Detoxification benefits…High rep sets…Why your lats suck…Lean out lineup

Mr. Vic,

I wanted to write and tell you how the Parrillo training and nutritional approach has changed my life. I am sure my story of fat-to-fit using Parrillo methods has been told a thousands times in a thousand ways by a thousand Parrillo users, but this is my life and I felt the need to share how I lost 60 pounds of fat in a year, added a bunch of muscle and revitalized my marriage and my life. I had become an embarrassment to myself and my petite wife – though she never said a word and stuck by me as I ate my way into a corner. My doctor shocked me back into reality when he put me on blood pressure meds (at age 38!) and told me I was headed for diabetes. Luckily I came across the Parrillo Performance Press and found out there was a Parrillo Certified Personal Trainer right in my neighborhood. The first few weeks were as difficult physically as anything I had ever done in my sheltered life – however one really overlooked aspect of the Parrillo approach is how good you feel when getting off all the chemicals in all the fake foods and sodas I had been drinking. You guys changed my life!

Bill, San Francisco

Actually Bill, YOU changed your own life – we just provided a blueprint, or a roadmap. Yes, you were lucky to have a Parrillo CPT, but without intense motivation and desire and without intense effort, all the blueprints, roadmaps and PTs are worthless. You mention something that is often overlooked and underreported: the great ‘feeling’ that accompanies chemical detoxification, combined with intense, endorphin-producing exercise. So many trainees that undergo the Parrillo transformative process will comment on how difficult, physically and mentally, the first few weeks are when someone commits to the Parrillo process. Those that faithfully use the Parrillo diet plan and the Parrillo high-intensity weight training and aerobic plan all comment how terrific they feel, how energized they feel (as opposed to pre-Parrillo lethargic and run-down) and how vibrant and full of life they feel. This is an actual occurrence, a chemical process within the body attributable to two separate, ongoing processes…

• Detoxification: People fail to realize that manmade foods, i.e., chips, frozen foods, foods loaded with trans-fats, sodas, factory fake food and fast food and food that comes in bags or in cans are loaded with chemicals. After years of eating junk food and fake food and drinking all manner of artificial beverages, our bodies become saturated with a horrid brew of toxic chemicals. When the toxic person begins a Parrillo diet plan, and eats only natural foods, the body gradually rids itself of these chemical poisons. The result is the person “feels” better almost immediately. It takes 10-20 days to completely detoxify and as the individuals clear their system of these poisons they experience an indescribable euphoria.

• Exercise-induced endorphin euphoria: Endorphins are hormones that when secreted produce a narcotic-like analgesic effect that produces unexplainable feelings of well-being. Endorphins are only produced and released in reaction to extreme and intense exercise. Easy sub-maximal exercise, normal training done by normal people, is not sufficiently intense to cause endorphin release. Super-intense, take-it-past-the-limit, Parrillo-style aerobics and forced-rep, drop-set style Parrillo resistance weight training is sufficiently intense to cause the regular and predictable release of endorphins. When a person commits to the Parrillo Program fully, they experience the euphoric double whammy of detoxification and exercise induced endorphins. This I-feel-so-much-better feeling begins with the first hard Parrillo workout of the first week and builds and builds and builds the deeper into the Parrillo process the person goes.

Iron Vic,

What is your take on super-high rep sets used to finish off a body-part? I have been reading through the Parrillo Papers and it seems that John Parrillo recommends high rep sets – how would you incorporate them into the routine of an advanced bodybuilder, such as me? I would like to shake things up a bit and thought that high rep sets might be a possibility.

Arn, Falls Church, Virginia

Good to here from you again Arn. If you were to attend a Parrillo Extreme Training Camp (highly recommended) you would be exposed to a variety of high-rep sets, the most famous being the 100-rep Belt Squat. The theory behind the specific and judicious use of high rep sets is pretty easy to understand; John has always wanted his bodybuilders to use ALL the rep ranges when training a muscle. He feels it a common mistake to “fall in love” with a particular rep range, thereby limiting growth. Most bodybuilders love 8-15 rep moderate rep-range sets. While this rep range is extremely valuable and recommended, it is a mistake to use this one rep range exclusively. Strength athletes love 1-5 rep, low-rep range sets, and while these are also extremely valuable and recommended it is a mistake to make them into a religion. In a Parrillo style workout, one done under the Master Blaster’s direct supervision, John would have you “pyramid” up to a heavy, low rep set of say 1-5 reps, then pyramid back down using a series of moderate, 8-15 rep sets and finish off a body part with a high rep ‘flush and finish’ set. Using this strategy we would have all our rep bases covered. John would finish off a body part with a “super high rep set” of 50 to 100 reps. The hi-rep finish set completely decimates a muscle or muscle group. Examples of this strategy might be after finishing off a chest workout on the final set, the bodybuilder could conclude with a 30-rep forced rep set on the pec dec. One way to finish off the legs would be to conclude with a 50 rep set of partner-assisted leg

extensions or leg presses. Shoulders? How about a 25 rep, forced rep set of front presses on the Smith machine. Machines are great for high rep sets as they allow a single training partner to keep you going far past failure. Use high rep sets to conclude a body part; once you’ve completed one of these forced rep/drop set enduros, that body part is fried, decimated and further effort is useless.

Vic,

My lats suck – always have. I do pull-downs, cable rows and T-bar rows till the cows come home, and have for years; nothing seems to make them grow. Obviously I need some changes. BTW I have a good physique; I carry 11% body fat in the off-season and routinely hit 6% at shows. My best body parts are my legs and arms. Pecs are okay, shoulders could use some work, my back is my downfall. Any ideas? I’d sure like to be able to move up a few places in our local competitions and all the judges tell me I need to ‘get a back.’

 Frank, Eugene

Like the muscular Sherlock Holmes that I am, as soon as you said, “I have good arms” I knew what your problem is. We used to have a saying, “show me a man with a great set of lats and I’ll show you a man with lousy biceps; show me a man with great biceps and I’ll show you a man with lousy lats.” You likely “arm pull” all your lat exercises. When performing a lat exercise it is critical to isolate the lats and for that to happen the biceps need to be relaxed. All lat exercises involve pulling a payload towards you; think about it: pull-downs, rows, chins, pull-ups, you name the lat exercise and the proper procedure forces the latissimus muscles to pull poundage towards you. You can activate the biceps to help in the pulling and in extreme cases (like you) you can pull a weight towards yourself using nothing but tensed biceps (and relaxed lats.) How do you get the biceps out of lat work?

Two methods…

• Do not wrap the thumb around the handle or bar on lat exercises: use a “false grip” by placing the thumb behind the bar when pulling. It is virtually impossible to activate the biceps when the thumb is taken out of pulling. The downside is you lose a substantial amount of gripping power.

• The better alternative is to use lifting straps. Even better is to use lifting straps and a false, thumb-less grip. Lifting straps are canvas straps used to enhance gripping power. Wear straps when you chin, row, perform pull-ups, lat pull-downs and any other lat exercise. Use a false grip and straps and you have to pull with the lats. Beware! Your poundage will plummet. But so what – your biceps were doing all the work anyway.

I would also advise expanding your exercises. Too many bodybuilders use nothing but pull-ups, pull-downs, cable rows and the various lat machines. They ignore heavy bent over rowing and deadlifting. The latter is a fabulous lat exercise if the lifter tenses the lats at the start of each deadlift rep. There are two lat muscles: an upper and a lower latissimus dorsi. Machine and cable exercises only hit the upper lat; lower lats need big stimulation from big exercises. Strap up, go thumb-less and back pull instead of arm pull!

Hello Vic!

I am looking to get ripped in 2012 and wanted to get together a pile of Parrillo supplements designed specifically to aid my lean-out campaign. What would you recommend and why.

Bobby T, parts unknown

Here would be my supplemental lean-out lineup…

CapTri®: Everyone thinks thatCapTri® is used strictly to slap on mass (which it is) but what most miss is that CapTri® is an irreplaceable supplement for those seeking to get ripped. Why? Pro bodybuilders love their potatoes and rice, and in the off-season they eat these starches by the bucketful. The elite understand that as the competition approaches lean protein intake must remain sky-high; fiber carbs need to be eaten in large quantities. The lean out procedure hinges on a gradual reduction in starch carbs – however the dilemma is you risk losing muscle when reducing starch carbs. The solution is replacing ever-decreasing starch carb calories with an ever increasing amount of CapTri® calories. This tactic not only saves muscle it keeps energy levels soaring.

Advanced Lipotropic Formula™: This product is used universally by Parrillo bodybuilders as they seek to dip down into single digit body fat percentiles prior to a competition. For those using the Parrillo nutritional approach, Advanced Lipotropic Formula™ provides key nutrients that accelerate body fat oxidation: L-caritine, B vitamins, betaine, HCL, biotin, choline, inositol and chromium picolinate. CP has been shown in study after study to increase glucose tolerance and enhances the cell’s ability to shuttle carbohydrates into cellular blast furnaces (mitochondria) to be oxidized. CP also stabilizes blood sugar levels. For serious trainees seriously intent on melting fat, Advanced Lipotropic™ is indispensable.

Max Endurance Formula™: Leaning out and aerobic exercise is synonymous; any trainee serious about melting body fat needs to perform lots and lots of cardiovascular exercise. Parrillo cardio is way different than nickel-and-dime, nice-and-easy cardio done by casually riding an exercise bike while reading a magazine or watching TV. Parrillo cardio is by definition torrid, intense and above all, sweaty! In Parrillo World if you ain’t sweating when performing cardio you ain’t doing jack! Those that do it right, those that break into intense sweat in each and every cardio session run the risk of creating a lot of ammonia and ammonia disrupts fat burning. By taking 5-10 capsules of Max Endurance Formula™ before a sweaty, result producing aerobic session, ammonia is defeated and defused before it has a chance to form and ruin results.

Muscle Amino Formula™: If an individual is working out as hard as humanly possible, if they are performing aerobics daily and sometimes twice a day, if they are blasting away in the weight room using bone-crushing poundage and drop-sets, forced reps and high rep ‘finish sets,’ the toll on the human body is incredible. In order to sustain the body, in order to grow muscle and melt fat, the nutrition has to be perfect and the supplementation needs to be dead on and consistent. One often overlooked Parrillo supplement is Muscle Amino Formula™. This amazing product is a capsule full of research-grade branched-chain amino acids. The BCAAs are famous for repairing exercise-induced muscle trauma. Pro bodybuilders and world-level strength athletes use concentrated doses of BCAAs to heal battered muscles. Used properly, Muscle Amino Formula™ will allow the bodybuilder to recover quicker from weight training and cardio. The elite will take a handful of Muscle Amino™ capsules both before (to spare muscle) and after (to repair muscle) engaging in a high intensity training session. Muscle Amino Formula™ is a supplemental god-send for bodybuilders looking to recover quickly while exercising maximally and dieting with 100% commitment.

By JOHN PARRILLO

In this column, I’m pulling out the ultimate weapon — growth hormone. This is the most important hormone if you body-build, acting as a powerful stimulus for muscle growth and fat loss. Many of the effects of exercise in increasing muscle mass and decreasing body fat are mediated by growth hormone.

Every athlete who has struggled to build muscle is painfully aware of the fact that you have to lift weights to do it. In fact, you have to lift weights very intensely and consistently over a period of some time (months to years) to accumulate significant increases in muscle mass. Since muscles are made from nutrients in the food we eat, you may logically ask why can’t we build muscle just by eating the right foods? The answer to this question takes us back to the theme of this column: hormones.

Hormones are ultimately responsible for the process of tissue remodeling — that is, the process of laying down new muscle tissue. Although you can exert great control over some hormones by diet alone, exercise is required to generate the complete hormonal spectrum which will result in muscle gain and fat loss (1,2). Furthermore, the damage to muscle tissue which results from exercise training (especially the eccentric, or lowering phase of muscle contraction) serves as a stimulus to the muscles more responsive to the growth-promoting effects of anabolic hormones (1). Growth hormone (GH) is the most anabolic substance in the human body (3,4). In a study of old men (whose growth hormone levels are diminished), it was found that GH administration promoted an increase in muscle mass and a decrease in body fat even in the absence of exercise training (3,4).

GH also has a lipolytic effect, which means it mobilizes body fat from adipose depots and increases the use of fat for energy (5,6). This in turn spares carbohydrates so glycogen stores are preserved (5,6). GH is thus probably the most important hormone for bodybuilding since it has powerful actions in building muscle and burning fat.

That being so, how can you increase it naturally – without resorting to drugs?

There are several things you can do as a bodybuilder to naturally increase your GH levels (7). First, eat an adequate diet containing at least one gram of protein per pound of body weight.

Second, supplement your diet with Enhanced GH Formula™ containing the most effective combination of amino acids for GH release ever produced (8). Use Enhanced GH Formula™ before bed and before training. Always take it on an empty stomach. Glycine is also a potent GH stimulator (3) and this may explain the well-known anabolic effects of glycine. Parrillo Performance Hi-Protein Powder™ and Pro-Carb™ formula are fortified with significant amounts of glycine.

This combination of supplements, along with the right diet, has proven over the years to be incredibly anabolic.

Third, make sure you get enough sleep. Maximal GH release occurs during deep sleep. Take a nap during the afternoon if possible.

Fourth, train smart. Heavy, low-rep work is known to be effective in increasing strength. This is probably due to an increase in testosterone levels and a training effect on the nervous system. High-rep work with moderate weights is more effective in stimulating GH release (1,2,9). It’s a huge mistake to leave out the high-rep part of your training. While low-rep work is more effective in increasing muscle strength, high-rep work is very effective in increasing muscle size. The GH release resulting from high volume training also serves as a potent stimulus for fat loss. Of course, you need both high-rep and low-rep work to make continuing progress. Don’t get the idea that you don’t have to lift heavy weights anymore. If you want to get bigger muscles, you will always have to lift heavy weights — but you also have to incorporate high-rep work for maximum development. There are several strategies for doing this. You can incorporate both heavy and light work into the same training session using a pyramid technique.

Start with one or two warm up sets around 15 reps. Use a light weight when warming up and do not go to fail ure. Then pick a weight you can handle in good form for ten reps. Continue increasing the weight and do sets of eight, six and four reps. Take all working sets to positive failure. Then decrease the weight and do a set of 20 reps to failure. This helps pump the blood into the muscle and stimulates GH release. Lower the weight slowly, emphasizing the eccentric part of the contraction. This is especially important at the end of a set when ATP in the muscle is depleted. ATP is required for muscle relaxation as well as muscle contraction. When a muscle runs out of ATP it “locks up” in the contracted state and cannot relax properly. This state is known as “ischemic rigor.” When the muscle is in rigor and you are lowering a weight from the contracted position, the fibers cannot relax and literally get torn as the muscle elongates. If this sounds painful, it is. Most people stop a set just as this starts to happen because the pain gets unbearable. The ones who fight through the pain and crank out a few more reps are the ones who get big muscles. Sorry, but that’s the way it is.

Another way to incorporate high rep work is to train in the four-to-eight rep range one week and the 12-to-20 rep range the next week.

Finally, some people do a “powerlifting cycle” involving heavy, low-rep work for four to six weeks followed by a “bodybuilding cycle” with moderate weights and higher reps for the next four-to-six weeks. Most advanced bodybuilders have experimented with all three strategies at some point. The key is to find what works best for you. If you’re at a plateau, it’s probably time for a change.

To break out of a plateau, increase calories and try training less frequently with heavier weights. If you haven’t been doing any high-rep work, doing some will probably stimulate a growth spurt. Of course, there are many reasons for reaching a training plateau, but they usually relate to over-training, under-training, under-nutrition or not enough rest. Constant fatigue, loss of libido and failure to recover from workouts are signs of over-training, not enough rest and not enough calories and nutrients. If you neglect any part of the program — high-rep training, low-rep training, aerobics, stretching, rest, nutrition, or supplementation — your results will definitely suffer. The Parrillo Program is a balanced approach covering every facet of bodybuilding. You supply the hard work, consistency and dedication, and we’ll supply the winning strategy.

References

1. Kraemer WJ. Influence of the endocrine system on resistance training

adaptations. Nat’l Strength and Conditioning J. 14: 47-54, 1992.

2. Kraemer RR, Kilgore JL, Kraemer GR and Castracane VD. Growth hormone, IGF-I and testosterone responses to resistive exercise. Med. Sci. Sports Exerc. 24: 1346-1352, 1992.

3. Colgan M. Optimum Sports Nutrition. Advanced Research Press, New York, 1993.

4. Rudman D, et al. Effects of Human Growth Hormone in Men over sixty years old. N Engl. J. Med. 323: 1, 1990.

5. Guyton AC. Textbook of Medical Physiology. W.B. Saunders, 1991.

6. Johnson, LR. Essential Medical Physiology. Raven Press, New York,

1992.

7. Crist DM. Growth Hormone Synergism. DMC Health Sciences, Albuquerque, 1991.

8. de Castro JM, Paullin SK, and DeLugas GM. Insulin and glucagon as determinants of body weight set point and microregulation in rats. J. Comp. Physiol. Psychol. 92: 571-579, 1978.

Twisting Stretch

Start: Sit on the floor with your legs extended and together. Rotate your body slightly to the right. Facing you, your partner straddles your body just at your thighs. He then places his left hand and left knee under your shoulder. He also loops his right hand under your right shoulder and grasps the inside of his right knee with his right hand.

Stretch: Straightening his right leg and bending his left leg, your partner then pulls up your torso, twisting your body to the right. This position is held for ten seconds. Repeat the stretch for the left side of your body.

Variation: To also stretch your rib cage, your partner lifts your arm up and back.

nutrition Tip of the month:

Maintenance Plans vs. Low Calorie Diets

All diets, no matter how crazy or unsound, will work to produce weight loss if they don’t supply enough calories to meet the body’s needs. Diets fail because they produce results only as long as you remain on the diet. Once you go off the diet and eat ‘normally’, you gain the weight back. One leading obesity researcher put it like this: all diets work, it is the maintenance programs that fail. What if we just go on a maintenance plan at the beginning and skip the low calorie diet? You’re better off picking a program from the outset that you can tolerate for the rest of your life. You need to get enough to eat and not feel deprived.

News & Discoveries In Fitness & Nutrition

Key To Keeping Older People Fit Longer

A carefully framed combination of moderate exercise and nutritional supplements could help older people maintain an active lifestyle for longer.

A Manchester Metropolitan University study has found that taking carbohydrate and protein supplements just before and just after low-resistance exercise could boost muscle performance and slow muscle wastage in people over retirement age. Moreover, this combination appears to deliver greater fitness benefits than undertaking heavy-resistance training with or without changing one’s nutritional habits. This was the first-ever study of the combination of structured exercise and nutritional supplements to focus wholly on older people. This ground-breaking study involved a carefully selected sample of around 60 healthy, independent-living adults aged 65 and over. The volunteers were randomly divided into groups who underwent different 12 week programs of physical exercise and nutritional supplementation. Everyone was then re-assessed at the end of the program.

Some groups undertook low-resistance exercise once a week; others undertook high-resistance exercise twice a week. Within each group, some of the volunteers took protein and carbohydrate supplements while others did not. When all the participants were re-assessed at the end of the 12 week programme, it was observed that muscle size and strength had increased in all groups. However, the results suggested that older people would derive the most benefits if they took appropriate supplements coupled with low-intensity exercise.

“Maintaining muscle performance and arresting muscle wastage can offer older people real improvements in their quality of life,” says Dr. Gladys Pearson, who led the research. “Though we still need to assess precisely what level of exercise gives the best results, we believe we’ve shown that regular low-resistance exercise complemented by the right nutritional supplements could boost the well-being of the UK’s aging population.”

-Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, Sept. 11, 2008

Question of the month:

Question: I need more energy when I’m exercising, should I start drinking Pro-Carb™ before I exercise?

Answer: A study has shown that ingestion of one to two grams of carbohydrate per kilogram of body weight one hour before exercise can improve performance. In this experiment the carbohydrate was given in liquid form, which is what we would generally recommend if you’re going to eat something within an hour of exercise. This allows for more rapid digestion and absorption than is possible with solid food. Pro-Carb Powder™ is ideal for this, supplying 22 grams of medium-chain carbohydrate (maltodextrin) along with four grams of protein per scoop. That means a 180 lb. athlete would need about four scoops taken 30-60 min. before exercising. Consuming carbs during exercise can also improve performance. This works by helping to maintain blood glucose levels and preventing hypoglycemia, rather than by sparing muscle glycogen. Keep in mind I’m talking about maximizing exercise performance, not fat burning.

Quick Tip of the month:

Since ginger is our featured food, here are a few tips on using ginger in your cooking:

• You can easily peel ginger without a knife by gently scraping the skin with the edge of a teaspoon.

• Consider the point at which you add ginger during cooking, as this can affect the taste of the finished dish: if you add ginger early on, you get a more mild, subtle flavor, but if you add ginger towards the end, you’ll get a stronger, more pungent flavor.

Dominique’s Time Cruncher

When you open a new bottle of spices, herbs, or other ingredients, always write the date on it with a permanent marker or if it’s glass, stick on a piece of tape with the date. This way you know immediately how old an ingredient is before using it in your cooking or baking.

Easy training and undisciplined eating are fun, easy -and a complete waste of time

By Duke Nukem

People bitch all the time about how hard and difficult the Parrillo system is. Many people tell us, “If you people (Parrillo trainers) would just make the physical training a little less difficult, if you would allow the nutrition to be a little less demanding and a lot less strict – then you’d be able to get a lot more folks to follow your methods.” Point-in-fact: the demanding, difficult strictness of the Parrillo system is what elicits the results. Everyone else in the wider fitness world purposefully makes fitness easier and more user-friendly in order to make a sale. This is a classic “Devil’s Bargain.” Make any system of fitness purposefully easier in order to appeal to a wider segment of a potential audience and it loses its effectiveness, assuming (and that’s a big assumption) that it had any effectiveness to begin with. Unfortunately easy and physical improvement is an irresolvable contradiction. There is no such thing as an easy dramatic physical transformation. The reason people continually fail in their fitness renovation efforts is they continually buy into the idea that somewhere there exists an effortless way with which to obtain the dramatic changes they seek without the dramatic effort. This is the biggest lie in all of fitness.

Parrillo the truth-teller: There are legions of unscrupulous individuals that have made a mountain of money telling people that they have a method that enables the user to create incredible physical gains with a minimum of disciplined effort: exercise devices routinely claim, “Create six-pack abs with only two easy, ten minute workouts per week!” Miracle diets claim, “Eat anything you want and still lose fat and melt inches off your waistline!” These lying sales pitches invariably tout some “breakthrough” method that allows you, the purchaser, to avoid all the teeth-grinding physical effort and all the disciplined eating normally associated with the engineering of a true, major overhaul of the human body. In bold contrast John Parrillo has never minced words or downplayed the amount of hard effort and disciplined eating needed to engineer the radical gains people seek. “In order to grow muscle and dissolve body fat, in order to make real and substantial gains, the individual has to train hard – harder than they’ve ever trained in their life – and they have to practice really disciplined nutrition. Does anyone really think halfhearted training and sloppy nutrition is going to result in significant physical improvement?” The Parrillo method is a “tough love” message: the good news is that the Parrillo Method never fails to deliver dramatic results, assuming it is instituted fully and executed properly.

Results are the mighty motivator: The reason people quit “pretend” fitness is that eventually they wise-up to the fact that they haven’t obtained any results. They might lose a few pounds initially but the big gains, the lasting gains, the dramatic gains, the gains they envisioned when they began their “fitness quest” are, in the end, negligible. Real results, deep results, dramatic results, only occur when intense physical effort in the gym is coupled with a sustained Parrillo-style nutritional approach. The training effort and the strict eating needs to be done for a protracted period of time. That is the cold, harsh truth and most people don’t want to hear that tough love message. They prefer to keep window shopping in pretend, fairy fitness-land, being beguiled and enthralled and enchanted by yet another “no pain” training strategy and eat-what-you-want diet plan. Needless to say, zero results occur from these excursions into pretend world. Meanwhile, those rugged individuals that embrace the hard truth and utilize Parrillo methods end up transforming themselves. In pretend world jumping into the training and dieting is easy as eating pie; pretend, no sweat training is fun and the fun and easy sub-maximal workouts are followed by tasty treats. “Gee, this is fun and this is easy!” the pretend trainee thinks. They travel to the gym to engage in patty-cake workouts and then eat pretty much what they want – but maybe a little less of it. Meanwhile in Reality World the person new to Parrillo procedures is thrown into the deep end of the pool – here is how that critical first week for a new Parrillo convert looks…

• 5 am: Wake up, drink an All-Protein™ shake and wash down a handful of “Parrillo Pills”
• 5:30 am: Commence an intense 45 minute aerobic session; profuse sweating is the hallmark
• 6:30 am: 8 eggs whites, one yolk, ½ cup of oatmeal doused with Butter Flavor CapTri®
• 9 am: Parrillo Energy Bar™, Optimized Whey™ shake
• Noon: Chicken breast, large garden salad, brown rice with CapTri®, Parrillo pills
• 3 pm: Parrillo muffins slathered with Butter Flavor CapTri®
• 5 pm: Intense weight training session: forced reps, drop sets and fascia stretching
• 6:45 pm: Post-workout: 50/50 Plus™ shake, Muscle Amino™ and Ultimate Amino™ capsules
• 7:30 pm: Fish fillet sautéed in CapTri®, green beans, yam, Parrillo Hi-Protein Cake™ with Parrillo Protein Frosting™
•  10 pm: Hi-Protein™ shake, Liver Amino Formula™ tabs, Enhanced GH™ capsules

This would be a typical day’s training and eating schedule and food selection would vary day to day. Cardio is done seven days a week while weight training is performed 4-6 times weekly.

• Typical Parrillo-inspired Weight Training Session: chest, triceps & biceps
• Bench press: pyramid up to a top set of 5 reps, reduce poundage, 8 rep sets + forced reps
• Incline dumbbell press: same as barbell bench; 5 rep “top set” then 8 rep sets, forced reps
• Dumbbell flyes: four sets of 10-12 reps “progressive,” adding weight on each set
• Pec-deck: four forced rep sets; failure at rep 8 plus 2-5 partner-assisted forced reps
• Dumbbell overhead tricep press: 4-5 sets of 8-12 reps alternated with
• Seated dumbbell curls: 4-5 sets of 8-12 reps
• Triceps push-downs: 4-5 sets of 8 reps plus 2-5 forced reps alternated with
• Machine curls: 4-5 sets of 8 reps plus 2-5 forced reps

In between each set, or super-set, a specific Parrillo fascia stretch is performed. After the stretch, the athlete flexes the stretched muscle hard, to the point of cramping. This is known as the Parrillo Three-phase Set: pump the muscle, stretch the muscle, flex the muscle.

• The overall weekly template under the Parrillo system might be structured as follows…
• Monday: thighs, hamstrings, calves and shoulders
• Tuesday: chest, triceps, biceps
• Wednesday: off
• Thursday: lats, erectors, traps, biceps
• Friday: shoulders, arms
• Saturday: weak point day (extra work on weak body parts)
• Sunday: off

Sissies need not apply! Those that are serious, those that have had it with patty-cake pretend methods are welcome to step up to the Parrillo methodology. Please be aware that the Parrillo Method is not just for the elite bodybuilder; many individuals mistakenly assume that the Parrillo approach is strictly for the ultra-advanced athlete – nothing could be further from the truth. Effective methods are effective for everyone. While the poundage used for new trainees is a fraction of that used by a bodybuilding professional, the exercises, sets, reps and approach should be adapted and adopted. Ditto the Parrillo nutritional approach: while the new trainee will not be able to fire down the sheer volume of clean calories the seasoned athlete can and does, on a smaller scale, a more modest scale, the serious individual intent on getting onboard with the Parrillo approach will eat the same low-fat proteins, the same natural fiber carbs and the identical selection of starches.

Just as the elite athlete following the Parrillo approach will jettison refined, man made, artificial foods, along with toxic soft drinks and progress-blocking alcohol and fruit, so does the Parrillo novice. The exclusion of fruit from the Parrillo dietary plan is superficially controversial, yet logical and appropriate when looked at scientifically. Fruit sugar turns into fat in the liver and enters the bloodstream as fat, and for that reason fruit is not eaten by those adhering to the Parrillo protocol. Body fat cannot be oxidized if alcohol is present in the body: alcohol goes to the front of the oxidation line and for that reason it is avoided. There is no break-in period for those using Parrillo strategies: right from day one adherents are expected to perform intense cardio and weight train up to and past capacity; hard weight training and equally hard cardio are required to build muscle and oxidize body fat. Parrillo nutrition makes no compromises. Those that use the Parrillo strategy are expected to eat with perfect discipline from day one. The overall Parrillo approach is not for half-steppers, moderates or sissies!

The critical first week: Experience has shown that those new to the Parrillo approach have the most difficult time during the first few days of their transition from “regular” eating and “regular” fitness training to the hard reality of Parrillo training and Parrillo nutrition. Food preparation is critical; to be successful the Parrillo adherent needs to make a goodly amount of approved foods ahead of time – this way the proper foods can be consumed at the proper times in the proper amounts; and since the trainee eats five or more times per day, hunger is avoided. There is a direct correlation between hunger and binging: if approved foods and supplements are ready and available, hunger is satiated and the risk of binging or “falling off the nutritional wagon” is dramatically decreased. Chicken, fish, lean beef and some shellfish can be prepared days in advance; potatoes can be baked ahead of time, rice can be made, and fiber carbs sautéed beforehand. Classically, the Parrillo trainee sets aside a few hours on the weekend to mass produce the requisite foods that are then stored in the refrigerator and eaten during the coming week. Training is regular as clockwork: cardio is done upon awaking and sets the tone for the rest of the day. Weight training is done 4-6 times weekly: pushing up to and past the limits is the name of the Parrillo progressive resistance game. The first few days are critical for establishing new patterns and habits. As the week progresses the trainee “feels better” as the nutritional detoxification process unfolds. With each successive day, with each successive workout, with each successive meal, real improvement and real results appear; these results occur in an astounding number of ways. Lifting poundage increases, aerobic capacity improves with each successive training session; the approved foods taste better as the toxicity of refined foods fades; the trainee feels significantly better almost immediately. By the end of the first week tangible results appear: with each successive week thereafter momentum is built; roughly 85% of the time those that experience a perfect first week go on to successfully engineer a complete physical makeover.

The critical role of Parrillo supplements; the final piece in the transformational puzzle: Optimally, it is recommended that Parrillo supplements are purchased en masse and a month in advance. As John Parrillo famously said, “Supplements are designed to supplement a solid nutritional program built upon the expert use of regular food. This is the foundation. Properly utilized, supplements can add 10-20% to the progress of the user.” That is a huge edge. Which supplements should the beginner purchase? First and foremost, buy a canister of one of the famous Parrillo protein powders: All-Protein™, Optimized Whey™ or the old reliable, Hi-Protein™.

Equally as important as a protein supplement is CapTri®. Many individuals new to the Parrillo method shy away from a supplement that is a lipid (a fat) that promises to add hundreds of calories to the trainee’s nutrition program. As a society we have been brainwashed into thinking that calories are bad when factually “clean” calories, calories that cannot and will not be converted into body fat, are the bourgeoning bodybuilder’s best friend: to build muscle we must establish anabolism and anabolism is a direct result of caloric consumption. If the calories used to establish anabolism are preferentially partitioned into fat storage these calories are known as “dirty” calories, in bodybuilding vernacular. CapTri® calories are derived from medium-chain triglyceride sources and are impossible to end up stored as fat. Ergo, CapTri® is critical for supplying requisite calories needed to establish anabolism, the requisite precursor to muscle growth. The third critical supplement in the Parrillo Triad is 50/50 Plus™, the perfect post-workout supplement. Science has shown that a “window of opportunity” opens after an intense workout and if a 50-50 blend of high BV protein and insulin-neutral carbs are ingested within an hour of the workout, results are actually amplified. 50/50 Plus™ is designed to take advantage of the open window.

Supplementing to avoid a predictable pitfall: A sizeable portion of those new to the Parrillo method have to overcome an addiction to sweets. The amazing assortment of Parrillo “engineered foods,” the cakes, cupcakes, brownies, muffins, pancakes and Ice Kreem™ – to say nothing of the incredible assortment of Parrillo bars, are all used to overcome sweet cravings and fill in the gaps and spaces. Put it all together – the training, the eating, the supplementing and then exert perfect discipline for a mere seven days and you have an outstanding chance of gaining transformative traction and renovating your body in a way you’ve only dreamed about. Beware! The Parrillo System cannot be picked apart, avoid the trap of embracing some aspects (“I like the cardio”) while rejecting other aspects (“The eating is too demanding!”) Like a fine Swiss watch, all the components of the Parrillo System are designed to fit together and work together in a way that amplifies results. Do it all and succeed. Pick it apart and fail. The choice is yours!

Episode 60: The great ‘how many meals?’ debate

As a writer for bodybuilding magazines for over twenty years now (don’t ask me where the time went), I’ve had the privilege of being able to speak to all the great champions and learn their personal opinions about training and nutrition. Not long ago, something 4-time Mr. Olympia Jay Cutler told me got me thinking. Jay feels the need to eat a minimum of four solid meals before he will work out, which has him hitting the gym anywhere from six PM to as late as 10 PM at times. If he can’t get that minimum number in, Jay won’t even train that day as he feels it would be a waste. The quality of the workout would suffer due to insufficient ‘gas in the tank.’ But Ronnie Coleman, 8-Time Mr. O, used to eat just one big breakfast of eggs and cheese and grits before blasting the iron. Arnold Classic Champion Branch Warren eats twice before training. All three of these men have incredible physiques and attacked the weights like ferocious beasts, so which one of them is ‘right’ about how many meals a bodybuilder requires prior to a workout? I think the answer to that depends on various factors.

When do you train?

Some of you may have the luxury of being able to train any time of day or night that you please. In that case, you could theoretically always eat and digest multiple meals before working out. Most of you probably don’t have a very flexible schedule. Unless you are self-employed, chances are your options are limited to training before or after roughly an eight-hour workday that may also involve a sizeable commute. Many parents need to get back home after work to care for their offspring, so it’s either train first thing in the morning or not at all. This means one meal before working out, and I do feel strongly that you do need that one good meal of a lean protein and complex carbs. One thing I am certain of is that weight training on an empty stomach is not only futile, but you will end up eating up more of your own body’s muscle by forcing it to perform without fuel. Don’t even think about it! You may need to wake up a bit earlier to get that breakfast in, but it’s a must. Personally, I have been training after just one meal most of the time for over a decade now, and I do fine.

You also have to consider if putting off the workout until later in the day makes sense logistically for you. Are you a morning person and start fading in the afternoon? If so, it seems to make sense to train when you will perform at your physical and mental peak rather than later on, just so you can be more fully carbed up.

What bodypart are you training?

Some bodyparts are more demanding to train than others. Specifically, they involve such large amounts of muscle and such heavy weight and volume to train properly that they make far greater demands on your muscle glycogen reserves. Legs and back are easily the two areas that require more ‘fuel’ than others. For example, a workout featuring multiple sets of squats, leg presses, hack squats, and walking lunges will take a lot more out of you than barbell curls and dumbbell kickbacks. I’ve always felt it just made sense to eat more, particularly more complex carbohydrates, before and after training legs or back. Therefore you could also argue that if indeed eating several meals before training would offer any advantage, it would also be on the days you train those. Then again, if you have a certain stubborn bodypart and you do find you have better workouts with multiple meals beforehand, those might be the best days for you to eat more prior to training.

Is your training high-volume or not?

Most bodybuilders train with ‘high volume,’ but that term has a lot of room for interpretation. Technically, volume refers to the total amount of sets performed for each bodypart. On average, most of us probably do around 12-20 ‘work sets’ for larger muscle groups (not counting warm-ups), and 9-12 for smaller muscle groups. I wouldn’t consider these to be ‘high volume’ to the point where you would require extravagant amounts of food to have a decent workout. If you are doing more than those ranges, then sure; I could see why you might feel you run out of steam halfway through the workout. Techniques like drop sets, super sets, and giant sets will also take a bigger bite out of your glycogen stores and would justify multiple meals. But if you’re not doing a ton of volume and you’re sticking to straight sets, chances are you can train just fine after just one good meal.

How fast is your metabolism?

We all have different metabolic rates. This is often evidenced in how much food in general it takes for each of us to maintain our weight, or to make any gains. I know Jay Cutler does have a very fast metabolism, because he claims he will easily lose 5-8 pounds of muscle over the course of any weekend in which he misses a few meals – which happens frequently due to his grueling travel and appearance schedule. Also, the sheer amount of muscle mass he has been carrying most of his adult life – 290 pounds at 5-9 – requires a great deal of food every day. And so it also is for many ‘hard gainers,’ those whose bodies incinerate calories faster than they can take them in (which is why they need to be supplementing their food intake with CapTri®, Parrillo bars, and shakes). For these people, one meal eaten after a night of fasting during sleep may not be nearly enough to fuel an intense workout. Two, three, or more may be much better.

Only you can know

So how many meals should you eat before working out? That’s a question that really only you can answer. If your particular schedule only allows for one meal because your only option is to train early in the morning, you don’t even need to think about it. If you do have more leeway in terms of what time of day you train, carefully weigh the pros and cons. Consider how your workouts seem any better or worse depending on how much food you’ve consumed that day, and weigh that against what time of day you seem to have more productive workouts. And in the end, I don’t think it makes a world of difference as long as you are eating quality meals every two to three waking hours, every day. This constant stream of nutrients is what’s really important as far as making gains from your workouts. If you feel that you can train heavier, harder, and with more intensity with multiple meals in your system and are able to do this, wonderful. Go for it. Otherwise, focus more on making sure you get six quality meals in every day, and that at least one of those is eaten before you train.

The fastest growing sport on the planet is Mixed Martial Arts. MMA grew out of a need to see who were the best fighters and what were the best fighting systems. Up until the advent of the MMA format, anyone could claim anything and fight schools everywhere proclaimed loudly that their style of fighting would and could whip any other style of fighting. This all ended when Rorian Gracie and Art Davey devised the octagon and created an essentially no-holds-barred format and invited loud mouth fight style braggarts to show up or shut up. The Ultimate Fighting Championship was created and soon established what fight styles were most effective and which ones were completely bogus.

Over the intervening decades something amazing occurred: a new hybrid style of fighting emerged, not championing any particular style or technique, embracing all effective techniques; the modern MMA fight stylist draws upon a seemingly endless number of tactics taken from dozens of sources to create modern fighters adept at any fight situation without exclusively embracing any single technique. Bruce Lee, the patron saint of modern MMA, predicted this phenomena twenty years before the birth of the UFC with his credo, “Absorb and expropriate what is useful, regardless its source; discard the superfluous.” Lee was ahead of his time in envisioning the hybrid MMA fighter and he was also ahead of his time envisioning the vast array of training techniques and tactics needed to build “the ultimate fighter.”

Bruce Lee embraced hardcore weight training at a time when martial artists purposefully avoided resistance training on the erroneous, unchallenged, and widely accepted belief that weight training would “slow down punch and kick speed.” Lee saw through that BS; Lee wanted the pure power weight training could provide. Lee also was a nutritional pioneer: his 5% body fat percentile, so apparent in any of his movies, showed that a lean, fat-free body was the perfect body for fighting: low body fat improved cardio capacity and when coupled with hardcore lifting provided the fighter, regardless of his skill set, the perfect body for giving and absorbing punishment. Nowadays every MMA fighter includes lifting in their fight training regimen and nutrition plays a huge part in enabling elite fighters to maximize muscle mass within the various weight divisions. A prototypical modern MMA physique has emerged: the world’s best fighters, regardless of their height or weight class, regardless of their muscular proportion, are lean and powerful. Their intense training, disciplined eating and moderate lifestyles have created a remarkably similar physical look: regardless if the fighter is a 135 pound bantam weight, a 170 pound welterweight, a 205 pound light heavyweight or a 265 pound heavyweight, the Ultimate Fighting Championship top ten champions and contenders all sport 10% or less body fat percentiles, all engage in hardcore weight training to increase power, and all perform intense “combat cardio.” In more ways than one, the modern MMA fighter has expropriated many of the Parrillo precepts and used these strategies to provide the powerhouse strength and fat-free body needed to successfully compete as a modern MMA fighter.

Dan Root is a perfect example of the modern MMA fighter: this 30 year old lives and trains in Baltimore, Maryland. Dan teamed up with a local bodybuilding legend, a longtime Parrillo follower named Chris Toland. Chris was asked to help “whittle down” Root’s bodyweight without sacrificing any muscle or power. Dan is an intelligent, intensely disciplined ex-college wrestler and needed to radically reduce his bodyweight in a short period of time. He related, “My ‘walking around’ weight was 205 pounds when my coach at the Team Ground Control fight center, John Rallo, shared with me his view that in order to maximize my potential and given my height of 5 foot 10 inches, I should fight in the 170 pound class. Initially this seemed unobtainable – the last time I had weighed 170 (or less) was ten years prior. It wasn’t like I was completely fat and out of shape at 205.” Dan guesstimated his 205 bodyweight body fat percentile to be 12%. Dan did his weight training at Gold’s Gym, a few short minutes away from the Team Ground Control training center. He had made the acquaintance of a local bodybuilding champion named Chris Toland. “Chris was big and ripped and in shape and when I saw that he did nutritional consulting and counseling, I thought ‘this might be the way in which I could hit the magical 170 bodyweight without destroying my body and losing my mind.’” The two met, hit it off and Chris indicated that handled properly, he felt attaining a 170 pound bodyweight was more than plausible or possible. In fact, Chris felt it was doable and could be accomplished in such a way that Dan Root could actually increase his power and dramatically improve his already awesome cardio capacity.

“I was fired up and ready to roll after consulting with Chris. We essentially laid out every bite of food, every sip of liquid I would eat or drink and Chris got me on Parrillo supplements – and lots of them – immediately.” It turned out to be a perfect partnership: Dan was chock full of discipline; his years of high level wrestling and MMA training made intense, disciplined effort effortless. Chris Toland had the nutritional knowledge and the empirical experience to point out to Dan every pitfall and pothole before it appeared. Dan said, “It was like magic; every week I got lighter and leaner and amazingly, instead of dragged out and beat down – the way I had felt in the past when I had dieted down or slashed weight, now I felt energized and alert; the best part was by losing the last vestiges of body fat, my cardio went through the roof. I was drinking CapTri® by the bucketful and this kept my energy sky-high while I removed all the starch from my diet.” Chris Toland remarked on what a joy it was to work with a determined disciplined athlete that methodically did whatever Chris suggested. “Dan sought my expertise to help him prepare for a fight he had set for April 30, 2011. He would be fighting at the Shogun Fights at the 1st Mariner Arena.  Dan was scheduled to fight weighing 170 or less and did not want to lose any muscle or power. I immediately adjusted his diet according to the Parrillo Nutritional Strategies that I have been using for years. I put him on Parrillo supplements: Butter-flavored CapTri®, Liver Amino Formula™, Ultimate Amino Formula™, Muscle Amino Formula™, Essential Vitamins™, Mineral Electrolyte Formula™, Advanced Lipotropic Formula™ and Hi-Protein Powder™ on a daily basis.  By April 27, 2011, we were able to get Dan’s body fat down to 5.5% body fat percentile while his lean muscle mass came in at 167.86!”

Dan wound up fighting on April 30, 2011 at a “catch weight” of 176 pounds because, ironically, his opponent could not make weight! Dan submitted his opponent with a Rear Naked Choke in the first round. Needless to say, both Dan and Chris were ecstatic about this amazing turn of events: Dan Root had lost 30 pounds of fat without losing an ounce of muscle. In an incredible fairy tale ending, Root then submits his opponent in the biggest fight of his career in a brand new weight class. “I felt reborn.” Chris related Dan’s strong points and why he felt he was so successful so quickly, “Dan trains with an extremely high level of intensity, both at the gym working with weights and at Ground Control when he works his fight skills. During the time he was preparing for this fight, he would tell me that his energy levels and strength were “through the roof like never before.” He said his training partners at Ground Control couldn’t understand where all of his newfound non-stop energy came from. As he told me this I chuckled and told him it’s amazing what our bodies are capable of when we feed them the right ingredients in the right amounts at the right time and have the iron-willed discipline to avoid what we are not supposed to eat or drink.” His next fight was scheduled for October 8th of 2011 and ten weeks prior to the fight he met with Chris to begin his “next phase” nutritional and supplemental plan, synchronized with the fight. By fight time, again utilizing the Parrillo Nutritional and Supplemental Strategies, Dan weighed in at 169 pounds sporting a 6.4% body fat percentile. Again Dan advised Chris that his strength and energy levels were “through the roof; my best cardio condition ever.” This was born out: Dan completely dominated his opponent and won by a technical knockout in the third round. (This fight can be viewed on YouTube: search for Dan Root vs. Diego Peclat)

Dan attributes his success in his last two fights to the nutritional and supplemental strategies which enabled him to train with far more intensity and far more endurance and with zero degradation in his power. Chris commented, “I thought I trained with intensity but Dan Root brings an entirely new meaning to the word intense!” Insofar as future plans, Dan Root is a realist. “I am not a dreamer. I love what I am doing and will continue to do it into the foreseeable future – however there is more to life than MMA fighting and I always have an eye on what I will do when my career ends – as all careers do at some point: for now, I feel I have a ton of room left for improvement and I feel that I can become a far better fighter and a far better athlete.” And at the relatively young age of 30, Dan’s career could conceivably stretch for another decade if he so chooses. Chris Toland is equally enthused about Dan and his potential. “Dan plans to continue utilizing the Parrillo nutritional and supplemental strategies that I have set up for him as he prepares for future fights. He is intense when it comes to his training and he is one of the most disciplined individuals I have ever met. His inherent self-discipline makes his dieting and supplementation relatively easy. Put it all together, the work ethic, the discipline, his amazing pain-tolerance and his indomitable spirit and you have one very tough MMA fighter: his strength is “through the roof” and Dan’s “gas tank” never seems to run out. He’s the kind of guy that will do whatever it takes to improve and he constantly crushes current limits and pushes himself to new limits. It’s an absolute pleasure to work with Dan.” Dan had some final words about Chris, “I consider Chris a mentor and a role model; he not only talks the talk, he walks the walk. In life outside of athletics, he inspires me – I am grateful that we ‘partnered up’ and see us working together for years to come.”

• Meal 3: 150 grams chicken breast, 250 grams broccoli

• Meal 4: 225 grams tuna fish, 250 grams green beans

• Meal 5: 150 grams chicken breast, 250 grams broccoli

• Meal 6: 4 scoops of Parrillo Hi-Protein Powder™

Protein 350 grams

Carbs 98 grams

Saturated fat 14 grams

Food calories 1928 calories

CapTri® calories 720 calories

Total calories 2468 calories

Chris Toland set up and managed Dan’s Parrillo-inspired nutritional approach: “We had to slash bodyweight off Dan as fast as possible and this required we utilize a severe, austere, no room for error approach, right from day one. On Tuesdays and Fridays Dan would add in 1/4 cup of brown rice to Meal #3 and 56 grams of a potato to meal #4.  These were Dan’s hardest training days so we gave him a few extra starches to cope. In addition, Dan would add a tablespoon of Butter Flavored CapTri® to each meal, giving him an additional 720 calories per day. As for Parrillo supplements, with every meal Dan would take an Essential Vitamin and Mineral Electrolyte™ tablet, 8-10 Liver Amino Formula™ tablets, an Advanced Lipotropic™ capsule, three Ultimate Amino™ and Muscle Amino Formula™ capsules. He never misses a meal or skips a supplement. Because of this degree of discipline, he has shed 35 pounds of fat while retaining 100% of his muscle.”

Dan’s Daily Meal Plan

Dan Root’s MMA

Training Schedule

• Monday: Session 1 – 45 minutes weight training; 15 minutes intense cardio

Session 2 – 45 minutes fight technique

Session 3 – 45 minutes live sparing

• Tuesday: Session 1 – 45 minutes weight training; 10 minutes intense cardio

Session 2 – 90 minutes live sparing

• Wednesday: Session 1 – combat cardio conditioning w/strongman implements

Session 2 – 60 minutes of pad work and live sparring

Session 3 – 30 minutes of weight training

• Thursday: Session 1 – circuit weight training six exercises five cycles

Session 2 – light striking for 45 minutes

• Friday: Session 1 – 30 minutes weight training

Session 2 – rotating partner live sparring

• Saturday: Session 1 – combat conditioning with strongman implements

Session 2 – two hours of Muay Tai boxing

• Sunday: Session 1 – three hours of jujitsu, live sparing Muay Tai

Photo by Richard Mullen

I am an advanced trainee looking for something new and different in my weight training. I am sick of all my various routines and strategies, none of which fire me up. As you and I both know (as does anyone that’s been in this game for a long time) the ability to hit a workout with real fire in the gut makes a huge difference. I feel like a guy that has the same six movies and I am tired of looking at the same movies over and over. I have two or three ‘in-season’ routines and two or three ‘off-season’ routines and every one of them seems old and stale. Give me something new and different Maestro!

Baz, Toronto

I feel your pain. After you’ve been at it for a decade or so, elite trainers develop a series of proven-effective routines and while this is good (you obtained great results from these individual routines in the past) this is also bad because, as you point out, it’s like listening to the same half dozen records or watching the same movies over and over. Yes they were effective in the past and can be effective in the future but part of their effectiveness stemmed from their being new and different and exciting. It is tough for an old pro to try something

Evening Primrose Oil

totally different; particularly when they already have a large collection of routines that worked in the past. Still, mental motivation is a HUGE factor and rolling into a workout revved up, fired up and psyched up is the real key to bodybuilding success. Better to use a flawed routine that fires you up than a perfect routine that bores you to tears. Put another way, motivation is a mental trait and it is tough to get fired up over something old and worn. Here is a push-pull chest/lat routine that I use with great success when I need a stagnation buster. You can adapt this approach to any body part.

First super set: Dumbbell bench press alternated with heavy pull-downs using V-handle.

Dumbbell bench presses are done using a PAUSE – most every bodybuilder uses the classical touch-and-go style because the lifter can handle considerably more poundage. First we shift from barbell to dumbbells and second we institute a one-second pause at the bottom of each rep. Perform 8 sets, including warm-ups. A strong, advanced lifter capable of a 350 bench might use the following poundage…remember all reps are paused: 70s for 12, 75s for 10, 80s for 8, 85s for 8, 90s for 6, 95s for 5, 100s for 5 then 90s for one set to failure. Super-set (alternate) with pull-downs using the strongest grip, the narrow-grip V handle…stretch at the top of each rep and pause when the weight is pulled to the sternum…perhaps 170 for 12, 185 for 10, 200 for 10, 225 for 8, 240 for 8, 260 for 6, 275 for 5-6 then 225 for one set to failure. In between each set perform a Parrillo Fascia Stretch and hold the stretch for a full 10 seconds.

Second super-set: dumbbell flyes alternated with bent-over rear cable lateral raises.

Flyes are super-deep in the bottom and RAISED SLOWLY. It is an easy thing to take really big dumbbells and do a sort of half-bench press/half flye using ego-stroking weight and a little tiny range-of-motion. Use smaller bells and strive for a tremendous range-of-motion. We seek to make flyes tougher by purposefully raising the bells slowly out of the bottom using pec power alone. Super set 5-6 sets of flyes with equally precise bent-over rear delt raises using cables. Essentially we want to turn the bent-over cable lateral into the mirror image of a perfect flye. Slow motion (not stupidly slow) ensures that rear delts, rhomboids, teres and center traps are worked to exhaustion.

You can use this same strategy on other body parts: thighs/hamstrings; bicep/triceps; abs/lower back; lats/delts (pulldowns/presses) etc. etc. I like to cram as many precision exercises done super-set style into a one hour timeframe. Let’s forget about poundage and go for “feel” and muscle isolation. Have a Parrillo fascia stretch ready to go between each super-set. Use this approach for 4-6 weeks and segue back into a more standardized barbell power routine. This rut-buster, super-set approach has always worked for me.

Victor Steele,

What percentage of machine training to free weights is optimal? I find that because of safety and time I am using resistance machines for about 70% of my weight training with 30% free-weight. I use machines for 100% of my cardio. It seems that you put a LOT of emphasis on free weights and I am thinking that perhaps I am missing something. I understand that free weights are better – but how much better? I am a little bit hesitant to perform barbell squats and bench presses because I train alone.

Ross, Macon

Good question. Think of free weights as meat and potatoes and think of machines as dessert. Generally speaking elite bodybuilders will start a body part with a free weight exercise and finish off the body part with machines or cables. I hear you about the safety issue with squats and barbell benches: I would suggest the Smith Machine for squats and use dumbbell benches. The practical approach is to use free weights when possible and machines for the isolation movements that follow the big, compound multi-joint exercises that should form the backbone of your program. Machines are seductive because they are safe, easy and comfortable – however safe, easy and comfortable is not optimal when it comes to stimulating muscle tissue, the eternal goal of bodybuilding. Hey I like certain machines for isolation exercises; the pec dec, a good curl machine, Hammer Strength makes some nice pull-down and rowing devices; however it is a mistake to use machines to virtual exclusion and it is a mistake to think that machines stimulate as much muscle fiber as free weights. Cardio is a bit different. There are a pretty good variety of aerobic machines and many of them are beneficial. I would suggest you try aerobic machines that incorporate the arms as well as the legs. My personal favorite is the decidedly old school Schwinn Aerodyne push/pull stationary bike. It has handles, can go both forward and backward, and is built like a tank. These elaborate electronic cardio devices with built in TVs are the epitome of sissy cardio. Plus, when they breakdown or go haywire you have to bring in a $100 dollar per hour tech to fix them. I would shift your current 70-30 balance of machines to free weights to 70-30 in favor of free weights over machines.

Vic,

My brother-in-law is a medical doctor and a complete ass. He has my wife upset and saying that because I take in 200+ grams of protein everyday I am “at risk” of destroying my kidneys. Naturally he looks like hell and is lecturing me while drinking one of his endless glasses of super-expensive wine; he is a skinny-fat jogger and loves to preach and lecture, ignorant of the fact that he has the physique of a 12 year old girl. I’d really like to beat his ass and if I ever get a divorce, I will assuredly act on that urge.

Pete, Port Arthur, Great State of Texas

All this protein is poison BS is predicated on the erroneous assumption that there is some epidemic of protein-caused kidney failures; as if bodybuilders nationwide are keeling over right and left and ending up on kidney dialysis machines as a result of too much protein. In our four decades in the bodybuilding business we have never heard of a single instance of a bodybuilder overdosing on protein and blowing out his kidneys. This absence of a single instance of protein overdosing does not stop the high-moral-ground medical professionals from ominously stating that taking more than 30 grams a day is somehow on a kidney-endangering par with drinking a gallon of vodka a day. Notice how all these protein opponents love their wine – which has far more kidney-damaging potential than protein. Yet, they mysteriously give their vice a pass and go out of their way to scare the hell out of bodybuilder relatives and spouses. Way back when, John knew one very famous Baltimore bodybuilder who won the National championships weighing 154 pounds. This little dude took in 1,000 grams of protein per day (that’s no typo) and was the epitome of health and fitness. He never had the slightest complications from his massive intake and while I am not suggesting you quadruple your protein intake, my point is illustrative of the fact that a whole lot of bodybuilders are taking a whole lot more protein than you without the slightest problem. Next time he starts lecturing you, tell him how concerned you are about his wine-soaked kidneys.

Vic,

I am a local-level female bodybuilder that does fairly well in competition. I am a hardcore Parrillo System user and have a reoccurring problem. The closer I get to a show, the stricter I diet, the harder I train, the flakier, redder and worse my skin gets. I tan and I use spay tan to cover this up, but I ‘dry out’ and my complexion becomes blotchy and unhealthy – do others have this problem? I feel fine, I train hard and I do well, but these skin eruptions are becoming predictable and regular every time I close in on a bodybuilding show.

Crystal, Falls Church, Virginia

I would bet the farm that you have an Essential Fatty Acid (EFA) deficiency. EFAs are not a problem for normal people living normal lives eating a normal (lousy) American diet. There are fatty acids in saturated fat and Americans eat so much saturated fat – the wrong kind of saturated fat, long-chain saturated fat – that despite all the other nightmarish consequences of eating wrong, EFA deficiency is NOT one of them. EFAs can be stored in the body and therefore EFA deficiencies don’t show up for a long time. John Parrillo tells a tale that is remarkably similar to yours…

I remember one female bodybuilder in particular that had a terrible time with her skin getting dry and breaking out; this problem would increase in severity at contest time. I put her on a remedial EFA supplementation program and her skin became completely clear in a dramatically short period of time. You can only imagine how happy she was.

John used a little-known substance called Evening Primrose Oil. One of the first symptoms of EFA deficiency in adults is dermatitis: red, dry, scaly skin, particularly around the face. The condition cannot or will not be relieved by lotions or moisturizers. As John says, “You’ll simply have red blotches with moisturizer on them.” The Evening Primrose is a small, flowering plant with yellow blooms that open at night. EPO contains Gamma-Linolenic Acid (GLA) and consuming EPO capsules is a terrific way in which the hard-dieting bodybuilder in the final phases of a competitive training cycle leading up to a show can imbibe the requisite EFAs without eating long-chain fat. In the Parrillo philosophy, supplements are designed to increase cellular nutrient levels beyond levels that can be obtained from regular foods. Food will always be the cornerstone of sound nutrition. The science behind EFA metabolism is complex and need not be gone into here and now; I would strongly suggest you purchase a bottle of Parrillo Evening Primrose Oil™ and begin taking 3-5 capsules per day. I will bet that within a week of commencing, your skin problems will be a thing of the past.

Greetings Ancient One,

I am like the rest of the bodybuilding world and looking to get leaner and larger in 2012 – what is the biggest problem you encounter amongst the serious seeking physique renovation? What are the mistakes? Do you have any helpful suggestions?

Jimmy, Charleston

John Parrillo has a terrific four-step prescription for “busting through plateaus.”

1. Move into a calorie-plus state: the first mistake most New Year’s resolvers make is to slash calories. This shatters the metabolism and stunts progress. As John says, “The ‘eat-more-calories’ advice defies conventional wisdom; but handled properly and combined with intense exercise, this approach works every time.”

2. Select “plateau busting” foods: lean protein; fiber carbs; starch carbs and Parrillo engineered foods and supplements. Purchase a copy of the Parrillo Performance Nutritional Manual and lockdown a dietary game plan.

3. Utilize metabolism-building supplements: The right supplements taken at the right time in the right amounts ‘supports’ the efficient working of the human metabolism. Be sure and use the often overlooked Advanced Lipotropic Formula™ as it contains fat-mobilizing nutrients. Take one capsule with every one of your 4-6 multiple meals and be assured of receiving a continual supply of fat-mobilizing nutrients throughout the day.

4. Perform pre-breakfast cardio: get every day off to the perfect start by performing 45-60 minutes of high-intensity Parrillo-style aerobic exercise. Spike the metabolism first thing, burn through glycogen, start melting off fat. This is a beneficial and invigorating way in which to start the day.