MIKE MENTZER TRAINing????

[tiger88]

the famous mike menzter training

ok i dont do any bodybuilding things during the season and i was wondering what is his training all about? i read that he just does ONE SET per muscle group? the set is too total failure

i didnt read the whole article it was an old muscle mag collection...


any one know about this training?

thanks for reading my post

 

[IronLion]

The common view on his training is that it sucked....too much intensity for most....he had good theries but none of them really panned out. If you use enough gear I am sure it will work for ya....

 

[tiger88]

i dont feel like buying his book, can u give me an idea what is like??? sounds odd.....

 

[guldukat]

i dont feel like buying his book, can u give me an idea what is like??? sounds odd.....

What part strikes you as so odd?

The one set thing is hardly unique. Doggcrappers do a single working set of most exercises per bodypart. We'll rest-pause after hitting failure, but it's still really one long set. Mentzer advocated post-failure intensity techniques, too.

Of course, you have to remember, the one set refers to a working set. DC guys warm up however they see fit, and Heavy Duty trainers did the same.

I was actually friends with Michael (RIP Mike). It pains me to say it, but, yes, his ideas became erratic. He was convinced that ever decreasing frequency is the solution to avoid overtraining, and would have you training each bodypart as infrequently as once a month in some cases!

It's certainly fair to argue the merits or lack thereof to his training systems, but don't think less of the man because he made mistakes. He had a far rougher time than most realize, and it's difficult to fully recover from as much.

Anyway, some of his routines certainly work. They worked well for me when I was about 15-16. It's not something one can really follow for many months at a time, however; some kind of periodization would've been nice, because it did stress the dogshit out of the CNS.

All else I can say is that Heavy Duty is really just a less extreme version of what Trevor Smith advocates. Big Trev might take issue with that, but his routine is VERY much like the workouts outlined in Mentzer's '93 _Heavy Duty_.

So, take a look at Trevor's stuff, take away some of the drop sets and post-failure stuff, and you've got something a lot like HD.

I think C3Bodybuilding, a member here who was looking to hit 300 lbs. by the end of the year, still trains in a Heavy Duty style. Maybe he'll take over from here

 

[MsBeverlyHills]

traditional "HIT" is basically performing one set per exercise to failure, 2-3 exercises per muscle group, 2-3 times a wk.

guys still doing HIT usually combine it w/other multi-set training. also-- HIT works really great if you have limited amount of training time.

 

[tiger88]

thanx everyone for responses...help is always welcome

 

[guldukat]

thanx everyone for responses...help is always welcome

With a beauty like that in your avatar, how can I resist?

Seriously, HD can be okay, but you'd want to stick to the earliest versions. *Or*, you could go with Mike's so-called "Consolidation Routine," which looked something like this:

Day 1
Incline press
Pulldown
Squat

Day 2
Deadlift
Military
Calves

However, rather than do it super infrequently as Mike suggested, simply do it really often. Trying it on a 1 on, 1 off schedule is probably a decent starting place.

You'd want to tweak it further, no doubt--doing squats, rows and dips in one session might be a bit much--and could probably add some abs and arms in the mix. I'd also have at least one alternate exercise for each movement, and rotate them each time you trained.

Day 1
Dip
Row
Leg Press

Day 2
Shrugs
? Delt exercise of choice
Different calf exercise

You could switch all of this around as you saw fit. You could even work it into a 2 on, 1 off program, though doing squats AND deads on consecutive days is probably not the best idea That might also get real tricky with shoulders and tris.

Still, if you were doing only one working set, maybe pushing it to 90% of failure or so, you should be able to recover for some time. I bet it'd take at least a month for overtraining to start setting in, if not longer. Being able to hit everything twice a week is certainly a plus, too.

 

[tiger88]

karma to you thanx bro

 

[guldukat]

karma to you thanx bro

You are very, very welcome my man

Best to you and that gorgeous gal!

 

[c3bodybuilding]

Guld hit the nail on the head. If theres anyone to take training advice from, it's him. You should read some of his posts, he reallys gives 110% to training.

It is true that Mike had his fair share of problems. I hate to see people bash him, because he really did make a difference in bodybuilding. He was a great man, and was always willing to help others. He could come off as a bit off the wall at times, but that was just how he was.

As Guld mentioned, the best form of HD, is the original. In the late 80s, and 90s, Mike went too far. Working each body part 1-2 times a month! I think where Mike failed, Dorian, and even DC succeeded. With such low volume, you could work each body part at the min once every 6-7 days, and even 2-3x a week (ala DC).

I loved DC ideas. When I followed his program, I made great gains, quickly. But sadly, I couldn't tolerate the frequency. I'm the type of person who can get sick just being in the same room with someone who has a mild cold.

I started reading more about Mike, and came across Iron Addict, and our very own Realgains. IA and DC share training sections on a few boards. I decided I would try and experiment on what I could, and could not tolerate. I found that using a lot of DC, IA, Mikes and Realgains idea's, I was able to come up with something that fit me perfectly. I suggest that perhaps you do the same. Theres lots of GREAT programs out there. DC, HST, Realgains post on the women's board, the original Heavy Duty book (you can get that one at Mikementzer.com), etc. Look them over, and see if you like them.

Also, don't be scared of the one set per body part, or per exercise. If you want high frequency, I would follow something like DC or HST to a t, but if you can't handle that, and DC says there are many that can't, try working everything once every 6-7 days. If you do that, you can certainly do a bit more volume. In Mike's Olympia days, he would do 4-6 sets for large parts (remember this was at a time when others were doing 20-25 sets per part, even biceps!).

Good luck, and I hope I was of some help.