For my birthday, my brother bought me “The Book of Muscle.” It was written by Ian King and put out by Men’s Health. The nutrition looks typical of Men’s Health, but the training program looks like King all the way. There are very detailed pictures and discriptions of excercises, basic and King’s own. Has anyone looked at this book? Any thoughts? I’m planning to start the training program for the new year.
The Men’s Health boys offered me a copy of this book and I accepted, saying I’d review it for T-mag’s “Stuff We Like” product review column, but I haven’t received the book yet. If they still send it, look for a review in a future column.
I got my copy a few days ago…very well written I highly recommend.
Whoa, someone bumped an old thread! As an update, the book review has been published. Here it is:
Hey,
I’m three fourths of the way through the intermediate stage. It’s a six month program. It has been absolutely miraculous. The progression is immaculate. My friends have gotten far worse results than me because they kept tinkering with it and didn’t get a feel for the subtle art of its design. Advice:
When starting a new phase, underestimate rather than overestimate the weights. This is hard for some because they want to lift as heavy as possible. Underestimating a bit allows you to cycle intensity. By the third week you’ll be nailing it. Otherwise you can stall out for three weeks of bad form and crappy adherence to reps and tempo indications.
Next, pay strict attention to the rep ranges and especially tempos. Sometimes the only change from one phase to the next is instead of doing 12 to 15 reps you do eight to twelve. If you overestimate the weights and your reps are eight to twelve in the first phase, then when its time to change you have nowhere else to go but further screwing up the program.
Tempos in these programs can be dreadfully slow for awhile. Nobody I know but me seems to enjoy a 311 tempo. Mr. King can dish that out all day. If you ignore it, the 201 tempos wont be so great halfway through the program. He practically invented tempo indication, so yes they matter. Lastly, heed the rest intervals between exercises exactly, and take a week off between stages. It does NO harm.
All these things are carefully manipulated and I didnt understand the progression until I stuck with it for the full 4 and a half months so far. Unfortunately, my small training buddies are back in the superfast curls in the squatrack lane and asking me how I’ve put on 13 pounds of muscle despite my ridiculous canadian slow motion training.