2009 August | How to Build Muscle, Gain Strength & Become a Better Athlete

Archive | August, 2009

Goodbye, My Friend

29. Aug, 2009 63 Comments Uncategorized

“We got the results back from the doctor today. It’s pancreatic cancer. There’s no cure… It’s terminal.”

My heart stopped and tears welled up in my eyes.

Even though he and my mom never decided to make it official and tie the knot, he was, for all intents and purposes, my step dad. That’s what we referred to him as, and Edward Liebman was the greatest father figure I had ever known.

“Whattaya mean? Are they sure?!” I asked as cold sweat started to roll down my back.

“Yes.”

I couldn’t speak and began to [...]

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The Best Gains of My Life- by John Alvino

12. Aug, 2009 10 Comments How to Build Muscle

By John Alvino

Over the years I’ve had a lot of different training partners; a couple professional bodybuilders, a few competitive powerlifters, and countless hardcore lunatics. But I never got faster gains in muscular size and strength than the months I spent training with my buddy and world class strength coach, Jason Ferruggia.

Jay is not only immensely focused and intense when he trains but he has this stuff down to an exact science. He’s the thinking mans strength coach, forever analyzing and experimenting. There literally hasn’t been a single day in [...]

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3 Lifting Mistakes You MUST Not Make

11. Aug, 2009 10 Comments How to Build Muscle

If you’re serious about building muscle and getting stronger there are three very critical mistakes that you absolutely can’t afford to make. I can’t tell you how many times I see guys in the gym committing these cardinal sins and how badly I wish I could help them all. Unfortunately I can’t save everyone but I’ll always do my best to give my loyal readers an unfair advantage over everyone else.

One critical mistake skinny guys make is to follow traditional bodybuilding advice and only train each muscle group once per [...]

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9 Quick Tips For Bigger Arms

10. Aug, 2009 3 Comments How to Build Muscle

1) Include a lot of close grip chin ups and dips in your workout program.

2) Do both heavy sets to stimulate the fast twitch fibers and higher rep sets to get a good pump increase the size of the slow twitch fibers, sarcoplasm, etc.

3) Consider training arms (biceps and triceps) on your leg day, 48 hours after your main upper body day. This allows you to hit them more often and also when they are fresher.

4) Or consider, for a short specialization period of a month or two, training biceps [...]

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Q & A with Dave Tate

03. Aug, 2009 11 Comments How to Build Muscle

This is an interview from the winter of 2006 that I did with my good friend, Dave Tate. Since many of you may have missed it the first time around I decided to repost it. Enjoy…

*****

I’ve never met “Big Bad Dave Tate.” I have never even met Dave “Fuckin” Tate. Supposedly this is some terrifying lunatic who would throw you through a wall for squatting less than 800 pounds in his presence or suck the brains from your skull if you looked at him wrong. At least that’s what I [...]

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