Growing From the Bottom End of the Spectrum

There are a ton of exercise routines out there for a bigger bench press, squat, deadlift, gain x amount of muscle in so many weeks, etc.

Many of these programs focus on taking a % of your 1 rep max and doing 70% for 3, next week it's 80% for 2 reps, 90% for 1, so on and so forth. A beginner will solely focus on what his max lifts are at any given time. He may follow one of these routines and try and see if he can increase his lifts in x number of weeks. While this sort of training can work for strength and some size at first, eventually it will not.

If I could increase the weights I use every workout by 5 lbs I would be lifting up buildings and semi trucks by now! So as one becomes more seasoned in the gym and building his body these types of routines just don't work well.

So how do we progress from this point and stay motivated? Welcome to “growing from the bottom.”

Now I'm going to ask you a question. Would you consider a 5lb gain on your bench press to be a big gain? Maybe not on a 1 rep max, but how about 5 lb work weight for 12 reps? That, my friend, is a huge gain. You have just pushed 60 lbs more in a given set, and if your rest intervals are timed then it's an even bigger gain!

So lets take a 6 week program where you have increased by 5 lb work weight each week; by the end of the routine you have made a 360 lb gain and that is HUGE HUGE HUGE! The problem people have is the way they look at a 2.5lb plate or a 5lb plate. Do not look at them as plates anymore, look at them as overall work output in a given set or workout.

Legs can often handle 10 lb jumps each week. Just because you can bench press 405 for a single doesn't mean you can handle 225 lbs for 6 sets of 12, then 230 for 6 sets of 12 next week, 235 the following week etc. So when I speak of growing here, I'm speaking in terms of a different type of mindset and workout routine. The biggest strength gains I ever made (and safest) were from lower volume, a true 4 second negative, and 3 different exercises per week for the full body.

I'm going to give you a template here, this should be done for 6 weeks, after 6 weeks take a week off and just do cardio that week, then you can jump back into this with different exercises or take more time off. The bigger and stronger you are, the less frequently you should be performing this routine, it will break you down!

Day 1

Bench press

1 –  Light warm up of 12 reps

2 – Moderate warm up of 8 reps

3 – Heavy warm up of 3-4 reps (usually 30- 50 lbs less than work weight)

4 – Work weight for at least 12 reps, but get as many as you can

Squats

Same protocol as bench, 4 sets, 1 of the sets being your all out work set

Military press

Same as above

Lateral pulldowns

Same as above

Bent over rows

Same as above

Calves

Same as above

Tricep pressdowns

Same as above

Abs

1 set of 20-30 reps, any exercise for abs you like

That's the workout!

You just covered most of your body in 8 different exercises. Same rep and set scheme as above. You will perform this 3 times a week (Mon/Wed/Fri) only now onto day 2 (Wed).

Day 2

OK, same type of workout only different exercises. It may look something like this:

Incline bench

Leg press

Side lateral raises

Pullups

Cable rows

Calves

Different calve exercise than Monday, if you did them seated Monday, do 'em standing Wednesday

Overhead dumbbell extension

Abs

Different abs than Monday, if you did crunches Monday do leg raises Wednesday

You will find yourself fresh and strong despite just training those body parts 2 days ago, since you did just enough to trigger growth and strength, but did not slaughter it.

The next workout is Friday, you will perform the same thing but with yet different exercises than Monday and Wednesday.

Day 3

It may look like this:

Incline dumbbell flies

Leg extension

Bent over lateral raises

Close grip pulldowns

Deadlifts

Calve press machine

Skullcrushers

Abs

NOW, onto week 2. Try to increase your upper body lifts by 5 lbs. Those little 2.5 lb plates are gonna be your best friend for these 6 weeks! 10lbs for lower body! What you will probably find is that you will not only increase your lbs by those 5 lbs, you will also do more reps than you did the week before WITH THAT INCREASED LBS! Now you are making gains through double progression, you are going up in lbs AND reps.

Anything and everything is fair game with a routine like this. Hell, I've had workouts where push-ups were my chest exercise and last week I made it to 78 push-ups before falling on my face, and this week I made it to 79 or 80!

Maybe you can bust out 14 pull-ups, so next week you do 14 pull-ups with 5 lbs hanging from you? Get creative! This sort of routine makes the gym fun. You can see the progression on a regular basis. This sort of training is so fucking effective, I've had days I've gone in the gym on no sleep or even had a few beers the night before, and still beat my last workout! This is very similar to a Mike Mentzer or Arthur Jones routine, but a little more frequent and a little more exercise rotation before coming back to the same one again.

But I can honestly say that in my 17 years in bodybuilding, this is the style of training that has provided me my best gains in strength and size. This is even more beneficial to the natural trainer, because he can take full advantage of resting his muscles by exercise rotation, yet can still hit it frequently enough to make many gains throughout the weeks, months, and years to come.

DO NOT DO THIS ROUTINE WITH LOW REPS! This is for sets of 8 reps MINIMUM, but I usually push it to 12-15.

Pick a rep scheme and tell yourself “I won't increase weight until I can at least get 10 reps!” Don't lower your reps for more weight used, get that egomaniac bullshit out of your mind for this. And remember to keep those true 4 second negatives with your reps. We are not going for an inflated ego here, if you have to lower the bar by 40 or 50 lbs because you're slowing your reps down, DO IT!

When you're walking around big as fuck, nobody is going to question the weight you lift. You just know something they don't!

Train hard!

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3 thoughts on “Growing From the Bottom End of the Spectrum”

  1. This is a really nice routine and I can see the different angles of this working great to actually put size on you in six weeks for real unlike a lot of other six week routines you find on the net.Three ways I see is good time under tension if you keep the ceiling at 12 reps,muscle confusion by changing the excercises 3 times per week,staedy weight progression with those 2 1/2 lb plates and even more growth windows hitting the body higher frequency.This is the routine I want to do now!But im having to wait as I train at home and don’t have dumbells or cables.I have Olympic bars,over 400lb in plates,a half rack with pull bar(just got this and love it)I have a separate bench with leg extension/leg curl attachment..This is my new setup and there are no gyms where I live,which is fine as I like training at a private setup.That being said I really don’t like to change the creations of the creators as in switching the routine around.Alot of us guys run into that problem that train at home.Would be great if you could throw versions of routines out there for us who have limited basic setups..really oldschool setups.Will be looking forward to more of your routines here as I think you have a unique style on program design.

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  2. Due to an old deadlift injury, this type of training is almost essential for me! At least for anything that involves my now weaker lower body and vulnrable low back as I train those supporting muscles properly. Having to start all over with squats at 95lbs, but doing sets with a minimum of 8 reps and shooting for at least 12+ before increasing weight, and taking it slow. I do NOT want to injure myself again, but I want to get back to heavy weights. The type of training outlined here is great for rehabilitation like this. Slow, deliberate, “light”, and not feeding the ego (which injured me in the first place)!

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