Classic Bodybuilding Articles and Essays

Tommy Kono’s Insights

Strength-Building and Mind-Power Secrets from the 20th Century’s Greatest Weightlifter/Bodybuilder I love old-school bodybuilders. If you’ve scoured this site, or have been a long-time reader, you’re probably aware of that. My most popular articles at Integral Strength are almost all “classic bodybuilding” pieces. Old-school bodybuilders—especially before the ‘70s—were a different breed. Like bodybuilders today, they trained for aesthetics and to have a pleasing physique, but they also trained for strength and power, for flexibility, on various “odd” lifts, and for all-around athleticism. They were, essentially, one part bodybuilder, one part weightlifter, and one part gymnast. But a few stood out above all others. One of those was, without a doubt, the great Tommy Kono. Superlatives such as “great” are heaped upon a lot of old-time lifters, but with Kono it’s no hyperbole....

Back-Off Sets and Extra Work for the Strength Athlete

Some Thoughts on How/When to Use Back-Off Sets, Add Extra Work, and Increase the Total Workload of Your Training The other day, I received an email from a reader who wanted to know my advice on back-off sets and how to use them. His question was based on the fact that he was having a hard time increasing the weight on his “top-end” sets using a standard 5x5 training model. This essay is partly an answer to that question but, in addition to that, I want to use it to discuss how (and when) you should not only do back-off sets but also when a lifter should add extra work, whether that additional training is at the end of a workout or in another workout altogether. The goal of all of this being, of course, greater strength on the core lifts, whatever those core lifts might be, whether you’re a powerlifter attempting to increase the three powerlifts, an Olympic lifter looking to increase your quick lifts, or just an “all-around” strength...

Marvin Eder’s Mass-Building Methods

The Many and Varied Mass-Building Methods of Power Bodybuilding’s G.O.A.T. Eder as he appeared in my article "Full Body Workouts" for IronMan magazine. In many ways, the essay you are now reading is the one that has had the “longest time coming.” I have no clue why it has taken me this long to write an article specifically on Marvin Eder, especially considering the fact that I have long considered him the greatest bodybuilder cum strength athlete of all friggin’ time . In fact, over 20 years ago, I wrote this in the pages of IronMan magazine: In my opinion, the greatest all-around bodybuilder, powerlifter and strength athlete ever to walk the planet, Eder had 19-inch arms at a bodyweight of 198. He could bench 510, squat 550 for 10 reps and do a barbell press with 365. He was reported to have achieved the amazing feat of cranking out 1,000 dips in only 17 minutes. Imagine doing a dip a second for 17 minutes. As Gene Mozee once put ...

C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

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