Total Anabolism 2.0 Review
I came across this e-book on a fellow bodybuilding blogger’s website, Muscle Hack by Mark McManus. The first thing I noticed about this e-book was that it was free! All I had to do was sign up to his website and get a free copy of his e-book. This makes a refreshing change from all the other so e-books that I see that seem to cost anywhere from $10 to $100!
The e-book is aimed at either disgruntled bodybuilders or complete newbies that want to know all the tricks and learn from other people’s mistakes. I found it very interesting, largely because it confirms many of the things I’ve read in other texts and because it is pretty much how I go about my training already.
The main points I took from the e-book are as follows:
- Progressive overload
- Maxium recuperation
- Periodisation and deconditioning
- Rep range
- Train each body part once a week
Progressive overload
The idea behind progressive overload is simply that you strive to lift more weight or perform more reps every single workout. This means you are on a relentless quest to challenge your body each workout. I was amazed that this point needed to be made, I would have thought it was obvious to anyone doing weight training, or any sports training for that matter. Clearly not! The book has a very good explanation of progressive overload and how to achieve it consistently.
Maximum recuperation
This is something that you often hear conflicting advice on from fitness magazines, gym instructors or general “know-it-all” types. In the e-book it confirms my research, which is that you should take 2-3 minutes of rest between each set to allow the muscles to recover. In the e-book, the author suggest you should rest for 3 minutes for large muscle groups and 2 minutes for smaller muscle groups. I generally just try and rest for a consistent 2 and a half minutes between sets.
Periodisation and deconditioning
Periodisation is the process of splitting your workout into periods of 6,8,10 or 12 weeks, and in doing so allowing you to plan what training you will do, and then once each period is over, you have a rest period, typically a week, also known as deconditioning. In the e-book there is a great explanation of why deconditioning is important.
Rep range
The e-book confirms what I’ve read about bodybuilding and the optimum rep-range, which is between 8-12 reps.
Train each body part once a week
Again, the e-book confirms what I’ve read in well respected strength training books that you should train each body part once a week. The book also makes a very good point, in that you may well train each body part once a week primarily, however, each bodypart will get other stimulus in training other body parts. For example, you may only train biceps once a week, but they will get stimulus from doing a back workout.
There is also some great information about dieting in this e-book, especially the ideal bodybuilders diet, which is essentially an Atkins diet during the week, then carb loading over the weekend when not training.
Please go to Mark’s site and download a copy for yourself here, he also has another great e-book, Total Six Pack Abs which I will review at a later date.
2 Responses to “Total Anabolism 2.0 Review”
March 5th, 2010 saat: 1:51 pm
Hi,
I think this will be the very first comment which addresses that the WorkOut/Nutrition system explained throughout MuscleHack Website and the report sent for free to those who are willing to receive it do not work for everyone.
After having given a try to THT/MANS combination for two one month and a half, I went to the gym early this morning for body composition measurement, amd I was schocked to see that I did not only lose fat but a considerable amount of muscle as well which would be the last thing any sports-lover would want to.
Specifically, I went from 69,5 kg to 66,5 kg and out of such difference of 3 kg, I am so frustrated to see that I lost 1 kg of muscle (app. 2,2 lbs). Given that I am a guy on the “thin” side with a height of 1.78 m (app. 5″10), every gram of muscle matters for me and having lost 1 kg of muscle is a total disaster.
I have long been a good follower of healty eating and regular exercising and I must say that the system proposed in the report and on such Website is not suitable for every hard-gainer. I think people should be aware of that; otherwise, they will be so much annoyed and angry like me.
Thanks…..
March 23rd, 2010 saat: 3:36 pm
I’m amazed that you lost 1kg of muscle on that diet, though without knowing what exercise you were doing it’s difficult to say one way or the other why it was.
For instance, if you were doing a lot of cardio then you would lose muscle mass. You may not have been eating enough protein, so you could look at increasing that until you start to gain. Lastly, you could well just be over-training, as is the way with most things in life, less is more, so try and keep the training down to three sessions a week of less than an hour but make each set count instead of doing shitloads of sets!
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