Mike Mentzer Science/training

I have the video of that contest. Arnold was probably still good enough to win although his legs were short of standard.

Doctor Morbius said:

Agreed. But back then bodybuilders just trained by the seat of their pants. There wasn't any good science to speak of. Most just copied the "successful" champs, which back then was Arnie. The only good thing about pyramiding was that it may have lessened the chance of injury because of all the warm up sets. But yes it was a waste of energy and time and wasn't what we would call optimal training by today's standards.

I certainly never could. Even when I was a young guy in my teens and early 20's I could never make gains training more than about 4 days per week. Most of us were doing about 10 sets per bodypart on the pyramid scheme back then too. We didn't know any better. About the only thing we did right back in the early 80's was to incorporate heavy and light workouts into our 4 day/week split.

Arnie should never have been in that contest. He didn't register in time. Just because you're politically connected doesn't mean you should be able to pull strings and bend the rules. I lost a lot of respect for Arnie over that. He was hands down my favorite until then. Mentzer had every right to have been [censored] over Arnie being able to compete in that one.

Something that you may find of interest though, is that it has been reported that Arnie trained for a ridiculously short period of time for that contest. I seem to recall it was something like 8 weeks or some such thing.

I met some of these old-timers such as Robby Robinson and Bertil Fox back in the eighties. I recall Robby was wearing a tracksuit when I was talking to him and didn't look so big in clothes.
I had a friend who saw Mike Mentzer and Arnold in person and he said Arnold didn't look so big at all till he pumped up and, then, when he pumped up, yes, he was really huge.
Mike struck this friend of mine as looking like a huge fat f***k (his words not mine) but it was all solid muscle so the guy really was huge and so was Ray.
Mike's conversion to Arthur Jones training came about when he was doing the old 20 sets per body part with split routines but not gaining. He then met Arthur Jones, reduced his sets, investigated the science of high intensity training and he was sold. He made huge gains. He then promoted his (and Jone's system) and, as I recall, pointed out that bodybuilders like Arnold were getting away with overtraining mainly due to steroid use.
I wouldn't go so far as copying Mike's old 4 sets per bodypart (with forced reps) routine to the letter but, yes, I confess I'm becoming interested in neo-Mentzerism. I've been doing losts of experimentation of my own and I figure a 12 pound muscle gain over just a few weeks is pretty amazing for a seasoned trainer. This isn't recuperated muscle but fresh muscle.
I confess I just got back from another session today where I did two sets of squats with very high reps to positive failure. I did just 3 sets of bench and 2 - 3 sets for other muscle groups.
I got back home cooked. My arms are getting huge and I'm not even training them directly.

Doctor Morbius said:

Yeah, Platz was the man. I realized that bodybuilding contests were rigged when he didn't win the 1981 Olympia hands down. Although Franco was probably in the best shape of his life at the time he still didn't compare to Platz. Franco also had a smallish leg from his accident in the WSM contest and a [censored] [censored]. He never should have won. Doubtful he was even top 5 material.

Something for all reading this thread to keep in mind, back in the 70's when 20 sets per bodypart was the popular method, they often did pyramid sets. Although they did a total of 20 sets, they often did 4 exercises of 5 sets each exercise where the first 2 to 3 sets for each exercise were more of a warmup. That would reduce the total "work sets" to between 8 to 12.

Also during the off-season many bodybuilders would only do 10 to 12 sets per bodypart until contest time was getting close and they were juicing. I believe that's what TiMan is alluding to in Platz' more sane approach in his course booklet.

P.S. I also believe much of Mentzer's physique was due to juicing just like everyone else's at the time. Mentzer had a reputation for being out of shape much of the time.

I'm no stranger to steroids. I was offered them on many occasions but never took them. For one thing, I know you can make terrific gains without drugs. When I was training in Russia, there were loads of stacks of drugs being used by the sportsmen.
I confess you can't compete professionally without them but you can make huge advances without drugs. I know people who were benching over 400 pounds without steroids.

TiMan said:

Platz's training wasn't even close to Mentzer bro. Mentzer liked Platz as a person and admired how hard Platz would work BUT Platz would do MANY sets more per body part than Mentzer. He also worked out 6 days a week. He could do this because of genetics and drug use. You can train almost any way you like IF you use enough juice.

Funny though...I have Platz's course booklets from 1980. In it he recommends a much more sane training methodology for all but the pro....this is a traditonal 4 day split working on the basic compound movement swith few "working" sets.

Platz was/is a smart guy and he damn well knows that you cannot train like he once did and most pro's do know without tons of juice.....[censored] bro now they even take INSULIN after working out and after a big feed!!!

By the way by casual Casey Viator, former 70's and early 80's BIG pro and Mentzer traing partner, trains in HIT fashion down in Florida.
He never forgot his Jones days. He lets many of his clients train in a more conventional way ie: higher sets and more days in the gym, because they will not train HIT because it's too tough.

Carrera, a few comments about your comments 🙂

Your buddy must have been on drugs when he saw Arny, unless it was well after 1980. From 74 through 78 Arny was huge...a freak compaired to everyone except Sergio, Mentzer and maybe Bertil Fox and Dave Johns.

I have done steroid bro and I can tell you that you can train any bloody way yo like and still make great gains.

You can make good gains without gear and get pretty big bro but t takes a hell of a long time and WAY longer than the 2-3 years that both Mentzer and Jones speculated. My educated guess is that you won't reach your natural maximum weight/size unless you have been training hard for at least 10 years.
Once you are at your "natural max", or the weight and size that your own levels of testosterone and GH can maintain, then you are done growing. Steroids can take you WELL beyond this natural max....the average man of about 5'10" can reach a solid and quite lean(not ripped) 190-200 pounds...with steroids you can add at least another 30-40 pounds to that.
The typical man can work his way up to a 300 pound bench, 400 squat and 500 dead. A gifted natural man that is a larged boned endomorph or pure mesomorth might be luck enough to add 100 pounds to those numbers. A BIG natural man might be able to add 200 to each lift but they would be really big boys.
A 500 pound bench is pretty common with steroid users, and even bodybuilders. Casey Viator could bench 500 as could Franco...Arny couldn't out lift Franco in any of the trhee power lifts...but he had really strong(and big) biceps and lats.

NOBODY was a bigger Mentzer fan than me bro....I even went so far as to hate Arny just like Mike did, not having ever talked to Arny.
In 1980 Mentzer switched from doing 4-6 sets per body part on a traditonal 4 way split to 2-4 or 5 sets and trained three days a week on a split routine ie: Mon-Wed-Fri and alternating workouts. This was step in the right direction for him and for those "normal guys" like me that copied him.
BRO...DO NOT copy Mentzers old training, and even the training he did in 1980, as it is WAY too intense for the non steroid user.

Stick with Stuart McRoberts advice and train no more frequently than twice a week, or once every third day max, on a "divided" program, hitting each muscle group with 1-3 sets per body part. No forced reps until nearing the end of a cycle when trying to squeeze out a few more weeks of gains before taking a lay off. NEVER do negatives! You can still train in full body workouts but I wouldn't do them more often that once every 5-6 days.
As you have experinced you don't need much, if any, direct arm work.....just work on the big compound movements for the most part and your arms will grow. Supinated(palms facig you) grip pulldowns and chins work the hell out both your lats and biceps....and the king of upper body movements, the dip, works the hell out of your chest and triceps.

Carerra, Mentzer himself would say that you simply cannot gain 12 pounds of muscle in a few weeks, unless perhaps you are coming back from a long time without training and were once that size ie: Casey Viator in the Jones Study.
A raw beginner that is way under weight might gain 12 pounds over three months but some of that would probably be fat.

An advanced man, on steroids and GH, MIGHT be lucky enough to gain 12 pounds in ONE YEAR.

🙂

"A 500 pound bench is pretty common with steroid users, and even bodybuilders. Casey Viator could bench 500 as could Franco...Arny couldn't out lift Franco in any of the trhee power lifts...but he had really strong(and big) biceps and lats."

I was training for a time in St Petersburg Russia. We had one guy who was squatting somewhere around 900 pounds (or even more) but these were full squats, down on the calves and back up. He wasn't a huge guy either, muscular but not huge - maybe around 240 pounds.
Then in the Basque country I met a guy called Paco who was benching some eight 20 kilo plates each side of the bar. One American told me saw him break the world record on an unofficial basis right there, in the gym.
So, Miguel Indurain wasn't the only genetic freak knocking around that area at the time. Mind you, Paco just looked like a huge fat tub and he was put out of training when he ripped his pectoral badly.
"You can make good gains without gear and get pretty big bro but t takes a hell of a long time and WAY longer than the 2-3 years that both Mentzer and Jones speculated."
A friend of mine who trained with people like Mike Katz and Serge Nubret didn't do steroids. Everybody thought he did but the truth was he trained very very hard and also had good genetics. He swore by power cleans and basic exercises.
However, steroids aren't really so bad if they're used properly and not abused. By that, I mean that bodybuilders of the old school like Larry Scott used a little bit of dianabol and egg and protein shakes and that was it. They usually had a qualified doctor to do the various tests and were sensible enough to take time out from steroid cycles.
There was a risk, of course, but not so much as nicotine or high alcohol intake.
Nowadays, the bodybuilders are taking growth hormone, stacks, chemicals normally ingested by cattle and God knows what else. It's gone way way over the top and, of course, people have died.
"Carerra, Mentzer himself would say that you simply cannot gain 12 pounds of muscle in a few weeks, unless perhaps you are coming back from a long time without training and were once that size ie: Casey Viator in the Jones Study.
A raw beginner that is way under weight might gain 12 pounds over three months but some of that would probably be fat."
My situation wasn't like Casey's. Casey had been working on an oil rig and suffered injury, followed by muscle loss. Jones then did his experiment and Casey regained mostly recuperated muscle. Mine wasn't recuperated muscle. I was at my normal body weight which has been stable for quite some time.
Soooo, I'm going to delve into this a bit more deeply and see where I wind up. I figure I'd like to take a look at some of Mentzer and Jone's ideas and see how I can maybe adapt them for what works for me.

TiMan said:

Carrera, a few comments about your comments 🙂

Your buddy must have been on drugs when he saw Arny, unless it was well after 1980. From 74 through 78 Arny was huge...a freak compaired to everyone except Sergio, Mentzer and maybe Bertil Fox and Dave Johns.

I have done steroid bro and I can tell you that you can train any bloody way yo like and still make great gains.

You can make good gains without gear and get pretty big bro but t takes a hell of a long time and WAY longer than the 2-3 years that both Mentzer and Jones speculated. My educated guess is that you won't reach your natural maximum weight/size unless you have been training hard for at least 10 years.
Once you are at your "natural max", or the weight and size that your own levels of testosterone and GH can maintain, then you are done growing. Steroids can take you WELL beyond this natural max....the average man of about 5'10" can reach a solid and quite lean(not ripped) 190-200 pounds...with steroids you can add at least another 30-40 pounds to that.
The typical man can work his way up to a 300 pound bench, 400 squat and 500 dead. A gifted natural man that is a larged boned endomorph or pure mesomorth might be luck enough to add 100 pounds to those numbers. A BIG natural man might be able to add 200 to each lift but they would be really big boys.
A 500 pound bench is pretty common with steroid users, and even bodybuilders. Casey Viator could bench 500 as could Franco...Arny couldn't out lift Franco in any of the trhee power lifts...but he had really strong(and big) biceps and lats.

NOBODY was a bigger Mentzer fan than me bro....I even went so far as to hate Arny just like Mike did, not having ever talked to Arny.
In 1980 Mentzer switched from doing 4-6 sets per body part on a traditonal 4 way split to 2-4 or 5 sets and trained three days a week on a split routine ie: Mon-Wed-Fri and alternating workouts. This was step in the right direction for him and for those "normal guys" like me that copied him.
BRO...DO NOT copy Mentzers old training, and even the training he did in 1980, as it is WAY too intense for the non steroid user.

Stick with Stuart McRoberts advice and train no more frequently than twice a week, or once every third day max, on a "divided" program, hitting each muscle group with 1-3 sets per body part. No forced reps until nearing the end of a cycle when trying to squeeze out a few more weeks of gains before taking a lay off. NEVER do negatives! You can still train in full body workouts but I wouldn't do them more often that once every 5-6 days.
As you have experinced you don't need much, if any, direct arm work.....just work on the big compound movements for the most part and your arms will grow. Supinated(palms facig you) grip pulldowns and chins work the hell out both your lats and biceps....and the king of upper body movements, the dip, works the hell out of your chest and triceps.

Carerra, Mentzer himself would say that you simply cannot gain 12 pounds of muscle in a few weeks, unless perhaps you are coming back from a long time without training and were once that size ie: Casey Viator in the Jones Study.
A raw beginner that is way under weight might gain 12 pounds over three months but some of that would probably be fat.

An advanced man, on steroids and GH, MIGHT be lucky enough to gain 12 pounds in ONE YEAR.

🙂

http://www.trulyhuge.com/mikementzer.htm
"I was in California in 1999 when Mike was training people in
Santa Monica, I was moving in a few weeks and I felt this
was my last chance to meet and train with my boyhood hero
(I never realized how right I was as Mike passed away a
little less then 2 years later).

I called Mike and scheduled an appointment to meet him, I
arrived at the gym and when I spotted Mike walking towards
me, the first thing I noticed was he looked like he was in
pain, I said "Mike, what's wrong with your back?" "Oh, I've
had bad back troubles for years." He told me. Many have
tried to attack Mike's latest training theories on the fact that
Mike himself was in such bad shape in the late 90's, and
if all it took was a few sets per workout, then why wasn't
he in shape? The truth is he was no longer able to train
as hard as he felt he had to, because of his back.

The next thing I noticed was he wan't in shape, but he was
not as bad as some made him out to be, his forearms and
upper arms were still very big!

He told me he would put me through a leg workout, and the
first thing he showed me was the form he wanted me to
use on all exercises, this was very slow, about 4 seconds
up and 4 seconds down. And if there is resistance in the
contracted position, like in the leg extension hold for 2
seconds, this makes the exercise very hard, yet extremely
safe, he told me he had trained over 1,000 different people
and never was anyone injured in a training session with
him.

After a brief warm up, Mike had me do 1 set of painfully
slow and heavy Leg Extensions to failure then with no rest
a set of Leg Presses to failure. It is quite different having
someone there pushing you compared to training alone,
Mike would tell me "Ok, you can do more, if there was an
earth quake or if your life depended on it you'd get 2 more
reps, and if there were ten naked girls watching and waiting
you would get 3 more!" I did way more reps then I ever felt I
could, and when I really did hit failure he said "Ok, that's
enough, that's failure."

One of the questions, I had and you might have is "What did
Mike consider failure?", well if you get to a point where you
can't complete another full rep on your own, that's failure. No
need to do forced reps, etc.

I had only done two sets but my legs were very pumped and I
felt a deep growth stimulation in them. He had me take a short
rest and then we did calves, most people say they can't get
their calves to grow, but I see them bouncing up and down
very fast on calf raises. Well try them the way Mentzer made
me do them, "SLOW UP, HOLD AT THE TOP, HOLD, RAISE UP
HIGHER, HIGHER, HOLD, LOWER SLOW." You do 12 to 20
reps that way and see if you feel a difference.

Believe it or not that was the whole workout!

Mike then took me outside and talked with me for about half
an hour and answered any questions I had. He was very
polite, even soft spoken, he didn't try to shove his ideas
down my throat. He was a very intelligent man. Was he crazy?
No. Was he eccentric? Well, a little, for example when we first
sat down he was drinking a big cup of coffee and then takes
out a pack of cigarettes, "Do you smoke?" He asked. "No." I
said., He then lit up, took and huge drag and said "I love it!"

My next workout a few days later was a chest and back
workout, again after a brief warm up, He had me do a set of
Pec Deck to failure then with no rest a set of Incline Press to
failure. We rested a bit then did Close Grip Lat Pulldowns, the
first rep was hard, I told Mike, "This is too heavy a weight for
me." He said, "No, it's fine you'll get 6 to 8 reps." And to my
surprise I did, I knew there was a big difference having
someone like Mike pushing me, I was thinking what would
happen if I trained with Mike for a while. It was like he read
my mind, he said "Man you got a good build already, I wish
I could work with you for a few months". Sadly that never h
appened because I had to move.

The second workout ended with 1 set of deadlifts, again
that was the full workout!

P.S. I forgot to add that, for whatever reason, women don't go for guys with big muscles. They simply don't like it. I've seen too many guys in the gym develop a cubic appearance and that really is the point where women just don't find a guy appealing. They like a reasonable amount of muscle and a slim waist but not too much bulk.

t,
waddabout bertil in his pre-extreme ripped prime, to me, this was an epitome.

as for Mike Mentzer, in this interview he espouses some ayn rand type relativism, what do you guys think?
forum.bodybuilding.comshowthread.phpOpen ↗
i have not been up on matters bodybuilding for some time, and i was saddened to hear of both mike and ray mentzer's passing.

TiMan said:

.

It wasn't until 83!!!!!!!!! that the best man won SAMIR BANNOUT..one ofmthe best physiques of all time IMHO.

Carrera said:

P.S. I forgot to add that, for whatever reason, women don't go for guys with big muscles. They simply don't like it. I've seen too many guys in the gym develop a cubic appearance and that really is the point where women just don't find a guy appealing. They like a reasonable amount of muscle and a slim waist but not too much bulk.

I'm inclined to agree with this statement, however different woman have different tastes in men. The lean muscular atheletic look seems to be more popular, but looks are only one of the factors they are looking for.

Carrera, why do you want to put muscle on? I thought you were interested in improving your bike performance and then finding a happy balance?

TiMan, I use to have the long recovery periods you mentioned, in particluar with chest. Nowdays my recovery times are much quicker, mainly due to improved diet in relation to the type of training done that day. I also have a higher level of aerobic fitness, does this also help?

A 12 pound muscle gain will inevitably complicate my cycling - you're right. What happened was I had to more or less hang up the bike due to my working commitments so the only thing I did have time for was weights. Also, because time was so short, all I had often was half an hour in the gym which is why I had to train so hard.

mikesbytes said:

I'm inclined to agree with this statement, however different woman have different tastes in men. The lean muscular atheletic look seems to be more popular, but looks are only one of the factors they are looking for.

Carrera, why do you want to put muscle on? I thought you were interested in improving your bike performance and then finding a happy balance?

TiMan, I use to have the long recovery periods you mentioned, in particluar with chest. Nowdays my recovery times are much quicker, mainly due to improved diet in relation to the type of training done that day. I also have a higher level of aerobic fitness, does this also help?

Bertil Fox was another guy I met personally. He (Bertil) was on fairly good terms with Ricky Wayne back then.
Bertil and Mike Tyson probably have a lot in common - they didn't have sufficient mental equilibrium which is why they both squandered their enormous talent.
Bertil winded up on a murder charge and is still in prison. Prior to that he'd been behaving violently and having roid rages. To be honest, I think steroids suck - period. I hear so many cases of peoples' lives falling into tatters because they play with fire and take these drugs irresponsibly.
You just don't need that [censored] to make decent progress in sports - that's my view.

Hypnospin said:

t,
waddabout bertil in his pre-extreme ripped prime, to me, this was an epitome.

as for Mike Mentzer, in this interview he espouses some ayn rand type relativism, what do you guys think?
forum.bodybuilding.comshowthread.phpOpen ↗
i have not been up on matters bodybuilding for some time, and i was saddened to hear of both mike and ray mentzer's passing.

Well I'm moving towards my conflict. I'm off to visit the guy in charge of the local power lifters organisation.