My first mass workout: lessons from the good old, bad old days

Flex, Dec, 2003 by Chris Cormier

* Hardly anyone supinated their curls. Bodybuilders held their dumbbells level, in order to maintain a twisting contraction on the biceps. Supination interrupts that contraction.

* Robby Robinson and Gary Strydom taught me to keep my index finger and thumb flush against the inside plate of the dumbbell as I press and to keep my pinkie and outside of my palm against the inside plate as I curl, again for more exaggerated stress on the muscle.

* For triceps, I did close-grip benches and still do, even though it's another forgotten exercise. It's also good for front delts, which makes it ideal for arms/shoulders day.

SECTION 2

THE BAD OLD DAYS

* I had no workout, per se. I lifted only to see how strong I could get. My gym sessions were not designed with progressive and balanced exercises, sets and reps. Instead, they were overloaded with one strength exercise for each bodypart.

* I trained for strength, but my workouts weren't grueling in a hardcore bodybuilding sense. Muscles were not burned to failure, nor even pumped. I did not push any bodypart to fatigue. For my first couple of competitions, my precontest leg workout was three sets of leg extensions for two weeks. Little did I know.

* I worked the weight, not the muscle, and there was no systematic pyramiding. Mind-muscle connection? What was that?

* Cheating, jerking and throwing the weight around were standard practice. Had I continued that style, I wouldn't be bodybuilding today--I'd be crippled.

* My marquee muscles--arms and abs--were prioritized at the expense of the rest of my physique, so I had to spend years of heavy compensatory work to bring my back, chest, shoulders and legs into balance. By building only my showoff muscles, I only showed off my deficiencies.

* Every time I trained a bodypart, I worked the same muscles in the same order with the same exercises. By being too consistent, muscles trained at the tail end of my workout fell consistently behind.

* I did not know the difference between "getting" reps and "doing" reps. "Getting" reps means you are concerned only with counting them. "Doing" reps means you are concentrating on getting as much as possible out of each muscle.

* As a callow youth, I did not realize that bodybuilding was nutritional and intellectual as well as physical. I thought all I had to do was lift heavy and I'd grow. Not true. We need hard training, good eating and the knowledge to synergize them into muscle growth.

SECTION 3

THE G00D NEW DAYS

* Priority training is paramount. I mix up my exercises to keep all bodyparts in balance, and I use everything: free weights, machines and cables.

* To get the most out of every workout, I now train instinctively, which means that not only are my exercises chosen according to what's needed at the moment, but my schedule is flexible, as well. Normally, I work my whole body over four consecutive days, then take one day off, but sometimes I can keep it going for two weeks before I take a break.

* Every bodypart is frequently shocked with different exercises and rep schemes, some for bulk, others for separation.