C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

  A Split Training Program for Strength, Power, and Mass      In general (even if you’ve only read a small smattering of my writing, you probably still know this), I’m a fan of full-body workouts.   When training with a split program, I typically like 2-way splits and little else.   There are times, however, when a “multi-split”—splitting your body into 3 or more sessions—can be effective.   In this article, I want to present one such program.   This program will be great for anyone who is at least at the “intermediate” level and is looking to gain even more mass, strength, and power.      Before we go any further, let’s look at the reasons that I generally favor full-body workouts and problems I have with most split training programs.   Once you understand that information, then you can make an informed decision over whether or not this program would be right for you.      Full-body progr...

       If you’re a natural lifter who wants to gain plenty of muscle mass but also the strength to go with it, I think there are three things that are paramount.   First, you need to train heavy.   Second, you need to train often.   And third, you need to remain fresh while doing the first two.      If you’re a student of the lifting game, and if something about my above statement seems vaguely familiar, there’s an explanation for that.   I basically paraphrased the great Russian strength coach Vladimir M. Zatsiorsky, who, rather famously, said that the key to strength training was “to train as heavy as possible as often as possible while being as fresh as possible.”   That quote is well-known for a reason.   Following it judiciously will unlock a lot of strength and hypertrophy gains.      Of course, there are a couple caveats to that statement.   You need to be training with barbel...

 My book "Ultimate Mass and Power: A Collection of Training Programs for Getting Massively Big and Incredibly Strong" is now available to purchase in a paperback edition.  (Click on the link to purchase.) Here's a description of the book: Are you looking for massive muscles? Monstrous strength gains? How about a combination of both? There seems to be quite a bit of confusion out there—whether it’s on the internet or at the gym—about how to train for BOTH hypertrophy and serious strength gains. The first problem seems to be that some folks just don’t know how to do either. Guys go to the gym to “get big” but then spend most of their time attempting to max out on a lift. Or, conversely, a guy wants to be massively strong but spends too much of his time training for a pump or doing a lot of repetitions. The training programs contained in this book will clear up this confusion. Herein you will find 16 different articles—each article replete with different programs—that offer...

  5 Tips to Turn an Easy Strength Program into a Mass Building Regimen      As regular readers know, I’m a fan of high-frequency training (HFT, for short).   In particular, I regularly promote easystrength and (what I call) easy muscle training programs.      Easy strength regimens are, you guessed it, strength programs, but ones built around frequent training, low reps, and fairly low volume in general.   I would argue that easy strength methods are hands down the most underutilized form of strength-building in the entire training world.      Easy muscle programs are similar to their easy strength cousins in that they utilize HFT but couple it with relatively low intensity (“intensity” here referring to how it’s utilized in strength training—as a % of one-rep max) and high reps.   Neither method of training is “hard”—in fact, you should always leave the gym feeling decidedly better than when you ...

The Best Two-Way Training Splits for Inducing Hypertrophy and Unleashing Impressive Gains in Strength      I’m fond of full-body workouts.   In fact, if you’re new to training, and you stumbled upon this essay as you scoured the internet looking for the best split program to make you massive—not to mention massively strong—then understand that you’re better off utilizing full-body workouts.   At least at the start.   Eventually, you will want to move on to a split program of some sort, however.   Now, please don’t get me wrong (I mean, really, don’t), you could spend your entire training life doing nothing other than full-body workouts —whether they’re high-frequency “easy strength” programs, or heavy/light/medium programs, or just “basic” 3 day a week programs where all of the training is “ moderate ”—and never need anything else.   But eventually you’ll want to use some split programs, even if it’s just occasionally, and even if it’s don...