We did a survey here at IRON MAN a few years ago with a group of women, and all of them put muscular arms up near the top of their lists for sexy bodyparts on a guy. That alone should get you fired up to torch your tri’s and bi’s for new size.
Then there was the time I took my new girlfriend out on the town. She always told me that bodybuilders were “gross,” and she made the puking motion when she saw me reading Iron Man. But that night out at a club we ran into a friend who happened to be the current Mr. Texas–in a short-sleeved shirt no less. He was not known for being a good-looking guy, yet she couldn’t keep from hanging around him, touching his arms, giggling. Sheesh!
Do you think my arm workouts were intense after experiencing that ego-deflating (for me) event? You bet.
Unfortunately, so many guys who crave big arms tend to overtrain them without realizing it. Think about all the indirect work your arms get. Triceps get hammered during all the pressing for chest and delts, and they even get involved when you train back (any pullover type move hits the long head hard). As for biceps, when you train your back, your bi’s are attacked with rows, pulldowns, chins and so on.
My arms recently got a big growth spurt when I reduced direct workouts for them to only once a week. I put delts and arms on Wednesday, with chest and back on Monday and Friday (legs get hit on Tuesdays and sometimes weekends). I developed that split when I recalled Jonathan Lawson’s amazing gains with the 10-week Size Surge program. <===
Jonathan, my former training partner, packed on an amazing 20 pounds of muscle in only 10 weeks–and I recalled that his arms grew like crazy when he was using only one direct biceps/triceps workout a week–in addition to two chest/back sessions.
Now, to be fair, he was regaining some of that mass, as he had been motivated previously, built some muscle, got discouraged with his slow gains and then backed off his training–just going through the motions for the most part. I re-invigorated his passion for bodybuilding when I recruited him for the Size Surge experiment back in the late ’90s.
In addition to one “direct” arm workout a week, another technique I remember from the SS program that got Jonathan growing like mad was end-of-set static holds. When he would hit failure at around rep eight, he would drive the weight to the sticking point and flex-hold for six seconds. He did that on almost every exercise, which really spurred a lot of quick growth–and over an inch on each arm.
If he had simply stopped at eight reps without the hold, his muscular tension time would’ve been a bit low–around 30 seconds. But by adding that static hold, he boosted it up close to 40 seconds, the low end of the optimal hypertrophic time under tension.
I remembered all of this because we just updated and retooled the Size Surge e-book (see the note below for details). It’s amazing how going over older programs, what you’ve done in the past, can re-motivate and rekindle old mass tactics for another round of new gains.
An end-of-set static hold can definitely trigger loads of new muscle growth. Give it a try for a burst of new size.
Stay tuned, train smart and be Built for Life.
Note–Updated 2.0 Version: The best-selling SIZE SURGE e-book, which includes the exact training and eating plans Jonathan Lawson used to pack on a solid 20 pounds of muscle in only 10 weeks has now been UPDATED. This bigger retooled version includes two NEW Phase 2 workouts with the M4X density-overload method–one that fuses Power pyramids, M4X and one-set finisher moves with X-celeration, X-centric or NA-Speed reps. Those are unique one-set hits you can use to get huge. It’s a perfect winter GET-BIG blueprint. For Jonathan’s before and after photos, size-and-strength progress charts and more info on The X-traorddinary Size Surge Workout 2.0, GO HERE. www.SizeSurgeWorkout.com.
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