C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

Some Thoughts on Hard Training, Challenges, and Other Such Stuff      In my last essay on “ Outdoor Workout Challenges ,” I mentioned the body’s need for challenges on occasion, and gave some workout ideas for loaded carries and odd lifts.  In this essay, I just want to discuss hard training in general, and give some thoughts on when—and when not—to use challenges and other hard forms of training.      First, the body does need to be challenged constantly in some way.  But this doesn’t mean that one has to always go “all out” at each session, much less on each and every work set.  For instance, the act of working out on a regular basis is itself a challenge to the body.  Your body grows bigger and/or stronger—or fat loss occurs—through adaptation and accumulation.  Without pushing your body to do more and more on a regular basis, this won’t transpire, and results won’t happen.      Our ...

  Some Training Ideas for Outdoor Fall Lifting Using Loaded Carries and Odd Lifts      I have written before that my favorite time of the year to train is the Fall season.  In fact, last year, around this exact same time, I wrote a piece on Fall training that was mainly centered around sandbag workouts.  In this essay, I want to do something a little different by giving you some different and varied training ideas for outdoor lifting using loaded carries and other “odd” lifts.      For the first time this year, it’s starting to get a little cool here in central Alabama where I live.  And when coolness sets in, I like to take some training implements and objects from my garage to the yard, where I can lift, carry, drag, flip, or push them in assorted ways.      Last night, after completing a full-body workout consisting of front squats, kettlebell cleans, bench presses, chins, and barbell cur...

You are lukewarm, and I shall spit you out. - Revelation  A couple of weeks ago, I published a post on the "one-lift-per-day" program, but I'm pretty sure that I ended up ranting about how most of the workout-world seems to prefer over-complicated and easy (a two-punch combination that is NEVER going to produce appreciable gains in, well, any-damn-thing) instead of simple but HARD workout programs !  And since the more I think about it, the less annoyed I get, and the more just plain baffled I become, I thought I'd write about some "simple NOT easy" workout tips/tricks/ideas or whatnot that YOU can put to use and achieve some awesome results. Bill Pearl understood that MASS was built with the basics and heavy-as-hell weights. You see, I'm baffled more than annoyed at this point because even though results don't come from "easy" programs (there IS an exception to this rule, but it entails VERY frequent workouts and more attention to detail,...

  If you've never read any McCallum, you're in for a treat.  I didn't read McCallum myself until after  I had already become a successful lifter - not to mention a successful writer.  But I wish I had  read McCallum when I first began weight training.  It would have saved me a lot  of confusion, not to mention prevent me from following a lot of the foolhardy training programs I did follow, if I would have just read - and then put into practice - the great McCallum's advice on getting big. But here's the thing: McCallum ("Mac" as he was known) didn't JUST know how to get one big and strong.  He also knew how to get someone lean and looking good .  And he was light years  ahead of his time.  For instance, here's the diet he recommended about 15 to 20 years before Atkins (this article was written in 1965): “The Definition Diet, like most good things, is simple. It’s tasty, nutritious, easy to figure, easy to follow and the ideal adjunc...

The Best Leg Workout You’ve Never Tried!      Two things work the best when it comes to moving massive amounts of weight, and/or gaining massive amounts of muscle: Simple work, combined with hard work.   Nothing else is going to cut it.      As Mark Rippetoe once remarked, “the most valuable lessons of the weight room: a simple, hard program works best, and that you get out of your training – and your life – exactly what you put into it.”      I could never have said it better myself.      I also have a good feeling that a whole lot of lifters know that simple, hard work is absolutely the best way to train for building slabs of muscle that is also capable of hefting ponderous poundages, but they don’t do it.   And I think they don’t do it for a couple of reasons.   First, either they’re lazy and/or have convinced themselves that fancier programs that don’t require hard work...