Please Scroll Down to See Forums Below
napsgear
genezapharmateuticals
domestic-supply
puritysourcelabs
UGL OZ
UGFREAK
napsgeargenezapharmateuticals domestic-supplypuritysourcelabsUGL OZUGFREAK

Mike Mentzers Highintensity Training??

God no, it has so many faults I don't know where to begin. If you want a high intensity system then I would say DC is the only way to go but it's not appropriate for 90% of the people who attempt it (the fact Dante said DON'T DO THIS if you've not got 5 years and some huge numbers under your belt seems to have escaped the average kid who attempts DC)

HD = teh suck
 
There are many HIT variants, but from what I've seen Mentzer's isn't well thought out. He wants to put everything in a neat, tidy package and make that the only thing that matters. It's not that simple.

I'd avoid 'Mentzer HIT' like the plague and frankly I'm not sold on the other, more thought out variants that others have put together. DC sure has a lot more to offer in terms of a program than any of the HIT varinats that I have read about, though I don't claim any sort of expertise on the matter.

Some ramblings at best :D But investigate it thouroughly and I'd wager you'll find that most HIT proponents 'drank the kool-aid' and view HIT as some sort of holy grail despite a lack of evidence/results. To me, HIT is just oversimplified answers to complicated questions.
 
I used Mentzers Hit for a while. Results were disasterous. I read a couple of his books and he puts his points across very well, unfortunately they just don't work in practice - nice idea, shame about the results.

I have a lot of respect for him having stuck to his guns, but his method is bad news - so don't bother with it dude.
 
Thank You All For The Feed Back !! And What Is Dc!!?? I Am Just Trying Some New Training Methods To Get Past A Sticking Point .i Have Done A 2 Set 5 Rep 3 Ex Per Bobdy Part(heavy As Hell ) Be4 And It Worked Great!!! Thnx Again .........
 
tweakle said:
the fact Dante said DON'T DO THIS if you've not got 5 years and some huge numbers under your belt seems to have escaped the average kid who attempts DC

Everyone on the internet is advanced. Or didn't you know?
 
Protobuilder said:
Everyone on the internet is advanced. Or didn't you know?

They also have 11" penises, 34-20-36 curves (guys and girls, yup), and 4% bodyfat.
 
I would have to agree with everyone here, his training doesnt work for most people. I have been training for a long time and have a lot of experience, but I overtrained within a week or two on his system. Madcow's dual factor 5x5 on the other hand worked like a charm.
 
maldorf said:
I would have to agree with everyone here, his training doesnt work for most people. I have been training for a long time and have a lot of experience, but I overtrained within a week or two on his system. Madcow's dual factor 5x5 on the other hand worked like a charm.
madcows dual factor 5x5 ??? can you show me a link or a sample of his program .thx :mix:
 
1968Charger said:
madcows dual factor 5x5 ??? can you show me a link or a sample of his program .thx :mix:

Do a search, you're fucking plat.

Lazy ass bitch.
 
elitft_bouncer said:
Could you give a synopsis of this vid? It'll take 2 hours to d/l it...
 
Guinness5.0 said:
Could you give a synopsis of this vid? It'll take 2 hours to d/l it...

Yeah, I was gonna check it out, but I am not gonna d-load a 2 hour clip of Mentzer's verbal diarrhea just to entertain myself at work.
 
1968Charger said:
madcows dual factor 5x5 ??? can you show me a link or a sample of his program .thx :mix:

Read the thread, I posted a direct link to his site, 2 posts prior to you asking this question. Hence AI telling you to search a little.
 
Guinness5.0 said:
Could you give a synopsis of this vid? It'll take 2 hours to d/l it...

Hmmm... hard to give sypnosis.

Well, I guess you'll have to watch it yourself to really comprehend the stupidity that the "supposed" HIT coach was blurting out to the trainee.
"Slow, do it really slow because blah blah blah"
"Never use momentum, make sure you don't accelerate the weight because blah blah blah"
"It's the last rep that turns on the growth mechanism because blah blah blah"
"You only need to perform 1 set, all the other a warmups because blah blah blah"
"The nautilus pulldown is the BEST exercise for the back because blah blah blah"
"Train only once every 7-8 weeks, come back when you are fully healed because blah blah blah"

Well, that's basically the kind of stuff he blurts out. He was this old skinny guy teaching this other beefed up guy on how to train HIT style. He also adds in that this is science.
Well, you can download just part 1 and watch it just to see what this crap is all about. You don't need to dl the rest. When you extract it (using windows) just alt+ctrl+del the winrar process. The partly extracted file remains on the disk which is now viewable.
 
I d/l'd the first part and I can't get it to play. I have no idea what you mean by ctrl/alt/del - what do I do when I have the processes up?
 
Guinness5.0 said:
I d/l'd the first part and I can't get it to play. I have no idea what you mean by ctrl/alt/del - what do I do when I have the processes up?

Right click the rar, click "extract here", it will tell you to enter the password then it will start extracting to your disk. It will then tell you to point it to the 2nd/3rd rar files (make a note of what percentage of the extraction this happens). If you don't have the 2nd/3rd rar file, it will delete the partially extracted file. You therefore need to end the extracting process before this happens. Press ctrl+alt+del to get the process/task manager up. Click on the the winrar.exe process and click "end task" just before you reach that point noted above. The extracted file will remain on the disk. It's in real media format. There's an easier way but it only works for non-password protected rar files I think.
 
elitft_bouncer said:
Right click the rar, click "extract here", it will tell you to enter the password then it will start extracting to your disk. It will then tell you to point it to the 2nd/3rd rar files (make a note of what percentage of the extraction this happens). If you don't have the 2nd/3rd rar file, it will delete the partially extracted file. You therefore need to end the extracting process before this happens. Press ctrl+alt+del to get the process/task manager up. Click on the the winrar.exe process and click "end task" just before you reach that point noted above. The extracted file will remain on the disk. It's in real media format. There's an easier way but it only works for non-password protected rar files I think.
:nerd: ;)
 
check out this testimonial from mike's website (especially check out what i've underlinded!):

HEAVY DUTY DOES INDEED WORK! -- Posted 2/8/06
Mark Martinez – Track and Field Coach - Santa Fe, New Mexico - USA

Back in the early to mid-‘90s, after several years of inactivity, I began working out again in my quest for size and power. I tried many different methods of training, from training once a day, to two and three times a day. I tried the Bulgarian method of training and believe it or not, I even tried Power Factor Training. Sometime afterwards, I remembered about a bodybuilder that I would see in the muscle magazines - the bodybuilder was MIKE MENTZER. I recall how impressed I was when looking at the pictures of him and his brother working out, and how much effort they seemed to be putting into their workouts. I began searching the magazines to see if I could find anything about Mike Mentzer regarding his workout routine. It took some time, but I found an article where he gave an update on himself and said that he was doing personal training and phone consultations.


I guess at this point Mike had started writing for one of the magazines, and I couldn’t believe what I was reading. It made sense and he didn’t dumb it down. I found that he wrote the way he spoke - articulate and to the point. After using his routine that I got out of the magazine article, I started making pretty good gains! I finally realized that if I wanted to continue my quest for more size and strength, then I would have to call Mike and purchase some consultations. I ended up purchasing a total of ten (I believe) phone consultations from Mike. On the day I purchased them, Mike got some general information from me regarding what I did for a living, what I was doing for workouts, how often and so forth.


I finally called Mike a few weeks later for my first session. Mike spoke about how bodybuilding is a science, that you need rest, etc. (it is all in his books and other writings). The one thing I distinctly remember is Mike saying that he had it perfected. I took notes on everything he said that day. Finally the moment that I was waiting for came, the workout. I was told to do 1 set of Pec Deck with Inclines on a smith machine in superset fashion, lower the bar to my neck with my elbows flared back towards my ears (really involved my pecs doing it this way, awesome), etc. I recall that when Mike told me how many rest days to take between workouts, “workout once every four days”, I balked “every four days”? He probably started laughing inside, but then he again explained to me the importance of rest and assured me this was what was necessary.
 
Wow.....I bet those stupid Bulgarians might actually win some international weightlifting competitions if only they started supersetting pec deck and Smith Machine inclines with the elbows flared towards the ears!!!
 
BiggT said:
Wow.....I bet those stupid Bulgarians might actually win some international weightlifting competitions if only they started supersetting pec deck and Smith Machine inclines with the elbows flared towards the ears!!!

LMAO!! Yes! Many, many Champion weightlifting teams have used teh HIIT system!! With varying results . . . namely, burnout and zero medals to date. LoL
 
BiggT said:
Wow.....I bet those stupid Bulgarians might actually win some international weightlifting competitions if only they started supersetting pec deck and Smith Machine inclines with the elbows flared towards the ears!!!
naaahhh.... the bulgarians are juicers..... :coffee:
 
Well about 4 years ago i gave it a try it is set up for you to only lift like every 8 days or something it was just know fun at all. hard to stay motivated.

I would stick to the madcow work out bill starr good stuff there.
 
thnx all for your help .one thing i have to say about the mentzer's work outs ,is it kicked my ass!!! .but training one time a week sucks ass for sure .i will give madcows work out a try ...........:)
 
I am one that believes in HIT for a few reasons. Well first off I train one set to failure per body part 3 days a week concentrating on reducing momentum and speed of movement basically its a 3 seconds up pause 3 seconds down pause. Full body workouts. I absolutely love this style of training. Since november i've gone from 154 to 172 with hardly any changes to my diet. The reason i train this way is for many reasons. WHen training with % of a max for instance, that % say 85% is only for the first rep of the set. There after the intensity of that set begins to increase. How much, who knows...The only way to really quantify intensity is to train to failure. This is based on the size principle of recruiting muscle fibers. No matter how heavy the weight the first fibers recruited are the type I fibers. As the set becomes more intense type I and type IIa fibers, and as the set becomes even more intense type I, type IIa and type IIb fibers are recruited. When failure is reached you know you have recruited as many muscle fibers as you can to perform this movement. So therefore saying that im going to do a set of 10 is really holding yourself back because you do not know how intense you really worked. When you fail you know you have reached your max. A lot of you will say well who wants to train to there max all the time, it will lead to overtraining, thats the beauty of working 1 set to absolute failure 3 days a week. In reality that would be 3 sets for chest in a week. Overtraining i think not. I know everyone is different but no one ever said that everything has to be so complicated, with loading, deloading, percentages of this and that. Lift til you cant lift anymore for one set and then based on science you have recruited basically as many fibers as you could, the more you recruit the more they will be able to grow.
 
No i did not drink the punch, to me it is simple and just makes sense. Remember K.I.S.S. I may have ranted a little in my explaination of things, but by no means am i dicounting anyone's routine on this board or anywhere for that matter, if it works for you , well than train, eat, and f*ckin grow. Like i said to me it just makes sense.
 
Good for you, now try getting to 230 with the same training.. you sound like me many years ago when I discovered the one-size-fits-all, black and white ideas of HIT on Cyberdump.com. No offense, but 170 is not very big unless you're shorter than average or in single digits bodyfat, pretty much any training should have got you there provided diet was in order.

It has to be 'complex' because that's how the body works, it adapts to stresses placed on it and strength gains & progression are not linear as you will discover. Some training volume and the highest possible frequency are necessary for muscle growth and you need to deload to give your body a chance to recover & grow. Slow concentrics are a terrible idea as they limit the amount you'll be resisting on the negative & they are not 'safer' than a natural lifting speed.

Go to intensemuscle.com and spend a week or two reading up on DC training at the doggpound, this addresses all the faults of simple HIT.
 
I think HIT has some of the right ideas, for squats and deads mainly. One intense workset per week is all you need to grow.



I would never use Mentzer's whole program though.
 
The HD routines Mike put in those books with John Little, are bs. That's not even what Mike himself did when he competed. At first he would do full body routines three times a week. Then later after leaving Jones and Nautilus, he would still work everything at least two times a week, but he didn't really count his warm ups (which were pretty heavy) as sets. As Robby Robinson said, Mike was in the gym often and he did train hard, but he wasn't there three times a month, doing two set workouts like he recommended to others in the 90's.

I would recommend using a good routine with a focus on basic, compound lifts. Add weight to the bar each week, don't read too many bs magazines and get your mind warped, eat often, and be patient. Nobody can offer an over night body, not HD, not Arnold, not anyone.
 
C3bodybuilding said:
Nobody can offer an over night body, not HD, not Arnold, not anyone. Except Anthrax Invasion, of course. He's god.

Thank me in your prayers.
 
Well in terms of strength you are only as strong as the weakest point of ur lift. So moving slower allows you to reduce the momentum which means ur not accelerating the bar past your weakest point of the movement. So training slower allows you to strengthen your weakest point allowing you to become stronger overall. Then if you compete you can do sport specific training and you will be stronger. And yes 170 is not big, but it is the biggest i have ever been, and without changing my diet i got there. I've tried many routines without really changing my diet. I have bill starr's book, tried 5x5, hst, gvt, tried it all with like i said a very similar diet and this HIT style of training has allowed me to break the 170 mark. But again im not here trying to change everyones routines, just having some good conversation. Whatev works keep on doin it.
 
Topside said:
, and without changing my diet i got there. I've tried many routines without really changing my diet.

Congratulations, you have just found the first exception to the Law of Conservation of Mass! Seriously though, if you were maintaining weight on a given diet, a training program cannot cause that to increase, it's physically impossible unless you did it at the same time as a huge reduction in overall physical activity.

I'm not bashing you though I'd say the same thing to a 5X5 trainee in the same circumstance.
 
Protobuilder said:
they also defy the laws of physics on a regular basis.
I'm levitating as I type this.

On a somewhat related note, have the perpetrators of advance fee scams discovered HIT boards yet? Seems like a gold mine: gullibility is assured. Although I guess this assumes the HITers haven't already given all their money to Mentzer...
 
LMAO!

You must spread some Karma around before giving it to Cynical Simian again.

maybe we should learn about it, just so we could develop a system or book that is uses the HIIT lingo, etc.. They'd make us rich.
 
well i have to say i picked a good topic for sure .i wanted to thank all of you for shareing your ideas and info .i for one cant work out onec a week .i will just take some of the" hit "ideas and add them to my work outs and see what happends .i am at 240 now and pretty strong, bf% at 13 .i will post my progress in a month with full details on my routine and diet .thanks again
 
1968Charger said:
well i have to say i picked a good topic for sure .i wanted to thank all of you for shareing your ideas and info .i for one cant work out onec a week .i will just take some of the" hit "ideas and add them to my work outs and see what happends .i am at 240 now and pretty strong, bf% at 13 .i will post my progress in a month with full details on my routine and diet .thanks again
maybe you could read up about dogpound training instead of loosely picking from MM's junk pile of training information... there are a number of fundamental differences between DC and MM training even though they supposedly use many of the same HIT ideas... funny isn't it?
 
Thanx, I Have Never Head Of Dogpound Training Untill I Started This Thead! Do You Have A Link For Me :) And Thanx You Again
 
GSP said:
Congratulations, you have just found the first exception to the Law of Conservation of Mass! Seriously though, if you were maintaining weight on a given diet, a training program cannot cause that to increase, it's physically impossible unless you did it at the same time as a huge reduction in overall physical activity.

I'm not bashing you though I'd say the same thing to a 5X5 trainee in the same circumstance.

Well first off i said with no changes in my diet not just eating enough to maintain weight. And this law of conservation of mass which states that the mass of a system of substances is constant, regardless of the processes acting inside the system. An equivalent statement is that matter changes form, but cannot be created or destroyed. This implies that for any chemical process in a closed system, the mass of the reactants must equal the mass of the products. So i guess being able to lift weights and not put on any weight without changing diet violates this law????? Then wouldnt atrophy be void as well. And thirdly no amount of muscle is created or destroyed in this process called weightlifting. What happens when weightlifting is muscle hypertrophy, which is an increase in the size of a tissue or organ due to the enlargement of existing cells. Hmmm the size... not in the creating of new muscle fibers. So while the law of conservation of mass does apply to muscle building, the way you used in it rebutting my comment is false. So before getting all snippy you should understand some elementary definitions related to fitness.
 
TOPSIDE i had to read that twice lol, oh and by the way i am glade you got past 170 lbs mark i was a hard gainer untill i learn what made my body grow ,as every one is diffrent. now i will try to get past 240 lbs and keep it .the heavest weight i got to was 250lbs . 238 at the moment :)
 
Topside said:
Well first off i said with no changes in my diet not just eating enough to maintain weight. And this law of conservation of mass which states that the mass of a system of substances is constant, regardless of the processes acting inside the system. An equivalent statement is that matter changes form, but cannot be created or destroyed. This implies that for any chemical process in a closed system, the mass of the reactants must equal the mass of the products. So i guess being able to lift weights and not put on any weight without changing diet violates this law????? Then wouldnt atrophy be void as well. And thirdly no amount of muscle is created or destroyed in this process called weightlifting. What happens when weightlifting is muscle hypertrophy, which is an increase in the size of a tissue or organ due to the enlargement of existing cells. Hmmm the size... not in the creating of new muscle fibers. So while the law of conservation of mass does apply to muscle building, the way you used in it rebutting my comment is false. So before getting all snippy you should understand some elementary definitions related to fitness.

LOL! Nice try, you took a good stab at the physics argument, which is commendable. Of course, I'm sure you know that when a muscle grows, it isn't simply the same matter taking up more space with a lower density. It contains additional protein, glycogen, capillaries, connective tissue, nervous tissue, etc.

As for atrophy, in the absence of an odd degenerative disease, when it happens it's simply used by the body as energy, and the byproducts excreted as waste. So unless someone is drinking their own urine, this process doesn't work in reverse for muscle building! ;)
 
I did "HIT the Mike Mentzer way" for 12 months. It was really fun, the weights i handled in those short workouts increased enormously, BUT without my body changing :( And when i wanted a break and went back to a regular 3 split my strenght was lower then ever. Somehow the pre-exhaust + compound trainings made me strong in that particular way of training. But i didnt take anything with me to other exercises.
 
GSP said:
LOL! Nice try, you took a good stab at the physics argument, which is commendable. Of course, I'm sure you know that when a muscle grows, it isn't simply the same matter taking up more space with a lower density. It contains additional protein, glycogen, capillaries, connective tissue, nervous tissue, etc.

As for atrophy, in the absence of an odd degenerative disease, when it happens it's simply used by the body as energy, and the byproducts excreted as waste. So unless someone is drinking their own urine, this process doesn't work in reverse for muscle building! ;)

Of course, of course, nothing is that simple. I was just saying that me saying that i have gotten more muscular without changing my diet while changing my routine does not violate the law of conservation of mass. It's like i said in my first few posts, whatever works for you in terms of diet and training then do it. I was just telling everyone about my personal experiences with different types of routines. This is why in terms of exercise physiologists resistance training is such a hot topic, its just not easy to figure out, and there is never going to be one method of doing things. So many variables to look at.
 
Topside said:
Well in terms of strength you are only as strong as the weakest point of ur lift. So moving slower allows you to reduce the momentum which means ur not accelerating the bar past your weakest point of the movement. So training slower allows you to strengthen your weakest point allowing you to become stronger overall. Then if you compete you can do sport specific training and you will be stronger. And yes 170 is not big, but it is the biggest i have ever been, and without changing my diet i got there. I've tried many routines without really changing my diet. I have bill starr's book, tried 5x5, hst, gvt, tried it all with like i said a very similar diet and this HIT style of training has allowed me to break the 170 mark. But again im not here trying to change everyones routines, just having some good conversation. Whatev works keep on doin it.


Weird how even running all these programs and reading bill starr's work, you must have come to the conclusion that HIT training is not as effective as many other routines out there. I've tried many routines out there as well (mainly powerlifting), and even I know HIT isn't something I'd try. It just doesn't seem effective at all. As for sticky points/weakest link, well that will only apply to powerlifting and olympic lifting/sports specific training really. If that's the case, you might as well do "sticky point/weak link training" such as board presses, saftey bar squat, platform deadlifts, high pulls, box squats etc...
There's also a graph out there somewhere showing comparison between fast lifts and slow lifts and its effect on muscles.
 
elitft_bouncer said:
Weird how even running all these programs and reading bill starr's work, you must have come to the conclusion that HIT training is not as effective as many other routines out there. I've tried many routines out there as well (mainly powerlifting), and even I know HIT isn't something I'd try. It just doesn't seem effective at all. As for sticky points/weakest link, well that will only apply to powerlifting and olympic lifting/sports specific training really. If that's the case, you might as well do "sticky point/weak link training" such as board presses, saftey bar squat, platform deadlifts, high pulls, box squats etc...
There's also a graph out there somewhere showing comparison between fast lifts and slow lifts and its effect on muscles.
this is a link i posted a while back in another thread:
http://www.strengthcats.com/nodeadlift.htm
this describes the effect speed training (specifically cleans) could have on a slower lift (specifically the deadlift). somewhere towards the end of the article, he illustrates the point with approximate power outputs. i think this is similar to the graph you mentioned.
 
Top Bottom