The Mighty, Massive Arms of Franco Columbu

 

The Arm Training Secrets of an Old-School Bodybuilding Legend

 

Columbu in his heyday

     “The average person who wants to see how well built or strong you are will inevitably say, ‘Make a muscle.’  Such folks aren’t interested in your lat spread, huge pecs, or rippling abdominals.  They want to see you roll up your sleeve and display a bulging biceps.  It’s the main attribute that sets you apart from the average man or athlete and identifies you as a muscle man!” ~Franco Columbu[1]

 

     As I was searching for an article of mine in an old Iron Man magazine, rummaging through my many issues, I happen to come across the article “Franco Columbu’s Mighty, Massive Arms” by Gene Mozee.  It was in his regular feature “Mass from the Past” from the ‘90s that always outlined the training regimens of many of the “old-school” bodybuilders from the ‘70s or before.  Truth is, they were invariably just older articles that Iron Man reprinted for a new generation of readers but were often written by Mozee at a time when the “classic” bodybuilders were still competing.  I doubt this particular article was any different, as it was most likely written by Mozee in the late ‘70s or very early ‘80s, when Columbu was at his competitive height.

     Anyway, after coming across it, I thought it might be something that readers would be interested in.  It has some sound advice, and Columbu gives some pretty good tips.  As with many of my other “classic bodybuilding” pieces, I will include some of Columbu’s words and then my own scribblings on what he said if I feel I can offer some insight into the program.

     “Before getting into the actual program, I want to emphasize the importance of gaining muscular weight to increase your arm size.  For each inch of arm growth, you need to increase your bodyweight by about 10 pounds.  It’s very difficult to add new muscle tissue without doing this.”

     That was “typical” advice from old-school bodybuilders, and it’s still good advice to this day.  This is especially true if you’re a natural bodybuilder.  Steroid users may be able to add several inches to their arms without actually gaining much, or any, bodyweight, but the same cannot be said of the natural lifter.  However, you don’t want to get fat, so don’t use this counsel as an excuse to “dirty bulk” by eating everything in sight.  Unless you have the metabolism to handle it—very few do—make sure that the additional weight is muscular bodyweight and not just fat.

     “I devised the following program after several years of experimenting with many different routines.  It’s designed to develop mass, shape, and definition simultaneously, a superset program where you alternate a biceps exercise with a triceps movement.”

 

Franco’s Mighty, Massive Arm Blaster

Superset

Incline dumbbell curls: 1x10 (warm-up), 4x8

Pushdowns: 1x10 (warm-up), 4x8

Superset

Semi-cheat curls: 5x6

Lying triceps extensions: 5x6

     On the cheat curls, do the first 4 reps with strict form, then use body momentum to cheat the weight up on the last 2 reps.

Superset

Preacher curls: 5x10

Close-grip bench presses: 5x10

 

Training Tips

     “After you complete this program, don’t do any more exercises that involve the arms.  Because the arms are composed of smaller muscles, they’re easily overtrained.”

     I hate to go against Columbu’s tips right off the bat, but I want to at least suggest a different possibility.  Bodybuilders from Eastern Europe often espouse the opposite.   They believe that smaller muscles recover faster because, well, they’re smaller.  If your quads or, say, the entirety of your back muscles are sore, they would argue that those muscle groups take longer to recover because they are bigger.  Smaller muscles—such as the arms—can handle more volume and more frequency because of the very fact of their diminutive size compared to other muscle groups.  Now, some would argue—and I would be one of them—that Columbu actually did train his arms more frequently than other muscle groups because he trained chest and back—often via supersets, similar to this arm workout—on 3 days per week and arms on the other 3 days per week.  That means he trained arms directly 3x weekly and indirectly another 3x weekly.  That’s quite a bit of arm training in my book.

     “Rest between supersets but not between the exercises within each superset.  In other words, you go from the biceps to the triceps movement without stopping and then, after you complete one set of each exercise, rest 30 to 45 seconds before going to the next superset.  After you’ve been on the program for a couple of weeks, cut the rest period to 30 seconds or less.”

     I would follow this as guidance but not necessarily “set in stone.”  First, do NOT rest any between supersets; Columbu is wholly correct in that regard.  If you do rest any, then you aren’t doing supersets.  Second, stick with the 30 to 45 seconds suggestion at first.  If you find you need more rest time between supersets, such as 60 to 90 seconds, that’s perfectly acceptable.  As I’ve written many times before, I rarely recommend rest periods because of how individualistic they are.  The bottom line is this: If you are after muscle growth, rest until just before your oxygen debt has recuperated completely.

     “Always try to push yourself to handle as much weight on each exercise as you can—except for the warmup superset on the first group.  Keep trying to increase the poundage—you’ll get stronger as you go along because this program builds power as well as size.  This is essential for fast progress.”

     This is where it’s important that you understand how you respond to hard training.  Some lifters will do best on this program by leaving one, two, or even three reps “in the tank” at the end of a hard set.  And others will do better by going “all out” on all sets.  If you don’t know what kind of lifter you are then you probably aren’t ready for a program as advanced as this one anyway.

     “Perform this workout 3 times per week.  If that’s too much for you, use it 3 times in one week and 2 times the following week, alternating the schedule from week to week.”

     For most bodybuilders—unless you’re certain that you thrive on more work—the 2^nd option is better.  If you go this route, your program might look something like this:

Week One:

Monday: chest, shoulders, arms

Tuesday: back, abs, legs

Wednesday: chest, shoulders, arms

Thursday: off

Friday: back, abs, legs

Saturday: chest, shoulders, arms

Sunday: off

Week Two:

Monday: back, abs, legs

Tuesday: chest, shoulders, arms

Wednesday: back, abs, legs

Thursday: off

Friday: chest, shoulders, arms

Saturday: back, abs, legs

Sunday: off

     “Stay with the program for 6 to 8 weeks, using it exactly as outlined.  Stay with it as long as you keep making gains.”

     I think for most lifters a program runs its course at the 8-week mark, but that’s not always true.  Many lifters get great gains by making “tweaks” at the 8-week mark but not necessarily switching to an entirely new program.  You might, for instance, do the same program but decrease sets and increase reps on each movement or, the opposite, you increase sets and decrease reps.  You could also keep the set/rep scheme the same but change movements.

     “Always try to get 8 to 10 hours of sound, restful sleep every night so that you have energy to train hard and your body can recuperate fully and grow.”

     The amount of sleep you need, or are even capable of getting, is another individualistic thing.  However, you do need to get as much good, quality sleep—restful as Franco puts it—as possible.  I would try to get 9 to 10 hours over a 24-hour period.  Get at least 7 hours at night, and then take a nap of a couple of hours during the day if you can manage it.  I often cite, though it may be apocryphal, the Cuban weightlifting team.  In the ‘60s, it was said that they slept 9 hours at night then took a 3-hour nap during the day.  Although that might be impractical for you, it still shows the need for plenty of sound sleep when you are training hard.

     “Eat a good muscle-building diet and never skip meals.”

     As the saying goes, you can’t out train a bad diet!  It doesn’t matter if that’s referring to getting lean or building muscle mass.  Make sure you’re getting enough calories and protein daily, and when it comes to building muscle, make sure that you’re eating several meals spaced throughout the day.

     “Always train with enthusiasm and THINK big arms!”

     A lifter’s mindset is as important a factor as training or diet, believe it or not.  I have often said—or written—that, to achieve outstanding results in anything, you must have a highly focused, well-honed “chief aim.”  I won’t go into the details here since it’s outside of the overall scope and purpose of this essay, but if you would like to know more, please read my essay “A DefiniteChief Aim” from 2023.

 

Final Thoughts

     I will let Columbu have the final words here: “This is one of my favorite arm programs for fast muscle growth.  It helped me win the Best Arms award at both the Mr. World and Mr. Universe contests, plus both titles, as well as the Mr. Olympia.  It worked great for me, and I’m positive that it will work just as well for you.  Give it a try.  You won’t be sorry.”

---

[1] This quote, and all others from Columbu in this essay, come from the article “Mass from the Past: Franco Columbu’s Mighty, Massive Arms,” by Franco Columbu as told to Gene Mozee, as it appeared in the December 1994 issue of IronMan magazine.  All quotes from Columbu have been italicized.