefully, he never claimed that it would be OPTIMAL for body building. He knows for BB you would need way more stuff, in that case roids.>tldr: take his advice in the lense of genpop and you will see that it makes definitely sense
>>76668728Pull downs for biceps are the best thing ever, I found out that thanks to Mike.
>>76668883>He thinks 15 inch arms are big>He thinks 18 inch arms are so big as to be implausible The state of this board. Nobody here lifts anymore
