You want to build muscle and get lean.  And you don’t have all day to read about all the meaningless minutia. You just need to know precisely what to do. So read these mass building tips and you’ll be on your way to the physique you want. The good news is you don’t need tons of fancy equipment or a thousand dollar a month supplement bill.  Its not complicated. This is simple stuff, my friends… 1) Do 3 Hard Strength Training Workouts Per Week Some guys can train more often than this but for most average people with busy,… continue reading.

In the midst of a three day bender, I woke up Sunday morning with an insatiable desire to lift some heavy weights. I looked across the hotel room at my friend Chris who was still in the upright position I saw him in seven hours earlier when I fell asleep. He was somehow still holding the bottle of Heineken in his hand although some of it had spilled on his shorts. “We gotta go train, bro.” “What? Are you serious?” “As a heart attack. Let’s go to breakfast with the bride and groom, eat and drink some coffee and then… continue reading.

Question: Coach, I’m anxious to start your ‘Home Gym Warrior’ program that you have outlined in your Muscle Gaining Secrets package (which is awesome btw). Anyway, since I prefer the home-gym programs due to my schedule, as you might have guessed, I was looking for the most cost-effective solution to having a set of dumbbells on hand. Currently I have some light dumbbells for warm ups and such (sets of 10s and 15s) and some heavier ones(sets of 30s through 40’s) based on where I’m at in my progression. But, I want to also have some heaver… continue reading.

Originally written for Dave Tate &  Elite Fitness Systems in 2004 They say you can tell a lot about a person by the company he keeps. If you associate with positive, motivated, driven people it can only rub off on you and make you more successful in anything you do. If your running buddies are nothing but a bunch of degenerates, that pretty much says that you are a degenerate, or will end up one. Like the legendary old school rap group, EPMD once said, “Hang with nine broke brotha’s and you’ll soon be the tenth.” If you… continue reading.

Originally written for Elite Fitness Systems At a recent party at my moms house a friend of hers approached me and said he needed my advice. He was in his mid fifties, overweight and out of shape. He told me that he started to work out and needed to know how to use some of the machines. “I have no idea,” I told him. Thinking I was joking, he continued, “You know the one that you sit on with your chest against the pad and your hands out to the side, with your knees bent forty five degrees and…” “Mike,… continue reading.

Intervals The good- intervals allow you to burn a lot of calories in a short amount of time and keep your metabolism elevated long after you finish doing them. The bad- if you are training legs two or even three times per week, you can not do intervals more than once a week without overtraining. Let me rephrase that; you can but eventually it will lead to overtraining or at the very least slow down your strength gains. You can negate this slightly by keeping your leg training volume extremely low and doing… continue reading.

The purpose of doing cardio when trying to get bigger and stronger is to keep you lean, improve your insulin sensitivity and allow you to eat more calories. What kind of cardio will have the least negative effect on your size and strength gains? That’s a no brainer; walking. The great thing about walking is it will not impede your progress in the least, the bad thing is that you have to walk for a bare minimum of 45 minutes to really burn a decent amount of calories and you will not elevate your metabolism much after walking. That is… continue reading.

I have gotten several questions lately about doing cardio while trying to get bigger and stronger. Should it be done at all? What kind? How much? How often? What are the negatives? And what are the positives? Hopefully I can answer everyone’s questions at once with this post. Here’s the real deal on doing cardio while trying to gain size and strength… If you are a beginner who also happens to be a ripped ectomorph who has to fight for every ounce he gains (e.g. a classic hardgainer), I suggest that you lay off cardio almost entirely for at least… continue reading.

CNS intensive training is hot topic these days. Everybody always wants to talk about the CNS and the role it plays in your training. I have done so myself on several occasions but today I want to talk about the role that overthinking about CNS intensive training may be playing in your long term results. For those that don’t know, it is widely recommended that you do not do two CNS intensive workouts on back to back days. For example, you do not perform two max effort workouts on consecutive days or if you are training for speed, you… continue reading.

Originally written 8/2005 I decided to write this article a few months ago but never got around to it until recently. It wasn’t until last weekend, when I scrolled through Dave Tate’s hip hop training mix on his iPod, that I realized this article was a necessity. Too many people are listening to, and worse yet, training to bad hip hop. Before I get into my recommendations of hip hop to train to I must first tell you why I feel I am qualified to write such an article. Afterall, if I saw a hip hop article written by some… continue reading.

Nutrition expert, Mike Roussell and I sat down for an interview recently and discussed the topic of building muscle. Check it out: MR: Jason, your transformation was pretty incredible going from 147lbs to 231lbs. How much trial and error did you think you went through training wise until you found what really worked? JF: Oh man, Mike, I can’t even begin to tell you. I tried so many different methods and systems it was unbelievable. I actually started out as a beginner on a six day a week high volume body part split. This was back in the… continue reading.

I would like to thank everyone for all of the emails that have been flooding in during the last 48 hours and apologize for not being able to get back to everyone personally. I promise my staff and I are doing our best to get back to everyone and will be working around the clock today to handle all of your questions and concerns. I woke up this morning to find an email in my inbox that I wanted to share with everyone because it demonstrates one of the biggest mistakes people could ever make and essentially guarantees failure in… continue reading.

Originally published at EliteFTS.com 11/2005 Last night I closed the doors to my strength and conditioning facility for the last time. After over ten years in the same town and the same building, it was time for me to move on to new challenges. When I finished carrying the final few medicine balls out to my truck I locked the doors permanently. I pulled out of the parking lot and headed to meet a few friends for dinner. When I arrived I walked into a surprise party thrown for me by over thirty of my closest clients. I was touched… continue reading.

In the quest to get bigger, faster, and stronger many athletes overlook the most important aspect of training, which is recovery. The faster you can recover from an intense workout the faster progress will be made. Recovery does not mean just getting as much rest as possible in between training sessions. There are many steps to be taken in the road to recovery and if you want to reach your training goals it would be wise to utilize as many as possible. Perhaps the best way to aid recovery is to avoid over-training. I will not go into great detail… continue reading.

For EliteFTS- Originally written in 2004 Am I the only one who reads articles by other strength coaches and wonders if I’m losing my mind? Reading about an iso-quasi-eccentric upside down fat bar hang clean supersetted with sub-maximal dynamic effort isometric depth jumps can have the profound effect of making you tear out your own hair in an effort to figure out a way to incorporate these methods into your workouts. The sad fact is that many of the people who read these articles don’t realize that much of these methods are unnecessary and even useless. By constantly trying all… continue reading.