C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

       A couple of posts ago, in my essay on stealing good ideas, I mentioned a quote I stole (and have often used) from the strength coach Nick Horton: “More is not always better, but it usually is.”  In this essay, I want to give you some practical ways to apply this truth to your training.      It has been generally asserted over the years—in bodybuilding magazines and now in blogs and in YouTube videos, or other social media sites—that the key to gaining muscle or strength is through “progressive overload” and that the best way to do that is by either increasing reps or by increasing the weight (but keeping the reps the same), but that one shouldn’t just add sets or exercises.  But I don’t believe that to be the best option for the majority of lifters.  I actually think it’s good to add extra sets, exercises, and, yes, even entire workouts , on a consistent if not regular basis.  In fact, I think this is the key to making steady progress.  But it needs to be done systematically.  

  One-Exercise-Per-Workout for Strength, Power, AND Muscle Mass Anthony Ditillo wrote several programs that are similar to the one-lift-a-day program presented here.      The best programs are often both hard and simple.  They’re also—if articles and YouTube videos are to be believed—not very popular.  Which probably has a lot to do with the fact that, well, they’re hard and simple.  Hard and simple doesn’t usually sell magazines, or make for a popular “fitness” influencer,  or imbue a blogger with too many readers.  Oh, well.  It doesn’t make it any less true.  So I’m here to once again preach a hard and simple workout program.      I have been lifting weights, in various forms, since the late ‘80s.  I have been a bodybuilder, powerlifter, and competitive martial artist, changing programs to produce desired goals.  I have also written about a variety of programs since I first started working as a freelance writer for bodybuilding publications in 1993.  I have written about—and recomme