C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

Slovenian powerlifter Erni Gregorčič at Worlds 2014 in Sydney, Australia The other day, I received an email from a reader who wanted to know if I still felt the same way about strength training - specifically Russian strength training, for some reason - as I did years ago.  He asked this, he said, because I hadn't published very much on the subject in the last couple of years.  I replied that, of course, I still feel the same way about the efficacy of strength and power programs that I recommended 10 years ago as I do today. There really is nothing new under the strength and power building sun. With that being said, for those of you new to Russian-style training, here are the "rules" of Russian-style training as recommended by strength guru Pavel Tsatsouline*: 1. You must lift heavy. 2. You must limit your reps to five. 3. You must avoid muscular failure. 4. You must cycle your loads. 5. You must stay tight.  Tension is power. 6. You must treat your strength as a skill an

Entering Deeply into Practice Bodhidharma (a.k.a. Da Mo), first patriarch of Zen*       “ While you are continuing this practice, week after week, year after year, your experience will become deeper and deeper, and your experience will cover everything you do in your everyday life.  The most important thing is to forget all gaining ideas, all dualistic ideas.  In other words, just practice zazen in a certain posture.  Do not think about anything.  Just remain on your cushion without expecting anything.  Then eventually you will resume your own true nature.  That is to say, your own true nature resumes itself. ” Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind      In a past blog entry on Zen, martial arts, and building muscle mass, I made a brief mention of entering deeply into practice .  But what does this mean, to “enter deeply into practice”?  First, and for some odd reason this seems to be a point that practitioners are apt to miss, it means that you must have a daily practice that you

Three "Rapid Fire"* Routines for Mind-Blowing Arm Growth Garrett Sloan builds his muscular arms with various programs When I started bodybuilding—as I may have mentioned elsewhere on this blog—the first programs that I followed were ones in the "briefer-is-better for massive growth" vein of '80s and '90s training articles.  This sort of training was personified by the Mentzer brothers in the '70s and early '80s, and before that was brought to the world primarily through Arthur Jones (who was the person the Mentzer brothers, Mike and Ray, received their inspiration from in the first place).  And if, like me, you read a lot of Ironman magazine  in the '80s and '90s, then you know that the Mentzers and Jones were influential with other Ironman  writers such as Steve Holman, John Little, Stuart Robert, and Richard Winett.  (Not to mention Bradley Steiner, even though Steiner wasn't really interested in "HIT" training, but was ju

A.K.A: Building Muscle and Strength Under Lockdown and Self-Isolation If you're anything like me (and I have a good feeling that many of you are), you haven't left the house in a couple days.  And I have a good feeling, you may even be reading this blog entry because you're surfing the internet a little more than usual in self-isolation/lockdown/quarantine mode - whichever one better suits your situation - in hopes of finding some ways to continue your gains (or at least not bring them to a grinding halt) while you have no way to make it to the gym.  But if you're also like me (and this where I also have a good feeling that many of you are decidedly not  like me), you have a full gym at your disposal in the confines of your garage, replete with squat rack, deadlift and Oly-lifting platform, a bad-ass Forza bench, a good 1,500 lbs of free weights, not to mention various other bands, chains, benches, and other assorted goodies such as sleds and sandbags.  Okay,

Martial Arts Training In the first part of this series, I had a brief overview on much of what I want to discuss for the remainder of these posts. For this post, I want to discuss on training as it relates almost specifically to the martial arts, although you will quickly notice that it can’t help but “spill out” into the other two. The Bushido of Training Several years back, I wrote a post that focused on “The Lifter’s Bushido.”  Here is the quote that I used then by the samurai Yamaoku Tesshu: “In order to learn about the Way, forget about self and awaken to the truth… Exerting self is a mistake… We should not say “myself” — in truth there is no such thing… When there is no thought of self, true Bushido develops.”  I have often thought of lifting as a form of Budo, and my gym as the dojo.  (This is one reason that I enjoy lifting at home, in my garage dungeon gym.  It is not commercial, and, therefore, becomes more of a dojo than anything commercialized.  The fur

"Technical knowledge is not enough.  One must transcend technique so that the art becomes artless art, growing out of the unconscious."  -Daisetzu Suzuki When the founder of Kyokushin Karate-Do (one of the primary arts that I trained in as a young man), Masutatsu Oyama, came off the mountain (it was a very literal, and at the same time, figurative, mountain), he defeated all in the martial world who came within his path in the dojo, felling almost every opponent he met in a quick, effortless manner.  The tales of Oyama has become the stuff of legend.  Even though his exploits are recent in the history of martial arts, it's still hard to tell what exactly is fact and what has already faded into myth.  But one thing is for certain: Oyama's mountain-top training was the difference between him and those who he dismantled so quickly. Oyama's training was founded upon three integrated aspects, combining martial arts practice, zazen, and hard, physical training (pr

The Classic Physique and Workouts of a Golden-Age-of-Muscle Beach Demi-God There was no one - and I mean no one  - quite like the "golden age" bodybuilder Zabo Koszewski.  This is not hyperbole, however cliche that it might sound. If you are unfamiliar with Zabo, or have never really spent the time to familiarize yourself with his training, then I promise that you are in for a real treat here and now. A picture that does the great Zabo Koszewski justice. I can't remember the first time I laid eyes on Zabo or read about his training, but I do remember not being impressed when I first saw pics of him.  This is probably because he wasn't that large of a guy, especially when standing next to some of the larger legends of his day, and, at the time in my bodybuilding life, I was all about  massive, more modern bodybuilders.  (I seem to recall that another first impression of him was that he liked to hang out with - and smoke weed with - Tommy Chong, of Cheech an