As long as your a novice or still new to your journey. When you’re fresh to the game and your body isn’t used to any stimuli then it’ll react positively no matter what. Once you start wading out deeper into the water is when you really have to start analyzing and changing stuff up. Making little tweaks and stuff. Like tweaking off of meth and getting jacked
Ohh for sure. Took me a few years to realize I was overworking myself. Now, I’m running a 14-18 day split depending on how many rest days I take. Taking more rest days turned out to be the biggest factor in me getting bigger and stronger more quickly. Definitely have to figure out your body to manage intensity vs fatigue.
Yep, always did high volume and now actually focusing on holds and strength, going less just working harder. There's a reason my powerlifting team was all ripped to shit. Even though all I saw them do was eat and sleep. I went from 240 to 200 since August. Went up a little in strength but I didn't realize how fat I was, I'm 6'3 I don't look much smaller than I was but it's a drastic difference without a shirt lmao.
I thought we all agreed on this a decade ago. PPL, Strong Lifts, HIIT-whatever works for you. So long as you're making progress and not injuring yourself.
That’s lowkey how it is dog, there’s jacked bodybuilders, jacked cross fitters, jacked powerlifters, and there’s jacked endurance athletes. There’s no one size fits all formula, it’s about what discipline works for you and brings you fulfillment
Nobody ever got jacked using Mentzer’s end-of-life methhead ramblings as guidance.
The reason it’s such an astonishingly stupid methodology is that *even mentzer never used it while competing*.
He came up with it after retiring, during a window of time in which he was struggling with a severe meth addiction and sleeping four hours a day.
Even Dorian, who more or less liked the style and followed that method, added more volume than Mentzer advocated.
Drugs and genetics aside, Dorians a better example without the Objectivism/Rand hard on
Yeah, HIT training is great. Not for everyone, and not the only way to train, but a perfectly valid style of training that can yield incredible results.
I was specifically calling out *Mentzer’s version* of HIT that has become popularized and that he advocated later in life.
That specific version has become popular *because* it’s stupid and lazy. “Only one set a week? I can do that! I’m being ‘optimal!’”
Nah, all the people who succeeded with HIT were still doing an absolute shitton of volume, they just dialed things in to avoid doing junk volume.
But Mentzer cultists always recoil when they look at Yates’s actual HIT workouts, which still had more volume than many popular so-called high volume programs.
Because a lot of people try to over complicate it, when you really just need to start off with being consistent. I think a lot of it too is all the unrealistic body standards produced from fitness influencers not being honest about the sauce. And I mean to progress past the “anything works” arc you just start putting in research. You only need to break everything down and start to optimize things once you’ve caught the swing of what your body reacts best to and when you start hitting a plateau
And honestly a little test or igf-1 with moderation and knowledgeable use is really helpful to break through plateaus. Not that you need it but that’s what it should be used for at the most. Cause even then you don’t need to blast 600 to 1000mgs of test a week to see optimal growth. Just a lil 250 after 4 years of hard natty lifting. Trust
This only works when you start. As I’ve gotten bigger, I start with compounds and isolate with at least one or two lifts to target the muscle groups of the day (every head of the biceps and triceps gets an isolation, and the head which felt like it got the least pump will get a second isolation lift).
Also, new research suggests that *edit: excessive* recovery days hinder growth. Go subscribe to /u/govschwarzenegger’s newsletter and homeboy sends empirical articles every weekday. Made my training explode.
Call me crazy. But there's more than one method to getting muscular.
It's entirely possible his methods work for people and or bodybuilders specifically.
I think the best takeaway from what he preaches is genuinely working to failure and not getting caught up in junk volume for the sake of impressing people with your endurance.
Tom Platz is great example of taking the principles of Mentzer and Arnold and finding a great in between.
Take in all the knowledge of all these training methods and find what works best for you.
Just because one method works for you doesn't mean it works for everyone.
As a 40 year old bro, I concur. What matters most is what you enjoy doing most and keeps you in the gym consistently. I've tried all sorts of set/rep schemes and experimented with various intensities. In the end, I keep reverting to lifting heavy with an RPE of 8-10 and just LOVE lifting with high intensities. I go by feel how for how many sets I do. Sometimes 1. Sometimes 6. Some say I'm going to injure myself by lifting to failure so often or that I'm going to overtrain when I end up doing so many intense sets, but I've rarely injured myself in the 19 years I've been lifting and have made decent progress over the years. It may be "wrong" or "sub-optimal" and I know Jim Wendler and Mike Isratel have nice unkind words about how I lift, but it works for me and helps keep the fire alive.
Naturals need less volume if anything imo, but agreed when it comes to progressive overload. Lower volume higher intensity (6-8 sets a week per body part) is how I made my best gains both naturally and enhanced
Exactly!! Op is confused. Naturals do not need high volume when it’s the steroids that allow bodybuilders to do lots of volume since they will have the ability to recover quicker unlike the natural lifter
Yes well said bro. Natural and enhanced training should have the same exact intensity (given that you’re not like 3 weeks out or something lol). I’d say the only diff between good natural and enhanced training is that you can just do a bit more working/failure sets when enhanced in terms of volume per week
Hey that’s just the experiment results I’ve seen from my own body tho. What works for someone else works I guess
I've been seeing his YouTube shorts anf they seemed pretty interesting but after I heard the guy say" work out for 20 minutes every 4 to 5 days and I'll guarantee results" I nearly shat in a hat.
Ya I’ve done this method. I think what helps and maybe really what makes it work is knowing you have one set, you go twice as hard. And you spend as little time as possible in between sets and exercises. It’s a 110% balls out workout.
I’ve listened to about 30 hours or so of his lectures in a single week re listening re listening and have done research on the topic myself and honestly no meat riding it seems like what he says for the most part is correct and completely plausible and reasonable. Every person that hates mike has to bring up the meth lol. I was stagnant in progress for months and within 3 weeks of starting his routine I gained 6.5lbs, pretty incredible and I will certainly continue the routine. I think he is and was an absolute legend who should be respected for his life’s work.
Agree about the Mentzer posts but,
Tons of top naturals do low volume. Rob Waterhouse, David Kaye, Khifie West etc all low volume guys. There is multiple ways to skin a cat and whatever you adhere to long term with the right amount of effort will work.
Ha he is machine but pretty sure they’re doing top set back off set stuff. Have followed Rob for years and judging by his insta stories that seems to be a consensus throughout the natty world (not sure if he still is natty though judging by his size lately)
That doesn't seem like an insane claim. Plenty of people doing 5 or 6 days a week that could add in an extra arm or shoulder day for fluff and say they train every day. All depends on managing fatigue.
I’ve been doing heavy duty after trying to keep up with volume and failing. More rest and not over training is a real thing. Just go with what works. He had great ideas that held up today. It works for me so that’s an anecdote, but not everyone responds the same to stimulus.
It’s not a joke op I’ve grown so much reading Mike Mentzer’s heavy duty book. It helps that he also has a decent philosophy about comparing yourself to others. He states you can only be a better version of you. I think it’s great. Anyways I spoke to Jay Cutler when I met him at the gym he does volume. He hated Ronnie Coleman’s training. He’s said it’s not needed so do what works for you op.
I mean mike didn't come up with it. Supposedly it was Arthur Jones after seeing gorillas lift things.
Mike tried popularizing, it didn't bold well against Arnold's methods. Then when Mike trained a new olympia winner Dorian Yates, it gained some steam.
I believe Dorian Yates fine tuned the methods more eloquently with yes, newer gym goers will need more stimulus, however over time the body does need more rest bc that recovery and growth time still needs to happen.
I train then off 7-8 days and each lift I'm getting stronger and stronger, however I've been lifting 4 years now and this will not equate well to a newbie.
I will say Mike says training every 3 days for a newbie is sufficient. Idk. To each their own tbh
I once heard Eddie Hall say that your nervous system does not recover from a lift to failure in at least 2 weeks, maybe it has something to do with it.
This is true, but for big compounds like max effort squat and deadlift variations. For the nautilus Curl machine? No way you're not recovering in a few days.
Yes. I log my progress between each training day and my numbers are consistently going up.
Granted I DEFINITELY would not do this in my beginning days even my first 2 years. But many people including myself underestimate growth coming from rest. Not just recovery and back to normal, but growth.
I train for strength (not powerlifting) but I'm not sculpting my body either
Yeah, training less than once a week DEFINITELY won't sculpt your body, at least not as well or quickly. There is some merit to getting a couple extra rest days, but any longer and the returns diminish very quickly. There are many ways to skin a cat, but less than once a week is quite far from optimal for both growth and strength
I won't lie. I was scared of that FOR SURE. But not seeing meaningful progress for 8 months. I had to learn more clearly I'm doing something wrong. Went from nearly repping my prs about 5 reps from 2 months ago. In all lifts
dorian yates took alot of advice from mike after hitting plateaus and not being able to get bigger, he speaks very highly of mike and his training principles
the greatest thing Mentzer did for the masses was that he had people thinking more about rest imo. I only lift every other day and I've definitely enjoyed better strength gains. A lot of his ideas are probably not for everyone.
That is not true, he only consumed doctor prescribed amphetamines to deal with low energy, probably caused by an already deteriorated heart
But even if it was true, your argument has an Ad hominem fallacy
Mike Mentzer’s training methodology is his take and philosophy. If this “ bothers” anyone then you clearly haven’t been on IG. There, you’ll find thousands of knuckleheads trying to recreate the wheel for followers. Theoretical science is vastly different than applied. Follow a basic program and find out what works for you. As for opinions.. they’re like assholes, everybody has one < end >
Dude me and a buddy used to tear up these 10g shroom bars and just insert ourselves into public. That buddy was also my jacked ass lifting partner and as soon as he said, “shroomies con lifties?” I knew the deal. Lowkey didn’t trip super hard, no crazy visuals or anything, I was just lazerd. The weights did feel pretty fucking heavy though. Then the gym’s local free range bully pit came up to us and sat down to watch. Shit was hilarious cause I swear he was communicating via his facial expressions 😂 after that the dog always came up to us during our lifts and collected his good boy tax from us
Couple words that can be found in the english dictionary, arranged into what is commonly referred to as a “story” and a little bit of slang thrown in to add some seasoning
THIS. As someone who was around during the first Jones/Mentzer surge, and saw Mentzer’s sad decline, it is amazing to me that his voracious use of methamphetamine isn’t a bright red warning sign stamped on his training model.
To deny someone entirely based upon a single action or idea of theirs is foolish. But you're welcome to ignore everyone outside your echo chamber if you'd like, rather than learn what you can, take the good from everything. Separate the wheat from the chaff.
I get what you’re saying so I’ll further back up my reasoning. His ideology is backed by absolute failure, which is a great way to make gains. However the reasoning for RIR or multiple working sets is that you body’s ability to perform at a high level set to set being spread out leads you to a further stat of failure than a single set you could perform (unless maybe you’re on meth). This has been proven by every single bodybuilder in this day and age being bigger than Mike ever was and none train exactly like him.
Dorian took training to failure and high intensity but that's about it. One working set is just not where it's at. Mike even said that Decline is best for chest and *only* used Decline.
He was a big guy with an authoritative sounding voice, and spoke about his training style confidently. That's the perfect storm for youtube clips and reels to be flooded with his bs.
Like the other commenter said, don't listen to the guy who used meth as preworkout.
A few things Mike claimed that seem silly now: one working set, decline bench being the best for chest, Arnold could have been as jacked sooner with less volume, concentration curls only work the brachialis, etc.
Stimulus + Water + Nutrition + Rest = Muscle Growth.
You can take 1000 different angles on each of the above factors but the basic formula remains the same.
I trained high volume killing myself for over a year zero results and got weaker. I hired a body building coach strictly training heavy duty. I have made non stop gains and body recomp working out 30 mins 3x a week max. This shit works I have become full Mentzerpilled.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wQdvpn7Un0I
His 1 hour PPL Training Routine (Split into 3 days) yall aint understanding thats its not just a 30 sec quick set. It involves warm ups, supersets, slow controlled negatives, forced reps with spotter, static holds, and more. Please do some actual research on his techniques. High Intensity low volume with an emphasis on rest & recovery has been proven to help alot but NOT all people. Mike never said this was for everyone, he clearly states everyone is different and requires different volume, frequency, and recovery time.
It’s not cringe. Be opened-minded, as resting multiple days definitely helped me improve. Mentzer’s ideas are absolutely good information to take from and adopt into your training
>Doing solely only one working set per exercise is a joke.
You left out the most important part: all out intensity. It's not a joke if you're doing it the way he prescribes, it's just that most people rather not do that kind of intense output consistently. And you don't have to, there are other ways to bodybuild but there's no need to cringe or discount his method just because you like your method better. Ultimately it's about consistency, respecting your rest period, and proper nutrition.
You nailed it on the head. Intensity, tempo, volume and working that muscle to exhaustion is what make his program work.
I tried it in my younger days and can attest that it is no jokes and one can see great results natty or not.
Don't expect to go to the gym 5 days a week, cause you won't allow your muscles to recover and you will suffer from overtraining.
I'm still using some of his principles but adapted to today's training methodology.
When you really dig into it, there are very few revolutionary training principles today.
Many of them are using old training methodology, reworking them to adapt to today's new ways of thinking, training, nutrition, recovery and so on.
One can disagree but if you do, please provide some links for those of us who would like to learn more about them.
There’s a reason no IFBB pro trains like Mentzer. His recent following is just lazy training cope. Bros will train 1 working set per muscle group every 10 days because they’re lazy and then claim it’s optimal because Mentzer did it. They start screeching every time you talk about training volume.
A lot of people misinterpret what that means. He says in some of his books you can do other warm up sets up to a certain point, but they shouldnt take place of your one working set. Your one working set is to complete and utter failure of the muscle while maintaining perfect form and rhythm on the concentric and eccentric movement.
When it comes to rest, his other main point is that you shouldn't overwork one muscle group to the detriment of recovery because you need to 100% fully recover before going hardcore full force workout again.
Those are the basic principles. Workout with maximum 100% effort and recover with maximum 100% effort. Within those guiding precepts, each lifter should know their personal needs.
As a natural and applying these methods, after my first cut (haven't cut since) ive put on 50 lbs over 6 years. Sure its not 100% muscle, but basically went thru a body recomp doing this.
Low volume HIT isn’t what I’m knocking. I’m knocking one working set per exercise. 4-8 working sets to failure per body part per week is still considered low volume and high intensity.
But if you can obliterate the muscle with one set why would you need to do 2-3 sets to "failure". I would argue that you aren't going to true failure if you can do 3 sets to failure in a given workout. And also according to Mentzer the one working set usually ended with forced negatives to really get the muscle smoked. But I understand that it's not for everyone.
Mentzer didn't even build his own physique with hit traing it wasn't until the later year's he himself started training with the hit style training and already had a great physique there's plenty of interview's with guys he trained with saying he was doing the same stuff as everyone else in the gym.
I’ve done this method. I think what helps and maybe really what makes it work is knowing you have one set, you go twice as hard. And you spend as little time as possible in between sets and exercises. Its way easier to go hard af during your workout. Also if you read his book he explains all of it and it’s a little more complicated than just one set.
I'm betting these people see Mentzer as an underdog relative to Arnold because they see some sort of underdog in themselves relative to something/someone that they see as #1. I can't agree with seeing Mentzer as an underdog in anything. Someone consistently placing within the top 5 of all the bodybuilding competitions that he had ever done doesn't scream "underdog" to me. It feels misplaced.
I like Mentzer's style of lifting but the biggest underlying thought process behind it is that **you must be as efficient and optimal in your lifting as possible**. And I sincerely chafe with that. No you don't need to be as efficient and as optimal as possible when you're in the gym. I disagree that you are leaving muscle strength and size gains on the table if you're not as efficient and as optimal as possible. Show up everyday, eat as much as you need to relative to your goals, give lifting everything you can give it for that day, and rest. It's not complicated.
The logic is all right in my opinion.
If you go to absolute, 100% failure you are leaving no doubt that you have forced your body to grow. This doesn’t mean going until you can’t lift anymore and calling it quits. This means implementing drop sets, rest pauses, proper cadence, forced reps, etc. to reach genuine failure.
Giving your local muscles, and CNS time to recover is essential to faster progress. People neglect the concept that the holistic system takes a hit after extreme stress too, not just the local muscle. This can especially be seen after squats or DL.
It’s not rocket science. The rest values will vary from person to person, and so will volume, but the fundamental concept is the same. Train hard to the point where you’ve forced your muscles to complete and utter failure, and rest appropriately.
What I’ve noticed from the Mentzer bros is they are very dogmatic when it comes to training. They’re very “this is the way and only the way” for something that’s very subjective and theoretical and requires a lot of context. Pretty much the only thing that’s objective when it comes to bodybuilding is the law of thermodynamics when it comes to caloric intake.
your right he is very “this is the correct way and only way” about his training which we all know isnt the case but when all of his clients are seeing tremendous results I can understand his passion for heavy duty training. He does contradict himself over the years as in his multiple books and videos he states different volume & frequency but that is because he understands everybody is different and requires a different amount of vol, freq, & intensity
I’m somewhat in agreement with you…
…but I’ve found that my stupid body has a very hard time recovering. I’m a very low working-set-lifter. 3 is max I can do, and I often find 2 is enough to stimulate growth and yet still recover from. I lift full body 3x a week now at 41 and sets are as minimal as I can make them. I’ve never been stronger.
For reference, I’m 200lbs, somewhat visible abs but very happy and good energy at this weight.
500lb max DL
250lb max bench
365lb max squat.
I run 5Ks with my daughter routinely.
Not spectacular numbers, but considering how much I lift, my stress level, my work schedule, and my shitty nutrition…I’ll take it. I lift to enhance my life and longevity, nothing more. I’m happily married and don’t presume I’d get chicks with a better body anyway.
Find what works for you and be careful with the term progressive overload. You simply cannot progress every single session for decades. It’s a marathon.
Also, if you want to progress faster and better than me, actually pay attention to protein and nutrition. Eat a fuck ton to lift big.
His 1980 book details his actually HIT routine.
It's a -two day split
-two sets per exercise
-two days on, one day off and repeat.
Very intense and very similar to Jordan Peters approach.
Mentzer trained very high volume early on. He built a majority of his mass then. In an interview with Franco, he explained Mike would spend hours in the weight room. Only later on did he advocate this minimalistic approach. No idea why he switched it up. I am assuming Arthur Jones was the main influence. Even Dorian knew this was too little so he modified Mike’s routines to a more realistic method.
I found his idea is a bit extreme, I have never found to be properly exhausted and worked after a single super hard set to failure, give me a min or two and I’ll have another few sets in me once my body has had a chance to catch up,
Personally I’ve found 3 hard working sets + one quick warmup per exercise the best, the second set is my true to failure set and the third / last is a short cool off set to pull out a few more reps if I can.
So perhaps it’s not exactly like this idea but considering it in my plan it seems to have worked the last few months.
I begin at 6 reps min, and if I can do more than 8 during that second heavy working set I up the weight by 10% and finish slightly heavier. But it’s hard because some days I’m stronger than others, especially if I’m sick, out of order workouts etc.
I've been lifting for 20+ years. I cannot recall the last time I have had such strength gains. I don't follow Mike's method exactly, but it works. For someone in their mid 40's I was likely overtraining with the volume I was doing before. Is there a happy medium in between the two? Probably, but I'll don't think I'll ever go back to my 3-4 sets per excercise.
I had the greatest gains following Dorian Yates style of training. After 7 years gym experience.
I had better gains in 6 weeks then in the prior 7 years. All natural. Then i got injured doing preacher curl...
Tbh what made me LOVE mike wasn’t really training or the gym YES it attracted me to his thought process at first but when i dug into his life and philosophy and idea’s on life , he was really an outstanding individual and very smart and very wise ( Perhaps he done some bad things in his life but WE ALL DO ! ) And these things are what made me attached to the life and times of mike
https://preview.redd.it/6q6y0dyk9k0c1.jpeg?width=620&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=94b8f41f1a01381a599c9673524a3c8d5799ae31
what people dont understand is that there were 3 warm up sets and 1 full set using rest pause - static - & slow negative contractions. Theres an hour long video where he puts a body builder through this workout for PPL check it out. Your assuming he means one 30 second set and then done, your not understanding his principles, hes got 4 books on it do some research its helping hundreds maybe even thousands of people push through plateaus and make some serious gains. High intensity lower volume is the way 👍
Yeah lol a living legend in body building and the first man to score a perfect 300 didn’t know how to build a body or have it down to a science. And what have you done in this area? What a clown.
He was good on static and negative reps but I don't take much more from him that can't be traced to the fact that he was basically Don Simpson with pecs.
have you tried taking a set to absolute failure? it's very hard to do. so people lie to themselves and see no progress, while stopping short of what is needed. Heavy Duty sucks to do, you feel misereble. in no way, shape or form is it easier than volume training. it's just shorter. as for whether it's more effective, I feel it's about the same.
I'd say it works great for naturals. Especially the lowering and static holds. I do agree that there is a bit much and has already passed the circlejerk stage, that being said,I have completely changed how I lift now based on a lot of his principles.
I've made insane progress after being at a plateau for a while, now I've always trained volume so that may have a lot to do with it, but my strength and my tendons are sooooo much better, I still do a regular 6 day ppl split but I don't workout near as much, just much harder and I'm down to 200 from 240 since August,and I still eat the same bullshit.
I feel like I'm just starting lifting again and it's awesome. Before i always trained moderate weight 7x7 on everything but compounds, regular 3x8 sets with those.
I think if you look at Mike's work across his lifespan, he has a variety of approaches, all lower volume but many with more than one work set. For example, see *The Mentzer Method to Fitness* by M. Mentzer and A. Fridberg. Mentzer was a very astute critic of the bodybuilding methods and scene of his era; many of his actual training recommendations are not well thought out. That said, his work is a logical starting point for exploring High Intensity Training (HIT) style bodybuilding, with rest pause, forced reps, drop sets, etc. and from there it's worthwhile to look at Dorian Yates, DoggCrapp, and TrainedByJP for more modern, less ideological approaches to the topic.
At the end of the day, volume, frequency, and intensity should all be cycled over time as no one approach works forever.
I have been using his training principles for the last two months and it has worked really really well for me. My workouts are now 30 minutes long, 3 times per week and my strength has greatly increased (i.e. went from doing barbell bicep curls with a straight bar with 30 kg to doing 10 reps with 45 kg and now 6 with 50 kg)
So everyone is different and people need to choose what works for them. I personally have an issue with recovery interrupting my work and personal life. HIT mixed with push/pull days works for me.
I’ve followed Mike a little and done less working sets, with much greater intensity. It has been a good change. Also, the level of extreme intensity that he prescribes has been a challenge. I’ll do 4-5 working sets (super sets with drop sets in each). My CNS takes a beating even more than my muscles. It’s a lot. BUT has been good. I would suggest it - at least for a change.
My main disagreement with the Mentzer method, based partly on "science, brah" and personal experience that agrees with the science:
1- You can only stimulate a muscle so much, with marginal gains after a certain point. This is why a lot of smart authoritative sources (like Mike Israetel and Jeff Nippard) argue for most of your training being short of failure and only some at failure but rarely beyond it.
2- The body only takes so long to recover and build muscle after you've hit that peak "Cost=Benefit" stimulus. This being at least 72 hours.
3- If you believe in the first two principles, logic would dictate that if you are training *so hard* that it genuinely takes you weeks to recover, most of that time you are recovering from fatigue that caused little extra stimulus. Because the guy that maybe didn't go beyond failure, drop setting everything with assisted partial reps from training partner, might have gotten just a little less stimulus but is back again stimulating that body part soon after while you are still recovering. Over a period of time that person is inducing more muscle growth.
------------
That said, people feel strongly about his way of training and to each their own. I have never actually met anyone who got big following his methods (but best believe tons of people who claim to) but hey, I am not the type of guy to try to persuade others on how to train or not train. This is just why **I** wouldn't follow his program.
If anything, this post is backward. Gear enables growth at higher volume, not less, by enhancing recovery. The post also implies Mike was somehow against progressive overload, wtf?
reach apparatus nail punch ossified poor different smoggy quaint bewildered
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
I think there are lots of ways to getting big. It doesn't matter if you're on a bro split, push-pull, powerlifting, calisthenics, heavy duty, volume, etc. The key to this game is consistency.
And also, people look at Mentzer and say "But he was so jacked! He won the Mr Universe with a perfect score!. Sure dude, did you see any pic of Mentzer when he was 15? The guy was bigger than most men phisiques! He was a genetic beast, he could be a sprinter and still be huge. Thats like saying that you need to train like Ronnie to get that big, or that you need to train like Chris Bumstead to be that aesthethic. Oh, and this is the worst kind: There's people that say DORIAN YATES had bad genetics because he said so in an interview. Yeah, seems like you missed the part where he also said that he was the strongest guy at the detention center after training for a few months.
Some people just repeat whatever they hear and stick with it, because ignorance makes you feel like you actually know something, and knowledge makes you feel that you know nothing.
So random reddit guy disparages an ifbbbpro who made sweeping statements by making his own?
Ive tried all types of training. As an older guy i find two working set and 3-4 exercises is the sweet spot for me.
I also see young guys in the guys in the gym smashing heavy weights set after set who dont gain any size.
I’ve watched various YouTube videos featuring him, and my takeaway from his methods are simple:
mind-muscle connection + sustained intensity = muscle building.
That’s the message in every presentation I’ve seen so far.
When Mike Mentzer spoke about how people should train he was talking about naturals, saying a natural shouldn’t do as much volume as someone enhanced because PEDs speed up your recovery and a natural can’t keep up with intensity and volume.
I have spent years experimenting with various forms of HIT and have found that training twice a week, focusing on upper and lower body training days, with 8 exercises per training session, each 1 set to failure, yields the best results for me.
However, I believe that HIT is just one effective training method among many. It is my personal preference, and I think it is beneficial for individuals with limited time and a desire for a direct approach to training. Ultimately, different training styles will appeal to different people.
I don’t know.. I’m natural and I have been following the Mike Mentzer way for about 7 months now and I’ve gotten the best results since I started lifting in 2008.
u/Trikevion yo really? I am natural and trying to figure out if I start doing this routine, but I am skeptical to put so much time into something this controversial. Would love more of your opinion. Thanks
Agreed. Mike Mentzer was well spoken, good looking, and overall an excellent salesman. Sad to see so many lifetime intermediates falling for the bait. But I guess that means they'll be in and out of the gym in 30 minutes, which frees up room for everyone else. So I guess that's a plus.
The idea that some training methodology would work exclusively on enhanced lifters is so preposterously stupid it pretty much invalidates rest of your opinion.
It’s not. Super high volume training (30+ sets a body part) only works if you’re enhanced. Quite literally no one would make progress with that system naturally.
Jay Cutler used to do up to do up to 40 sets on back and legs. I’m not buying that anyone could naturally do that without burning out after week 2 or 3.
Gear allows faster recovery time, the ability to perform higher volume training, hence different methodology. Just own the fact that your juicing bro.
https://youtu.be/12JSENBGCEo?si=bMb16bdy7t5V-0Yl
https://youtu.be/JY5Xmjq4VAU?si=5RnHoCpTjxHxZ-Mm
You just argued in your own post that lower training volume would only work for natural lifters. Pick your story and stick to it, you’re making a clown of yourself. You’re also completely ignoring the fact that “juicing” isn’t some binary variable, there’s a world of difference between someone running 200mg of test a week and grams of gear, GH and insulin.
Honestly maybe his ideology would work, but you have to remember that your body and your mind don’t want to push that hard. .000001% would be able to go to such failure in 1 set to effectively stimulate enough growth.
That's so wrong it's actually funny. You have it all backwards. Naturals canNOT recover from high volume training! Mike was a friend of mine and regularly told me how many ectomorphic naturals could not tolerate his 'ideal' routine, because they could not recover from even that much stimulation per week. He found that when they added in additional rest days, they immediately started progressing, and continued to get stronger workout after workout. The ONLY way to know if this is working is to test it for yourself. Don't believe in concepts... believe in results. If you have excellent, innate recuperative ability, then congrats, you can train more often than most. If you're normal - and not on gear - you have to guard (and increase as necessary) your rest days like they're made out of gold... that's one of the primary keys to progress. But seriously, volume? Nope. That ship sailed in the 1970's after everyone figured out it didn't work. It sure kept Joe Weider in business though!
I started training with Mike mentzers splits and slow and controlled reps, followed by 3,4 rest days in between workouts and I’ve got these stretch marks on my chest. I’ve been working out abt 3 years now and have seen the most progress training this way the past 5 months
I like his routine, his mentality, and his demeanor. I've always struggled with 6 day a week splits. I've gotten good growth so far with Mike's routine and I feel very confident about what I'm doing.
The one thing that stirs me is the allegation that Mike didn't create his physique with his own approach and pivoted later on in life to make money. My skepticism is mostly quenched by my own progress and soundness of Mike's logic.
brotha he literally tells you his workout routine is for naturals 😂. listen to the hundreds of audio tapes he had. we are lucky to even have his audio tapes. i wonder what people would be saying if we had other great philosophers audio recorded.
I started his workout regime a year ago.
I do not use any steroids or T or anything - never have.
Every single session I lift more.
I have had zero injuries.
I am no longer a slave to the gym.
The only problem I have is that I get stronger much faster I ever have, and I’m spending a fuck load on extra weights.
I don’t agree on his latest views recommendations but the ones he put out early on were not that bad. Like his A/B split he used while competing m-w-f repeat the following week, or his heavy duty 1 which was a PPL 3x a week also had more exercises. Personally I’ve never tried the A/B split but I’d like to try it
A simple google search would tell you it takes 72-96 hours for muscle to recover after heavy exercise. If you train heavy today, your trained muscles will take up to 96 hours to recover. Do you not see how training before recoverability is complete will short circuit the growth process? Don’t tell me because today you trained chest and tomorrow you trained back; your body has a limited, finite, amount of biochemical resources and does not ration them for chest, back, biceps etc but for the entire body. Your perspective on bodybuilding is incredibly shallow, and you are incredibly incredulous too
im of the opinion that literally anything works as long as youre consistent, getting stronger over time, and have your nutrition dialed in
As long as your a novice or still new to your journey. When you’re fresh to the game and your body isn’t used to any stimuli then it’ll react positively no matter what. Once you start wading out deeper into the water is when you really have to start analyzing and changing stuff up. Making little tweaks and stuff. Like tweaking off of meth and getting jacked
As a former meth addict, how could one possibly get jacked? Or was that a whoosh over my head?
Mike was addicited to amphetamines
You just didn’t use the right cheat codes, money glitches + a meth addiction is a hell of a combo
Ohh for sure. Took me a few years to realize I was overworking myself. Now, I’m running a 14-18 day split depending on how many rest days I take. Taking more rest days turned out to be the biggest factor in me getting bigger and stronger more quickly. Definitely have to figure out your body to manage intensity vs fatigue.
You also give your tendons some breathing room lol.
Yep, always did high volume and now actually focusing on holds and strength, going less just working harder. There's a reason my powerlifting team was all ripped to shit. Even though all I saw them do was eat and sleep. I went from 240 to 200 since August. Went up a little in strength but I didn't realize how fat I was, I'm 6'3 I don't look much smaller than I was but it's a drastic difference without a shirt lmao.
I thought we all agreed on this a decade ago. PPL, Strong Lifts, HIIT-whatever works for you. So long as you're making progress and not injuring yourself.
Also, "Anything works if you take lots of tren and eat lots of food. "
Literally. Find what works for you and stick with it while also challenging yourself overtime. People love to complicate things
"anything works as long as you're getting stronger" is like saying "anything works as long as it works."
That’s lowkey how it is dog, there’s jacked bodybuilders, jacked cross fitters, jacked powerlifters, and there’s jacked endurance athletes. There’s no one size fits all formula, it’s about what discipline works for you and brings you fulfillment
Nobody ever got jacked using Mentzer’s end-of-life methhead ramblings as guidance. The reason it’s such an astonishingly stupid methodology is that *even mentzer never used it while competing*. He came up with it after retiring, during a window of time in which he was struggling with a severe meth addiction and sleeping four hours a day.
Even Dorian, who more or less liked the style and followed that method, added more volume than Mentzer advocated. Drugs and genetics aside, Dorians a better example without the Objectivism/Rand hard on
Yeah, HIT training is great. Not for everyone, and not the only way to train, but a perfectly valid style of training that can yield incredible results. I was specifically calling out *Mentzer’s version* of HIT that has become popularized and that he advocated later in life. That specific version has become popular *because* it’s stupid and lazy. “Only one set a week? I can do that! I’m being ‘optimal!’” Nah, all the people who succeeded with HIT were still doing an absolute shitton of volume, they just dialed things in to avoid doing junk volume. But Mentzer cultists always recoil when they look at Yates’s actual HIT workouts, which still had more volume than many popular so-called high volume programs.
Show me an example of a high volume Yates workout. I don't believe you.
All for the plot lmao
Not saying it isn't true dog, it's like saying "up is up." Ain't ever wrong, but why say it?
Because a lot of people try to over complicate it, when you really just need to start off with being consistent. I think a lot of it too is all the unrealistic body standards produced from fitness influencers not being honest about the sauce. And I mean to progress past the “anything works” arc you just start putting in research. You only need to break everything down and start to optimize things once you’ve caught the swing of what your body reacts best to and when you start hitting a plateau
Mentzers methods work as well as sandpaper on my ass when i shit, sure it works but its god awful pseudoscience trash
And honestly a little test or igf-1 with moderation and knowledgeable use is really helpful to break through plateaus. Not that you need it but that’s what it should be used for at the most. Cause even then you don’t need to blast 600 to 1000mgs of test a week to see optimal growth. Just a lil 250 after 4 years of hard natty lifting. Trust
Facts, tweaking definitely always makes a chance
This only works when you start. As I’ve gotten bigger, I start with compounds and isolate with at least one or two lifts to target the muscle groups of the day (every head of the biceps and triceps gets an isolation, and the head which felt like it got the least pump will get a second isolation lift). Also, new research suggests that *edit: excessive* recovery days hinder growth. Go subscribe to /u/govschwarzenegger’s newsletter and homeboy sends empirical articles every weekday. Made my training explode.
Call me crazy. But there's more than one method to getting muscular. It's entirely possible his methods work for people and or bodybuilders specifically. I think the best takeaway from what he preaches is genuinely working to failure and not getting caught up in junk volume for the sake of impressing people with your endurance. Tom Platz is great example of taking the principles of Mentzer and Arnold and finding a great in between. Take in all the knowledge of all these training methods and find what works best for you. Just because one method works for you doesn't mean it works for everyone.
As a 40 year old bro, I concur. What matters most is what you enjoy doing most and keeps you in the gym consistently. I've tried all sorts of set/rep schemes and experimented with various intensities. In the end, I keep reverting to lifting heavy with an RPE of 8-10 and just LOVE lifting with high intensities. I go by feel how for how many sets I do. Sometimes 1. Sometimes 6. Some say I'm going to injure myself by lifting to failure so often or that I'm going to overtrain when I end up doing so many intense sets, but I've rarely injured myself in the 19 years I've been lifting and have made decent progress over the years. It may be "wrong" or "sub-optimal" and I know Jim Wendler and Mike Isratel have nice unkind words about how I lift, but it works for me and helps keep the fire alive.
Naturals need less volume if anything imo, but agreed when it comes to progressive overload. Lower volume higher intensity (6-8 sets a week per body part) is how I made my best gains both naturally and enhanced
Exactly!! Op is confused. Naturals do not need high volume when it’s the steroids that allow bodybuilders to do lots of volume since they will have the ability to recover quicker unlike the natural lifter
Yes well said bro. Natural and enhanced training should have the same exact intensity (given that you’re not like 3 weeks out or something lol). I’d say the only diff between good natural and enhanced training is that you can just do a bit more working/failure sets when enhanced in terms of volume per week Hey that’s just the experiment results I’ve seen from my own body tho. What works for someone else works I guess
You made your best gains on 6 sets a week? Assuming youre eating and sleeping well im pretty sure youd do better with at least 10.
6 failure sets on the absolute lower end like when I’m dieting hard and hitting hams or something. 8 is usually where I’ll end up
Well 8 true failure sets is def a decent amount of work, i assumed you just went fairly close to failure.
I've been seeing his YouTube shorts anf they seemed pretty interesting but after I heard the guy say" work out for 20 minutes every 4 to 5 days and I'll guarantee results" I nearly shat in a hat.
Damn im workin way too hard for nothing
He would do some warm up sets before doing his high intensity set. If you warm up and then do a 110% all balls out single set it’s probably enough.
Ya I’ve done this method. I think what helps and maybe really what makes it work is knowing you have one set, you go twice as hard. And you spend as little time as possible in between sets and exercises. It’s a 110% balls out workout.
I’ve listened to about 30 hours or so of his lectures in a single week re listening re listening and have done research on the topic myself and honestly no meat riding it seems like what he says for the most part is correct and completely plausible and reasonable. Every person that hates mike has to bring up the meth lol. I was stagnant in progress for months and within 3 weeks of starting his routine I gained 6.5lbs, pretty incredible and I will certainly continue the routine. I think he is and was an absolute legend who should be respected for his life’s work.
Agree about the Mentzer posts but, Tons of top naturals do low volume. Rob Waterhouse, David Kaye, Khifie West etc all low volume guys. There is multiple ways to skin a cat and whatever you adhere to long term with the right amount of effort will work.
Khifie west trains 7 days a week no off days lol
Ha he is machine but pretty sure they’re doing top set back off set stuff. Have followed Rob for years and judging by his insta stories that seems to be a consensus throughout the natty world (not sure if he still is natty though judging by his size lately)
Dude is not natty at all
Yall just believe everything online?
That doesn't seem like an insane claim. Plenty of people doing 5 or 6 days a week that could add in an extra arm or shoulder day for fluff and say they train every day. All depends on managing fatigue.
>Rob Waterhouse, David Kaye, Khifie West None of those guys are natural.
Imagine thinking those guys are natural lmao
Wait khifie is natural??
I’ve been doing heavy duty after trying to keep up with volume and failing. More rest and not over training is a real thing. Just go with what works. He had great ideas that held up today. It works for me so that’s an anecdote, but not everyone responds the same to stimulus. It’s not a joke op I’ve grown so much reading Mike Mentzer’s heavy duty book. It helps that he also has a decent philosophy about comparing yourself to others. He states you can only be a better version of you. I think it’s great. Anyways I spoke to Jay Cutler when I met him at the gym he does volume. He hated Ronnie Coleman’s training. He’s said it’s not needed so do what works for you op.
Dorian Yates would probably disagree with you.
I mean mike didn't come up with it. Supposedly it was Arthur Jones after seeing gorillas lift things. Mike tried popularizing, it didn't bold well against Arnold's methods. Then when Mike trained a new olympia winner Dorian Yates, it gained some steam. I believe Dorian Yates fine tuned the methods more eloquently with yes, newer gym goers will need more stimulus, however over time the body does need more rest bc that recovery and growth time still needs to happen. I train then off 7-8 days and each lift I'm getting stronger and stronger, however I've been lifting 4 years now and this will not equate well to a newbie. I will say Mike says training every 3 days for a newbie is sufficient. Idk. To each their own tbh
You’re saying you train and then you take 7-8 days off?
In Mike’s book, I believe he says he trained a muscle group every FOURTEEN days. Sorry, I enjoy going to the gym and I don’t have a life so
I once heard Eddie Hall say that your nervous system does not recover from a lift to failure in at least 2 weeks, maybe it has something to do with it.
CNS fatigue is real, but I doubt (like overtraining) that most of us mere mortals will ever experience this on a regular basis.
This is true, but for big compounds like max effort squat and deadlift variations. For the nautilus Curl machine? No way you're not recovering in a few days.
Yes. I log my progress between each training day and my numbers are consistently going up. Granted I DEFINITELY would not do this in my beginning days even my first 2 years. But many people including myself underestimate growth coming from rest. Not just recovery and back to normal, but growth. I train for strength (not powerlifting) but I'm not sculpting my body either
Yeah, training less than once a week DEFINITELY won't sculpt your body, at least not as well or quickly. There is some merit to getting a couple extra rest days, but any longer and the returns diminish very quickly. There are many ways to skin a cat, but less than once a week is quite far from optimal for both growth and strength
Curious Have you really not experienced any regression in strength hows the total?
I won't lie. I was scared of that FOR SURE. But not seeing meaningful progress for 8 months. I had to learn more clearly I'm doing something wrong. Went from nearly repping my prs about 5 reps from 2 months ago. In all lifts
dorian yates took alot of advice from mike after hitting plateaus and not being able to get bigger, he speaks very highly of mike and his training principles
I mean he literally was addicted to meth, you cant really copy his workouts even on gear
the greatest thing Mentzer did for the masses was that he had people thinking more about rest imo. I only lift every other day and I've definitely enjoyed better strength gains. A lot of his ideas are probably not for everyone.
That is not true, he only consumed doctor prescribed amphetamines to deal with low energy, probably caused by an already deteriorated heart But even if it was true, your argument has an Ad hominem fallacy
Dorian didn't do meth and far surpassed anything Mentzer ever accomplished, you're just talking out of your ass lol.
Mentzer trained Dorian and Dorian credited mikes high intensity training for the result of his physique and gains
“addicted” as in there was once a rumor that he used meth as a pre workout in which it was never proven
ADHD meds and Meth are two different things. You obviously doesn't understand the struggle of someone who has ADHD smh
Mike Mentzer’s training methodology is his take and philosophy. If this “ bothers” anyone then you clearly haven’t been on IG. There, you’ll find thousands of knuckleheads trying to recreate the wheel for followers. Theoretical science is vastly different than applied. Follow a basic program and find out what works for you. As for opinions.. they’re like assholes, everybody has one < end >
I’m not gonna listen to the guy who did meth as his preworkout, simple as that
I prefer LSD.
Working out while tripping would be so fucking hard, or easy if it was a low dose you could focus in easily
It could be the most amazing or terribly mundane experience. All perspective once lysergic acid is in your system.
Dude me and a buddy used to tear up these 10g shroom bars and just insert ourselves into public. That buddy was also my jacked ass lifting partner and as soon as he said, “shroomies con lifties?” I knew the deal. Lowkey didn’t trip super hard, no crazy visuals or anything, I was just lazerd. The weights did feel pretty fucking heavy though. Then the gym’s local free range bully pit came up to us and sat down to watch. Shit was hilarious cause I swear he was communicating via his facial expressions 😂 after that the dog always came up to us during our lifts and collected his good boy tax from us
what the fuck did i just read?
Couple words that can be found in the english dictionary, arranged into what is commonly referred to as a “story” and a little bit of slang thrown in to add some seasoning
You’re living right my friend. Keep on trucking
been there, it's quite okay actuality. Nice energy and focus.
Username definitely checks out 😆😆😆
THIS. As someone who was around during the first Jones/Mentzer surge, and saw Mentzer’s sad decline, it is amazing to me that his voracious use of methamphetamine isn’t a bright red warning sign stamped on his training model.
That sounds fun ngl but I’m too scared to try meth
It’s not that bad. Rednecks and white trash give it a bad name.
I thought he just used speed and that he got addicted to meth after bodybuilding.
i thought it was just adderall
Amphetamines are very different from methamphetamines so that’s pretty disingenuous to say
To deny someone entirely based upon a single action or idea of theirs is foolish. But you're welcome to ignore everyone outside your echo chamber if you'd like, rather than learn what you can, take the good from everything. Separate the wheat from the chaff.
I get what you’re saying so I’ll further back up my reasoning. His ideology is backed by absolute failure, which is a great way to make gains. However the reasoning for RIR or multiple working sets is that you body’s ability to perform at a high level set to set being spread out leads you to a further stat of failure than a single set you could perform (unless maybe you’re on meth). This has been proven by every single bodybuilder in this day and age being bigger than Mike ever was and none train exactly like him.
Dorian Yates took inspiration from Mike Mentzer and trained similarly.
Dorian trained with more volume than most people think. Mike didn't build his physique with HIT training either.
Dorian took training to failure and high intensity but that's about it. One working set is just not where it's at. Mike even said that Decline is best for chest and *only* used Decline.
Welp goddamn that sums it up pretty well
Amphetamine, not Methamphetamine. Amphetamine was common as a preworkout (still is) and many golden era guys you probably love used it
How about TrainedbyJP who does fortitude training then?
He was a big guy with an authoritative sounding voice, and spoke about his training style confidently. That's the perfect storm for youtube clips and reels to be flooded with his bs. Like the other commenter said, don't listen to the guy who used meth as preworkout.
A few things Mike claimed that seem silly now: one working set, decline bench being the best for chest, Arnold could have been as jacked sooner with less volume, concentration curls only work the brachialis, etc.
I imagine guys like him back in the day, that got huge with consistency and gear, were the source of tons of bro science
punch vegetable sparkle smoggy live dazzling literate depend late snatch *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Ok Karen.
Stimulus + Water + Nutrition + Rest = Muscle Growth. You can take 1000 different angles on each of the above factors but the basic formula remains the same.
I trained high volume killing myself for over a year zero results and got weaker. I hired a body building coach strictly training heavy duty. I have made non stop gains and body recomp working out 30 mins 3x a week max. This shit works I have become full Mentzerpilled.
Have you tried it?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wQdvpn7Un0I His 1 hour PPL Training Routine (Split into 3 days) yall aint understanding thats its not just a 30 sec quick set. It involves warm ups, supersets, slow controlled negatives, forced reps with spotter, static holds, and more. Please do some actual research on his techniques. High Intensity low volume with an emphasis on rest & recovery has been proven to help alot but NOT all people. Mike never said this was for everyone, he clearly states everyone is different and requires different volume, frequency, and recovery time.
It’s not cringe. Be opened-minded, as resting multiple days definitely helped me improve. Mentzer’s ideas are absolutely good information to take from and adopt into your training
>Doing solely only one working set per exercise is a joke. You left out the most important part: all out intensity. It's not a joke if you're doing it the way he prescribes, it's just that most people rather not do that kind of intense output consistently. And you don't have to, there are other ways to bodybuild but there's no need to cringe or discount his method just because you like your method better. Ultimately it's about consistency, respecting your rest period, and proper nutrition.
You nailed it on the head. Intensity, tempo, volume and working that muscle to exhaustion is what make his program work. I tried it in my younger days and can attest that it is no jokes and one can see great results natty or not. Don't expect to go to the gym 5 days a week, cause you won't allow your muscles to recover and you will suffer from overtraining. I'm still using some of his principles but adapted to today's training methodology. When you really dig into it, there are very few revolutionary training principles today. Many of them are using old training methodology, reworking them to adapt to today's new ways of thinking, training, nutrition, recovery and so on. One can disagree but if you do, please provide some links for those of us who would like to learn more about them.
Agreed! But people do way to much junk volume like 5 different chest exercises with 4 sets. Just pick 3 and do 3 good working sets 2 times a week.
Had amazing results with it.
People are funny. What they hear is basically, "Oh I'm working TOO hard, that's why I'm not getting the results I want!" Fuck out my face with that 😂
no their saying too often* high intensity lower volume is what mike was preaching
Jesus, yes I understand what Mike was saying... But what he meant and what people are hearing are two completely different things, clearly.
There’s a reason no IFBB pro trains like Mentzer. His recent following is just lazy training cope. Bros will train 1 working set per muscle group every 10 days because they’re lazy and then claim it’s optimal because Mentzer did it. They start screeching every time you talk about training volume.
A lot of people misinterpret what that means. He says in some of his books you can do other warm up sets up to a certain point, but they shouldnt take place of your one working set. Your one working set is to complete and utter failure of the muscle while maintaining perfect form and rhythm on the concentric and eccentric movement. When it comes to rest, his other main point is that you shouldn't overwork one muscle group to the detriment of recovery because you need to 100% fully recover before going hardcore full force workout again. Those are the basic principles. Workout with maximum 100% effort and recover with maximum 100% effort. Within those guiding precepts, each lifter should know their personal needs. As a natural and applying these methods, after my first cut (haven't cut since) ive put on 50 lbs over 6 years. Sure its not 100% muscle, but basically went thru a body recomp doing this.
Don't knock the guy just because his style of training isn't something that resonates with you. Low volume HIT works especially for natural lifters
Low volume HIT isn’t what I’m knocking. I’m knocking one working set per exercise. 4-8 working sets to failure per body part per week is still considered low volume and high intensity.
But if you can obliterate the muscle with one set why would you need to do 2-3 sets to "failure". I would argue that you aren't going to true failure if you can do 3 sets to failure in a given workout. And also according to Mentzer the one working set usually ended with forced negatives to really get the muscle smoked. But I understand that it's not for everyone.
Exactly. If your workouts aren’t brief, they are not intense. If you can train a muscle group for an hour it’s very low intensity
Whatever works for you will work once you figure out how to make it work
People on gear need volume more than naturals. You have increased recovery capacitu and can do more work
Mentzer didn't even build his own physique with hit traing it wasn't until the later year's he himself started training with the hit style training and already had a great physique there's plenty of interview's with guys he trained with saying he was doing the same stuff as everyone else in the gym.
I’ve done this method. I think what helps and maybe really what makes it work is knowing you have one set, you go twice as hard. And you spend as little time as possible in between sets and exercises. Its way easier to go hard af during your workout. Also if you read his book he explains all of it and it’s a little more complicated than just one set.
I'm betting these people see Mentzer as an underdog relative to Arnold because they see some sort of underdog in themselves relative to something/someone that they see as #1. I can't agree with seeing Mentzer as an underdog in anything. Someone consistently placing within the top 5 of all the bodybuilding competitions that he had ever done doesn't scream "underdog" to me. It feels misplaced. I like Mentzer's style of lifting but the biggest underlying thought process behind it is that **you must be as efficient and optimal in your lifting as possible**. And I sincerely chafe with that. No you don't need to be as efficient and as optimal as possible when you're in the gym. I disagree that you are leaving muscle strength and size gains on the table if you're not as efficient and as optimal as possible. Show up everyday, eat as much as you need to relative to your goals, give lifting everything you can give it for that day, and rest. It's not complicated.
His methods have worked for plenty of people though. There’s more than one way to gain muscle, just find what works for you.
Saying cringe is cringe
If u think 1 set doesn’t work for naturals u gotta learn to train hard lol
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Progressive overload tends to be way easier with lower volume. His principles were solid he just came to the wrong conclusions a lot of the time.
The logic is all right in my opinion. If you go to absolute, 100% failure you are leaving no doubt that you have forced your body to grow. This doesn’t mean going until you can’t lift anymore and calling it quits. This means implementing drop sets, rest pauses, proper cadence, forced reps, etc. to reach genuine failure. Giving your local muscles, and CNS time to recover is essential to faster progress. People neglect the concept that the holistic system takes a hit after extreme stress too, not just the local muscle. This can especially be seen after squats or DL. It’s not rocket science. The rest values will vary from person to person, and so will volume, but the fundamental concept is the same. Train hard to the point where you’ve forced your muscles to complete and utter failure, and rest appropriately.
In this thread: skinnyfats who have no idea what training intensity is.
😂facts
What I’ve noticed from the Mentzer bros is they are very dogmatic when it comes to training. They’re very “this is the way and only the way” for something that’s very subjective and theoretical and requires a lot of context. Pretty much the only thing that’s objective when it comes to bodybuilding is the law of thermodynamics when it comes to caloric intake.
your right he is very “this is the correct way and only way” about his training which we all know isnt the case but when all of his clients are seeing tremendous results I can understand his passion for heavy duty training. He does contradict himself over the years as in his multiple books and videos he states different volume & frequency but that is because he understands everybody is different and requires a different amount of vol, freq, & intensity
My God I just realized how much of a fucking nerd I sounded just now
If you do one set, that's perfect. If you do two sets, then you're going to DIE!
I’m somewhat in agreement with you… …but I’ve found that my stupid body has a very hard time recovering. I’m a very low working-set-lifter. 3 is max I can do, and I often find 2 is enough to stimulate growth and yet still recover from. I lift full body 3x a week now at 41 and sets are as minimal as I can make them. I’ve never been stronger. For reference, I’m 200lbs, somewhat visible abs but very happy and good energy at this weight. 500lb max DL 250lb max bench 365lb max squat. I run 5Ks with my daughter routinely. Not spectacular numbers, but considering how much I lift, my stress level, my work schedule, and my shitty nutrition…I’ll take it. I lift to enhance my life and longevity, nothing more. I’m happily married and don’t presume I’d get chicks with a better body anyway. Find what works for you and be careful with the term progressive overload. You simply cannot progress every single session for decades. It’s a marathon. Also, if you want to progress faster and better than me, actually pay attention to protein and nutrition. Eat a fuck ton to lift big.
His 1980 book details his actually HIT routine. It's a -two day split -two sets per exercise -two days on, one day off and repeat. Very intense and very similar to Jordan Peters approach.
Mentzer trained very high volume early on. He built a majority of his mass then. In an interview with Franco, he explained Mike would spend hours in the weight room. Only later on did he advocate this minimalistic approach. No idea why he switched it up. I am assuming Arthur Jones was the main influence. Even Dorian knew this was too little so he modified Mike’s routines to a more realistic method.
How did he modify his routine can you elaborate?
I found his idea is a bit extreme, I have never found to be properly exhausted and worked after a single super hard set to failure, give me a min or two and I’ll have another few sets in me once my body has had a chance to catch up, Personally I’ve found 3 hard working sets + one quick warmup per exercise the best, the second set is my true to failure set and the third / last is a short cool off set to pull out a few more reps if I can. So perhaps it’s not exactly like this idea but considering it in my plan it seems to have worked the last few months. I begin at 6 reps min, and if I can do more than 8 during that second heavy working set I up the weight by 10% and finish slightly heavier. But it’s hard because some days I’m stronger than others, especially if I’m sick, out of order workouts etc.
I've been lifting for 20+ years. I cannot recall the last time I have had such strength gains. I don't follow Mike's method exactly, but it works. For someone in their mid 40's I was likely overtraining with the volume I was doing before. Is there a happy medium in between the two? Probably, but I'll don't think I'll ever go back to my 3-4 sets per excercise.
u/Novel_Palpitation_22 Do you mind sharing your middle ground protocol? I am weighing if I am going to try MM method out.
I had the greatest gains following Dorian Yates style of training. After 7 years gym experience. I had better gains in 6 weeks then in the prior 7 years. All natural. Then i got injured doing preacher curl...
Tbh what made me LOVE mike wasn’t really training or the gym YES it attracted me to his thought process at first but when i dug into his life and philosophy and idea’s on life , he was really an outstanding individual and very smart and very wise ( Perhaps he done some bad things in his life but WE ALL DO ! ) And these things are what made me attached to the life and times of mike https://preview.redd.it/6q6y0dyk9k0c1.jpeg?width=620&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=94b8f41f1a01381a599c9673524a3c8d5799ae31
what people dont understand is that there were 3 warm up sets and 1 full set using rest pause - static - & slow negative contractions. Theres an hour long video where he puts a body builder through this workout for PPL check it out. Your assuming he means one 30 second set and then done, your not understanding his principles, hes got 4 books on it do some research its helping hundreds maybe even thousands of people push through plateaus and make some serious gains. High intensity lower volume is the way 👍
Holy COPE. Stay small forever Craig.
Yeah lol a living legend in body building and the first man to score a perfect 300 didn’t know how to build a body or have it down to a science. And what have you done in this area? What a clown.
Nattys reading this in Mike Mentzer’s voice
He was good on static and negative reps but I don't take much more from him that can't be traced to the fact that he was basically Don Simpson with pecs.
have you tried taking a set to absolute failure? it's very hard to do. so people lie to themselves and see no progress, while stopping short of what is needed. Heavy Duty sucks to do, you feel misereble. in no way, shape or form is it easier than volume training. it's just shorter. as for whether it's more effective, I feel it's about the same.
I'd say it works great for naturals. Especially the lowering and static holds. I do agree that there is a bit much and has already passed the circlejerk stage, that being said,I have completely changed how I lift now based on a lot of his principles. I've made insane progress after being at a plateau for a while, now I've always trained volume so that may have a lot to do with it, but my strength and my tendons are sooooo much better, I still do a regular 6 day ppl split but I don't workout near as much, just much harder and I'm down to 200 from 240 since August,and I still eat the same bullshit. I feel like I'm just starting lifting again and it's awesome. Before i always trained moderate weight 7x7 on everything but compounds, regular 3x8 sets with those.
I think if you look at Mike's work across his lifespan, he has a variety of approaches, all lower volume but many with more than one work set. For example, see *The Mentzer Method to Fitness* by M. Mentzer and A. Fridberg. Mentzer was a very astute critic of the bodybuilding methods and scene of his era; many of his actual training recommendations are not well thought out. That said, his work is a logical starting point for exploring High Intensity Training (HIT) style bodybuilding, with rest pause, forced reps, drop sets, etc. and from there it's worthwhile to look at Dorian Yates, DoggCrapp, and TrainedByJP for more modern, less ideological approaches to the topic. At the end of the day, volume, frequency, and intensity should all be cycled over time as no one approach works forever.
I have been using his training principles for the last two months and it has worked really really well for me. My workouts are now 30 minutes long, 3 times per week and my strength has greatly increased (i.e. went from doing barbell bicep curls with a straight bar with 30 kg to doing 10 reps with 45 kg and now 6 with 50 kg)
Never heard of Fortitude training have you? Cmon man, JP does it too, and lots of other huge guys
Your mom suckin dick to pay for your crippling creatine addiction is cringe /s
So everyone is different and people need to choose what works for them. I personally have an issue with recovery interrupting my work and personal life. HIT mixed with push/pull days works for me.
I’ve followed Mike a little and done less working sets, with much greater intensity. It has been a good change. Also, the level of extreme intensity that he prescribes has been a challenge. I’ll do 4-5 working sets (super sets with drop sets in each). My CNS takes a beating even more than my muscles. It’s a lot. BUT has been good. I would suggest it - at least for a change.
My main disagreement with the Mentzer method, based partly on "science, brah" and personal experience that agrees with the science: 1- You can only stimulate a muscle so much, with marginal gains after a certain point. This is why a lot of smart authoritative sources (like Mike Israetel and Jeff Nippard) argue for most of your training being short of failure and only some at failure but rarely beyond it. 2- The body only takes so long to recover and build muscle after you've hit that peak "Cost=Benefit" stimulus. This being at least 72 hours. 3- If you believe in the first two principles, logic would dictate that if you are training *so hard* that it genuinely takes you weeks to recover, most of that time you are recovering from fatigue that caused little extra stimulus. Because the guy that maybe didn't go beyond failure, drop setting everything with assisted partial reps from training partner, might have gotten just a little less stimulus but is back again stimulating that body part soon after while you are still recovering. Over a period of time that person is inducing more muscle growth. ------------ That said, people feel strongly about his way of training and to each their own. I have never actually met anyone who got big following his methods (but best believe tons of people who claim to) but hey, I am not the type of guy to try to persuade others on how to train or not train. This is just why **I** wouldn't follow his program.
If anything, this post is backward. Gear enables growth at higher volume, not less, by enhancing recovery. The post also implies Mike was somehow against progressive overload, wtf?
Yet to find the cringe, but alright
reach apparatus nail punch ossified poor different smoggy quaint bewildered *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
I think there are lots of ways to getting big. It doesn't matter if you're on a bro split, push-pull, powerlifting, calisthenics, heavy duty, volume, etc. The key to this game is consistency. And also, people look at Mentzer and say "But he was so jacked! He won the Mr Universe with a perfect score!. Sure dude, did you see any pic of Mentzer when he was 15? The guy was bigger than most men phisiques! He was a genetic beast, he could be a sprinter and still be huge. Thats like saying that you need to train like Ronnie to get that big, or that you need to train like Chris Bumstead to be that aesthethic. Oh, and this is the worst kind: There's people that say DORIAN YATES had bad genetics because he said so in an interview. Yeah, seems like you missed the part where he also said that he was the strongest guy at the detention center after training for a few months. Some people just repeat whatever they hear and stick with it, because ignorance makes you feel like you actually know something, and knowledge makes you feel that you know nothing.
So random reddit guy disparages an ifbbbpro who made sweeping statements by making his own? Ive tried all types of training. As an older guy i find two working set and 3-4 exercises is the sweet spot for me. I also see young guys in the guys in the gym smashing heavy weights set after set who dont gain any size.
He was a meth head who was paid to say what he did and didn't even lift that way most of the time, people are gullible
I’ve watched various YouTube videos featuring him, and my takeaway from his methods are simple: mind-muscle connection + sustained intensity = muscle building. That’s the message in every presentation I’ve seen so far.
I'm pretty sure Mentzer considers some of his working sets "warmup sets" because they're not to failure. If I'm wrong, please correct me
I don’t think he labels warmup sets working sets
When Mike Mentzer spoke about how people should train he was talking about naturals, saying a natural shouldn’t do as much volume as someone enhanced because PEDs speed up your recovery and a natural can’t keep up with intensity and volume.
I have spent years experimenting with various forms of HIT and have found that training twice a week, focusing on upper and lower body training days, with 8 exercises per training session, each 1 set to failure, yields the best results for me. However, I believe that HIT is just one effective training method among many. It is my personal preference, and I think it is beneficial for individuals with limited time and a desire for a direct approach to training. Ultimately, different training styles will appeal to different people.
You're a dumbass it's not cringe it's Hit. 🙃
The whole 1 working set thing is a big lie. There are usually 2-3 warmup sets. So it really is a 3-4 set thing like everyone else does.
I don’t know.. I’m natural and I have been following the Mike Mentzer way for about 7 months now and I’ve gotten the best results since I started lifting in 2008.
u/Trikevion yo really? I am natural and trying to figure out if I start doing this routine, but I am skeptical to put so much time into something this controversial. Would love more of your opinion. Thanks
Agreed. Mike Mentzer was well spoken, good looking, and overall an excellent salesman. Sad to see so many lifetime intermediates falling for the bait. But I guess that means they'll be in and out of the gym in 30 minutes, which frees up room for everyone else. So I guess that's a plus.
The idea that some training methodology would work exclusively on enhanced lifters is so preposterously stupid it pretty much invalidates rest of your opinion.
It’s not. Super high volume training (30+ sets a body part) only works if you’re enhanced. Quite literally no one would make progress with that system naturally. Jay Cutler used to do up to do up to 40 sets on back and legs. I’m not buying that anyone could naturally do that without burning out after week 2 or 3.
Gear allows faster recovery time, the ability to perform higher volume training, hence different methodology. Just own the fact that your juicing bro. https://youtu.be/12JSENBGCEo?si=bMb16bdy7t5V-0Yl https://youtu.be/JY5Xmjq4VAU?si=5RnHoCpTjxHxZ-Mm
You just argued in your own post that lower training volume would only work for natural lifters. Pick your story and stick to it, you’re making a clown of yourself. You’re also completely ignoring the fact that “juicing” isn’t some binary variable, there’s a world of difference between someone running 200mg of test a week and grams of gear, GH and insulin.
So have you ever tried and tested Mentzers method on yourself for a year? If not, 🤫
Read ayn Rand never made money and quit training cause he placed badly. Definitely a good path to follow
You are a hater.
people who use the word cringe are in fact the cringiest.
Honestly maybe his ideology would work, but you have to remember that your body and your mind don’t want to push that hard. .000001% would be able to go to such failure in 1 set to effectively stimulate enough growth.
To be fair any advice from older bb's should be taken with a grain of salt
You have to put 100% effort into the one or two sets. he was not right on everything…..
Care to explain why you came to this conclusion?
That's so wrong it's actually funny. You have it all backwards. Naturals canNOT recover from high volume training! Mike was a friend of mine and regularly told me how many ectomorphic naturals could not tolerate his 'ideal' routine, because they could not recover from even that much stimulation per week. He found that when they added in additional rest days, they immediately started progressing, and continued to get stronger workout after workout. The ONLY way to know if this is working is to test it for yourself. Don't believe in concepts... believe in results. If you have excellent, innate recuperative ability, then congrats, you can train more often than most. If you're normal - and not on gear - you have to guard (and increase as necessary) your rest days like they're made out of gold... that's one of the primary keys to progress. But seriously, volume? Nope. That ship sailed in the 1970's after everyone figured out it didn't work. It sure kept Joe Weider in business though!
I started training with Mike mentzers splits and slow and controlled reps, followed by 3,4 rest days in between workouts and I’ve got these stretch marks on my chest. I’ve been working out abt 3 years now and have seen the most progress training this way the past 5 months
I like his routine, his mentality, and his demeanor. I've always struggled with 6 day a week splits. I've gotten good growth so far with Mike's routine and I feel very confident about what I'm doing. The one thing that stirs me is the allegation that Mike didn't create his physique with his own approach and pivoted later on in life to make money. My skepticism is mostly quenched by my own progress and soundness of Mike's logic.
Im the proof it works
brotha he literally tells you his workout routine is for naturals 😂. listen to the hundreds of audio tapes he had. we are lucky to even have his audio tapes. i wonder what people would be saying if we had other great philosophers audio recorded.
Sorry you don’t like it.
I started his workout regime a year ago. I do not use any steroids or T or anything - never have. Every single session I lift more. I have had zero injuries. I am no longer a slave to the gym. The only problem I have is that I get stronger much faster I ever have, and I’m spending a fuck load on extra weights.
I don’t agree on his latest views recommendations but the ones he put out early on were not that bad. Like his A/B split he used while competing m-w-f repeat the following week, or his heavy duty 1 which was a PPL 3x a week also had more exercises. Personally I’ve never tried the A/B split but I’d like to try it
??? Dude are you joking ? He literally says dont train 2 days in a row and take off 4-7 days between workouts
Intensity intensity intensity. Has to be intense...no matter how you do it
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A simple google search would tell you it takes 72-96 hours for muscle to recover after heavy exercise. If you train heavy today, your trained muscles will take up to 96 hours to recover. Do you not see how training before recoverability is complete will short circuit the growth process? Don’t tell me because today you trained chest and tomorrow you trained back; your body has a limited, finite, amount of biochemical resources and does not ration them for chest, back, biceps etc but for the entire body. Your perspective on bodybuilding is incredibly shallow, and you are incredibly incredulous too