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Deleted member 123722
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I'm sure most will simply ignore this post, but for those of you truly opened minded, you and your joints will thank me later.
So I was watching Mark Bell's Power Podcast and he had a guy named Doug Brignole on. He is been bodybuilding for 40+ years, was Mr. Universe and a few other things. Anyway, getting to the point, he basically proves with physics and biomechanics that many of the "must-do mass builders," and several other popular movements, are inefficient and simply not worth doing, due to risk to and strain on joints; that the fitness industry is promoting myths and falsehoods based on keeping tradition and the mentality of "train hard or go home," "gotta hit the muscle from every angle," with a ton of redundant and ineffective exercises, when really, we can stimulate our muscles without destroying our bodies by avoiding exercises that "cost" a ton of energy to do, don't even load the target that well, and cause joint/tendon pain, along with an increase risk of injury.
To break it down, isolation movements are always superior for "mass-building" than compound; it is a bold statement, but irrefutably true. The term "mass-building" is very misleading in the first place, since literally any exercise that can stimulate muscle growth will result in "mass," with proper nutrition etc.
I went on to watched a ton of his interviews, aside from the two posted below, then started applying the optimal physics to my workouts. I also bought his book also so I could learn more (I highly recommend), and now I'm an advocate, and I've applied his ideas to my workouts for the last three months. Basically no more joint point, and my legs haven't shrunk, in fact they improved, without doing squats and the "must-dos."
The hardest part will be convincing yourself and all the people who have seen results with barbell movements like bench, squat, SLDL, barbell curls, skull crushers, deadlift etc., (as we all have) to let go of these things for bodybuilding purposes. Now, no one is saying these things don't work at all, but they don't work as well. For example, you get 100% quad load from leg extensions, but only 30% from squats, so it makes no sense for us bodybuilding to use more energy than necessary to try and load the quad muscle with a less effective exercise, all while increasing the risk of injury and total systemic fatigue, when we can just do the better one for more sets, and recover faster for another session sooner than later.
Now, how did Ronnie and others build huge legs with squads and for forth? This is the typical rebuttal some "gurus" (Palumbo for example) has retorted with, always appealing to the past or other examples, but never refuting the physics. Well if you add up all the sets and exercise they did, an exercise with the efficiency of 30% here, 50% there, 20% etc, you will get 100% stimulus, but they could have done all that without doing all these different movements and instead using the most efficient ones. Could we have built a Ronnie or Jay with JUST compound barbell movements? Doubtful. And look at Ronnie now: many pros get injured doing things they don't need to be doing, but think they should be doing it, because someone before them did it, and told them so. The only people who should doing compounds are those who are powerlifting or competing in strength, where such movements are REQUIRED for the sport; as for bodybuilding, there is literally no reason to do anything compound at all: the best movements are with dumbbells and cables, but not just any dumbbell or cable exercises, there are specific ones that load the muscle the best way possible because of their biomechanical profile. For example, I think we all agree that dumbbells chest presses are far superior than barbell chest presses. The reason for this is because with barbell, the hands are "locked" in the grip you put them in and do not allow the full ROM of the movement, whereas dumbbells do allow it, and also help better train the stabilizers, not hit your front delts too much, and reduce risk of pec tears.
Anyway, here's there two interviews below. The first one got people triggered; the second one clarified it more. I've been in touch with Doug via DM on Instagram, and he is ahead of his time with this stuff. It is crazy once you see what he is saying, how we didn't conclude these things on our own.
If you don't want to ditch the barbell for whatever reason, maybe you just enjoy certain movements (like I did), I suggest to at least do all isolations first, then you can do barbell movements with lighter weights, reducing the risk of injury, all while still building the muscle you want, since they will be pre-exhausted. But once you understand that compound barbell movements, by their very nature, do not hit the target muscle better than isolation, you'll start to realize why you won't need them anymore.
Also, I'm not here to argue or debate anyone, I'm just sharing my own experience and its been extremely positive. I can hit the gym 6x a week now, every muscle group with even more intensity without the systemic fatigue, sore joints, and all that noise. Each muscle group gets literally two exercises with more sets, and I train two muscle groups per session: Back/Chest, Shoulder/Arms, Legs, Repeat those days, then Sunday off.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VdX59JGEgQ&t=8319s
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qG8_if1Wz-0
So I was watching Mark Bell's Power Podcast and he had a guy named Doug Brignole on. He is been bodybuilding for 40+ years, was Mr. Universe and a few other things. Anyway, getting to the point, he basically proves with physics and biomechanics that many of the "must-do mass builders," and several other popular movements, are inefficient and simply not worth doing, due to risk to and strain on joints; that the fitness industry is promoting myths and falsehoods based on keeping tradition and the mentality of "train hard or go home," "gotta hit the muscle from every angle," with a ton of redundant and ineffective exercises, when really, we can stimulate our muscles without destroying our bodies by avoiding exercises that "cost" a ton of energy to do, don't even load the target that well, and cause joint/tendon pain, along with an increase risk of injury.
To break it down, isolation movements are always superior for "mass-building" than compound; it is a bold statement, but irrefutably true. The term "mass-building" is very misleading in the first place, since literally any exercise that can stimulate muscle growth will result in "mass," with proper nutrition etc.
I went on to watched a ton of his interviews, aside from the two posted below, then started applying the optimal physics to my workouts. I also bought his book also so I could learn more (I highly recommend), and now I'm an advocate, and I've applied his ideas to my workouts for the last three months. Basically no more joint point, and my legs haven't shrunk, in fact they improved, without doing squats and the "must-dos."
The hardest part will be convincing yourself and all the people who have seen results with barbell movements like bench, squat, SLDL, barbell curls, skull crushers, deadlift etc., (as we all have) to let go of these things for bodybuilding purposes. Now, no one is saying these things don't work at all, but they don't work as well. For example, you get 100% quad load from leg extensions, but only 30% from squats, so it makes no sense for us bodybuilding to use more energy than necessary to try and load the quad muscle with a less effective exercise, all while increasing the risk of injury and total systemic fatigue, when we can just do the better one for more sets, and recover faster for another session sooner than later.
Now, how did Ronnie and others build huge legs with squads and for forth? This is the typical rebuttal some "gurus" (Palumbo for example) has retorted with, always appealing to the past or other examples, but never refuting the physics. Well if you add up all the sets and exercise they did, an exercise with the efficiency of 30% here, 50% there, 20% etc, you will get 100% stimulus, but they could have done all that without doing all these different movements and instead using the most efficient ones. Could we have built a Ronnie or Jay with JUST compound barbell movements? Doubtful. And look at Ronnie now: many pros get injured doing things they don't need to be doing, but think they should be doing it, because someone before them did it, and told them so. The only people who should doing compounds are those who are powerlifting or competing in strength, where such movements are REQUIRED for the sport; as for bodybuilding, there is literally no reason to do anything compound at all: the best movements are with dumbbells and cables, but not just any dumbbell or cable exercises, there are specific ones that load the muscle the best way possible because of their biomechanical profile. For example, I think we all agree that dumbbells chest presses are far superior than barbell chest presses. The reason for this is because with barbell, the hands are "locked" in the grip you put them in and do not allow the full ROM of the movement, whereas dumbbells do allow it, and also help better train the stabilizers, not hit your front delts too much, and reduce risk of pec tears.
Anyway, here's there two interviews below. The first one got people triggered; the second one clarified it more. I've been in touch with Doug via DM on Instagram, and he is ahead of his time with this stuff. It is crazy once you see what he is saying, how we didn't conclude these things on our own.
If you don't want to ditch the barbell for whatever reason, maybe you just enjoy certain movements (like I did), I suggest to at least do all isolations first, then you can do barbell movements with lighter weights, reducing the risk of injury, all while still building the muscle you want, since they will be pre-exhausted. But once you understand that compound barbell movements, by their very nature, do not hit the target muscle better than isolation, you'll start to realize why you won't need them anymore.
Also, I'm not here to argue or debate anyone, I'm just sharing my own experience and its been extremely positive. I can hit the gym 6x a week now, every muscle group with even more intensity without the systemic fatigue, sore joints, and all that noise. Each muscle group gets literally two exercises with more sets, and I train two muscle groups per session: Back/Chest, Shoulder/Arms, Legs, Repeat those days, then Sunday off.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VdX59JGEgQ&t=8319s
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qG8_if1Wz-0
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