Maximum Muscle The Science of Intelligent Physique Development Matthew Perryman www.ampedtraining.com Copyright © 2009 Matthew Perryman. Some rights reserved. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. You are free to copy, distribute, and display this work, provided you attribute the work to the author, that the work is not used for any commercial purpose, and that the work is not in any way altered, transformed, or modified from its original state. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA. Contact me at [email protected] Visit my website at www.ampedtraining.com Table Of Contents Introduction............................................................................................................................................................7 Chapter 1: The Logic of Exercise...........................................................................................................................11 Why You're Reading This.................................................................................................................................12 The Role of Science..........................................................................................................................................15 Why We Can't Ignore Anecdote......................................................................................................................20 Knowledge: The Importance of Critical Thinking.............................................................................................25 How to Kill a Myth With Occam's Razor..........................................................................................................27 The Labcoat Mindset: Towards a Model of Hypertrophy................................................................................28 Chapter 2: A Look at the Science..........................................................................................................................30 What is Muscle?..............................................................................................................................................30 Neurological Stuff............................................................................................................................................31 Getting a Muscle Bigger ..................................................................................................................................35 The Short-Term: Mechanical Signaling and Protein Synthesis.........................................................................40 The Long-Term: Adaptive Remodeling............................................................................................................44 Metabolic Variables ........................................................................................................................................46 Resistance to Change: The Repeated Bout Effect............................................................................................49 Muscle Atrophy...............................................................................................................................................51 Stress and Adaptation.....................................................................................................................................52 Hormones: Are They Really Important?..........................................................................................................61 Keeping It Real: What This Means To You ......................................................................................................70 Chapter 3: Muscle Outside the Lab.......................................................................................................................73 The Fundamentals: Why You Need to Lift Weights ........................................................................................73 The Tension-Time Integral...............................................................................................................................77 Progressive Overload.......................................................................................................................................80 How Much?.....................................................................................................................................................85 How Often? ....................................................................................................................................................90 Different Kinds of Strength Training................................................................................................................93 High Intensity Training and Muscular Failure................................................................................................101 Limits of Muscle Mass...................................................................................................................................107 Size and Strength Are Complementary..........................................................................................................111 Chapter 4: Philosophy of Program Design..........................................................................................................113 The Program Isn't Fundamental....................................................................................................................113 What Are The Key Guidelines, Anyway?........................................................................................................116 Are You a Bodybuilder or a Powerlifter?.......................................................................................................119 Is Bodybuilding Useless?................................................................................................................................120 The Numbers.................................................................................................................................................122 The Intangibles .............................................................................................................................................129 Size and Symmetry: Training Muscle Groups.................................................................................................135 Recovery and Regeneration...........................................................................................................................146 Toolbox of Training Methods........................................................................................................................149 Chapter 5: Program Strategies............................................................................................................................155 Periodization Wanking...................................................................................................................................156 Periodization for Bodybuilding......................................................................................................................160 Planning Things Out.......................................................................................................................................167 Which Method is Best?..................................................................................................................................172 Solid Programs to Think About......................................................................................................................183 Conclusions & Final Thoughts.............................................................................................................................201 References..........................................................................................................................................................205 Index...................................................................................................................................................................218 Introduction I started writing this back in 2006. In that span of three odd years I alternately wrote, got bored, got tired of writing, got sick of the fitness industry, then threw it out and started all over again. Three times. That totaled three manuscripts long enough to be books. You may not think it's a big deal, and in the scheme of things it's not. You may not even care, and I wouldn't blame you, but that's the price you pay for reading somebody's introduction. The point is, I don't want anyone to think this is some fly-by-night project I threw together on a whim. In a lot of ways, I wrote this for myself as much as anyone else. I've got a lot of thoughts on the subject, and putting them on paper has always been the best way to organize them. It's interesting how concepts seem to crystallize when you have to state them in a way that others can understand and digest. There's another purpose, so now let me bore you with a little of my life's story. Once upon a time I was the clueless newbie ambling around the gym, mindlessly following bodybuilding routines from the magazines. I was that guy we all see doing 10 kinds of curls, benching way too much weight, and squatting with the little dippy- doo knee-bends that seem to pass for squats. I didn't know any better;