Classic Bodybuilding Articles and Essays

Programming Made Simple

Simple, Easy-to-Implement Strategies for More Size and Strength If the titles of workout articles are any indication, America doesn’t know how to train. I can’t speak for other countries, since I haven’t lived anywhere else. In the past, I have spent some time in Asia for work, and if my visits there were any indication, then I don’t think the rest of the world trains much better. So I guess there’s that. Now, if you know anything at all about proper training, and if you walked into any gym anywhere in America, you’d probably come to the same conclusion—that Americans simply don’t know how to train—so why am I singling out the titles of English-language workout articles? The reason is simple. Almost every single article I have seen lately—to a friggin’ tee—has almost the exact same title, and it goes something like this: “I did (fill-in-the-blank) for (fill-in-the-number of days...

Full-Body Blast

George Turner’s Old-School Full-Body Program for Gaining 90 Pounds—that’s right, 90!—of Pure Muscle George Turner was in his 60s in this picture! When it comes to old-school bodybuilders, George Turner remains one of my favorites. Probably because of the fact that he was more than just a competitive bodybuilder. He was a gym owner along with being a damn good writer of (damn good) training articles. He was also a bit—how should it be said?—curmudgeonly. But he was without a doubt curmudgeonly in the best possible way. He was, in many ways, similar to Vince Gironda in that regard, just without the disdain for squats. (That’s right, as much as I like Gironda, he wasn’t a fan of the barbell back squat.) Myself, I love back squats. As did Turner. Anyway, that paragraphic preamble is just a way of writing that, as I was thumbing through an old IronMan magazine this morning, looking ...

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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