Can a Gun Held to Your Head Build a Better Body?

No I’m not crazy. The imagined threat of a gun held to your head was a favorite mental tactic of Arthur Jones—the founder of High Intensity Training principles. I got it put to that test by Mike Mentzer (probably Jones’s most notable students) in the summer of 1981 when I was training at Gold’s Gym in Venice, California.

I’ll never forget that day. Mike and Ray Mentzer had just finished their workout with training partner Jerry McCall and I was into my last rep (or so I thought) on bicep curls with the Nautilus machine. I was pulling with effort and Mike came up and bellowed “If I held a gun to your head right now and threatened your life could you get another rep?

Now of course the real gun was Mike standing over me with brother Ray looking on. I was either going to get their respect OR they’d never again give me the time of day. So I fought back the pain and pulled harder and harder squeezing every ounce of raw determination I had in me. And yes, I earned Mike and Ray’s respect that day.

Mike, Ray and, of course their mentor, Arthur Jones held the idea that Intensity of Effort is the most important factor for making improvements in your physique. Jones wrote an entire article about intensity of effort right here in the pages of Iron Man magazine in 1970.

Arthur and Mike would always challenge people to train harder and harder as they had a unique ability to pull more reps out of someone who thought they were done… fried… can’t get one more… yet… somehow they got one more rep…. then another. People would vomit or pass out but they’d get results like crazy.

Mike often repeated his Mantra; “You can train hard or you can train long but you cannot train hard AND long.” Another favorite was; “If you can train long, you are NOT training hard enough!”

If you want productive training that produces results, you have to stimulate growth, while at the same time assure that you have not drained your recovery ability. Your muscles won’t grow if your workout intensity is too low, but they also can’t grow if you are training too long or too often.

Arthur and Mike believed that in order to get the best results you have to:

1) Train extremely hard — high intensity training (HIT).

2) Training must be brief – never more than an hour and usually much less.

3) Training must be infrequent — no more than 3 or at most 4 workouts a week.

Get it right from the experts… Let Arthur Jones, Mike Mentzer and John Little take you through the paces right here. Their articles will take you step-by-step into building a better physique and cut to the chase as they did back in the day.

Iron Man has the Largest Database of HIT (High Intensity Training) Articles—by Arthur Jones, the man who created it, Mike Mentzer who furthered its development and John Little who carried Mike’s torch after his passing.

People have used high intensity training principles to gain new muscle in the shortest time possible! Check out the High Intensity Training section at:

http://www.ironmanmagazine.com/category/hit-high-intensity-training/