The Mind Over Body Matter Letter

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Okay, so I did a video the other day about big muscles…

… and whether women find them attractive or not.

It’s an interesting video for sure. Just click the link above to check it out.

HEY GUYS: Punch in your height, waist, and shoulder measurements and discover your Adonis Index Today!

Yep, no doubt about it. You can indeed build muscle without weights, and it’s not as primitive or as barbaric as you might imagine. No, you don;t have to get into hurling, (though that would definitely do the trick!) In fact, people have been doing this for centuries!

For many people the thought of hitting the gym gives them a great deal of unease. Perhaps it’s a physical limitation, injury, transportation, time, money or even a small dose of self-consciousness; whatever the reason, there’s a number of exercises you can employ that will enable you to build muscle without weights.

Let’s look at some of these.

• Pushups - An old standby, now aided by tools that can isolate chest muscle efficiently. You absolutely don’t need any tools, and there are many varieties of this kind of exercise to choose from.
• Pullups - There are many variations on this theme too, where you cannot only work your shoulders and arms, but add an abdominal element as well.
• Bench Dips - This one is as simple as finding a convenient bench, and start dipping!
• Regular Dips - Find two handles short distance above your waist, and employ this technique to develop your arms, shoulders and chest.
• Reverse Dips - Or tricep dips. Do this one backwards, and you’ll work out your triceps, upper back and shoulders.
• Squats - Doing these either quarter, half or full, sometimes adding difficulty by increasing your load, will definitely strengthen your quads and knees.
• Stairs - Okay, now we’re getting evil here. Running, or even walking briskly several hundred stair steps can not only help build muscle, but can bring an added cardio benefit to the table as well.
• Bands or Isometrics - Using rubber bands designed to deliver resistance training can add a great strengthening element to your training without having to use weights. Other isometric exercises also deliver these benefits.
• Gymnastics - If you are fit enough and limber enough, and have access to gymnastic equipment these can provide terrific results. Who hasn’t admired the strength of athletes who use rings, parallel bars, pommel horses and other gymnastic exercises.
• Crunches - Also available in many flavors, these work out the smaller but socially vital abdominal muscles!
• Boxing workouts - Shadow boxing, or working against a heavy bag are very tough workouts indeed!
• Scissor Kicks - another tough ab exercise.

Finding the best combination of exercises to build muscle without weights is one of personal choice and convenience. All of these have their benefits, and there are many, many more to choose from, but this list will give anyone a great start. All you need is time, a bit of space, and a lot of imagination!

Make sure you combine these moves with a sensible eating plan and other fitness activities to get a total body benefit!

.

(Notice: I just received this email today… the kicker is whether we should believe it or not. Analysis further down.)

Dear Friend,

I received a shocking email from someone I respect the other day that I want to share with you. (I have permission.)

My friend just came right out and told me the brutal truth: “You’re wasting months of your life for nothing.”

Pretty scary…and I had no idea what he meant!

So, I kept reading…

“Look, just figure out how many hours you’re spending in the gym and doing cardio every week. Multiply that number by 52. Then email me back.”

So I did the math. It freaked me out! It was a lot more time than I thought. I was spending literally YEARS of my life in the gym. Let’s not even talk about cooking food and eating 6 meals every day. It feels like my workout routine is like a second job sometimes. Can you relate?

Anyway, I emailed him back and here’s what he said:

“Okay, take that number down to less than an HOUR a week…tops. How much time have you just added to your life?” The obvious answer: A lot!

By now I was wanting him to give me the answer. If there was a workout program where I could see results in minutes a day versus hours I was all ears.

He said, “Check out my latest book and video series.”

Here’s the website so you can see it too –

7 Minute Muscle

The guy I’m talking about is bestselling fitness author Jon Benson. His latest book “7 Minute Muscle” is an absolute jaw-dropper. You owe it to yourself to at least visit his homepage and discover what this is all about.

Jon spent three years researching one simple question: “How can you get the MOST results in the LEAST amount of time?”

Seems like common sense, right? Well it’s not. Most people, myself included, are spending FAR more time than necessary to get results.

Even worse –

— > I learned that all that time in the gym
— > was keeping me from the body I wanted!

Of course there is more to the story than just “working out less.” This is not some gimmick that involves pills or gadgets either. Honestly, it’s hard work.

But only 7 minutes of it.

7 minutes. No joke.

After that 7 minutes you feel like your muscles will explode from the pump. You get leaner, stronger, and you do it faster than any other workout I’ve ever seen. Your energy shoots through the roof to boot.

See for yourself –

7 Minute Muscle < --- click.here

I'm sure you'll love "7 Minute Muscle" as much as I do. Even more, you love the months of life you'll get back by train smarter, not longer.

Sincerely,

Dave G.

P.S. Jon has some limited-time offers going on right now so it's a good time to check out his homepage. Go see what others are saying about this revolutionary new way to train in just 7 minutes a day --

7 Minute Muscle

7 Minute Muscle

(Check out Vince’s No Nonsense Muscle Building when you get a chance… it’s pretty strong)

Could you teach me how to gain muscle fast? Could you teach me how to pack on an extra ten to fifteen pounds of muscle mass before my next vacation? Could you help me get ready for my first bodybuilding or fitness model competition? Could you help you look like someone who actually lifts weights? Could you help me build a body that turns heads and demands respect?

As a skinny guy muscle building expert, I get approached these questions daily in my office. Every single hard gainer I consult with wants to know how to gain muscle fast and how to do safely and effectively.

Hard gainers, please listen up! There is hope for you. I am happy to say that learning how to gain muscle fast is not as hard as some would make you believe but it also not as easy as you might think. But you must be prepared to train smarter and not harder. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not talking about wimping out during your workouts. I am referring to the big picture of training more intelligently.

Here is some of the most popular advice I give to the hard gainer when he wishes to gain muscle fast.

1. Never Perform More Than 10 Reps.

If you are lifting weights beyond 10 reps than you are emphasizing your slow-twitch muscle fibers which have the smallest opportunity for muscle growth. You are a hard gainer and you need recruit the maximal amount of muscle fibers in every set. Always choose your weights knowing that a 11th rep is forbidden and trespassing into ’skinny land.’

If you really want to gain muscle fast than get your mind into heavy lifting mode. Every single set and every single exercise. Keep the weights heavy and never more than 10 reps. Approach every workout knowing that you are going to be venturing into new territory and waging war on your skinny genetics. I recommend these workouts with a workout partner so you can eliminate any safety issues, not slack off and push your limits every inch of the way.

2. Reduce Your Workout Time

Perform more work in less time and you have increased your work capacity. Work refers to the number of sets, reps and poundage within your workout. Who is fitter? The guy who can do 4 sets of 185 pounds bench press with 30 second rest or the guy who can do 4 sets of 185 pound bench press with 90 second rest? The one who can do the same amount of work in less time. Guess who is more muscular? The one who has a higher work capacity.

Next time you enter the gym, try to complete your current workout in less time. Take shorter rests. Move from one exercise to the next much quicker. Don’t be surprised if you feel out of shape! This is one of the easiest tips you can take away to increase your muscle density and take your fitness to a new level. Be prepared to humble yourself and get out of your comfort zone.

3. Do Only One Exercise Per Muscle Group

Only one? Yes, only one, unless you want to buy into the notion that you must mutilate a muscle for over an hour to get any growth out of it. Consider this typical day in the gym. Today is your chest day. Your first exercise is bench press. You perform your first set with 185 lbs, second set with 205 lbs, third set with 225 lbs and fourth set with 245 lbs.

Assuming this is your max weight for the desired number of reps, is it not safe to say that you have used the maximal number of muscle fibers? Your goal is to simple spark your muscles into growth. Not exhaust them to death. Once they experience a unknown assault (stimulus), your body will be forced to adapt and create new muscle to prevent future assaults! Therefore, your take home lesson is this: Once you have out performed your last workout, it is time to move onto the next exercise.

4. Do No More Than 3-5 Sets Per Muscle Group

I question a hard gainers workout intensity if they must do more than 3-5 sets per muscle group. Now if you are using anabolic steroids or have muscle friendly genes than you can safely dismiss this advice. Remember, learning how to gain muscle fast for the hard gainer requires following a new set of rules.

Consider the first 1-2 sets at 85% maximal effort. The third set at 95% maximal effort and the fourth (and sometimes fifth) set at 100% maximal effort. It is only this last all out set that contributes to the greatest muscle growth. Anything over and above this last go till you blow set simply exhausts the muscle beyond reason and delays your recovery ability to hit the muscle again. It is this last set that you should perform at least 1-2 extra reps or 5-10 extra pounds than last workout. Mission accomplished. You have sparked your muscles into growth. Time to move on.

5. Increase Your Strength 5% Every Two Weeks

One of the biggest mistakes I see hard gainers make in the gym is not track there progress. They return week-after-week to simply rehearse the same workouts with the absence of progress. How do you expect to gain muscle fastif you continue to lift the same weights each workout? Your body is designed to tolerate stress. Assault it and let it get bigger. Assault it and let it get bigger. It’s a simple concept.

So your take home message is to aim for a minimum of 5% strength increase every two weeks. You might progress a little quicker with larger muscle groups like back and legs versus smaller muscles like biceps and triceps. Just think, in six months from now, you will be over twice as strong as you are now! I would actually recommend writing down your strength goals for six months from now and than work backwards. If you are currently dead lifting 135 lbs, aim to be deadlifting 270 lbs over the next few months!

Conclusion

I know these five tips were not your typical Muscle and Fitness 101 advice and not your typical generic bodybuilding advice. I learned a long time ago to question everything you read and hear. Learn for yourself by doing and not by talking about it. As a skinny guy once myself, 149 lbs to be exact, I defeated my skinny genetics and learned how to gain muscle fast by not following the herd and training smarter and not harder Will you?

As a little continuation from yesterday’s article… today, we’ll let Brad Pilon go over the amazing way of conserving muscle while dieting.

Naturally, if you’re only doing steady state cardio right now… you REALLY should read this.

As you can imagine, after writing a book about fasting for weight loss, I’ve had an amazing amount of questions pouring into my In-box, with the most common question being about fasting and losing muscle. Most people are still very concerned that they will lose muscle if they don’t eat every 3 hours. My answer has always been, don’t worry, from my experiences if you are resistance training then you won’t lose muscle while dieting.

Then I received a very interesting question that went something like this - “If calorie restriction doesn’t cause muscle loss, then what does?”

Great question. We all know that people who are bedridden and on a low calorie diet lose muscle. When I first starting writing Eat Stop Eat, and was running the idea past several dietitians for input, they all brought up stories of muscle loss in their patients who were bedridden and on a low calorie diet.

And since I am constantly saying that caloric restriction doesn’t cause you to lose muscle if you are working out, then that leaves being ‘bedridden’ (or ‘disuse’ as they say in research) as the cause of muscle loss.

Ever break your arm and have to wear a cast, or know someone who did? Do you remember how skinny that arm was when the cast finally came off? Put a cast on your arm and your muscles shrink faster then an expensive new shirt in the dryer.

There was no change in nutrition, only a change in the amount the muscles were used, and the muscle wasted away.

In fact, ‘casting’ is so effective at causing muscle loss that it has been used in research to study something called ‘disuse atrophy’ or muscle loss from lack of use.

In a study conducted at the University of Nottingham, 22 male and female studies had casts put on their right leg for two weeks. Their diets didn’t change, yet after only two weeks the cross sectional area of their quadriceps (the big muscles in your thigh) decreased by 10%.

No change in diet..but the muscle still decreases in size by 10%.

When you combine this information with other research that has shown that as long as you are working out and meeting some sort of caloric minimum, you won’t lose muscle, you can come to the conclusion that if you don’t use your muscles, then it really doesn’t matter what you are eating, the muscle is going to shrink. However, if you are using your muscles, then as long as you are eating at least 80 grams of protein and over 800 Kcals a day (The amounts found in a recent research paper), you should not be losing muscle mass.

Now, If by some fluke accident you do break your arm, the research from Nottingham found that supplementing with Creatine Monohydrate can speed the rehab process, helping you build back your muscle and strength quicker than normal.

Resources:

Hespel P, et al. Oral creatine supplementation facilitates the rehabilitation of diuse atrophy and alters the expression of msucle myogenic factors in humans. Journal of Physiology 2001;526(2):625-633

Bryner RW. Effects of resistance training vs. aerobic training combined with an 800 calorie liquid diet on lean body mass and resting metabolic rate. Journal of the American College of Nutrition 1999;18(1):115-121

Brad Pilon is a strength training and nutrition professional and author of “Eat Stop Eat”. You can read more of Brad’s work at http://nutritionhelp.blogspot.com, and you can learn about his book that is changing the way people think about eating by visiting Eat Stop Eat

Once again, we see that people CAN prevent muscle loss while dieting…

Food for though… no pun intended.