While Chris is now ventuing on the HIT three day a week system I was wondering what the rest of you T-Nation Men think? (I mean TC, John Berardi, Tim Patterson, and the like). Pretty much everything written on the subject has been negative so I would love to hear you guys comments.
Cheers.
Wayne…
I think something HAS to be said about that book review. The friggin’ thing says “Add up to 18 pounds of muscle in just 2 weeks” right on the cover.
Now, I’m all for trying new routines and testing things out just as CS suggests and I’m not dogmatic about any specific lifting paradigm, but I’m totally against rediculous marketing campaigns.
Eighteen pounds OF MUSCLE in 2 weeks?! That’s absolutely insane. Maybe if you have the genetic mutation like that kid a couple months back AND you take so many steroids your eyes bleed. Not to mention the amount of protein (and calories) you’d have to ingest is rediculous.
I think the marketing of that book is no better than the Bowflex. In fact, maybe we’ll see one of those as a t-jack next?! With that on the cover, I’m surprised CS didn’t rip it to shreds. I realize he said that he may not believe everything, but that claim sets the whole book up as suspect…AT BEST.
Just my $0.02.
Only problem is, Matthew, one guy did actually gain that much muscle in two weeks, and if that’s too hard to believe then don’t even bother reading the book and seeing his 6 month results. You may combust, or worse, learn something.
God forbid you have to read the book to get the whole story.
“People fear what they do not understand.”
I dont think Chris is advocating One set to absolute crippling failure like most HIT people swear by.
Me, I am still trying to figure out what works for me… and if someone could prove to me how doing one legged jumping jacks improve my bench… I would be a one legged jumping jack fool.
Hell even Mentzer admitted that some of his clients results were extreme cases like those freakish twins who are actors. Those guys gained obscene amounts of muscle in no time.
Even Poliquin admits his arms are not the norm. How he is able to respond so well to low reps while most of us need more.
I may not agree with an ideology but I am willing to hear it out in hopes of gaining some knowledge from it…
[quote]Chris Shugart wrote:
Only problem is, Matthew, one guy did actually gain that much muscle in two weeks, and if that’s too hard to believe then don’t even bother reading the book and seeing his 6 month results. You may combust, or worse, learn something.
God forbid you have to read the book to get the whole story.
[/quote]
If you’d read my post a bit closer, you’d realize that I was against the marketing of the book. I do NOT believe someone gained 18 pounds of muscle in 2 weeks. In fact, if you’ll go back and read many of the articles on t-nation, they mock claims just like that. I don’t have an issue with HIT. Nor do I adhere to any weight lifting dogma.
18 pounds OF MUSCLE in 14 WEEKS, sure. 18 pounds of muscle in 14 days…no way.
(re: “You may combust, or worse, learn something. God forbid you have to read the book to get the whole story.”)
I’m not a sheep, and insulting my intelligence doesn’t help the case.
Matt
[quote]Arkane wrote:
“People fear what they do not understand.”
[/quote]
You are assuming I either fear or misunderstand HIT. I assure you the neither is the case. I’m apathetic to lifting dogma. I am willing to try any routine once (or more often, even). My issue is with the marketing campaign only.
Neither do I.
Same here.
Same here.
Re-read what I posted.
I ordered the book yesterday and will try the “New HIT”. I’ll probably learn something and will be excited to try something new. I have been stuck for a while hopefully this will push me to a new level.
[quote]Matthew9v9 wrote:
I do NOT believe someone gained 18 pounds of muscle in 2 weeks. [/quote]
Well, I don’t believe that people actually like free form jazz, but apparently they do.
Listen, I’ve never gained 18 pounds in two weeks and most people probably won’t. But this dude did. Read his whole story. And many others gained 10 and 11. And they were tested in every way possible to make sure it wasn’t just water or fat gain. Sure, some may have been rebuilding lost muscle or coming off a hard diet, but I’m not going to retype the entire chapter here.
Pick up the book. I’m just as skeptical as you, only difference is I’ve bothered to actually read the book, talk to the people involved and do some research.
BTW, I confront Darden with this in our upcoming interview. I don’t just blindly accept something because it’s written on the cover of a book. I’m glad you don’t either, but don’t let healthy skepticism turn into pious close-mindedness. You’ll never learn anything new.
[quote]Matthew9v9 wrote:
I think something HAS to be said about that book review. The friggin’ thing says “Add up to 18 pounds of muscle in just 2 weeks” right on the cover.
Now, I’m all for trying new routines and testing things out just as CS suggests and I’m not dogmatic about any specific lifting paradigm, but I’m totally against rediculous marketing campaigns.
Eighteen pounds OF MUSCLE in 2 weeks?! That’s absolutely insane. Maybe if you have the genetic mutation like that kid a couple months back AND you take so many steroids your eyes bleed. Not to mention the amount of protein (and calories) you’d have to ingest is rediculous.
I think the marketing of that book is no better than the Bowflex. In fact, maybe we’ll see one of those as a t-jack next?! With that on the cover, I’m surprised CS didn’t rip it to shreds. I realize he said that he may not believe everything, but that claim sets the whole book up as suspect…AT BEST.
Just my $0.02.[/quote]
I’m going to have to agree with Matthew on this one. I have no doubt that Dr. Darden’s HIT system works but the marketing does come across as being a little shady.
I’ve read through the site and understand that part of this 2 week protocol involves the use of creatine. So most likely alot of this weight is due to increased water volume. Also, was the person in a fasted state to begin with? Did they just finish dieting? Were they carb depleted?
You have to wonder if this is physiologically possible as well. An approximate for a pound increase in bodyweight is around 3500 excess kcal is it not? Multiply this times 18 in 14 days. Does it make sense? Could you reasonably eat that much extra food?
[quote]Chris Shugart wrote:
Well, I don’t believe that people actually like free form jazz, but apparently they do.
[/quote]
People like free form jazz? I can’t believe that either. Just kiddin’.
Will do.
Excellent. I eagerly await the interview and his response.
I agree 100%. I’m certainly not close-minded about HIT at all. And I will read the book. I’ll more than likely try some of the routine(s?) as well. The workout information and routine within may prove very usefull. At the very least, it may show me that it won’t work for me after all. At best, it may have an excellent impact.
Thanks for your replies.
Later,
Matt
deplete glycogen stores severly in a detrained individual and then load him up on creatine and carbs while training balls to the wall and you’ll be able to gain a lot of weight quickly. Is this a lot of water, i believe so, but hey that’s part of the muscle cell. laters pk
If you go to Darden’s site, it explains these claims. Just go there and read it right now.
Absolutely… I remember reading an article of a guy who gained 25lbs in 1 week… most of it was glycogen… He said that he gained something like 4lbs of muscle - which is already extremely good if it’s true. He gained a good deal of fat also.
It’s like those guys who do one day arm cures, stuff like that… check the muscle and fitness of this month, they tell you how to gain 2’’ on your chest in 1 WORKOUT! The only think that they don’t say is that it’s almost only glycogen and inflammation…
I don’t remember the details but Dr. Darden tested the guy’s metabolism to see how many calories he was burning. At the end it was up and matched the metabolic increase caused the amount of muscle he gained. Glycogen can’t do that. And the pictures, at least the six month pictures, are amazing. Obviously not just glycogen gain.
I’m not saying it was all muscle, but if you read the book or look at the site, it obviously wasn’t just water/glycogen gain either. It’s just amazing how many people immedieatly try to write off one guy’s progress. His results weren’t typical that’s for sure, but his transformaton was amazing and seems to be 90% legit.
I read the calorie expendatures as validation of the muscle gain on Darden’s site before. I don’t believe it.
It’s not so much the claim he makes but the way he presents the claim which makes me uneasy.
If it was a representative sample of all the clients he’s put on the program. If there were updates at 4, 6, 8, 12, etc… weeks on the progress. If there was no creatine used as I believe it gives an inflated number of actual muscle gained.
A parallel analogy would be the Atkins claims of losing 10 pounds in the first week. Yes this is usually true, but it is mostly water. What about the next week, and the week after that? Usually weight loss creeps to 2 pounds a week after all the initial water was lost.
But of course that doesn’t sell programs. The marketing seems geared towards 14 year old boys, the same way some supplement companies pimp their products.
My main problem is that the marketing is geared towards people making the logical leap that “If I can 18 pounds of muscle the first two weeks, then after 4 weeks I should be 36 pounds heavier, and so on and so on…”. A well informed reader of course knows this is bullshit but the other naive/ignorant people out there won’t. The marketing is preying on this fact. These people don’t know that they actually only gained probably 2-4 pounds of muscle during those 2 weeks, and that each week afterwards would be a smaller and smaller amount of muscle gained.
[quote]Dave2 wrote:
I’m not saying it was all muscle,
[/quote]
But the book cover DID say “of muscle”. That’s my point.
I’m writing off the marketing claim of 18lbs of MUSCLE in 2 weeks.
It’s amazing how many people immediately ignore what was actually WRITTEN in a post.
Then why would you want to claim that the general public might have a chance at it? To make money. Period.
So only 10% untrue, that’s what’s acceptable. Nice. Now it’s “mostly truth in advertising”, is it?
Look, I’ve said I’ll read the book and check the stuff out and that for me it’s about the marketing.
What amazes me is that some folks just want to accept the label claims from advertisers. Do you think they MIGHT want to fool the general public that never questions them? Nah, there’d be way too much money in that. Heck, even CS said he calls Darden on it. And I applaud him for doing so.
As for the rest, are you planning on doing all the manipulation of glycogen, starvation, whatever…that’s been listed above in order to gain 18lbs in 2 weeks? If so, how much MUSCLE do you have to loose to get to that number? Will it be worth it?
If yes, enjoy!
Matt
I’m 52 years old, which probably means I’m the oldest guy to take part in this discussion. This doesn’t mean that I have more knowledge or wisdom than anyone else on this site; it DOES mean that my weight-training experience is probably a little different from yours–unless you’re an old bastard (like me) who cut his bodybuilding teeth on the whole-body routines recommended by the likes of John McCallum (“Keys to Progress”), Bradley J. Steiner, and just about everybody else back in the '60s and '70s. (Even Arnold recommended an abbreviated, thrice weekly, whole-body routine for bulking.) Listen T-boys, this stuff works! It work for me and for the few guys I trained (and trained with) back in those years. I put a cousin of mine on a routine consisting of five exercises and had him do three sets to utter failure (plus “burns,” or partial reps, at the end of each set) of four of the exercises, and only one set of 20 on “breathing squats.” I added a little weight to each movement every workout and really pushed him to work as hard as he could. We didn’t have many good supplements back then, so I urged him to eat a lot and drink plenty of milk throughout the day. He did–and he grew like a weed. His strength shot up, and within a few weeks my once-skinny cousin was no longer skinny. Now, since then I have used split routines that call for training each bodypart once per week, and those routines work well, too. So I’m not suggesting that old-bastard training is the only way to go. I AM suggesting that those of you who are no longer making good progress on split routines and hitting each bodypart once every five to seven days will most likely benefit by switching (for a couple of months or so) to a three-per-week, full-body routine. It may prove to be just what you needed to get you out of a rut. My experience confirms a theme that appears frequently on this site: Just about every training system works, but no one system works all the time. Periodic change is essential.
You’re definitely not the only older guy to do full body routines and use them effectively. I know avoids roids (who doesn’t post much here anymore) uses HST very well. Hell, I’m only 28 and when I was first starting out, I was told to use full body routines. Very simple but very effective. That plus some form of cardio and eat healthy and your golden. It’s up to you to work out the details, but stick with that, and life is good.
Thanks for the replies guys. Seems whenever something unbelievable comes up (gain 18lbs of muscle) we all assume that it is ?impossible? and then poo poo it. Why is that? Because ?we? don?t believe it doesn?t mean it hasn?t / can?t happen. It just means were not able to grasp it. Then again we thought the world was square not all that long ago. Just goes to show?
I have the New HIT so I?ve read it. And I must say a lot (not all) but a lot makes sense to me. Chris has also taken the time to read it and interview the good Dr himself. I?m sure this question (18 lbs) is one of the first he posed to him.
Now, I must admit, I?ve not really followed the plan to the latter. Why? Because training to complete failure is a miserable, painful experience (for me), and I don?t have the balls to do it that often (1,2,3 times per week on all body parts). I hurts and makes me dread going to the gym. That?s my truth. So I cannot comment or complain why I haven?t gain 18lbs of muscle (plus my diet is shite). Do I believe it?s possible (after reading the book). Yes, absolutely. So I think it?s the norm? No.
I am very much looking forward to the interview Chris and keep up the good, good work.
Cheers matey
Wayne.
I bought it and have read through most of it. I am following the first workout verbatum just to give it a test drive.
I don’t know that I’ll follow through with the entire plan but I figure the workout parameters are so different from the T-Mag workouts I have been doing over the past few years that it should be a nice shock to my body.
Most of the philosophies are 180 degrees from what I have learned here and most of the exercises (Leg Press, Leg extension, Pull-over)are ones I had dropped from my routines years ago starting with the writings of Charles Poliquin.
I am pretty opened minded and I figure a six week trial of the program won’t destroy my hard earned muscle. If there’s one thing I have learned here at T-Mag, there are no absolutes in weight lifting. The one thing you haven’t tried might just be the one thing holding you back.
Any way if anyone else gives the routine in the book a try let me know so we can compare results.