It sure is inspiring for any aspiring body builder to read about the workouts that Arnold did back in the 70s and 80s. There are a number of clever little strategies that Arnold employed, mostly by instinct, that made him the biggest body builder of his era, and even by today’s freaky standards, his physique in its prime was nothing short of magnificent.
In this article, I will enumerate a number of interesting little secrets employed by this living legend that even most professional bodybuilders aren’t able to grasp. For example, according to some experts, he had perfected the technique of overloading his muscles at exactly the right spot where maximum force could occur, a point along the movement where all muscle fibers were perfectly aligned for maximum fiber tension.
This is definitely one of the reasons why his arms were so huge and peaked – a lead you too should follow to make your biceps and other muscles of your body bigger and more impressive.
Cheat Curls
One of Arnold’s favourite size building techniques was cheat curls. No, he didn’t invent the technique, as its antecedence can be traced as far back as the Middle Ages when Greek wrestlers and athletes used cheat curls to build huge physiques. But Arnold sure brought this long lost art back in vogue. He used to start his arm routine with cheat curls, lifting massive weights with superhuman strength.
So what are cheat curls?
During an exercise stroke, there is a particular point, known as the MFG (Max-Force Generation) point at which the target muscle is strained at its maximum – and maximum strain equals maximum mass. So if you are able to overload the MFG point correctly, you will experience incredible muscle growth within the shortest possible time.
If you are working on your biceps, you need to know exactly where this super sweet spot lies. It lies just before your elbows reach the 90 degree angle -- that is between the bottom and the midpoint of the stroke. At this angle, the muscle fibers are stretched their maximum, thereby generating maximum force for faster muscle growth; in fact, the closer you get to completing the contraction, the less force you generate due to fiber bunching and crowding.
Imagine how Arnold used to do a cheat curl. Leaning slightly forward, he would heave the barbell to up to his shoulders. The overload occurred almost entirely between the midpoint and straight arm position. (Observe the image.)
Dangerous?
Absolutely. There is an element of risk attached with cheat curls and it should only be done by those with strong and well developed back muscles. But hold on a second. There is a perfect solution.
Instead of doing cheat curls using barbells, do them with cable curls. There won’t be any risk of injury, as your back will be perfectly balanced. Moreover, you won’t even have to heave superhuman poundage.
Just do as many reps as you can manage, aiming for 10 straight reps in the first set. Then when you don’t have the strength to complete another rep, pull up the bar to the MFG point (right below the midpoint) and do partial pulsing reps, lifting the bar only till sweet spot as many times as possible till you can’t stand the burn. These Xtreme reps will overload your MFG point without putting your lower back at risk.
Stretch-Position Overload
While the MFG point overload was used by Arnold to overload his semi-stretched point, he also used the stretch position overload to work on his biceps. This he did using incline curls.
Incline Curls
By resting on an incline bench fixed at 45 degrees, he would begin with a dumbbell in each hand. At the bottom of the curl, his biceps would be in an extreme elongated state, from which he would blast several fast piston-like reps, making sure that the tension on his biceps was kept throughout the movement – without jerking or heaving.
Chest Workout
Arnold also used the stretch position overload technique while working on his chest. One of his favourite chest routines were dumbbell flyes. He, however, had an unusual way of doing them. He lowered the dumbbells to the bottom stretched position but while lifting them on the upward stroke, he stopped while the dumbbells were about three feet apart, lowering them immediately back to the stretch.
Dumbbell Flyes
Why?
According to Arnold, the short strokes not only helped in maximizing the tension on his pec muscles, it also enabled him to place the maximum load on his pec muscles when they were stretched or elongated.
Those partial flyes were nothing but a brilliant combination of stretch position pec exercise with rapid fire X reps. This was perhaps the reason why Arnold’s chest was striated and full.
X Reps are so effective at building muscles because you just keep pushing the muscle even after you hit the point of exhaustion, and you do so by pushing it only till its Max-Force-Generation Point, which according to scientists, is the optimum mass building position.
Xpert Opinion
What all these techniques prove is that stretched and semi stretched positions are very important for total mass stimulation. So if you aren’t seeing results despite sweating for hours in the gym, you too should apply the Max Force Generation in combination with the Stretch Position Overload every time you hit the gym.
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