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Classic Bodybuilding: Franco Columbu's Power Training Programs

Franco shows off his massive chest muscles in his prime Franco Columbu was one of the greatest bodybuilders of all time. He's also one that I have hesitated writing about simply because I was never a big fan. I have no real clue why that is/was! When I was younger, and first getting into bodybuilding in the late '80s, he should have been one of my heroes. I was smaller in stature than most lifters/bodybuilders in the gym - just like Franco - and I was also a lot stronger than most bodybuilders that I trained with, even from a young age - just like Franco! Maybe it was the look of his physique, or the fact that I always loved the other bodybuilders in that quasi/pseudo-documentary "Pumping Iron" better than he. Oh, well, whatever the reasons were, I definitely missed out on using some of Franco's awesome training advice, which I have come to appreciate more as I've aged and matured, and (hopefully) grown in wisdom. If you do a cursory search on the web fo...

Classic Bodybuilding: The Natural Power-Bodybuilding Methods of Chuck Sipes

Chuck Sipes as he appeared in the pages of the original Ironman Magazine. For a while now, I have wanted to write a piece on one of my favorite bodybuilders of all time: Chuck Sipes. I had relented in doing so until now only because there are so many good pieces that you can find on the internet just from doing a cursory search. But I finally figured, you know, what the hell, you can never have too much Chuck Sipes. Also, in addition to my own memories and thoughts on Sipes' totally bad-a training, I've tried to find some of the best information from various sites, and include a lot of that here. For those of you that don't know much about Sipes, he was one of a kind. I know that's a bit cliché, and I've used such terms before when it comes to other "classic bodybuilders", but there was nothing cliché about Sipes, so it's completely true in this instance. Don't believe me? Then read on. First off, he was natural. In fact, he was one of the l...

Zen and the Martial Arts: Zazen as Physical Practice

  Zen Master Kodo Sawaki (known affectionately as "Homeless Kodo") sitting Zazen* Zen and the martial arts have a complex history.  And it is one that is (a) almost completely misunderstood by all martial artists, especially practitioners of the Japanese martial arts who seem to talk about it the most but also seem to understand it the least, and (b) not even understood at all by the modern "zennist".** In this short little post, I'm not going to get into all of the reasons both A and B above are true, but simply want to express how similar both Zen and the Japanese martial arts are, and maybe this will give a good reason for the budo-ka to take up zazen, and while I expect even less zennists to take up budo, it does help for him/her to understand the martial arts better. Zazen is a physical practice.  It's at least as much a physical practice as it is a mental one.  I think this is vastly - and I do mean vastly - overlooked by most people, even practitioner...

More on High-Frequency Dumbbell Training

 I have, for a number of years on Integral Strength, pushed the benefits of high-frequency training.  But no matter how long I've been training, I can always learn something new.  And what I've learned over the past six months, is how wondrous hard, heavy, frequent  dumbbell training can be when it comes to eliciting mass and strength gains. I really can't believe it took me this long to give dumbbell-centric training a "go", but it did.  In the past, with HFT, I always used primarily barbell exercises, coupled with dumbbell training for "assistance" lifts.  Don't get me wrong, there were a few exercises that I always did, such as thick-bar one-arm dumbbell deadlifts and one-arm dumbbell overhead presses.  But now I've come to appreciate - not to mention very much enjoy  - exercises such as two-arm dumbbell power cleans, one-arm dumbbell power cleans, one-hand and two-hand dumbbell clean and push presses, two-hand dumbbell hang cleans, one-hand a...

Winter Bulk Building

 Matthew Sloan's Program for Packing on Winter Bulk A few months ago - it was the week of Thanksgiving - my oldest son Matthew (who used to post here on and off several years back) decided he wanted to go on a "winter bulk" and find out just how much muscle he could pack on over the course of a few months.  Prior to the bulk, he had been training in a sort of haphazard fashion, and wasn't "out of shape" but wasn't exactly svelte, either.  He started his bulk-building regimen weighing between 205 and 210, depending on daily weight fluctuation.  His goal for his winter bulk and power program was to reach a weight of 250. This past week, he weighed over 250 - 251 to be precise - when he weighed himself first thing upon waking, sans clothes. Here are some pics of what he looked like before his bulk (these were taken a few years ago, but he wasn't too much heavier than this when he began the bulking regimen - I hate I didn't take some legit "befo...

High-Frequency Dumbbell Training for Mass and Power

 Building Mass and Power/Strength with HFT + Dumbbells Combo The great Reg Park overhead pressing a pair of dumbbells In my last post, I outlined a brief, basic, (somewhat) hard full-body, 3-days-per-week program using ONLY dumbbells.  For this post, I'd like to outline a  high-frequency training (HFT for short, hereafter) program using primarily  dumbbells to build mass, power, and strength. The MASS is going to come about on this program from the sheer amount of total work performed in the course of the week.  When a lot of lifters -at least the ones I've worked with over the years - first take up HFT, they typically complain because it doesn't seem as if they are doing enough at each workout, or they don't think that they are training enough.  But the sheer frequency of the workout program really does add up .  After several weeks on the program, when most of the lifters I've worked with begin putting on muscle at a rate they hadn't been doing befor...

Heavy Dumbbell Training for Massive Bulk and Power

 Make Fantastic Strength, Power, and Mass Gains by Utilizing Heavy Dumbbell-Only Workouts! The great "old-time" strongman Arthur Saxon lifting a heavy pair of 'bells! When most lifters think of building tons of mass, power, and strength (either all at one time or in some combination), they usually think about heavy barbell training.  And when the same lifters think about dumbbell training, they usually think of it in terms of traditional "bodybuilding-style" workouts (3 to 4 sets of 10-12 reps - that sort of thing) or in terms of really light, higher-rep workouts.  But this shouldn't be the case.  The same way that a barbell-only workout can be geared toward traditional bodybuilding workouts and mega-high-rep training, dumbbell-only workouts can be great for building mass, strength, bulk, and power! Of course, every single workout of your program doesn't have to be a dumbbell-only regimen, but it does make for a nice change of pace and  dumbbells in many...