Dave Draper’s Musclebuilding Q&A

In my combination of martial arts and weight training, probably overdoing both, at what point does the pain degenerate into more pain and eventual injury? And are there specialized workouts for psychos like me who actually enjoy lifting weights seven days week?

Soon, real soon. You need to fix your head, your body, your goals, your priorities, your realities…

Nothing personal, we’re all nuts and we all need to do the same things: Live, lift, practice you art, learn and grow and be happy. The weights and martial arts are big contributors. They can also be great detractors… too much, like anything, can break you.

The body needs rest, the mind needs space, emotions need relief, creativity needs room, dog needs kibbles, kitty needs petting, baby needs shoes.

Part of your discipline and growth is to take a day off. Try one. Try two. Real whackos are afraid to. No other interests… insecure… think they’ll slide backwards or fail, or be forced to face responsibilities and/or themselves.

There are ways of balancing your training endeavors… your best friends are common sense and instinct. Only you know which is most important — iron or martial arts — to you. Blend them sensibly: alternate days, 3 iron and 3 art, or 2 iron/4 art, or 2 art/4 iron. Trial and error and experiment and experience. I hope you’re young.

dd

I’ve read that a lot of bodybuilders of your time would do, say, bench press with five sets with reps of 12, 10, 8, 8, 6.  On the 12, 10, 8, 8, 6   should only the last two sets be a 100-percent effort? I am confused on how to interpret this particular workout.

There is a a specific incremental weight-increase methodology I  applied years ago for about a month before I grew sick of the fussing. I forgot it intentionally. I always use the above rep-scheme, but with the will to get the last rep with form and appreciation, and seeking the 90-percent-max range of output, plus or minus.

Each day has its own devils and angels — pain and injury factors, high or low spirits and energy and wellness, enthusiasm and drive or lack thereof; desire, encouragement or disappointment. These affect — vary — output big time.

I ramp up for each workout and take the weight and reps to that 90-percent place with most every set. The first set of, say, 12 is a warm up, yet high performance.

Choppy answer. I trust my training thrust, and find love for training compromised when bound too closely to watching numbers.

Roll…flow… Godspeed…   Dave

I am a 19-year-old bodybuilder training for an upcoming power meet, and have been training for five years. My training partner and I have been training to failure for about three months. Here is the sets and reps we train with: 1st set-12 reps (warm up), 2nd set-10 reps,  3rd set-8 reps, 4th set-6 reps. What are your thoughts?

This has been my favorite rep scheme (adding a fifth set of 4) since I was your age (like 50 years ago). I like the weight and rep variation for interest and the power, mass, density and shape building qualities they provide.

For your power training, you’re ready to rearrange the reps to  include triples, doubles and one-rep maximums. How you should do this is every lifter’s personal journey and I suggest you seek some advice from masters like Rickey Dale Crain or Lou Simmons… folks like them.

You’re on your merry way. Be alert, be wise, be daring and be safe. There are injuries out there and you do not — I repeat  — you do not want them.

Bombs away… Dave            <<<Godspeed>>>

When performing deadlifts what rep set scheme do you prefer to use? Are deadlifts meant to be performed heavy weight low reps, or treated like any other exercise?

Treat them like any other exercise till you gain familiarity, build a sound foundation, develop good form and get the irrepressible urge to go heavy. Then be careful. I’m not a reputable powerlifter.

Rickey Dale Crain’s is a site you might check out.

Never Quit… Dave

I am just wondering if there is more muscle recruitment involved in barbell bench pressing, and if I will be missing something if I do dumbbell presses instead. Also, I think in the past when I have gotten shoulder pain, it was when I tried to do too low reps. Maybe keeping the reps between 8 and 12 would help eliminate that?

You’re in good hands with the dumbbells. There’s more and safer muscle recruitment with the dumbbells — you need to engage different muscles of the body to position the weights for pressing. You require more muscle to control the individual dumbbells, and with practice you are able to modify the tracking of the dumbbells to accommodate your specific needs. Not so with a bar.

Using higher reps is thoughtful. Build strength and muscle and familiarity with the mechanics over time. What’s the rush, right? Warming up is super important with all exercises.

You have plenty of time to investigate six reps and doubles and singles when you decide the time is right.

Don’t be afraid, but be safe.

Dave

I’m starting my 3rd combat tour here in Afghanistan and have some time to devote to physical fitness. I was wondering if there was any training advise tailored more to a soldier’s requirements than just bodybuilding. A soldier’s physical fitness test is currently graded by how many pushups and situps we can do in two minutes and then how fast we can complete a two-mile run. Being in tune with the bodybuilding and performance community as you are, can you direct me to a program that is more in line with performing this test as well as possible?

Two links to view to get you started: Nate Morrison’s Alpine Tactical and our Police and Fire Testing fitness overview page.

To enhance your performance as a runner, I  suggest you run regularly, including sprints and hills and stairs. Time your two-mile runs on occasion and seek to improve your numbers. Don’t flog yourself.

Same for pushups. Practice them every other day to avoid overtraining, and apply x sets of  y reps (perhaps 5 sets of 80-percent-max reps) to build muscle and power and technique. Once weekly go for a set of max reps. Modify my set-rep and weekly max according to your own abilities and common sense.

All basic bodybuilding (I prefer the idea of musclebuilding) exercises are effective in increasing muscle and strength.

God Bless America and our amazing military… Big Thanks for your sacrifice and service… Dave

I recently read an article on bodybuilding.com about HIT training. I used the theory for 15 years when I competed. I am wondering now that I would like to return to competition what can I expect to gain from the HIT training in 3-6 months. You are the guru and I trust your advice so I’m all ears.

I’m no more or less a guru than you. I do my traditional training with a little spice and a lot of might, which is less lately than it was when I had an infant daughter and hair 45 years ago. I have always lifted for expression and wonder and the longed-for muscle and strength and functional results.

Honestly, I’ve never applied or advocated or understood or tried to understand HIT methodology. I’m not being negative, but I thought, like, why? Where’s the flow of the journey along the way?

Different sets and reps for different nuts and bolts.

Older, and at a later stage of training, you might find HIT to be less desirable, less productive and whole lot more injurious.

Another odd thing — I’m not a big fan of competition, not in the day, not today. I’m a lazy coward at heart. Give me the iron, the ascending weights, the descending reps, the supersets and the volume in an uncrowded gym and give time to blast it joyfully, even when it’s ugly.

So much for a sound and encouraging answer from Dave Drapeless, the Bomber.

Where’s brother Mike Mentzer when we need him?

Go… Have fun… God’s might… Dave

Most bodybuilders never really varied their workouts much whether they were volume trainers or HIT trainers. They might tweak a program with being more instinctive or amp it up when contest time was around the corner, but you knew roughly what they were going to do when they came to the gym. Few ever logged a training program, the question is to you: Did you logged workouts and did you have a program that you stuck with by and large?

I logged for a short period during one winter while training at the Muscle Beach dungeon, 8-10 weeks — mid-’60s. It had its purpose and value then. Ever since, I’ve followed more or less some version of the scheme I enjoyed then. Today my workout it’s a skeleton of what it was years ago, but it has the same taste and smell and silhouette.

Hey! Wait! I think it’s my shadow.

I don’t remember any bodybuilders with noticeable muscle ever logging their workouts. A few might have made notes at home. Guys who did log overtly looked like students, trained like students and disappeared before the ink dried.

Powerlifters scribbled away on pads as they reached for their chalk and inhaler, and for them logging works quite well, some might say mandatory even.
We press on, never alone… Dave

I’ve got a couple of personal training goals: a strict overhead military press with bodyweight and a one-arm pullup.  I’m getting close to both.  I’ve been training mostly in the low-rep zone, going to momentary failure.  The number of sets is around the 6-8 range.  I’ve also used some cheat moves  (push press, weighted negative pullups). The problem is I feel like I’ve hit a plateau.  Do you think the rep /set combination is good? Some people suggest a lower number of sets, but that doesn’t feel like enough training.

When I hit a plateau — meaning, I’ve applied focus and intensity for a sufficient time and determined progress has become severely limited and my confidence and interest are waning — it’s time to change.

Sometimes it’s a good thing to modify your goals as you press on in the same direction. Go back to the original rep systems or go off on a bodybuilding tangent that revives your overall training spirit and achievement. The goals you aim for now might not be achievable with this approach and this round of forcing and pressing on.

Unless you’re 99, have fun and play with a strong heart and will. Plateaus are inevitable and, if we are inflexible and stubborn, can be downright depressing and destructive.

Blast on… from another direction or with a different approach… slight changes can be significant… substitute dumbbells for bar, use steep incline and DBs, heavy barbell curls with full range of motion plus preacher curls for a worthy cycle…

You are a perfect candidate for Dan John’s book, Never Let Go.

Godspeed… DD

I do my biceps on leg day and my triceps on chest day. I’ve read mixed opinions on this and would like yours.

I’m not crazy about separating bis and tris. I’ve trained to build muscle by good feeling and fun, though it mostly hurts and is a tedious drag. Thus, shoulders and arms, the tank top muscles, always fit nicely together. You push, you pull  and you curl, you extend and you pump.

And, too, the large areas of the back and front torso are a perfect match, pushing and pulling the chest and back muscles to make them big and strong.

And legs are legs are legs, of course… ooph!

Try that three-day combo as a plateau-breaking change of pace and approach. Dare to superset and dig a whole new way to excite your workouts.

> Shoulders and arms

> Chest and back

> Legs and core

With focus and form and confidence, we press on… Godspeed… Dave

I am 40 years old and was working out on a four day per week program, but seems like I may have been over-doing it.  I tried to go heavy when I could,but I work as a laborer on pipeline construction. I am in a slump and haven’t worked out regularly in over a year. Any suggestions? Thank you.

I’d stick with the three-day-a-week scheme. I suspect your job has you hustling, so you can forgo the aerobic exercise; save time and energy and motivation for focused and formed workouts.

Here’s an idea:

Day 1) chest and back, Day 2) legs and core, Day 3) shoulders and arms — a day between workouts.

Day 1) chest and back>>>

Bench press supersetted with wide-grip pulldowns  (4 sets x 10,8,6 reps)

Dumbbell incline supersetted with stiff-arm dumbbell pullover  (4 x 10,8,6 reps)

Cable crossover  (4 x 8-10 reps)

One-arm dumbbell row  (4 x 10,8,6 reps)

Day 2) legs and core>>>

Rope tucks and leg raises

Leg extensions (4 x 12,10,8 reps)

Leg curls (4 x 12,10,8 reps)

Squats (4 x 12,10,8 reps)

Calf raises (lots of sets of burning high reps between ext and curls and squats)

Day 3) shoulders and arms>>>

Steep incline dumbbell press supersetted with side arm lateral raise (4 x 10,8,6 reps)

Barbell curl supersetted with lying triceps extension (4 x 10,8,6 reps)

Seated dumbbell alternate curls supersetted with pulley pushdowns  (4 x 10,8,6 reps)

That’s plenty for now, providing you train intensely and with focus… Try it and tweak it… add more or less of this and that.

Here you hit everything directly once a week, and everything, but legs twice a week by virtue of muscle-overlap.

On a fourth day if you get the shakes you can blast a little of what you think is missing.

Some worthy links, please read:

Superset Training

Instinctive Training

Slumpbuster Workouts

Focus and form and confidence, we press on… Godspeed… Dave

I have switched from a three day a week workouts to two days cardio between workout schedule, with a timed set and one-rep max test, then a timed set later on various body parts. Each workout is spaced from one another about four days, so I wind up doing legs about twice a month, chest two times a month, arms about twice month. Sure seems like I’ve been missing some workouts here… what do you think?

Hard to beat the original workout plan you described. In my mind, the latter method is rigid and specialized and accomplishes little (or nothing) of the things about training an ironhead loves… diversion, exercise involvement, mind and body harmony, muscle and might growth as stress falls away daily, training freedom, discovery, creativity…

Try it… see if it produces worthy results and is likable. Then move on down the road, wiser and whatever…

Lift, live learn and grow… Godspeed… Dave

What do you think about the fewer reps, higher poundage workouts? I’m 56, train at my home in Nebraska and have found I don’t quite recover quite as fast as I  used to.

Must get lonely in rural Nebraska with few if any to share your iron tossing madness.

I like to mix the reps and weight in the sets of each exercise. For example, barbell curls: I choose a weight that allows me to preform 10 solid reps with a little body thrust to expand the muscle engagement. I can maybe get one more if I gag, scream, bleed and lose my groove — not good — I hold it at 10.

I then add weight and go for eight reps, same rules apply.

Next set, I add sufficient weight and go for six reps.

By this time I’m rockin’ and make another weight addition and go for another six, accepting 5 if I must.

I find the variation in resistance and repetitions is challenging, inspiring and otherwise beneficial to muscle growth.

Yes, recovery is slower as we get older. Our training needs to modified accordingly to avoid injury, overload, fatigue and disappointment.

Train hard and always… God’s Might… Dave

I’m interested in a workout of higher volume than those in Brother Iron. Do you have a favorite routine from back during your competition days that would be worth me trying?

If the routine is not in Brother Iron, make up your own that suits your needs.

Any more volume than I applied in the rough ‘n ready days is almost inconceivable and was short-lived  Overtraining becomes a problem with healthy, enthusiastic young guys, and injury, tedium and plateaus are the eventual outcome.

Be steady and sure and long lasting and happy and grateful. Be wise, be patient. Persevere.

Go… Godspeed… Dave

I currently weight train at home 3 times a day each of 15 minutes duration, doing this rather than training for one session of say 45 minutes I’m able to use heavier weights/resistance per exercise. Working on the premise that the greater the resistance used the greater the muscle growth stimulation, it could be reasoned that multiple sessions would be superior than a single session. However, is this really the case?

Why not?

Give the methodology full rein till you run into troubles — not enough repair time, too schedule consuming, any of various overloads, tedious, confusing — and make appropriate alterations to fix the shortcomings.

Or, go back to conventional training with extended training understanding and  apply the technique when you get the urge or when suitable.

Go… Live, lift, learn, grow… Dave

I’m struggling with a big plateau in progress. Truly, what are you thoughts about Mike Mentzer’s High Intensity training theories?

I’d rather hang by my thumbs, or, to be less harsh, there must be more enjoyable and sensible methods of scaling the mountains, where you can appreciate the scenery, breathe the fresh air, feel the earth beneath your feet and regularly thank God for the exciting challenge.

Maybe trying the madness is just what you need to lead you to your next lovable series of training routines and perceptions.

Dave

I just started 5×5 workouts. Is it necessary to do all the warm ups that are prescribed?

There are numerous versions of the 5×5 workout…
Unless you’re older and stiffer or have a history of injury, warm-up just enough to suit yourself.

Warming up ever-so-slowly but surely, like sneaking up on the heavier poundages, has great benefits in conquering the heavier goals. Try it sometime.

There’s a terrific section in the forum dedicated to 5×5 workouts. Spend a little time fleshing out your plan.

dd

It seems like no matter what I do, I cannot get my bench press to go up. I’m listing my current training program to review.

The more you worry about the bench and pursue heavy weight in its execution, the more you risk severe and long-term injury.

Your musclebuilding outline is okay as you proceed in your daily and on-going training challenge, but it is not one designed for increasing pressing power (it’s bodybuilding accentuated). Tris and front delts are heavily exerted almost daily, leaving not enough rest.

You might want to determine an alternate power program for insertion as a seasonal power push. Here’s a sample bench press routine, if you decide to go that route.

Take a second look at barbell benches — go upward in dumbbells instead. Think lean red meat and Bomber Blend.

Be wise and safe, strong and courageous,

dd

Should I do a wider variety versus the same month after month? My thought is if I don’t do the same ones I won’t be able to maintain the same weight. What maximizes the effectiveness when only training 3 times/week? Am I disciplined and routine to a fault?

Order works, but don’t hem yourself in…

From the last newsletter… answers your question to the best of my ability:

• The older I get, the more I prefer and better I respond to variety in my workouts. This variety includes exercise choice, order, tempo, execution (groove) and exertion.
• Musclebuilding/weight training is not about the exercises; it’s about the lifter and his execution of the exercises. It’s not what you do; it’s how you do it. What I fail to bring in originality, you must bring in execution (ever-renewing zeal, evolving style, improving skill, growing emotion, divine assurance). These work if and when you work.

I have my favorites (actually, the only exercises I’m able to do after many injuries and aging) and I practice them according to feel, need, desire, instinct and commonsense.

After years of training with yourself, I believe only you can uncover the answers.

You’re doing good.

We press on, observe and press some more… Godspeed… Dave

I have  a quick question about old school training. I know you trained at Vince’s Gym in your early years. I have read several articles about Vince’s training methods. What’s your opinion on training three weeks and then taking off a week?

I take off a week and I’m ready to climb the walls.

If you blast it and think you deserve or require a rest period, take a three or four days off, or lighten up for a week, or try an exploratory training variation for a week… but a regular routine of three weeks on, one off is for the North Hollywood set, not this bum from the dungeons..

Go… Praise God… DD