JOHN:
Speaking of which, I understand that you are now actually
preparing to compete in bodybuilding contests again.
Is that true?
DREW:
Yeah, depending upon how the diet goes I’m probably going to do an N.G.A. show up in Buffalo, New York. It’s a drug-tested, natural contest. They have another one in Florida in November, so depending upon the situation at the time and the finances if I can swing it –most of my money these days goes to diapers and baby food and whatnot. So, if not the New York show, then the show closer to here in Orlando. And we’ll be using Max Contraction Training in with the regular high intensity training. I’ll think we’ll be using Max primarily to focus in on the weaker bodyparts because it is pretty hard stuff. And if we were going to do it with every bodypart, I think it would just take a long time to recover from.
JOHN:
Right. Given that you are already advanced, I shouldn’t think you will be adding a lot more size to your frame, but the key is simply improvement. If you can bring up bodyparts that you haven’t been able to bring out to their maximum in the past, and improve your appearance, then that’s success – quite irrespective even of final placings. How frequently will you be training in preparation for your contest?
DREW:
Right now we’re doing just once a week – just a full body H.I.T. routine, similar to what Ell Darden has in his last book The New High Intensity Training (Rodale, 2004), but we keep it pretty limited – usually eight exercises or less -- and never more than one heavy compound exercise for each major muscle group. Usually one heavy leg movement, one heavy pushing, one heavy pulling movement, and then the rest of it is just the smaller muscle groups – calves, neck, forearms, maybe something for the traps, and then occasionally lower back stuff. But as far as the main muscle groups, we limit it to just one exercise. Any more than that at a really high level of intensity very quickly leads to overtraining.
THE
BEST MAX CONTRACTION EQUIPMENT
JOHN:
On a side note, we just received some equipment that
is designed for Max Contraction by Randy – from Negative-Edge. In fact, he’s called it the Max Contraction machine, and what a difference it has made for Max Contraction and Omega Set™ Training! Not only is it easy on your training partner, but the degree of stimulation is absolutely phenomenal – so you’re right about the “tools.” We had used old generation Nautilus machines because the cams were bigger and the amount of effective resistance delivered to the muscle in the fully contracted position is greater, but it’s nothing compared to the Randy’s Max Contraction machines.
DREW:
In my opinion, and I’ve worked on a lot of plate loaded equipment – I’ve worked on Hammer Strength, Hoist, the MedX Avenger equipment, Southern Exercise, Lamb Equipment, and even some of the obscure things – but as far as plate loaded exercise machines are concerned, and leverage machines in general, I think the Eccentric–Edge Equipment is the first really big step forward in designs. And mainly because they really, really took into consideration – of course their focus was on negative-only training when they were developing them – but these were really the first machines to allow a person to train in that manner efficiently. Like I said before, to do the Max Contraction Training and the Omega Set™, the hardest part was actually getting somebody else to help lift the weights – or here, training by myself, having to use the squat rack to assist in lifting the amount of weight I needed to thoroughly stimulate my biceps, made it difficult. But with the Eccentric-Edge equipment takes all of the problems out of doing it. You don’t need to have two or three training partners to do it. Even more convenient, because of the leverages you don’t need a ton of plates to provide a lot of resistance, which also saves a lot of work for the training partners and it also saves a lot of energy for you if you have to train by yourself on the equipment. Because if you can’t get somebody else to work with you, and you’re going from machine to machine just doing a regular positive-negative dynamic style of training, you can focus more on your workout, rather than dragging plates back and forth between the weight trees and the machines.
JOHN:
Right, which becomes a workout unto itself.
DREW:
Right. From the standpoint of a trainer, I wouldn’t go with anything else for a training facility. The worst part of working with clients on plate loading equipment is having to load and unload machines all day long. Now with this stuff, because of the leverages, you can get by with much, much less weight. And because of the ability to apply heavier negatives and things of that nature with the lever arms, you can have them train much, much harder without working yourself to death over a period of days. So you can actually save your own progress; you can prevent yourself from overtraining while training your clients.
JOHN:
Right. I couldn’t believe the difference – even in the short week since we’ve had them in the gym. Particularly with something like the Omega Set™ because your partner brings it up to the Max Contraction position right away and you have “zero” rest for the trainee. And the force output has to be absolutely optimal, which of course increases the fiber involvement and stimulation.
DREW:
Just phenomenal stuff.
FITNESS
INDUSTRY FALLACIES
JOHN:
I want to now pick your brain a bit on some of the fallacies
that are rampant in the fitness industry.
I can throw out topics for you to comment on, but
I want to start by asking you what is your biggest beef
that
you encounter now as one of the world’s leading personal trainers? What’s the biggest misconception that people have regarding exercise?
DREW:
The absolute biggest misconception that I come across
with clients – it’s almost everybody – is the belief that you “have to do” some sort of steady-state activity to improve cardiovascular sufficiency. And it amazes me that it has persisted this long for I would have figured it would have been put to rest in the mid 1970s with Project Total Conditioning at West Point. And even more recently, I think it was in 2004, there was an announcement at the World – I think it was some sort of physician’s conference, actually right here in Orlando, where they presented the results of a study showing that six months of Nautilus style, high intensity training produced the same or better results in aerobic conditioning than an equivalent amount of time doing traditional aerobic exercise. I mean, you can get cardiovascular benefits from going out and jogging and doing all these other activities, but you can actually do it with the strength training without all the risks inherent in all those other activities. You know, the pounding of the joints and the overworking the body and losing muscle. From a bodybuilding standpoint, a lot of people still believe that you absolutely need to do cardio to “get ripped” – which absolutely isn’t true. The first time I competed I was doing just one high intensity workout a week and no cardio – none. No, actually, scratch that – no “aerobics.” Technically, high intensity training is cardio. In fact, it is the safest and most effective and most efficient form of cardiovascular conditioning. But I got absolutely shredded with no aerobics. The guys that work at our headquarters up in Ohio also competed in natural bodybuilding contests and they were also shredded when they competed – and they also do not do aerobics. What people don’t get is that it’s really just a matter of calories in versus calories out and that just going and doing the additional activity doesn’t really burn enough calories to make enough of a difference and it certainly doesn’t make it worth the amount of time expended. You figure if somebody is just doing activity for the sake of burning calories their time probably isn’t worth very much, especially when you can simply achieve the same effect by not taking in those calories in your diet and preserving more muscle mass in the process because you’re now not out overstressing your body with all that extra activity.
JOHN:
Absolutely true. And another one I wanted to lob over
the plate for you is the idea that you have to roll around
on a “stability ball.”
DREW:
It’s absurd. Just absurd. The whole idea that you have to do any of that to train stabilizing muscles is ridiculous. The most ridiculous thing about this is that if you ask these people what a “stabilizer” is most of them won’t have the slightest idea. And even the guys who are really into that don’t seem to understand that “stabilizer” isn’t so much a classification of muscle as it is a role that a muscle can play. A muscle that normally acts as a stabilizer in one movement could be the prime mover in another movement; it can be a synergist, antagonist – whatever – it’s just a role. It’s a classification of what a muscle is doing during a particular type of activity or bodily movement. And if you want to get at a muscle the best way to do it is with an exercise that directly addresses that muscle, rather than depending on its involvement just as a stabilizer in another exercise. The muscles in the trunk, for example – obviously you can’t increase your squat or your deadlift to a significant degree without all the supporting muscles also being stimulated. But that’s not nearly as ideal for those muscles as if you were to do a direct exercise, such as a back extension machine or a properly designed abdominal machine. All the rolling around and doing things purposefully… if what they’re trying to do is make the exercise that they’re doing more difficult for the muscles that are acting as stabilizers they should actually – if they actually sat down and thought about it, what they’re trying to when they’re making the exercise unstable is that they are trying to make it more difficult for the muscles that are acting as stabilizers. If they really wanted to make it difficult for the muscles that are acting as stabilizers they would simply do an exercise specifically for those muscles where they could target it more effectively. The whole thing is absurd. It’s actually, oddly enough, a fad that is not new. David Landau mentioned something about it being popular in gymnasiums during the early part of the last century. David’s the history expert.
JOHN:
Re-treading old tires.
DREW:
Oh yeah.
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