Apr 30 2007

Iron Insights Part 3

Tag: The Golden Era of Bodybuilding — jerving @ 1:02 pm

The Scott’s Bench â„¢

Think about the balanced, beautiful, and massive overall arm development of 1960s icon like Larry Scott, Now think about the equipment they used, but with the properly contoured and comfortable pads they did not get the opportunity to use. Biomechanically effective arm work with barbells and dumbbells is now revived! While Vince may have invented some of these pieces, Scott refined them with better angles and improvements to maximize gains.

When the Preacher Curl Bench is properly designed

I dare say… it may be better for biceps than any other piece of equipment you will find…Here’s what makes this bench so good:

The most important feature is the rounded side of the bench. It should be curved, not flat. This allows the biceps to work all the way down to the bottom (where all the growth is).

The curved portion should be no more than 13 inches so the dumbbells don’t bang against the bench.

It should have high density foam so the elbows won’t ground out on the inner frame.

The bench has to be at least 22 inches wide so the elbows don’t slide off the ends but no more than 27 inches,. so the plates on the EZ curl bar don’t hit the bench. .

The top of the bench has to be rounded and comfortable to keep from hurting the armpits.

The lower edge nearest your groin has to be padded and rounded for pain free reps.

The upright post has to be offset away from the body… to avoid banging the groin.

Training Tip: The Amazing Secret To Huge Biceps

Scott curls are the best exercise for building biceps I have ever seen. I am going to take the liberty of calling them Scott curls even though Larry didn’t invent the exercise. Over the years however, Larry has perfected the design of this little bench to where it is as close to perfection as anything Larry has been able to achieve.

When it’s designed correctly it’s great. If not, it’s lousy. The normal flat faced bench is not very good for biceps work. There are many exercises that will do a better job. But let’s assume you have a well designed bench with at least a convex face. The key to this exercise working its charm requires a few specifics. They are as follows: The exercise should always be done standing so you can get your hips under you when you are doing heavy DB and EZ curls. The most effective system is a tri-series as follows: First get a set of dumbbells with which you can just make 6 reps. (6 reps has been determined by the National Strength Training Association as being the most effective number of reps for building size.) Then get a barbell that is about 70% of the weight of the dumbbells. Finally get an EZ curl bar and load it with 80% of the weight of the dumbbells. For example I use 70 lb dumbbells, a 100 lb barbell and 120lb on the EZ curl bar. You are now ready to do some serious work. It is best if you have a training partner for this exercise because it establishes your pace much better. Start off with the DB curls. Place a towel on the bench to keep your skin from catching on the cover. This exercise is done in a fairly loose style. Don’t get the armpits right down on the bench, but position the elbows just a little lower than the crown of the bench. For this to work, the face of the bench needs to be not only curved but short enough to keep the dumbbells from hitting the bottom of the bench. It doesn’t matter if you cheat to get the dumbbells up. You do however, need to let the dumbbells all the way down and completely uncurl the wrists at the bottom of the exercise. It is okay to pull back with the shoulders to assist in getting the weight back up to the top of the exercise. The 6th rep should really be tough. In fact it should be just about the last rep possible even on the first series. Once at the top of the 6th rep you then need to do at least (4) 1\2 rep burns. Just let the weight down to the point that it is going to fall and bring it back up again. If your bench has a flat face, this movement is terrible. It hurts your forearms and elbows. You need to have the rounded face for this to work its charm.

Next, set the DB’s down and immediately, with no rest, pick up the barbell with a wide grip. Appx. 4 inches wider than your shoulders. You should have the palms heavily chalked to keep them from slipping. Nestle the armpits clear down on the bench. (the bench needs to be well padded on the crown to eliminate any armpit pain). Let the feet go forward so you are really resting on the bench with the body. Slowly lower the BB with the wrists curled until you come to the complete bottom of the exercise. Uncurl the wrists totally. Then with no movement of the upper body whatsoever, slowly curl the wrists and force those arms to come up. Do not cheat even a smidgen. Keep the shoulders and the head forward. Look for ways to make this BB exercise of the series even more strict. The bar will come up very slowly, but it will come up. You must have faith and be willing to endure the pain of this exercise. It is excruciating. But it is the heart of the series. Don’t cheat at all. Do 6 reps with 4 burns on the top as you did with the DB’s. Set the barbell down and immediately pick up the EZ curl bar with a reverse grip. The weight should be so heavy you can just barely make 6 reps. Your armpits are not down on the bench for this movement. The form is very similar to the one you used for doing the DB curls. You are trying to use a heavy weight on this exercise just as you were trying to use a heavy weight on the DB curls. It is the BB curls that are done strict. Do 6 reps and 4 burns with the EZ curl bar also. This is one series. You can then rest only long enough for your partner to do his series. You should do anywhere from 3 to 5 series. It is a killer. But you wont believe how much progress you will make on your biceps development. Use this system for a week and then switch back to your Ring of Fire Bio-Phase programs to refresh your arms and let them recuperate. Then use it again. I know of nothing like it to build incredible Biceps.

The Spider Bench â„¢

The long forgotten “first cousin” of the SCOTT CURL BENCH.

SPIDER BENCH, the most effective biceps stimulating movement ever for peak, by LARRY SCOTT.

Being appreciative of the Golden Age Of Bodybuilding.

Think of the arms of the great Larry Scott and picture the famous SPIDER BENCH which helped to develop those prodigious biceps.

This bench is simply wonderful for building peak on the Biceps.

Peak Biceps Training Tip

Use to be when ever any one asked Larry how to get a better peak on their bicep Larry would say “find a new mother” because… Larry believed the shape of your bicep was determined at birth and there wasn’t much you could do about it. You just had to live with it and make the best of what you had. Later on Larry learned that wasn’t true.

When Larry first started training at Vince’s Gym, someone told Larry he had a pretty good bicep. It surprised Larry because Larry wasn’t even interested in biceps at the time. Triceps were Larry’s first love. But Larry figured what the heck maybe I should focus a little more energy on my biceps.

So Larry asked Vince what he thought was the best exercise for biceps. He directed Larry to his Preacher bench and Larry began a life long love affair with that funny little bench. The only problem with the preacher bench is… it is so darn tough on elbows. Sooner or later you are going to get injured and Larry have injured himself many times on it. In fact it was one of those injuries that helped Larry discover something he never knew before. My elbows just wouldn’t put up with one more set of preacher curls so Larry was trying to find something he could do.

Larry switched to the Spider bench and started playing around with different angles to see if he could come up with something that made it more effective… wasn’t expecting anything spectacular… just trying to heal so I could get back to the preacher.

Started changing the angle and testing… Kept bumping it up by 5 degrees until I seemed to hit a cross over threshold… The movement sprang to life…. he forgot all about “injury healing”… got that serious “don’t bother me look” and dug in for some new found growth.. What a pump he was getting… and the peak… he had never felt anything like it before… went over in front of the mirror… stuck his arm straight out and still there was a peak on his bicep. couldn’t tear his eyes off what was happening right before his eyes. Larry had found a new friend.

It wasn’t long before Larry couldn’t even get to the Spider bench because everyone else was on it. I want you to feel the same thing Larry Did so you can enjoy the thrill of seeing your arms take on this kind of be

Barbell Technique

Visualize this if you can. You’re lying face down on the bench. Your arms are hanging over the top of the cross and the back of the arms are supported by the arm rests. Your hands are about 8 inches apart with the thumbs on the same side of the bar as the fingers. You curl the bar all the way up to the chin and down again until you can’t do any more full reps. Then do 4 or 5 half reps at the top. Lower the bar and do 5 or 6 1/4 reps at the bottom. Then bounce out 10 or 12 reps right down low until your arms are roasted.

Believe me… this system is almost magic when it comes to building peak biceps. We never failed to finish off our arms with “burnouts on the Spider” till we couldn’t stand the pain. Then we ran over to the tape measure to see how much we could get. Makes my mouth water just to think about it.

Advanced Dumbbell Version

Your hands are holding the dumbbells with the “butt” of the palms up against the plates and the thumbs on the same side of the bar as the fingers. Curl the dumbbells all the way to the top, totally supinating the palms right at the top. The more you supinate (turn the palms out) the more you chisel a peak on the bicep.

Do 6 reps all the way to the top and down again until you can’t do any more full reps. Then do 5 half reps at the top. Lower the dbs and do 5 reps at the bottom. Then bounce out 12 reps right down low until your arms are roasted. Makes my mouth water just to think about it. Especially when I remember the more you compound the intensity, the more Growth Hormone you get and Growth Hormone builds size and burns fat.
Jesse Erving L.S.C.T. Very Happy

Apr 30 2007

Iron Insights Part 2

Tag: The Golden Era of Bodybuilding — jerving @ 10:38 am

Sharing The Secrets “Iron Insights”

Smash Your Training Plateaus, Overcome Injuries, Make Unprecedented Strength Gains and Grow More Muscle… with a Classical Education in the Wisdom of the Past — and the Scientific Breakthroughs of the Modern Day Master Larry Scott.

“A Day In the Gym with Larry Scott And Me on Video We Will Save You Years Of Wasted Effort”

Some people look but they never really see. Some people listen but they never really hear.

Those are just some of the lessons of life, and most people never learn life’s lessons.

Larry Scott and Jesse Erving L.S.C.T. Training Video download.

From 1RingofFire.Com
Larry Scott’s “Golden Biceps”
Height: 5′7″Weight: 205 lbsArm Size 20 1/4″

Heaviest Dumbbell ever Curled: 100 Heaviest Barbell Curled: 225

“Pounds on the Scott Curl Bench”
They’re were more like softballs.
Reg Park once told Larry that if it weren’t for his biceps and shoulders, He be a pretty average bodybuilder. Larry took that as a compliment, because when he started lifting, his arms were 12 inches, and his shoulders were really narrow. He concentrated on those areas because he wanted to prove that he could hold his own next to the big guys. So for Larry to say that years later was actually a compliment-the body parts that once were his worst were now renowned as the best in bodybuilding.
In Larry’s day no one worked lower biceps, so he actually ended up popularizing the preacher bench because he used it so often. In fact, they were originally called “Scott Benches”.Larry has always been my favorite champ gracious, friendly, and painfully honest. This first superstar of our sport loves nothing better than to chat and reminisce about the old days. Now 68, he still enjoys pulling up his sleeve and displaying his legendary arm, which swells into a baseball-size peak.
“Larry Scott a study in Muscles”
How would you like to spend a day watching… just me and Larry in the gym together on video?For a limited time Larry and I are inviting you to a day in the gym on video… just him and me… where you will learn… first hand… Larry’s best kept secrets. Some secrets have never been shared in his reports or on his website.Many of Larry’s techniques are just plain hard to put into words…
To say Larry’s techniques blew my mind would be an under- statement. Seeing how he does things is a real eye opener. Believe me, some of Larry’s exercises are unique and… they’re done in a totally different way. You can see why it works the muscle so much better. If I’m raving about his insight, I’m just being honest.” …Jesse L.S.C.T.
Unchained: Tri Harder for Massive Arms
“Everything is changing all the time. You’ve just got to change with it.”
The triceps muscle has three heads—the inner, lateral and long. The long head is the belly of the muscle, and exercises that work the long head are best for adding mass, including close-grip bench presses, lying EZ-curl bar triceps extensions, dips, supine triceps presses with an EZ-curl bar, triceps pushdowns with the elbows wide and pushing straight down and kneeling long-pulley triceps extensions using a twin-pedestal bench. Only the last exercise requires special equipment, an adjustable pulley machine—which allows the handle to be set about six feet off the ground—a twin-pedestal bench and a special V-shaped bar that’s three inches thick. Larry Scott sells such a machine, and he claims that the exercise is the absolute best movement there is for pure triceps mass.
In Loaded Guns he explains why: “The long head of the triceps is the largest and has, by far, the most potential for adding massive size to the upper arm—even more than the biceps and certainly more than the external and inner triceps heads. Yet we seldom see exercises being done to specifically target this potentially huge muscle…. The long head is not attached to the humerus (arm) bone as are the external and inner heads of the triceps. The long head is attached to the super glenoid tubercle of the scapulae (the back of the shoulder).
“I am sharing this with you so you will know why elbow position is so important. You see, a muscle cannot work effectively unless it is placed in a position in which it can be stressed through full extension and full contraction. In this instance, the elbow must be raised entirely overhead in order to place the long head in full extension. There are very few exercises that accomplish this movement unless one considers the overhead extension with an EZ-curl bar. This exercise places so much stress on the elbows it isn’t long before one cannot do any exercises for the triceps at all, let alone those that specifically target the long head.”
Larry likes to use heavy weights on all of his exercises (he can do kickbacks with 90-100 pound dumbbells), so any exercise that is overly stressful to the joints and prevents heavy training gets nixed in a hurry. That’s the reason he likes the kneeling triceps extension using the twin-pedestal bench. That special bench enables your arms to rest on the pedestals while your head ducks down between them. The long pulley is set about five feet off the ground, and you kneel on the floor. When your arms are pulled back behind your head, the only muscle that can move the weight forward to full extension is the long head of the triceps. You have to try it to appreciate how great an exercise it is—much better than pressdowns or other types of extensions.
Dips are great for the triceps if you stay upright (don’t lean forward as you do for pec development) and lock out to full contraction at the completion of each rep. You don’t have to dip all the way down—about two-thirds is enough—but you must push up to complete lockout and even lean back a little at the top.
Close-grip bench presses are pretty straightforward, but there are a few little tricks you can use to work the triceps. For example, you can lower the bar to your lower chest and then push the bar up and slightly toward your feet as you lock out. That activates a bit more of the lateral head too. I learned that from Larry Scott and he had awesome triceps.You can hit the triceps a little differently by pushing the bar up and slightly over your face as you lock out. The bar actually moves only a few inches, but it’s enough to hit muscle fibers not worked by pushing straight up or toward your feet.
Another Larry Scott favorite for building thick, massive triceps is the supine press using an EZ-curl bar. It’s basically the same as close-grip bench presses, but you use the EZ-curl bar to lessen stress on your wrists, and you let your elbows splay out to the sides. Use heavy weights; form is secondary. Scott says he doesn’t care how much he has to cheat to get the weight up as long as it gets up. When he finishes a set, he immediately goes to the kneeling triceps extension. He’ll go back and forth for six supersets of approximately six repetitions, plus four burns (partial reps).
The regular triceps extension done with an EZ-curl bar can be a good long-head developer, especially when performed on the decline bench. The decline bench gives you greater range of motion and puts less stress on the elbows. You can lower the bar to your throat/chin, to your nose, to your forehead (skull crushers) and behind your head. All are good exercises, and the variety stresses the triceps a little differently.
While most people lower the bar somewhere over the face and then push straight up to lockout, you can get a harder contraction if you push the bar up and back as the bar comes up. Give it a try and see if it doesn’t make a difference. Just about everyone loves to do triceps pressdowns. They are to triceps what bench presses are to chest training. There are two ways of doing pressdowns-what Larry Scott calls the strict method and the cheating method. In the strict method, you keep your arms close to your sides and push the bar down to lockout in a semi-circle. It’s important to keep your arms and elbows in that position throughout the entire range of motion. The cheating method builds the belly of the triceps, the long head. To do that version, drape your hands over the bar, with your thumbs on top of the bar, not wrapped around. Next, angle your elbows out away from your body in line with the bar. As you do your repetitions, push the bar straight down, not in a semicircle, to full lockout. Guide the bar straight up to your lower pecs.Of course there are many more triceps exercises and variations. One-arm dumbbell and cable extensions are good for building the inner head, and triceps kickbacks are good for working the rear head, where the rear delt and triceps meet. One-arm reverse pressdowns work the lower triceps near the elbows.To develop the lateral head of the triceps, try lying cross-face triceps extensions. This was a Steve Reeves favorite, and we all know what kind of triceps he had. The cross-face triceps extension is done just as the name implies. Lie on a flat bench holding a moderately heavy dumbbell in your right hand at arm’s length over your face, and then lower the ’bell to the opposite deltoid. Experiment by changing the angle at which you push the weight up until you find the motion that enables you to isolate the lateral head.

Those exercises should be done only after the completion of the heavy exercises for the long head and belly. A great finishing exercise is the triceps dips between benches with the feet elevated. You can place barbell plates across your thighs and do drop sets until your triceps are fully exhausted.

Super-setting biceps and triceps exercises are time saving and you can get a great pump but you need to concentrate more on each exercise. I find it best to superset for a few workouts in a row and then go to single sets of biceps and triceps separately to put more focus into the movements. Also doing sets of 6 to 4 reps one workout and 6 to 8 reps the next workout can help jolt your arm development.
Pump IronJesse Erving L.S.C.T. Very Happy

Apr 30 2007

Iron Insights Part 1

Tag: The Golden Era of Bodybuilding — jerving @ 1:30 am

For years, the “The Legend” himself, Larry Scott ruled supreme over bodybuilding. He dominated every aspect of the sport. The first to take it to the super level of mass. The first Mr. Olympia in history, the first multiple winner of the title Mr. Olympia and the first Mr. America, Mr. Universe, Mr. Olympia winner he was unstoppable and untouchable. Even today, almost forty years later, Larry Scott is a personality in bodybuilding people still seek information from and about.There may very well have been more articles and stories done on Larry Scott than any bodybuilder in the entire history of the sport. Larry did and continues to recognize and appreciate his fans.The Evolution of Better Ideas

Coming up with better ideas, therefore, is more than simply an activity, it’s an an attitude-an attitude of never being satisfied with the way things are; an attitude of always to serve the marketplace better, no matter what everyone else is doing.

Nearly all new ideas are built upon past innovations that have preceded them. Ideas are a team process. Some of your team members are innovators from the past “Larry Scott” who have provided the foundation that you can build upon. Others are the club owners, buyers, trainers, and mangers who can tell you about needs that are unfulfilled, or problems that are not solved. Still others are the users who discover the flaws that become the basis for your next attempt to serve the marketplace better. At Ring of Fire, we don’t pay much attention to what our competition is doing, only to what the marketplace needs. And we do our best to come up with better ideas.

My objective here is to keep Larry Scott name alive and make sure his knowledge, philosophy and goodwill toward bodybuilding will live on. I hope you’ll understand that I’m doing this because Larry is my teacher and mentor. I truly respect the man! If you read his courses or book’s, you’ll understand how brilliant he is. You cannot fail to benefit from them.

When I walk into a gym for a workout, I instinctively think of Larry, for that is the profound effect he has on me. Students I have trained relate the same feeling to me as if he were watching them. I always ask my students to promise me they will tell people it was the “The Legend’s” methods that gave them their physique, so that his methods and ideas will live on.

Training at the Gym

I’m not criticizing anybody, but this is how most people train.” I pointed to a fellow in the gym, a local bodybuilding hero who’d won a few contests and was a steroid user. “He’s probably here six days per week,” I explained, “but when he comes in he doesn’t do very much. He thinks that just being in the gym and taking steroids is going to increase his physique, which will probably happen with the steroids.” I told the kid to watch this guy.

He was doing the bench press for his chest, but the bench press is not a chest exercise. The neck press is, as Larry taught. He grunted and groaned and grunted and groaned, did about 7 or 8 reps, and then sat there for ten minutes looking at himself in the mirror. Then he got up and went for a drink of water. A few minutes later he came back and did another set. He grunted and groaned some more and then went into the next room and b.s’d with some guys for 10 or 15 minutes before doing another set.

When he’d finished his chest, he did his delts the same way. He read the bulletin board, did about 4 sets, and left. Most guys spend hours at the gym and tell their girlfriends about their long, hard workouts. Well, this guy did practically nothing. He spent more time reading the bulletin board, drinking the water, and looking at himself in the mirror than he did working out. There was nothing intense to his workout.

Another question some guys asked me, “What about personal trainers? How come you’re a personal trainer and (pointing to another fellow in the gym who was doing personal training) he’s certified?” So he said, “Certified by whom? I know that guy’s methods. He’ll tell you to eat gobs and gobs of complex carbohydrates. Look at the people he trains. Are they making any progress? No.

You’re going to get into this gym four times a week and you’re going to work out Monday a half hour, Tuesday a half hour, Thursday a half hour, Friday a half hour, and then you’re going to go home. These people spend two and three hours a day in a gym and their personal trainer kills them. Why? Because otherwise they don’t feel like they have got their money’s worth. They don’t understand Larry Scott’s “Bio-Phase Training Systems.”

Larry Scott proved - that the only way you can increase the size of the muscle is by what they call the Bio-Phase Training Systems : The greatest amount of work in the least amount of time. How much work you do doesn’t matter. How fast you do it is what counts. The principle was proven conclusively more then fifty years ago by Vince, and that’s one of the method’s Larry adapted.

Jesse Erving L.S.C.T. Very Happy
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