C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

Some Rambling Thoughts and Reflections on Bodybuilding Supplements of the ‘90s      I came of age in bodybuilding, so to speak, in the ‘90s.  Oh, I started lifting in the ‘80s when I was a middle-school teenager, mainly to improve my strength and power in martial arts, but it was the early ‘90s when I went from weighing 135 (when I graduated high school) to 220 pounds of (primarily) solid, lean muscle tissue over the course of a handful of years.  If asked at the time what my “secrets” were to gaining so much mass, I probably would have rattled off the usual suspects: hard and heavy training, a massive, copious amount of calories on a daily basis (at one time I was eating between 6,000 to 8,000 calories each day), and the use of good supplements.  But I’m not so sure about that last one anymore.  Indeed, and eventually, at least, there were some good supplements that came out of the ‘90s—or, at the very least, there was one good supplement: creatine.  Overall, however, it was more th

  Only Have Time to Train on the Weekend? No Problem.      Yesterday, I received an email from a reader who had a question about setting up a “weekends-only” strength program.  I have had similar questions asked before.  The most commonly similar question is when lifters only have a couple days of the week to train, and so they want to know how to set up a minimalistic training regimen.  If that’s you, then check out this program I wrote last year entitled “Maximum Mass, Minimum Training.”   Anyway, this particular reader said he had been doing a full-body workout, 3-times-per-week, alternating between heavier and lighter sessions.  He said that he has a new job that is going to make it very tough for him to get to the gym during the weekdays, so he wanted to know if there was a way to train on only Saturday and Sunday, but still do full-body workouts.  The program below is the one that I gave him, and the one that I recommend for you if you are in the same, or a similar, boat.      F

       I started writing this essay as much for myself as for anyone else.  The truth is that, despite the fact that I should know better, and in fact do know better, which makes it all the worse, I am entirely guilty of not giving my body (and mind) enough rest and recuperation.  Or, at the very least, not wanting to give my body enough rest.  Most of the time, I have to remind myself to take off for a day, or to do the things required to make sure I’m recovering properly.  Part of that is the fact that I love to train.  I know that there are a lot of people out there who have to force themselves to go to the gym.  I have to force myself to not go to the gym (especially since my gym is only a few feet away from me at all times, in my garage).      Before we go any further in this, let me make one thing perfectly clear: I think, overall, more training is better.  As I’m fond of saying—or writing, in this case— more is not always better, but it usually is .  A vast number of stren