beyond x rep

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IR O N M A N Training & Research Center Presents

by Steve Holman and J onathan Lawson

M U S C L E B U I L D I N G

B E Y O N D

R E P


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Beyond X-Rep M uscle Building was writ ten to help you getcloser to your physical potential with sensible bodybuildingstrategies. Weight training is a demanding activity, however, soit is highly recommended that you consult your physician andhave a phys ica l examina t ion pr io r to beg inn ing a weigh t -training program. Proceed with the suggested diets, exercisesa nd routines a t your ow n risk.

P hotog ra phy by Michael Neveux

Co ver models: S teve Holman a nd J onathan La ws on

C opyright 2005 by IRON MA N Ma ga zine andHomebod y P rod uctions

All rights res erved .

The ma teria l in this doc ument ma y not be reprod uced inw hole or in pa rt in a ny ma nner or form w ithout p rior w ritten

consent from the publisher.

Homebody ProductionsP.O. B ox 2800, Ventura , C A 93002

www.X-Rep.comwww.BeyondX-Rep.com

www.X-tremeLean.comwww.X-traordinaryAbs.com


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4 Beyond X-Rep Muscle Building

The Ultimate Mass Workout e-book showcased our gains withX Reps and explained that mass-building technique in detail. Ite s s e n t i a l l y k i c k - s t a r t e d t h e X - R e p m u s c l e - b u i l d i n gphenomenonand the gains of muscle-building enthusiasts allover the world. Our results with X Reps showed that, if usedcorrectly, it has the power to transform a physique in as few as35 d a ys . Tra inees ha ve re p o rted inc red ib le g a ins in s ize a nds t reng th in o nly a few w orko uts due to f ina lly be ing a b le toovercome the nervous system roadblock during any set to failure( i t s us ua lly the nervous s ys tem tha t cra ps out f irs t , not the

musc le). P ow er pa rtia ls a t the s we et sp ot a long a n exerc i s e ss troke a t the end of a s et to exha ustion ob litera te that roa db loc k,a llow ing you to trig g er new hypert rophic s timula tion like neve rbeforeso much so that many trainees said that X Reps are thela s t w ord on b uild ing ma s s ive musc les . B ut are they?

Our la tes t re s e a rc h a nd experiments (o r s hould we s a y X-periments?) confirm the power of X Reps, but as any seasonedbodybuilder knows, nothing works forever. You have to find waysto jack up the intensity if you want X-traordinary growth.

S o a fter more a nalysis a nd resea rch w e c rea ted new w a ys toX-ponentia lly inc rea se the intens ity o f the X-Rep te chniq ue. Thebest of the best of those X-Rep hybrid techniques helped uspa ck on nea rly 10 more po unds of new musc le to our a lre a d ydeveloped physiques (which is even more amazing when youco nside r that S teve is now 46 yea rs old!). These tec hniq ues ca n

do the same for youtakeyour mass to the next levela t a ra te that wil l as toundyou.

Consider yourself in thefa s t la ne to X-treme musc le.Are you rea dy? Lets put theped a l to the meta l!

Steve Ho lman and Jon athan Lawson

IRON MAN Training & Research Cen ter

Introduct ion

Steve H. and J onathan L.: Biggerand bett er in 05 t hanks to newX-Rep hybrid techni ques.


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Beyond X-Rep Muscle Building 5

CHAPTER 1

X-h ilira t in gMu s c le -Bu ild in g

Ob s e rva t io n s


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It all started when we began analyzing the way the biggestbodybuilders train for mass. These men are huge, so they haveto know a thing or two about getting extreme deve l o p m e n t just dont ask them because theyll say something like, Do six to 10 reps on a lot of exerc i ses. No wonder the failure rate inbodybuilding is outrageous. Its much more than that!

T h a ts why we decided to observe rather than ask. We watched them train, analyzed their techniques, read up ont raining re s e a rch and then applied what we saw to our ow n workoutswell, sort of. Due to our drug-free status we had to

be more discerning and keep an eye tow a rd science (we eve na n a l y zed how steroids work in order to get many of thoseeffects natura l l y, as yo ull see in an upcoming chapter). Andt h a ts when our gains began to skyrocket. Mo re on that later.First, lets look at a few things we discovered when we openedour eyeslike all the cheating that goes on (and were nottalking about steroids).

Yo uve no doubt heard a mass monster at your gym or in a

magazine article go on and on about strict form, but when yousee him train , most of his reps look more like a re j e c t e dOlympic lift. Ronnie Coleman, Mr. Olympia and one of thebiggest and strongest bodybuilders of all time, is the perf e c texample. In fact, on some of his exercises the weight is so heavy,

t h e res ve ry abbre v i a t e dm ovement. On shru g s, fore x a m p l e, he loads up ano u t rageous poun dage,s t raps onto the bar andpulls for all hes worth, but

Watch Ronnie Coleman t rain andyoull see that he does most ofhis exercise in an explosive,partial style, blasting the w eightthrough t he key semistretch edposition and only moving it

halfw ay or tw o-thirds of the wayup through the stroke.


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his shoulders barely ri s e. It looks like arm - s t retching tort u ref rom the Middle Ages. (Well have a complete exerc i s e - by-exercise analysis of his training toward the end of this e-book.)

To be fair, not all of his sets and reps are partial ra n g eand/or explosive, but a lot of them areespecially on the big,compound exerci ses like pressesand for good re a s o n :Cheating is one way to trigger extra o rd i n a ry muscle grow t h .Say what?

Most scientists say that one of the big keys to muscle growthis force. The more force you can get a muscle to generate, the

more growth youll stimulate. Thats one reason compound, ormultijoint, exercises produce more mass gains than isolationm ovements doyou use more weight when a number of muscles work together, and you can increase the poundagem o re easi ly over time. Thats pro g re s s i ve overload. (Weregetting to the cheating part; hang on.)

But theres more to it than just adding more weight to thebar on the big exercises, much more. As we explained in UMW ,

many re s e a rchers believe that the real growth trigger oncertain exercises is near the turnaround, where you move fromthe negative stroke to the positive. Why? Because thats wherethe most force occurs. And where do most of the big bodybuilders cheat or explode? Near the turnaroundbottomof a squat or pre s s, for examplewhich provides a wicked,g rowth-jolting overload. (Fo rce-plate studies show that as atrainee recoils and then explodes near the bottom of a press tore verse the d irection of the bar, the force can more thandouble. Its a wicked hypertrophic shockwave!)

Think about it. At the bottom of an incline press your pecshave to put the brakes on and then reverse the direction of theb a r. Lots of potential for maximum overload, or forc e, there.The problem: Many scientists say that the pecs cant quite exertmaximum force at the ve ry bottom of the move m en t therestoo much stretch. That means the muscle must be elongated toexert maximum force but not to the extreme . The key max-force

point, then, is just below the middle of the stroke but not all

Beyond X-Rep Muscl e Building 7


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the way down at thebottom, stretch position(and not at the completely c o n t racted posit ion , asmany people believe). Itsat a semistretched point.T h e re f o re, if you canoverload the position thats just above the stretch butnot quite to the midpoint,

you can si gnificantly i n c rease the anabol icpower of any set.

T h a ts exac tly wha tmany of the biggestbodybuilders do on almoste ve ry re p. Watch them doincline pre s s e s, and yo ul l

see them re verse the barb e f o re touc hing theirupper pecs, exploding upw a rd from there. (So m ee ven bounce it off theirchests to get the bar to the

more advantageous max-force point.) By stopping a little shortand exploding, they hit the semistretched position with moreoverload. That makes the exercise much more effective although it also makes it more dangerous.

What about Ronnie Coleman and the shrug example above?By using a weight thats too heavy for full movements, he only w orks the bottom part of the stro k e, never getting it near theco n t racted position. Though he only works the stretched ands e m i s t retched points and slightly above, he does it withe x t reme overload. And thats why his traps are gigantic! (Heactually uses a hitch at the bottom, but well have more on that

Double-X Overload technique later).

8 Beyond X-Rep Muscl e Building

Force-plate studies show t hat w hen atrainee recoils and explodes near t hebottom of a press to reverse thedirection of t he bar, the force canmor e than double. That s atremendous str ess overload on themuscl e right at t he key semist retchedpoint. How ever, th ats a dangerouspractic e. A better w ay to overload thatmax-force point is w ith end-of-set X-Rep parti als or one of the new X-hybrid techniques.


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Arnolds Olympia workouts contain a number of examples.One of his favo rite biceps exercises was barbell cheat curls.Hed take a heavy weight, lean forw a rd slightly and then

explode the weight up to his shoulders. Where does the mostf o rce occur on a set like that? The semistretched position, w h e re the arms are not quite bent at 90 degreesjust below the halfway point of the stroke (see the photo above). Theresve ry l ittle resistance anywhere else during the entire curl.Could that have been at least part of the reason for Arn o l dsgiant biceps and incredible peaks? Possibly.

Eve ry exercise has its own sweet spot, and the biggestbodybuilders seem to instinctively know where that key pointis and then exploit it for gigantic leaps in mass. (We explainedand identified the key exercise for each bodypart and its sweetspot, or X position, in UMW .) They do a lot of their reps with aslightly shorter range of motion and explode out of thet u rn a round with heavy weight. (Watch Co l e m a ns tra i n i n g v i d e o s, and yo ull see a lot of that.) Its precisely what give sthem excessive hypertrophic overload at the sweet spot of key exercises. It shifts the muscle machinery into overdrive!

As you know if youve been to our Web site or read our other


One of Arnolds f avorit ebiceps exercises w ascheat curls. Notice how itoverloads his bic eps rightat the max-f orce point, just below w here hiselbows are bent at 90degrees. That s t he X spot.


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e - b o o k s, we dont advocate jer king and hea ving gian t weightsespecially i f you dont use things l ike grow t hh o rmone to fortify ligaments and tendons. Thats the wro n g s t ra t e g y, despite what the pros do (re m e m b e r, even withpharmaceutical help a lot of pros have been seriously injureddoing that, from pec and biceps tears to vertebrae blowouts toshattered shoulders). So heres what you should learn from thisdiscussion...

Muscle-building le sson 1: The semistretched point of anex e rc i s es stroke is key. You need to overload that sweet spot,

especially on the big, compound exerc i s e s, if you want tomaximize your mass gains. The best way is with X-Rep partialsat the end of a strict set or Stage Se t s, which are a series of e x a g g e rated X Reps right off the bat that encompass thes em i s t retched position, and/or Double-X Overload, which isthe between-reps hitch method we saw Ronnie Coleman using on shrugs at the semistretched point and that big Jay Cu t l e ruses on almost eve ry exercise in his mass-building pro g ra m .

Well review X Reps and analyze all the other X-Rep hybri dtechniques, as well as have more discussion on those two probodybuilders training techniques, later in this e-book.



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Beyond X-Rep Musc le Buildin g 11

CHAPTER 2

X-t reme Pumps and

Pain to Gain


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Do the biggest bodybuilders always explode on their re ps ?No, there are exercises that they ra rely cheat onusually isolation movements that create continuous tension, like leg e x t e n s i o n s. Whats so special about continuous-tensione x e rcises? They block blood flow to the target muscle, whichcan have a spectacular impact on muscle size and strength.

Its called occlusion, and one study, which was reported onin the Journal of St rength Conditioning Re s e a rc h ( 1 5:362-366),applied it to subjects forearms by placing a blood pressure cuff on their upper arms for two minutes. The cuff was then

removed, and the subjects did wrist curls. Results: Those whohad their blood flow impaired prior to exercise showed a 20percent strength increase over the subjects who didnt use theblood pressure cuff. Yes, 20 percent!

What about muscle size? Rob Thoburn, an I RON MAN c o n t r ibutor and musc le -science re s e a rc h e r, has be enc o r responding with Japanese scientis ts who have beenexperimenting with Kaatsu, or occlusion, techniques. Thoburn

re p o rted that Takashi Ab e, Ph . D., got a 7 percent increase inquadriceps cross-sectional area in four months with standardt raining, but when he used occlusion, he got an 8 perc e n ti n c rease in cross-sectional areain only two weeks! Thatsright, better results in about one-eighth the timetwo we e k sas opposed to 16 weeks. Thats about an 800 percent increasein gains when blood flow was impeded. Wow! You can see why the biggest bodybuilders include continuous-tension sets intheir routinesthey force blood out of the muscle and createthose mass-and-strength-increasing occlusion effects.

Why does blocking blood flow produce such spectacularincreases in muscle size and strength? Part of it may be due tothe incredible rush of blood to the bodypart once blood flow resumes (ah-ha, so maybe getting a pump does matter!).Scientists have suggested that the bodypart bloodbath thatoccurs post occlusion can produce everything from upgradedrelease of heat shock proteins to alterations in muscle calcium

metabolism (calcium contributes to contraction) to gre a t e r



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out earlyat leastsooner than theyd likep a rtially due to nervo u ssystem failure, which is

why they do so many s e t s. Each additional setgets them a tad morestimulationa shift inf i b e r- r e c r u i t m e n to rderbut is all thate x t ra vo lume re a l l y n e c e s s a ry? Not if yo u

train a little smarter, as we explain later in this e-book.Heres something else to consider: If you cant keep enoughtension on the target muscle during a set for full occlusion too c c u r, yo ull minimize the anabolic effects even furt h e r. Fo rex a m pl e, if you have weak nerve force in your pecs, you may d i ve rt tension to your front delts near the top of dumbbellf l ye s. That allows blood to move into your pecs, dera i l i n g occlusion. If thats the case, it may be wise to follow Arn o ldslead and do only the bottom half or two-thirds of the stro k e.( By the way, Ronnie Coleman uses that partial technique onalmost all of his exercises, even squats, doing only the bottomtwo thirds of each repits a supercharged occlusion workout.)

The biggest bodybuilders often use exercises or parts of e x e rcises that keep max tensi on on the target musc let h roughout the set to get occlusion. Lou Fe r rigno did it onincline presses. Remember the scene in Pumping Iron whenhe was training at that cave-like gym in New York with his dad

s c reaming at him (Come on, Louie! Ah-nolds nothin!)? He


Stopping short on dumbbellflyes gives the pecscontinuous tension and moreocclusion. That t echniquew as an Arnold favorit e andcontri buted greatly to hisunreal pec size.


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was only doing the bottom two-thirds of the presses, achieving occlusion and hitting that important max-forc e - g e n e ra t i o npointthe sweet spoton every every partial rep.

Another example from the current crop of champs is VictorMartinez, an IFBB pro with spectacular delts. How did he buildthem? Check out this quote from his Q&A column in the June05 Muscular Development :

Pa rt i a l - rep lateral ra i s e s. The difference between my version and standard dumbbell lateral raises is that I move the weight only through the first quarter of the movement. Doing

them this way takes the traps completely out of it; its all sidedelts moving the weight. Pl u s, I get to use much heavierp o u n d a g e s, since Im not raising the dumbbells up to peak contraction.

In other words, Martinez is using X Reps from the get-go. Hegoes superheavy and does partials at the semis tre t c h e dposition on eve ry re p. And his delts are X-tremely massive !Ronnie Coleman does the same maneuver on the Na u t i l u s

l a t e ra l - raise machinesemistretched-point part i a l s, and Ja y Cutler does only the bottom part of his seated latera ls, whichreally look like seated dumbbell upright rows.

Something else to keep in mind: Rep acceleration, as well aslack of neuromuscular efficiency, can take tension off thetarget muscle. As mentioned above, an explosive rep can createan overload at the fully stretc hed or the impor t a n ts e m i s t retche d point (near the bottom of a press ), butmomentum can re m ove a lot of the tension halfway thro ug h .So while a number of pros use explosive movements oncompound exercises like presses, they may also do lighter setsusing partials for more occlusion (warmup sets and back-off sets count).

On most isolation, or contracted-position, exercises, like leg e x t e n s i o n s, howe ve r, they almost always use re l a t i vely slow reps to keep tension on the muscle, which maximize socclusionalthough they may not realize thats why they do it.

They do know the importance of the pump, though, and after a



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continuous-tension set,blood rushes to the targ e tb o d y p a rt like a flood surg eafter a dam collapse.

In c i d e n t a l l y, while mostbodybuilders use occlusionto finish off a bodypart t o

augment the pump cre a t edby multijoint actionanumber of champs havel e a rned that getting someocclusion in the target muscle b e f o re a big exercise cani n c rease strength, similar to what the scientists did with theblood pre s s u re cuff. For example, Ronnie Coleman usually does a number of high-rep leg extension sets before he moves

into his squats. Those pre l im i n a ry continuous-tension sets of 20 to 30 reps each squeeze blood out of the muscle and thencause a flood right after. Is he using occlusion to jack up hissize and strength? We say absolutely! (Well have more on using occlusion as part of a quick, precise warmup sequence toenhance muscle growth in the Q&A section of this e-book.)

Mu s c l e - b u i l d i n g l e s s o n 2 : Wh ile its imp ortant tooverload the semistretched position on eve ry exerc i s e, yo ushould also stri ve for continuous tension to block blood flow.T h a ts one reason to use isolation exercises after your big compound movefor more concentrated continuous tension, which produces significant occlusion, or blood-flow impairment, which in turn stimulates another level of muscleg rowth. Note: Some isolation exercises re q u i re part i a l - ra n g ereps to occlude the muscle properly, such as dumbbell flyes on which you should do only the bottom two-thirds of the strokeof each rep to maintain continuous tension. (That was an

Arnold favorite; see the photo on page 14.)


The biggest bodybuilders li ke Jay Cutler, w hodo a lot of conti nuous-tension movements,have exceptional neuromuscular efficiency,or nerve-t o-m uscle connections, as w ell aspain toleranc e. He X-Reps too, as you ll see.


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CHAPTER 3

Ho rmone Surg e s

and Fiber Slic ing


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Which exercises create the most mass? Any big bodybuilder will tell you its the compound, or multijoint, movements. Theb o d y s muscular stru c t u res are designed to work together top roduce maximum forc e. Compound movements re q u i remuscle synergy, or team work, so theyre more naturalmoree rgonomicand allow greater overload. They also blast uptestosterone output if you work them hard. (We described thebest ones for each bodypart in The Ultimate Mass Workout e-book.)

Those are the reasons the biggest bodybuilders constru c t

their workouts around the core exerciseslike squats, row s,presses and so on. As we discussed in the last chapter, they alsorely on continuous-tension isolation exercises for occlusion,pump and muscle burn. The burn is directly linked to growthh o rmone re l e a s e, as ve ri fied by a study published in theCanadian Journal of Applied Ph y s i o l o gy (22:244-255; 1997), aconnection that may have something to do with higher bloodlactic acid leve l s, which are partially responsible for muscle

burn. Or it may be the occlusion effect or both. Why is GH important? Because it synerg i zes with otheranabolic horm o n e s, like testostero n e, to make them muchmore potent. (It also helps burn bodyfat at a greater rate.) So, if you can max out GH and testosterone at the same time, yo ucreate a supergrowth environment, which is what the big mendo. (Ok a y, many of them do it with syringes too, as well as intheir training, but thats beside the point.) Whether they realizeit or not, they get a testosterone release with compoundm ovements and a GH surge with burn-igniting continuous-tens ion exerc i s e s, whether its part i a l - range compoundexercises or isolation moves that keep the pressure on.

Does that mean a pro g ram of compound-only exercises isinferior to one that includes isolation moves? Possibly, from ah o rmonal standpointand from an occlusion standpoint as well if you lock out on all sets, which re l i e ves targ e t - m u s c l etensionbut there are ways to get more muscle burn on

compound exerc i s e s. If you add X Reps to the end, yo u



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automatically get some occlusion and a severe muscle burn. You may or may not re c o g n i ze the name Tom Platz. Hes

known for having the most spectacular leg development ever,e ven by todays freaky standard s. His quads looked like giants t riated water balloons hanging off his hips. Inhuman! Wi t hone leg flex he could make onlookers eyes widen to the size of pancakes and their jaws hit the floor. How did he get the mind-numbing development that made people go into Looney Tunesshock? One reason: He was notorious for taking his sets pastfailure with power partials, usually near the stretch position of

certain quad exercises.For example, on hack squats hed crank out reps till failure,and then he would move down near the bottom, turn a ro u n dposition and pulse, feeling his quads stretch and burn for whatseemed like an eternity (end-of-set partials; thats familiar.)

Platz also used that technique on leg extensions, at both thetop and bottom positions. Leg curls too. And all the pain paidoff bigthe mans legs grew to phenomenal proportions! Sure,

genetics had something to do with it, but so did his attentionto detail and tremendous effort with stretch- andsemistretched-position overloadand his emphasis on stretchmay have triggered muscle cells to replicate.

Yes, its possible that a lot of his extreme eye-popping sizemay have had something to do withmuscle fiber division, or hyperplasia.Hows that? Well, one study done by Antonio and Go n yea in 1994 showe dthat fiber splitting can occ ur f ro ms t retch overloadand more fibers would equal more mass potential.He res what John Hansen, Mr. Na t u ra lOlympia, had to say about that study


Tom Platzs fr eaky quad development mayhave at least part ially been caused byhyperplasia, or fiber splitt ing. Stretch- position

overload has been linked t o that phenomenonin animals.


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and fiber splitting in his book Natural Bodybuilding :Most of the re s e a rch on hyperplasia has used animals

such as bird s, rats and catsas subjects. Jose Antonio, Ph .D.,p e rf o rmed a study on a bird in which he used weights top ro g re s s i vely overload one wing and stretch the anteri o rlatissimus dorsi muscle. The overload scheme started with a weight that was 10 percent of the birds weight and increased itby 5 percent up to 35 percent. Two days of rest preceded anincrease in weight. After 28 stretch days, the study recorded theg reatest gains in muscle mass ever in an animal or human

model of tension-induced overload a 334 percent increase in muscle mass with a 90 percent increase in fiber number . Wow! We mentioned earlier how Arnold overloaded his pecs

in the stretch position with partial flyes. He would only pull thedumbbells up about halfway out of the stretch position andthen lower back down for another replike exaggerated X Re p s. That gave him occlusion via continuous tension, butperhaps even more important, it created a severe rapid-fire pec

stretch. Could he have been triggering hyperplasia in his pecs with extreme stretch overload? Hmm. His pecs we re cert ain l y among the most massive ever.

Platz and Arnold are examples of legendary bodybuilders who intelligently emphasized stretch overload at almost every w o rkout. Co uld that be why they excelled at bui lding i n c redible muscle mass at a time when steroid use wasminimal? It may be at least part of the reason. They may havecreated some fiber splittingand the more fibers you have, thebigger your muscles can get!

Muscle-building lesson 3: While semistretched overloadis important, you also need stretched-position exercises toramp up anabolic hormones and perhaps trigger hyperplasia,or fiber splitting. Its another layer of growth production thatcan get you bigger much faster! (Well identify stretch-positione x e rcises for each bodypart later in this e-book and theDouble-X Overload tactic that can superc h a rge their mass-

building power.)



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CHAPTER 4

Cut the Vo lu m e ,Cover the Angles


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Most of the champs tend to train with lots of sets. Why isthat nece ssar yor perc e i ved as necess ary? Most do itinstinctively, but its because of what muscle physiologists callthe size principle of muscle fiber recruitment. We explained itthoroughly in The Ultimate Mass Workout e-book, but heres aquick review: When you do a set to failure, the first few reps firethe low - t h reshold motor units. Then, as they fatigue, themedium-threshold motor units kick in. Once those start to giveout, the important high-threshold motor units finally fire.

In other word s, you dont get to the fastest-growing fast-

twitch fibers till the last few reps of any set to failure. Thatexplains why experienced bodybuilders always say the last few reps are the most importantwithout the painful finale yo ubarely scratch the surface of fast-twitch recruitment.

T h e res a glitch, though. Once you get near the end of thedomino effectlow- to medium- to high-thre s h o l d yo u rnervous system craps out before you blast enough of the fast-twitch fibers to trigger significant growth. Thats why scientists

say that any set to failure hits only 30 percent of the fast-twitchf i b e r s. Less if your neuromuscular efficiency sucks. Yo u rn e rvous system, short - c i rcuited by fatigue, stops you shortevery time. Researchers believe its a protective mechanism.

So what do most bodybuilders do to get around it? They doset after set to failure or close to it. With each additional setthey get a slightly different re c ruitment pattern and get a few more fast-twitch fibers involved, if theyre lucky. But talk aboutinefficient: They have to do all those pre l i m i n a ry reps toactivate the motor-unit domino effect just to get at a few morefast-twitch fibers. Then they do it again and again and again,getting only slightly more growth stimulation via fiberrecruitment with each set of the same exercise.

A better way is to do only one or two work sets with X Repstacked onto the end at nervous system exhaustion. That way you leapfrog nervous system fatigue and keep the key fast-twitch fibers firing right at the important max-force point. As

weve said, with that strategy you make each set three to five



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times more effective as standard positive - f a i l u re sets. So twosets on any exercise gets the job done. But what about training a muscle from different angles, which the pros do a lot of?

Using different exercises can attack different fibers, and themore fibers you can get growing at once, the bigger youll get. What were saying is that you do need multiangular tra i n i n g once yo ure more advanced in order to stimulate more of themuscle (but probably not as much as you think; more on thatin a moment). Ok a y, you probably want some scientificc o r ro b o ration. He res a quote from Designing Re s i s t a n c e

Training Pro g ra m s by St e ven J. Fleck, Ph . D., and William J.K ra e m e r, Ph . D., two of the most respected re s e a rchers in thestrength-training field:

If the body position is changed, the order of re c ru i t m e n tcan also change (Gri m by and Ha n n e rz 1977). The order of recruitment can also change for multifunctional muscles fromone movement or exercise to another. Recruitment order in thequadriceps for the performance of a knee extension is different

f rom that for a squat. The va riation in re c ruitment ord e rp rovides some evidence to support the belief held by many strength coaches that to completely develop a particular muscle it must be exe rcised with seve ral dif ferent movements or exercises .

Does that mean you have to do eve ry exercise known toman for eve ry bodypart in order to max out growth? No, yo usee each muscle has three distinct positions, or arcs, of flexionfrom which you should train it to maximize fiber recruitmentm i d ra n g e, contracted and stretched. Those familiar withSteves work over the past decade and a half recognize that asPositions of Flexion.

A midrange movement is usually a big multijoint exerc i s ethat triggers the most fiber activation. Examples include squatsfor quads and decline presses for lower chest.

Co n t racted-posi tion movements are usually isolatione x e rcises that provide continuous-tension occlusion effects.

Examples include leg extensions for quads and cable

Beyond X-Rep Musc le Buildin g 23


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crossovers for chest.Stretch-position movements fully elongate the target muscle

against re s i s t a n c e, which can trigger anabolic hormones andpossibly muscle-fiber spitting. Examples include sissy, or limbo,squats for quads and dumbbell flyes for chest.

Muscle-building l esson 4: You must train a muscle fromthree distinct anglesmidrange, contracted and stretchedino rder to maximize fiber activation. Eve ry exercise for eachbod y pa rt falls into one of those categoriesand if you add X Reps and X-hybrid techniques, which well explain later,

c o r re c t l y, you only need one to two sets in each position tomaximize size stimulation very, very quickly!

24 Beyond X-Rep Musc le Buildin g

Posit ions-of-Flexion Bic eps Program

Barbell curls w ith a slightcheat train the midrangeposition, concentrat ion curlsw ork the biceps in theircontracted position, wit hocclusion, and incline curls(below) w ork t he bicepsstretch position, w hich cantrigger fiber splitting andanabolic hormone release.

Midrange

Stretch

Contracted


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CHAPTER 5

Time-Bomb Tr a in in g


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Unless youve read The Ultimate Mass Workout and/or triedthe X-Rep technique corre c t l y, you may not re a l i ze just how powerful it is. At the end of a set to failure, when the importantg row t h - o riented high-threshold motor units start to kick in, your nervous system fails. Thats when most people stop asetwhen they cant get another full-range repand grow t hstimulation is minimal. But with X Re ps, instead of stopping, you lower the weight to the max-forc e - g e n e ration point andcontinue to fire out part i als. Thats how you leapfrog nervo u ssystem failure and continue to recruit fast-twitch fibers. Heres

h ow you do a standard X-Rep sequence on Smith machinesquats: After a warmup your knees are lubed, yo uve got blood in

your quads, and your legs are ra ri n to go. First you do onesmooth set to positive failure, which is more of an extension of the warmup and primes your nervous system with a heavy work weight. No forced reps; no X Reps; stop at positive failure.

Now comes the money set. After about a three-minute rest,

get comfortable under the bar and unhook the safety catches. Your feet are sl ightly in front of your hips just wide r thanshoulder width and toes pointed out slightly. Inhale as yo ul ower to a count of two to a point to where your hamstri n g stouch your calvesupper legs past parallel to the groundandthen quickly re verse the action as you exhale. Dont bounce with the weight; its more of a controlled explosion. The weightshould reach lockout in about 1 1/2 to two seconds. As soon as you hit lockout, or close to it if youre doing partials, begin thenext rep.

Continue with that cadence till you stick. At that point yourpartner should step in so the bar stalls for only a millisecond.He should apply enough pressure to the bar to keep it moving all the way to lockout. Note that we said the bar should keepm oving. That so-called forced rep should notnot!be as l ow-mot ion tort u re tac tic. Your partner should prov i d eenough help to keep your rep cadence intact for a smooth

finish on your final rep. Otherwise your X Reps could suffer a



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s e ve re shortfal land yo ud o nt want to short c h a n g emax-force-point overload!

At lockout take a deepbreath and lower to a point just below paralle l. Now s q u e eze the bar hard into your tra p s, innervate yo u rquads to the max and pulset h rough about an eight -

inch range with X Re p s.Think of these as controlledm i n i - e x p l o s i o n s. Yo ushould feel your quadss c reaming by about X-Re pnumber five. If not, yo umay be too high on thes t roke; try going a little

deeper so you get a bit morestretch in your quads. When your quads are fried and you can no longer pulse, hold the weight statically for a few seconds down low, squeeze yo u rquads as hard as you can, thenBam!rack it. You may haveto rack it low if your partner cant help you get back to the top,but thats one reason you do these on a Smith machine. (Theother is that X Reps are impossible at the end of a set of free-bar squats due to a leverage shift.)

Yo uve just done more to stimulate growth in that one setthan most people get in three or four of the haphazard variety.Think about all the energy you save, energy your body can now channel into re c ove ry and growth, thanks to getting the jobdone with half or a quarter of the volume! It all comes down tooverloading the max-force generation point. Just the way Ronnie Coleman instinctively tries to overload that point on somany of his exerc i s e s. On an X-Rep set, howe ve r, instead of

j e rking or heaving eve ry re p, wait till the end of the set and


X Reps can be bru tal on the bigexercises and m ay require partnerassistance.


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attack that key mass-building sweet spot safely and efficiently.Getting more fast-twi tch-fiber invo l vement and energ y c o n s e rvation is only part of X Re p s extra o rd i n a ry powe r,h owe ve r. Theres occlusion too. Because X Reps are part i a lm ovements and create continuous tension, you get someocclusion at the end of every set you use them on, even if its af u l l - range multijoint exerc i s e. Pa rtial s create continuoustension. And if you use X-Rep partials at the end of a set of acontinuous-tension isolation movement, like leg extensions, you occlude the muscle even longer than if you stop at failure.

As we mentioned earlier, most people are forced to stoptheir sets too early to reap all the size - a n d - s t re n g t h - b u i l d i n g benefits of occlusion, but if you grit your teeth and continue with X Reps, youll force longer occlusion times and your gainscan skyrocket. So if you dont have the superior neuromuscularefficiency of a pro bodybuilder, X Reps can help you overcomethat limitation.

Power partials at the max-forc e - g e n e ration point attack

more fast-twitch fibers with fewer sets and block blood flow forocclusion-growth effectsand where theres occlusion, theresusually burn. Thats the growth hormone connection. If youvebeen bodybuilding for any length of time, you know that itsdifficult to get a burn on compound exercises. Not anymore. If you add X Reps to the end of a set, you can trigger muscle burnat willon just about any exerc i s e. That means you can gett e s t o s t e rone rele ase and a GH surg e, a double -bar re l e danabolic blast.

And if there is such a thing as hyperplasia, or fibersplittingthe jury s still outX Reps may be a key player (orsplayer, in this case).

X Reps produce spectacular muscle-building and shredding results, as the gains Jonathan Lawson and I made in only onemonth in 04 clearly show (see next page). I RON MAN Publisher John Balik said, X Reps are the single mostimportant muscle-building concept to come along in years.

But now theres more X - Rep hybrid techniques that can



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take you to the next level. Weve experimented with a numberof new X-Rep-style training methods, and we got bigger andbetter after we honed them and harnessed their powe r. (Wediscuss them in the next few chapters.) Check out our new results belowno drugs, no trick photography.

Muscle-building l esson 5: Change on a regular basis cancreate faster adapation, i.e. growth. Thats the reason you needa va riety of X-Rep techniques in your mass-building arsenal.Switch them up often, providing your muscles with differe n tstress overloads to cope with, and youll grow like never before.


Experimenting w ith X Reps gave us amazing gains i n only one mont h in04. In 05 w e mixed it up, experimenting w ith new X-Rep hybridtechn iques like X/Pause and X First Stage. Results: We both w ere almost10 pounds heavier than in 04 in the same extremely shredded condition!

1-month X-Rep result sin 04.

1-month X-Rep result sin 04.

Biggerandbetterin 05!

Biggerandbetterin 05!


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Musc le-Buildin g Lessons ReviewLesson 1: The semistretched point of an exercise is

ke y. You nee d to over load that sweet spot , especially onthe big, compound exerc i s e s, if you want to maximize yo u rmass gains. Many of the biggest bodybuilders in the world,like Ronnie Coleman and Jay Cutler, use it on almost every setof eve ry exerc i s e. Well have more analysis of their tra i n i n g techniques later in this e-book.

L e s s o n 2 : While i ts important to overload thes em i s t retched position on eve ry exerc i s e, you should a lsostrive for continuous tension to block blood flow on atleast some movements . Thats one reason to use isolation

e x e rcises after your big compou nd movefor moreconcentrated continuous tension, which produces significantocclusion, or blood-flow impairment, which in turnstimulates another level of muscle growth. Examples includeleg extensions and leg curls.

Lesson 3: While semistretched overload and continuoustension are important, you also need str e t ch e d -p o s it io nexercises to ram p up anabolic hor mones and perha ps

t rigger hyperplasia, or fiber splitting. Its another laye rof growth production that can get you bigger much faster!( Remember the bird study that created over a 300 perc e n tincrease in muscle mass in only 30 days? Our new Double-X Overload tactic on stretch-position exercises mimics that andcan supercharge mass gains. Very exciting!)

Le s s o n 4 : Yo u m u s t t r a i n a m u s c l e f r o m t h r e ed i s t i n c t a n g l e s m i d r a n g e , c o n t r a c t e d a n ds t re t c h e d in order to maximize fiber activation. Eve ry exercise for each bodypart falls into one of those categoriesand if you add X Reps and X-hybrid techniques, you only need one to two sets in each position to maximize sizestimulation very quickly!

Le s s o n 5 : Ch a n g e o n a r e g u l a r b a s i s ca n c r e a t efaster a dapation, i.e. growth. Thats the reason you need ava riety of X-Rep techniques in your mass-building arsenal.Switch them up often, providing your muscles with different

s t ress overloads to cope with, and yo ull grow like neve rbefore.


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CHAPTER 6

Stage Set s and

Double-X Overload


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p a rtia ls you do at the end of a pos itive - f a i l u re set? No tn e c e s s a ri l y. As weve said, full reps can prime the muscle foroptimal fast-twitch fiber re c ruitment at the end of the set. Inother words, it appears the first full reps or near-full reps on as t a n d a rd set make your end-of-set X Reps a more powe rf u lfast-twitch switch, which is due to the size principle of re c ruitment that weve cove red in an earlier chapter and inU M W . Ba s i c a l l y, its a motor-unit cascade that makes X Re p smore power packed!

Ne ve rt h e l e s s, Stage Sets have their place and when we

began mixing them into our program we once again saw bettermass gains. He res the sequence we usually used when we wanted to incorporate this new, potent X-Rep mass attack:

1) Warmup Sets. Do two pro g re s s i vely heavier setsuse50 percent and then 80 percent of your work-set weight to get your nervous system primed to fire the most muscle fiberspossible on your first work set. (T h e res more on pre c i s i o n warmup sequences in Chapter 11.)

2) Po s i t i ve - f a i l u reS e t . Do a standardpo s i tive- f ai lu re set (yo ucan add X Reps to theend, but only if yo urea d vanced and havegood recovery ability).

3 ) St a ge Se t . Do asecond work set, butthis time use the St a g etec hniq ue desc ri b e da b ove e x a g g e rated X Reps to exhaustion firstf o l l owed by top -en dreps with concentra t e dl o c k o u t s. (Yo ull feel it w o rking, we guara n t e e

it!)


Stage Sets c an provide mor esemistr etched-position overload as

w ell as anabolic oc clusion.


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[ Note: The Staged t echnique, as described, will beimpossible on some move m e n t s, such as upright row s. Wei n s e rt this technique in the upcoming routines only on theexercises that work best with it.]

We said above that you may want to add X Reps to the first w o rk setif yo ure advanced. Doesnt that contradict what weve said in the pastthat you should do your first work set topositive failure only? Not really. We said that because the firstset is designed to prime your nervous system for your second w o rk set that includes X Re p s. Weve discove red that if yo ure

fairly advanced and know how to warm up pro p e r l y h e a v y enough to get your nervous system jacked, but not so heavy that you fatigue the target muscleyou should be able to getthe full-blown mass stimulation from X Reps on your very first w o rk set. Then your Stage Set will act as a bonus blockbustermass builder to really kick your mass-building machinery intogear!

X-aggerate d X + X Reps. Thats a lot of Xes, but its a good

de sc ription of another version of this hybrid technique. Wi t h X - a g g e rated X + X Re p s, you sti ll do the first stage, mov i n g t h rough the semistretched position with exaggerated X Re p s,but when you hit nervous system exhaustion, instead of m oving to lockout, you move to the X Spot, or semistre t c h e dpoint, and perf o rm X Re p s. Thats more brutal than re g u l a rStage Se t s, so be pre p a red for some X-cruciating pain. Its w o rth it though . Yo ul l see muscular re sults almostimmediately.

Now back to our friend, Ronnie Coleman. Weve mentionedhis mass training and how its heavily dependent on max-f o rce-point overload. He does a lot of part i a l - rep sets withe x p lo s i ve turn a rounds at the semistretched point, the X spot,never getting close to lockout on any exerciseand his mass isincredible! It verifies a lot of what weve discovered.

Well, after watching his Re d e m p t i o n DV D, we picked upon something even more exciting, a simple exercise tweak that

could pack incredible new mass on your physiqueand



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anothe r X-Rep hybri dtechnique.

Dou b l e -X Ove r l o a d .First, you have to realize thatCo l e m a ns traps areabsolutely freaky! On theDVD hes working out in as t ring tank top, and weven e ver seen such gigant ict ra p s. The y sit on h is

shoulders like two-tonboulders! What does he dofor them? Only three sets of behind-the-back barbells h rugswould you believe11 reps with 745 pounds?!Now, thats not a real uniquee x e rc i s e, and he does ve ry

few sets compared to hisother bodypart hits, but hist raps are arguably his best,most freaky muscle group. Isit genetics?

Maybe, to a degree, but healso has a unique way of p e rf o rm ing hi s shru g s,


Colemans Double-X Overloadtact ic on shrugsa hitch at t hebottom of each rephavehelped him develop out rageoust raps! Its basicall y an X Rep at

the semistretc hed pointbetw een every full r ep. Alsonotice t hat he doesnt move thebar very far even on his f ullreps (see photos above)yet histr aps are huge. Check out thest i l l f r om his Redemption DVDw hen he w as wearing a str ingtank top (left ). Amazing!(Coleman s DVD is avail able at

www.Home-Gym.com).

Bottom.

Top.


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something he doesnt do for any other exercise (and afterseeing the size of his tra ps, we have to ask, Why not?). He res what he does: When he stands erect with the massive we ig h tsuspended at arms length behind his legs, he pulls up only afew inches, shrugging with a ve ry limited ra n g e, but when hegets to the bottom se mistretched positionthis is thei m p o rtant parthe double hitches. He uses that contro l l e dm a x - f o rce-point double blast on eve ry rep of eve ry set of shrugs.

Could it be that his double overload at the semistre t c h e d

position is creating extreme anabolic reactions in his upperback? Remember, there have been scientific studies correlating stretch overload with hyperplasia, or fiber splitting. Could hisdouble-hitch method be triggering muscle-fiber replication as well as max-force-point overload for a double-whammy mass-morphing effect? It sure looks that way!

Think about it. His traps are incre d i b l e, yet he only doesthree sets for them. How about this: On Jay Cutlers Ripped to

Sh re d s DV D, he uses the Double-X Overload technique onalmost eve ry exercise! Were convinced its how Cutler hasovercome many of his genetic limitations to become one of thebest bodybuilders in the world.

Were very excited about these observation, and after trying D o u b l e - Xes in the gym we can honestly say that you willalmost feel growth happening (is it hyperplasia?). For example,the next time you do leg curls, lower to the bottoms e m i s t retched point on the first re p, pull up only about 10inches, lower to full stretch again, and then pull the weight upfor a full re p. Continue that sequence on eve ry re p, Double- Xing at the bottom turnaround. At nervous system failure, youcan add standard X Repsif you can stand the burn.

Double X Overload obviously works for Ronnie Co l e m a nand has allowed him to build amazing trap mass with very few sets (Ronnie, youve got to try it on other exercises!). Give it ago and watch yourself grow!



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CHAPTER 7

X/Pause and

X-centric Tr a in in g


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Our first foray into X-Rep hybrid techniques was X Overload. What we did was take a set to nervous system failure,rack the weight, add 10 to 20 percent more poundage, thenc rank out a heavier X-Rep-only set. We thought that wouldoverload the X Spot and create some exceptional new gains. Itsure looked good on paper.

Un f o rt u n a t e l y, we didnt get a lot out of itand we we repuzzled. Why didnt it ramp up our mass gains? Then it hit us:By stopping at nervous system failure, we we re derailing thes i ze principle of muscle fiber re c ruitment and not extending

the set with occlusion. We did get some strength out of it, butthat may be because of the tendon and ligament work we weregetting on the heavy X-Rep-only set. It was essentially likedoing a second partial low-rep set (sets in the one-to-four-reprange are notorious for building more strength than size forthat very reason).

Then, as luck would have it, we ran across some of Mi k e


Mike Ment zer used a techni que he

called rest/ pause, taking six-secondbreaks between max singles. Thatnever did muc h for our m uscle size,so we retooled it int o X/Pausetr aining, a more severe form ofstandard X-Rep w ork.


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Mentzers writings on Heavy Duty training and rest/pause. Histechnique was as follows: a heavy single, rest six seconds,another heavy single, rest six seconds, another heavy single with help if necessary, rest six seconds and a final heavy single with a reduced poundage and/or with help from a partner.

Once again, that sounds like a strength-building re g i m e n ,and thats exactly what we found when we tried it as outlinedby Mentzer. But we also realized that he made good gains withit (perhaps because of his superior neuromuscular efficiency),his reasoning being that the pauses between all-out effort s

helped clear the target muscle of lactic acid and other wasteproducts that can short -circuit the nervous system and causepremature failure. That got us thinking...

What if you did a regular set to nervous system exhaustion,tacked on X Reps to force the muscle to continue to activa t efast-twitch fibers, and then rested for six seconds. After thatshort pause you take the same weight and blast out an X-only set. Bingo! We saw mass increases almost immediately.

We think the reason X/Pause works and X Overload doesnt work so well is because the X Reps tacked onto the first part of the set better deplete the muscle and add more occlusion. Also,because the rest is so shortsix seconds as opposed to alonger rest to change the weight on X Overloadthe sizep rinciple is still intact and fast-twitch fibers continue to fireefficiently without overbearing tendon and ligament support.

To review, heres how to do an X/Pause set on close, parallel-grip pulldowns: Strap on to the pulldown bar and wedge yourthighs under the support pads. Pull the handle down to yo u rchest and then release almost to lockout before pulling it back d own to your chest. At nervous system exhaustion, whichshould occur at around rep nine, move to the semistre t c h e dpoint, just shy of lockout, and do X-Rep part i a l s, pulling thebar down about eight inches in a controlled, explosive manner.

When you cant do anymore X Reps, stand up, let the weightstack down, but d ont release the handle. Count o ff six

secondsone-thousand one, one-thousand two, etc. t h e n



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it didnt rip muscles and joints was the key. Afterall, scientists have often

said that the negativep a rt of a rep is the mostimportant.

If our thinking wasc o r rect, heavy negative -only training should

p roduce outstanding results in size and strength. No p e. Thestudies comparing heavy negative-only sets to standard

positive/ neg ative work dont show much difference in re su lts.The spectacular size and strength increases from heavy negative-only training just dont happen. The studies find thatn e g a t i ve-only training with heavier weights produces aboutthe same results as regular sets. That blew our theory out of the water.

Then re s e a rchers compared regular positive / n e g a t i ve setsto positive-only (concentric) setsonly raising the we i g h t . What happened? St a n d a rd positive / n e g a t i ve work won eve ry time. The mystery continued: From the first studies it looks liken e g a t i ve work is nothing special. But when negative work ismissing, gains are near zero. Why?

Its not that negative work is more important than positive work; its just necessary to trigger more growthat least morethan positive-only work because the most important point in many exe rcises is near the turnaro u n d , when you shift fro mn e g a t i ve to positive. With posit ive-only work there is no

turnaround, that critical directional shift.


A new st udy shows t hat fast lowering ofresistance creates more muscle growththan slow, contr olled movement but itmay not be the speed that t riggersresults. Its probably the extr a overloadat the semistretched point on the str okecaused by stopping the fast dow nw ardmovement at t he bott om.


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When you do positive-only work, you just lift the weight. Inother words, maximum force production doesnt occur at thatkey turnaround point in the stroke. You do get a little overloadthere with positive-only workwhen you have to drive from adead stop out of the bottom of a press, for examplebut not asmuch as when you have to reverse the movement of a weight inthat position. That semistretched shock is the missing elementin positive-only training, which is why it does little for musclegrowth.

But hold on! He a v y, negative-only work doesnt include a

turnaround eitheryou just lower a heavy weight. So shouldntit produce the same meager results as postive-only work?No, because overload at the turnaround point is not missing

f rom heavy negative-only work. Think about it: Yo ure muchstronger during the negative phase of a rep than the positive.So negative-only sets re q u i re you to use much more we i g h tthan in a standard setusually more than your one-rep max,in fact. That means you do overload the turnaround point with

a much heavier weightthere is semistretched shock. No, youdont reverse the movement, but you do have to slow it down(at least youd better! That weight is friggin heavy!).

A recent study ve rifies the importance of turn a ro u n d ,although the re s e a rchers seem to miss that resul t. Jo s e Antonio, Ph.D. discussed it in his Anabolic Drive column in theOctober 05 issue of IRON MAN :

Twe l ve 24-ye a r-old subjects perf o rmed maximal re s i s t i velengthening isokinetic exercise with both arms for eight weeks,t h ree days per week, during which they trained one arm at afast velocity and the other at a slow ve l o c i t y. Type 1 musclefiber size increased in both cases. Type 2a and 2x muscle fiberin c reased in both arm s, but the increases we re greater in thefast-trained arm.

The re s e a rchers concluded that training using fast (3.66radians per second) lengthening contractions leads to gre aterh y p e rt rophy (growth) and strength gains than slow (0.35

radians per second) lengthening contra c t i o n s. The gre a t e r



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near lockout and do as many X Reps as possible. When yo ucrap out, use a chair or stool to put your feet on and get back into the top position of the chin. Lock into it, take your feet off the stool and do a four-second negative. When you reach the X Spot, near the bottom, pulse with X Reps. You may only be ableto do one or two of those slow negatives plus Xes, but what anincredible mass-kicking method!

Weve never tried it, but you could do a few X Reps on every rep of a pure - n e g a t i ve set too. For example, you tie about 20percent more weight around your waist for those chins, climb

to the top, lower slowly and then do about three X Reps nearthe bottom. Do four or five of those pure negatives plus Xes,butbe care f u l yo uve guaranteed to get mighty soreand yo u rlats may be ripping out of your shirt before you can say wicked V taper .



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CHAPTER 8

Iso X and X Fade


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In The Ultimate Mass Workout we made the case for doing X Reps at the top of contracted-position exerc ises, even though weve said over and over that the semistretched position is thebest spot for ultimate muscle fiber recruitment (see, we said itagain). Heres our reasoning:

We know that an important point on the stroke for[ s t retch- and contracted-position] exercises is full elongationon stretch-position exercises and full contraction oncontracted-position exercises. Therefore, you should do your X Reps close to those points.

For example, on incline curls, a stretch-position exerc i s efor biceps, when you can no longer do full reps, you pulse justa b ove t he stretch position. On concentration curls, thecontracted-position movement for biceps, once you hit failure,use your free arm to get the dumbbell up into the contra c tedposition and pulse at that key point. While we made thea rgument that elongation is important for max forc ep roduction on X Re p s, you already get that on midrange and

s t retch exerc i s e s. So X Reps in the contracted position willp rovide another unique muscle-building stimulus. Re m e m b e r, many re s e a rchers believe that the best grow t hstimulus occurs when the muscle is semi-elongated, so X Reps in the fully contracted position may not be idealjust unique .

That last statement is important and the reason that afterusing X Reps at the top of contracted-position exerc i s e s, likec o n c e n t ration curls, leg extensions and leg curls, we felt likesomething was missing and that our gains could be better. Wekept asking ourselve s, If the semistretched position is soc ricica lly impor tant for muscl e growth, why are nt weemphasizing it on contracted-position exercises as well?

Despite the explanation from UMW , we knew we had to dosomething to change our Iso-X strategyusing X Reps in thec o n t racted position onlyto something that blasted thes e m i s t retched posit ion in addition. X Reps at the max-c o n t raction point made some sense, but doing them at the

s e m i s t retched point seemed even more beneficial, especially



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af te r al l the tra i n i n g analysis andexperimentation wed beendoi ng. (Heck , Ro n n i eColeman almost neve r

m oves to the contra c t e dposition on any exercise, as youll see when we analyzehis training routine toward

the end of this e-book.) Thats how the X Fade was born.It started out as a three-position X-Rep sequence. At

n e rvous system exhaustion the trainee got help to the top,contracted position and pulsed for three to four X Reps. Then

he lowe red to the middle of the stoke and pulsed there foranothe r three or four X Re p s. Fi n a l l y, he lowe red to thes em i s t retched position and did X Reps there till the pain wastoo much. That ended the set (usual ly with horr i f i cscreaming!).

In the beginning we liked that triple-X method, but then werealized that we werent getting a heckuva lot of Xes in the lastpositionand that was the most important spot for fiberacti vation, the semistretched point! By the time we got there,the target muscle was spent, the burn was too intense, and we just couldnt do our X Reps near the bottom the justice they deserved. So the X Fade become a two-position fade instead of three.

Our new, improved version: At nervous system exhaustion we get help to the top, contracted position for X Reps, fire outas many as possible, then lower to the stronger semistre ch e dpoint and do X Reps there. Ah, much better with noticeably

better muscle-size results. Here are all the X-hybrid tactics...


The X Fade has you do XReps in the top contr actedposition, then move to the

sweet spot, the semi-stretched point near t hebott om, for m ore X Reps.


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X-Rep Hybrid Techniques Cheat Sheet

STAGE SETS. Do the two-thirds of the exercises stroke thatincludes the semistretched point first , like the bottom two

t h i rds of squats; at nervous system exhaustion, move tolockout and do the top one third of the stroke to exhaustion.( Note: T his technique works best on exercises with bone-support lockouts; for example, squats, bench presses, overheadpresses. You can also do the first stagethat encompasses the X spotand then at nervous system exhaustion move to the X spot and continue with standard X Re ps. Stage Sets dont work well for exercises that have continuous tension.)

DOU B LE -X OV E R LOA D. Use a hit ch, or X Re p, at thes e m i s t retched point between eve ry full re p. For example, onshrugs you move the bar down to the lowest point, pull up a few inches, move the weight back down to the lowest point and thendo a full rep. You can use this technique on almost any exercise,e ven squats; howe ve r, you may have to lighten the weight. Itsideal for stretch-position exercises and may trigger fiber spitting!

X / PAU S E . Do your normal set to nervous systemexhaustion, blast out X Reps at the semistretched position andthen rack the weight. Count to six, then take the same weightand grind out more X Reps at the semistretched point till youcant move the weight.

X-CENTRIC TRAINING. Do a normal set to nervous systemexhaustion, blast out X Reps, then get the weight back up tothe top of chins, for example with help. Lower the we i g h t

slowly for about five seconds and at the semistretched point doth ree or four X-Rep pulses. Get the weight back up again andrepeat the slow negative plus X Reps. Do that till you cant lowerthrough the negative phase with control.

X FA D E. This is more for continuous-tension isolatione x e rcises (contracted), like leg extensions and leg curls. Do a normal set to nervous system exhaustion, then get help to thetop contracted spot. Do X Reps there, then lower to the

s e m i s t retched point and do X Reps at that key point till themuscle is spent.


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Since our 04 X-periment, when we first began using X Reps, weve made some startling discoveries that increased our gainss i g n i f i c a n t l y. Yo uve al ready read about th e X-hybr i dtechniques that helped take our intensity and muscle mass tothe next level in 05. We also used a different split that had us working legs only once a week.

What?! Havent we said that working a bodypart once a week d o e s nt work for most people and has never given us re s u l t s ?Thats correct, but theres a minor detail that makes the strategy v i a b l e, at least for quads. They seem to need more re c ove ry

time, especially if youre doing cardioand during our ripping phase in the summer months, we do lots of card i o, and it allinvolves legs.

We snapped to the need for more leg recovery time when wesaw a new study re v i e wed by re s e a rcher Je r ry Brainum thatappeared in the August 05 IRON MAN . Heres an excerpt:

In a study presented at the 2004 meeting of the Na t i o n a lSt rength and Conditioning Association, re s e a rchers from the

Un i versity of Alabama examined just how long it takes tore c over from a we i g h t - t raining workout. Fifteen men and 15 women were tested for strength recovery at 48, 72 and 96 hoursafter a weight workout consisting of three sets of eightrepetitions done with weights equal to 65 percent of one-re pmaximum in the bench press and leg press.

X-Rep hybri dtechniqueshelped us takeour muscle massto t he next levelin 05, but w ehad to be carefulwit h them. Theyare pow erful andcan tr igger over-train ing if theyare abused.


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Analysis showed that 66.7 percent of the male subjectsneeded 96 hours for full recovery on the leg press. In contrast,93.3 percent of the men showed full re c ove ry on the benchp ress after 72 hours. As for the female study subjects, 66.7percent recovered on the bench press after 72 hours, while only 46.7 percent showed full re c ove ry on the leg press at the 96-hour mark.

We do a few more sets than three for our quads at any oneleg workout, and we add intense X Reps. Plus, like we said, we were doing lots of leg-related cardio during our ripping phase.

All that considered, we figured once-a-week leg training shouldbe about rightand we we re correct. Our strength start e dm oving up on almost eve ry exerc i s e, and our legs got moreshredded and vascular.

Du ring our 05 ripping-phase split our once-a-week leg workout occured on Wednesday. We split the upper body overtwo days, Monday and Tuesday, and then repeated the split onThursday and Fri d a y. We tried to minimize the ove r l a p, but

u n f o rtunately we still got some. He res how our 05 ri p p i n g -phase split looked:

Monday: delts, traps, midback, rear delts, biceps,forearms

Tuesday: chest, lats, triceps, abs

Wednesday: quads, hamstrings, calves, lower back

Thursday: delts, traps, midback, rear delts, biceps,forearms

Friday: chest, lats, triceps, abs

The major overlap occured with back. We trained traps andmidback one day, and then the following day we worked lats.Biceps also got some overlap: We worked them that first day d i rectly and with midback and then they got some indire c t work the next day, when we worked lats.

Despite the small amount of overlap, we liked this split. And



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the once-a-week leg training on Wednesdays kept our programin the five-day work week schedule we must use because wecant train on weekends (St e ve has kids on club soccer teamsand Jonathan teaches at car-racing schools).

What we failed to consider was that compared to 04, we we re training our upper-body muscles more fre q u e n t l y. Last year a bodypart would get hit once a week eve ry third we e k ,like a built-in re c ove ry rotation (see The Ultimate Ma s s Wo rk o u t for that pro g ram). In 05, training legs only once a week, we trained our upper body muscles twice a week e ve ry

week. Add to that the more intense nature of the X-Rep hybridtechniques we were using, and you see why we believe we may h a ve been ove rt raining to a degree this year (but we stillmanaged to pack on almost 10 pounds of muscle! Wereconvinced we couldve packed on more.):

In 04 we were doing the first work set to failure, and thenadding X Reps to the second work set.

In 05 we used the more severe X-hybrid techniques, andon some of our compound exercises we did the first work set with X Reps at the end, paused for six secondsand did more X Reps (the X/Pause technique), and then we did the second work set in Stage style or Double-X Overload. Thats much, much more intense than 04!

L e ts quickly review those X-hybrid techniques so you cansee how much more severe our 05 program was. Heres how weused X/Pause on Smith machine incline pre s s e s. After doing two progressively heavy warmup sets, we loaded the bar with apoundage that we could get about nine reps with. When wereached central nervous system exhaustion, we lowe red thebar to the max-force point, just above the chest, and pulsed,f iring the bar up to about the middle of the stroke on each X Rep. We usually got about four to six, then we racked it. After asix-second pause, we would unrack the bar again, take it down

to the X spot and blast out about three more X Reps.Talk about



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overload!That six-second rest gives some of the fatigue time to

subside, but its not long enough to take the stress off the fast-twitch fibers. In other word s, they will still be engaged when you continue the set with more X Reps.

Now for the Stage Set. After about a two-to-thre e - m i n u t erest we reduced the poundage slightly. He res the stagep rotocol: We would rep out on the bottom two-thirds of thestroke first, which encompasses the X spot. At nervous systemexhaustion we pushed the bar to lockout, usually with partner

a s s i s t a n c e, and then we would do the top one-third of thes t roke to lockout. Thats a weak area, so a little part n e rassistance was usually necessary on each of those re p s. Yo umay think the top range is mostly triceps on incline pre s s e s,but by doing the bottom two-thirds of the stroke first, weessentially pre-exhausted our pecs, so we really felt the top-range partials in our chestsbelieve us! Its a wicked burn.

A Stage Set is a unique way to extend the tension timeyou

get to attack the semistretched position, or X spot, first in theset, albeit with a more exaggerated X-Rep movement. St a g esets work nicely on most compound exercises that have alockout positionpresses and squats for example. Thep roblem is, on exercises that dont have a lockout position, w h e re there is continuous tension throughout the re p l i k erows and pulldownsin order to use the stage technique, youhave to do the contracted-position phase first and finish withthe third of the stroke that includes the X spot. That justdoesnt work as well, so we used other X-hybrid techniques ont h o s e. For example, the Double-X Overload techniquefull-range reps with a hitch at the stretch position. (As we said, big Jay Cutler uses this technique on almost every exercise, and itmay be a key trigger of hyperplasia, or fiber splitting, necessary for extreme size.)

To use the Double-X-O technique on cable upright rows, fore x a m p l e, we pull the bar to the chest, lower to the arm s -

extended position, pull up about eight inches, lower to full



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05 Ripping Phase Routine

Monday and Thursday:Delts, Midback, Biceps, Forearms

Rack upright rows or seated laterals (first set is a drop with X Reps; second is with X/Pause) 2 x 10(6), 10

Forward-lean laterals (X Reps; second set is a drop) 2 x 8-10, 8(6)Smith-machine behind-the-neck presses

(X Reps; second set Staged) 2 x 8-10Superset

One-arm cable laterals (X Reps) 1 x 8-10Incline one-arm laterals (X Reps) 1 x 8-10

Superset Cable upright rows (X Reps) 1 x 8-10Shrugs or Nautilus shrugs (X Reps or Double-X O) 1 x 8-10

Machine rows (second set with X Reps) 2 x 8-10Behind-the-neck pulldowns (X Fade) 1 x 8-10Superset

Bent-arm bent-over laterals 1 x 8-10Bent-over dumbbell rows (X Reps) 1 x 8-10

Bent-over laterals or standing uncrossovers (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 10(6)Preacher curls (X Reps) 1 x 8-10Cable curls with Biceps Blaster (X Reps) 1 x 8-10Concentration curls (drop set; X Reps or X Fade) 1 x 8(6)Rope hammer curls (drop set; X Reps or X Fade) 1 x 10(6)Superset

Reverse wrist curls (X Reps) 1 x 15Forearm Bar reverse wrist curls

or dumbbell reverse wrist curls 1 x 8 Aftershock superset

Wrist curls (X Reps) 1 x 15Forearm Bar wrist curls or dumbbell wrist curls 1 x 8

Rockers (drop set every other workout) 1 x 15-20(8)


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05 Ripping Phase RoutineTuesday and Friday: Chest, Lats, Triceps, Abs

(Friday Add Calf Work)

Smith-machine incline presses (X/Pause; second set Staged) 2 x 10, 8High-low cable flyes (drop set to high cable flyes with X Fade) 1 x 10(6)Superset

Decline-bench presses or wide-grip dips (Staged) 1 x 8-10Flat-bench dumbbell presses (X Reps) 1 x 8-10

Middle cable flyes (drop set to low cable flyes with X Reps) 1 x 10(6)Narrow, parallel-grip pulldowns (second set with X Reps) 2 x 8-10Superset

Chins (X-centric) 1 x 8-10Dumbbell pullovers 1 x 8-10

Superset Pulldowns (X Reps) 1 x 8-10Rope rows or machine pullovers (X Reps) 1 x 8-10

Decline extensions (second with X Reps in press position) 2 x 10, 8Tri-set

Rope or elbows-flared pushdowns (X Reps) 1 x 8-10Stiff-arm kickbacks 1 x 8-10Bench dips (X Reps) 1 x 8-10

Tri-set Cable pushouts (X Reps) 1 x 8-10Stiff-arm kickbacks 1 x 8-10Bench dips or parallel-bar dips (X-centric) 1 x max

Incline kneeups (X Reps) 1 x 15Superset

Incline kneeups 1 x 8Bench V-ups 1 x max

Ab Bench crunches 1 x 8-10Tri-set

Ab Bench crunches (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 8(6)

Freestyle twisting crunches 1 x 15Bench V-ups 1 x max

Friday only Seated calf raises (X Reps) 2 x 8-12Standing calf raises 1 x 20-25


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05 Ripping Phase Routine

Wednesday: Quads, Hams, GastrocsSmith-machine squats (second or third set with X Reps) 3 x 10-12Leg extensions (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 10(8)Leg extensions (X Fade) 1 x 8-10One-leg leg extensions (X Fade) 1 x 8-10Hack squats (feet high and wide)

or leg presses (feet high and wide) 2 x 10, 8Leg curls (drop set; X Reps) 1 x 10(8)Leg curls (wide with X Fade) 1 x 8-10One-leg leg curls (X Reps) 1 x 8-10Hyperextensions (X Reps) 1 x max Dumbbell stiff-legged deadlifts (Double-X O) 1 x 10-12Leg press calf raises (X Reps; second with X Fade) 2 x 15-20Superset

Hack-machine calf raises (X Reps) 2 x 8-12Standing calf raises (X Reps) 2 x 8-10

Machine donkey calf raisesor leg press calf raises (Double X O) 1 x 12-15

Seated calf raises 2 x 20-25Low-back machine (X Reps) 1 x 10-15


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CHAPTER 10

Sp lit -P o s it io n sX-Rep Tr a in in g


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As we ment ioned and you saw in the last chapter, ourannual photo shoot occurred in mid-June, almost three weeksearlier than in 04. As we explained, we included new X-hybridt e c h n i q u e s X - c e n t ric training, X/Pa u s e, Double-X Ove r l o a dand X Fadewhich we believe are the reasons our results camemuch faster during our second X-periment. We we re bothbigger than at our 04 photo shoot but in the same, or perhapsb e t t e r, conditionshredded! Thats impre s s i ve, especially forSteve, whos a middle-aged hardgainer. He finally saw the scalehover in the 200-pound range in his hardest, leanest condition

e ve r. Jonathan dialed it in too, with more musculari ty at aheavier bodyweight. We we re ve ry happy that we improved, but the question

remains: Could we have been even better? Muscle justshouldnt be that difficult to build. Sure, were fairly advanced,so gains wont be 20 pounds a ye a r, as they we re in thebeginning of our lifting careersor could they be? Afteranalyzing eve rything we do, and reviewing all weve learn e d ,

we have to ask ourselves, Why the heck not?!One of our strategies created an ah-ha moment was how wea p p roach our mass-building phase, usually in the winter. Wecontinue to hit it fairly hard five days a week (which may be ap roblem too; more on that in a moment), but we also try tomaintain visual contact with our abs. Weve always thoughtthat staying fairly lean makes it easier to get shredded assummer nears; howe verand this is a big howe verit alsomakes muscle much, much more difficult to build.

Huge muscles are a luxury for the human body, not an e c e s s i t y. Be f o re your metabolism will permit a lot of lean-mass gain, your body has to be damn sure famine is neve rgoing to happen. In other words, you need a fairly large caloriesurplusof the right nutrientsto kick your body intoanabolic ove rd ri ve and pre vent it from burning muscle forenergy. Just as important, those calories have to be spread outover the course of the day every day. Hunger is an absolute no-

n o. Keep your body in positive nitrogen balance and positive



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quality calorie abundance, and if your workouts are intenseenough to stimulate growth and you get enough re c ove ry Bam!new muscle should appear very quickly.

Bodybuilders who got huge before the stero i d - i n s a n i t y e ra A rnold, Da ve Dra p e r, Larry Scottused to appro a c h winter as a muscle-feeding/building fre n z y. A good laye rcovering the abs was considered a necessary evil during a max-muscle-building phase. These days thats not so much the casebecause a lot of bodybui lders cycle anaboli c stero i d sthroughout the winter. The right pharmaceuticals make excess

c a l o ries a minor playe r. Su re, the body needs something to w o rk with, but thanks to drugs its always in anticatabolicm o d e, being overly efficient with all the muscle-building blocks it receives. (No, its not fair, but its reality.) You can see where were going with this: Well be shoveling in more muscle-building calories during our mass-building phase, whichmeans were throwing ab visibility out the window. Mo re onour mucho-mass-diet strategies in a moment. Lets segue into

t raining, as our new split is rather ingenious, something weadopted before the end of summerand its a gain maximizer! Weve never been able to come up with a perfect recovery-

oriented split, mainly because we cant train on the weekends. Weve said that, ideally, we should be on a thre e - o n / o n e - o f f split, with a leg-training workout falling between two differentuppe r-body work o u t s. If you do the math, yo ull see that yo uca nt use that split without training on the we e k e n d s. One of our solutions was to still train on a three-way split, but tra i nf i ve days in a row, Monday through Fri d a y, picking up themissed sixth workout the following Monday and continuing with the sequence.

That five-day plan worked well for us in 04, but the new re s e a rch we mentioned in the previous chapter about legsneeding more re c ove ry time had us rethinking things. In anutshell the re s e a rch tells us that we should get better gainshitting a leg workout only once a week, especially when were

using X Reps and X-hybrid techniques that jack up the



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intensity and muscle damage significantly. We used that strategy for the last few weeks of our ri pp ing

phase over the summer, and it worked extremely well, eve n when we were doing cardio on a daily basis. If we put on quads i ze then, we should get even better gains over the winter,c o n s i d e ring our cardio cutback. Ok a y, lets rewind and gothrough our new mega-mass-building strategy point by point.

1) Mega-Mass split. So whats the ingenious split were soe xcited about? He re it is, no weekend training, no bodypartoverlap (well outline the pro g ram in a moment and explain

the A and B designationsits not as complicated as it looks,trust us): Wee k 1Monday: Workout 1A (delts, midback, biceps, forearms)Tuesday: Workout 2 (legs, lower back) Wednesday: Workout 3A (chest, lats, triceps, abs)Thursday: Off Friday: Workout 1B (delts, midback, biceps, forearms + calves) Weekend: Off (with cardio)

Wee k 2Monday: Workout 3B (chest, lats, triceps, abs)Tuesday: Workout 2 (legs, lower back) Wednesday: Workout 1A (delts, midback, biceps, forearms)Thursday: Off Friday: Workout 3A (chest, lats, triceps, abs + calves) Weekend: Off (with cardio)

Week 3Monday: Workout 1B (delts, midback, biceps, forearms)Tuesday: Workout 2 (legs, lower back)

Wednesday: Workout 3B (chest, etc.)Thursday: Off Friday: Workout 1A (delts, midback, biceps, forearms + calves) Weekend: Off (with cardio)

Wee k 4Monday: Workout 3A (chest, lats, triceps, abs)Tuesday: Workout 2 (legs, lower back) Wednesday: Workout 1B (delts, midback, biceps, forearms)Thursday: Off Friday: Workout 3B (chest, lats, triceps, abs + calves) Weekend: Off (with cardio)Repeat Week 1



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Notice that we hit legs once a week, on Tu e s d a y, whichb reaks up the two diff erent upper-body sessio ns. ThenThursday is a complete rest day, and Friday is a repeat of Mondays bodyparts. We never work upper body two days in arow, which should make for some awesome progress.

How does all of that pan out on the recovery scale? Check itout:

Monda y bodypar ts: 96 hours, or four days, to Friday

Tuesday bodypar ts (legs ): 168 hours, or seven daysalthough weekend cardio affects leg re c ove ry. (Werealso adding a mini-calf blast to our Friday work o u t sbecause calves recover much faster than the upper-leg muscles.)

Wednesday bodypar t s : 120 hours, or five days, to thefollowing Monday

As we said, Friday is a repeat of Mondays workout butandthis is importantwith different positions, which brings us to

our next strategy and explains the A and B designations onupper-body workouts (we could see that was puzzling you).2) Spli t-posit ions training. Up p e r-body workouts are

c a t e g o ri zed as either A or B. In the pro g ram in this chapter, youll see that the A workouts contain a big midrange exerciseand a contracted-position movement for each bodypart. Fo re x a m p l e, the 1A delt routine has dumbbell upright row s, thebig midra n g e, multi joint exerc i s e, followed by forw a rd - l e a nl a t e ra l s, a contracted-position delt move. At the next delt w o rkout, 1B, we use the same midrange exerc i s e, dumbellu p right rows again, but this time we follow with a stre t c h -position delt movement, incline one-arm laterals.

T h a ts how it is for eve ry upper-body muscle gro u p. Them i d range exercise stays constant, but the second exerc i s ea l t e rnates between a contracted-position movement and as t retch-position movement. Re m e m b e r, change is necessary for growth. Heres an example from the 3A and 3B workouts for

upper chest: The A workout has Smith-machine incline



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p re s s e s, the constant midrange exerc i s e, followed by inclinecable flye s, a contracted-position upper-chest move; the B w o rkout is Smith-machine incline presses again, but thatsfollowed by incline dumbbell flyes, a stretch-position exercise.

With split-positions training you cover all the positions, orarcs, of flexion, but over two workouts (a Po sitions-of -Flex ionp rimer is on page 76 if yo ure not familiar with that mass-training protocol). That provides a lot of variety, unique stressand more recovery, since you dont work all three positions atevery workout. Its a system that provides optimal recoveryif

you divide your workouts correctly. We use the split-positions approach for eve ry upper- b o d y exercise. That way the target muscles get some unique stress atevery session, la Ronnie Coleman (he also alternates betweentwo routines for every bodypart). In the routines that appear atthe end of this chapter, the A workouts arem i d ra n g e / c o n t racted , and the B worko uts aremidrange/stretch. Ingenious. (Modest, arent we?)

3) Mega-Mass nutr ition. Recovery is also about nutritionand getting the right compounds in sufficient quantities to fuelintense workouts and provide a surplus for growth. Ye s, werestill depending on our X Stack postworkout comboRecoverX plus Cre a Sol (www. X - Stack.com). Thats got eve rything weneed to take full advantage of the after- t raining anabolic w i n d ow; howe ve r, theres also re s e a rch that says you shouldfeed your muscles d u r i n g your training. That makes sensebecause the bodyparts you train last get the most from yo u rpostworkout drink. Think about it. The bodypart you train firsthas to wait almost an hour or longer for refueling. In reality thefirst bodyparts anabolic window is almost closed by the end of your workout (and you thought it was best to work yo u r weakest bodypart first). The solution is to drink as you tra i n( n o, not beer!although the Mexican beer Dos Equis meanstwo Xes. Hmm.).

Our recipe? Were going to mix about a scoop of Re cove r X ,

about a half scoop of CreaSol (titrated creatine) and a scoop of



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GAKIC together in a water bottle and sip it throughout our workouts, trying to down most of it early on. The RecoverX andCre a Sol will feed and refuel the muscles as we blast them,especially those that get hit early in the session (they wont getcheated any longer). GAKIC, a Mu s c l e Tech product, is anammonia buffer that has given us some amazing stre n g t hin cre a s es, which we re p o rted on in the I M Re s e a rch Team inthe November 05 IRON MAN . The problem with GAKIC is that when we took it before the workout, it wore off about two-thirds of the way through. With continuous fueling as we train,

we should be able to sustain the higher power output wevebeen experiencing early in our workouts with no drop off. Were also going to have one or two scoops of Pro - Fu s i o n

p rotein powder before bed. Its a mix of micellar casein and whey pro t e i n s, so it should provide our resting muscles withm o re re c ove ry and grow t h - p romoting building blocks as wes l e e p. Weve never done that because of the fear of exc e s sc a l o ries making us fat. Now we re a l i ze that its necessary to

prevent catabolic actions during the sleeping/fasting phase of the day in order

beyond x rep

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