28 February 2009

*Eat Like a Motherfucking Caveman, and You'll Look Like a Motherfucking Caveman



According to a study published in the journal Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology in 2003, skeletal remains show that paleolithic humans developed muscularity similar to today's superior athletes. (1) That's pretty awesome on the one hand, because everyone back in the day was fucking jacked, but on the other hand, it sucks that humanity has devolved to the point where your average American looks like a shaved walrus and is weak as a newborn kitten. Unless you're me, of course, in which case it rules because I'm a god among men. Or a man amongst pussies. Whichever one you like.

In any event, the fact that these bad motherfuckers of yore probably looked a lot like Maxick (about whom I shall blog very soon) is due to a combination of diet and exercise that is rarely emulated in the modern world.


What the Fuck are You Getting At?

Well, my fuckers, I'm getting at Paleolithic Nutrition. Back in the turn of the century, a rough-and-tumble professor who apparently grew bored enough with the ease of daily life decided to roll up to snowy Eskimoland with no gear and live amongst the Eskimos while studying their culture. Whilst he lived amongst those silly, snow-blasted freak, Vilhjalmar Stefansson ate nothing but meat, and found himself to be healthy as shit thereafter. He rolled back into NYC with tales of his diet, which everyone called insane, and then decided to be studied for a year to see if it would ruin his health. It didn't. In 1929, doctors concluded that his all meat, high-fat diet was the shit, and so was Stefansson. R. Buckminster Fuller picked up on this deal (he's the guy who invented the geodesic dome), and expanded it to include some fruits and veggies, but little else.(3) Later, a dentist from Ohio named Weston Price noticed that his patients' teeth were becoming an ever-worsening shitstorm of cavities and dental caries. He started traveling all over the world and studying the teeth and diets of indigenous cultures, discovering that none of the problems he was seeing in Ohio were extant in cultures that ate no refined grains or otherwise processed foods. Surprise! He wrote a book entitled "Nutrition and Physical Degeneration" detailing his finds, though his ideas and the foundation that promotes them is essentially considered a pack of quacks by the ADA, as his dietary recommendations would all but put the ADA out of business. About as useful as a pack of syphilitic whores, the ADA. In any event, the diet then sat dormant for years, until mainstream medical journals picked it up in the 1980s and ran articles about "ancestral diets", which then spurred the development of "evolutionary medicine."
Stefansson, looking harder than everyone.

So, in a nutshell, proponents of evolutionary medicine contend that mankind developed primary adaptations to their meat-filled diets during the paleolithic period, as hunter-gatherers who ran around in loinskins, killing shit and eating it. Secondary adaptations occurred later, and were localized based on the available foodstuffs. Since the Neolithic Revolution, people in the Subarctic and Central Asia evolved to eat very high fat and protein diets, containing little or no vegetable matter. Others, like the Indians of Central America and various peoples in Central Asia, adapted to higher carbohydrate, lower protein and fat diets. Outside of those groups, wide variations in adaptations exist, but they even exist within ethnicities (the ancestral Russian diet versus that of the Mediterannean).(2, pg. 281) Irrespective of where they were, paleolithic people ate, on average, half the fat we currently eat, but 3x the protein. The fats they did eat were by and large polyunsaturated, but their cholesterol was much higher than ours (which lent itself to higher test levels, I'm sure). Additionally, they ate very little in the way of refined carbs, a quarter of the sodium in the modern diet (and much more potassium), two times as much calcium, tons of micronutrients, and 130-150 g of fiber a day. That's a fuckload of fiber, in case you're wondering. (4, pp. 82, 86) As a result, cases of metabolic disease amongst Paleolithic people were rare, and findings of them are often steeped in controversy. (1, p. 6)
What was their diet? Meat and veggies, mostly. Their macronutrient profile essentially breaks down to 42% protein, 26% fat, and 32% carbs, eating roughly 3000kcals a day. (4, p. 79) Modern hunter-gatherers have varied diets due to geographic limitations and the general availability of various types of food, but it generally comes down to 30-40% protein no matter where they live, save for a couple of vegan tribes in Africa, who manage to eke out an existance in a place that barely even has dirt, much less any food worth cramming down your suckhole. (1, p.373) The result, however, is that they're strong little fuckers, are ripped to pieces, and can outperform Western athletes in their indigenous athletic events.
Like log running.


Let's Break This Motherfucker Down!

Ten Commandments of Paleo Dieting, as described by Ray Audette:

Do Eat
  • meats and fish
  • fruits
  • veggies
  • nuts and seeds
  • berries
Don't Eat
  • grains
  • beans
  • potatoes
  • dairy
  • sugar
Farly simple, and I can tell you from experience that the shit works. I've combined that with metabolic typing and carb cycling to spur greater gains in the gym, but the basis of my diet will always remain Paleolithic. Now, there are a couple of caveats. One, this diet is a pain in the ass, as you can't eat sandwiches. I find myself eating a shitload of italian chicken and turkey sausage, sliced relatively thin, and just carried around in tupperware. It transports easily and tastes good, but it gets old after awhile, just as turkey meatballs lose their luster after a month of eating nothing but. Audette also cautions against cheating, as he states that certain foods have a "druglike effect" that may cause withdrawal symptoms. I personally think this is horseshit, and I love me my 3 hour cheat windows on Tuesday and Friday nights. Lastly, both Audette and Cordain counsel against eating tubers, which is odd, as Cordain stated in the Evolution of the Human Diet that cooking arose at the same time that tubers came to prominance in the human diet. HG's eat a shitload of them, as did our ancestors. near as I can tell, the tubers of yore were much more fibrous than those of today, so they're pretty much apples and oranges, but I see nothing wrong with a post-workout yam, or one in the morning on a high-carb day.
Paleo does a body good.

There's a shitload more to this deal, so this will be merely the first installment of me schooling you fuckers on PDing, but I'm tired and this fucking thing is already too long. Thus, I bid you goodnight, my fuckers.


If you can't beat em, eat em.

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Now playing: Carnifex - The Diseased And The Poisoned
via FoxyTunes

  1. Eaton, SB and Eaton SB III 2003. An Evolutionary Perspective on Human Physical Activity: Implications for Health. Comp Biochem Physiol A 136, 153-159.
  2. Wharton, CH. Ten Thousand Years From Eden: Metabolic Man. Orlando: Winmark Publishing, 2001.
  3. Audett, Ray. Neanderthin. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999.
  4. Eaton, S. Boyd, Shostak, Marjorie, and Melvin Konner. The Paleolithic Prescription: A Program of Diet and Exercise and a Design for Living. New York: Harper and Row, 1988.
  5. Ungar, Peter S. Evolution of the Human Diet. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
  6. Cordain, Loren. Paleo Diet. Hoboken: John Wiley and Sons, 2002.

22 February 2009

*Fluidity in training

So, my new job requires a shitload of lifting and carrying, which adds a great deal of volume to my total work. How, then, should I modify my training to accomodate this new workload?

I'll tell you. the Bulgarians train between 7-9 hours a day, 6 days a week. this is brutal weight training, sticking between 70% and 990% of their ME the entire time. As such, it should be no problem for me to conduct 8 or 10 hours of lifting and carrying for the day and follow it with weight training, right?

This past week, I found that my energy was solely lacking when I hit the gym, and I dragged myself into the gym after a nap with about 45 minutes to train. though it seemed to me that I would lie to go light, given my total workload for the day, it occurred to me that the most prudent course of action would e to lift as heavy as humanly possible for the 30-45 mins I was there. That way, I taxed my CNS and hit the fast twitch fibers as hard as humanly possible, while still achieving a high overall volume over the entire span of my body due to the repetitions and duration of lifts that I performed during the course of the workday. As such, it was not necessary to modify my workouts drastically, as I simply needed to focus on hitting the highest percentage of my 1RM possible in as short a period of time as possible, thus activating the fullest span of muscle fibers possible.

Chaos and Pain can work with any activity level, and every skill level. they key is to remember the words of the Barbarian Brothers:
There is no such thing as over training; just undereating and undersleeping.

19 February 2009

*The Legend- Pullups for real mothafuckin g's

I've changed the name of these quite a bit over the years, but I'm going with "The Legend" as the name for this exercise, as I become a fucking legend in every gym where I perform them, from Top Gym in Austria to Iron Sport in Philly, and everywhere else I've done them.

I developed this ridiculous pullup variation out of boredom with doing regular pullups. They are not for the weak or the timid. To perform them, you will need the following:
  1. A squat rack with a pullup bar towar the front at the top
  2. the ability to do at least 10 pullups in a row
  3. big brass balls
Here's the deal. You're going to set up a barbell in the squat rack on the highest or second highest hole. That's near the top, in case you were curious. Now, hang from that bar, with your arms slightly bent (not a dead hang). I suppose you could go from a dead hang, but you'd not have the "coiled power" necessary for doing long-distance legends. Next, you pull yourself up as hard as humanly possible and throw yourself upwards, grabbing the top bar midflight. You then drop back down to the barbell and repeat. As you get better, and braver, drop the lower bar progressively deeper. I've not measured my best for a single, but it's in the neighborhood of 36". That's right. I fucking rule, and so does this exercise.

Peep this video, which shows you how motherfuckers get down:


Now, go forth and spread the gospel, get a huge, ripped fucking back, and become a legend in your own right.

18 February 2009

*GS Aftermath

I ended up only getting 535, but after weighing in at 175 at the meet, not too shabby.

So, I learned a valuable lesson in this weekend's experiment- Glycogen Supercompensation WILL work for a strength meet, but needs to be in or around the 36th hour to have an effect. My meet went badly for a variety of reasons (note to self- LISTEN TO THE FUCKING COMMANDS BY THE JUDGES!!!) and I only squatted 535, but the following day, after a powerlifting meet and an impromptu, inebriated strongman competition that lasted well nigh two hours, I push jerked 308! Given that my previous best was 285, and the state of exhaustion I was in, that's pretty goddamned good. Thus, my advice to you, gentlre readers- do a 5-7 day keto run, and then do a glycogen supercompensation lasting about 36 hours before the meet. The results match the science- you will see results.
Looking fucking huge at 181, 48 hours after weighing in at 170.

13 February 2009

*My Digestive Tract Hates Me, But I Look Awesome



Today is Glycogen Supercompensation Day! Today caps off a 5 day keto run, during which time I did not have more than 30g of carbs a day. A normal person would lose a considerable amount of water weight during such a time, but not me, my fuckers, not me. Apparently, I exist in a near-constant state of glycogen depletion, so I lost a mere 4 lbs this week, taking me from 170 to 174. I am ripped to pieces though. Two weeks out from a bodybuilding competition type ripped.
"But Jamie, I have been living under a rock and have no idea what glycogen supercompensation is!"
Well then allow me to shed some light on the subject. I've no idea which mad scientist figured this out, but I read about it in two separate places simulatenously- Better Than Steroids, by Dr. Warren Willey (which I HIGHLY recommend), and an article written (I think) by Christian Thibedeaux on T-Nation (the two methods are vastly, vastly different, which I just discovered by reading an article on it.
I tried the T-Nation method and really saw no difference in my physique, so I'm trying the Wiley one now). Anyway, one spends between 5 and 14 days on a keto run (that is, running a constant macronutrient ratio of about 60-70% Fat, 25-35% Protein, and 5% Carbs). That sounds like fun, but it's actually harder than you'd think to stick to, even with my insanely strict regular diet. Food literally dominates all of your thoughts, and eating out is a massive pain in the balls, unless you're eating wings. Wings are the key to that diet, in my opinion. If you look at my diet for last week, practically all I ate were wings and ground chuck burgers.

I intend to look like Marius at the end of this.
So, at the end of the week, you have a 24-48 hr supercompensation period. Wiley explains the metabolic pathways in great detail, but in my carb-depleted state, I forgot the fucking book, so I will relate the formulae to you from memory (but here's an article giving you a bit more background). I'm that good. He recommends a 36 hr supercompensation period, but I honestly don't see myself waking up all night tonight to feed every two hours.

On a wholly unrelated note, Annotations of an Autopsy has a Song called "Sludge City", in which the only intelligible lyrics in the song are at the beginning during a brutal breakdown, and are "SHE BLED FROM EVERY FUCKING HOLE" and "WHEN I'M FUCKING DONE, SHE WON'T HAVE A CUNT LEFT." That's bringing the brutal, and it's what I am currently enjoying on my iPod while typing this nonsense on my Mom's Mac. I am a bad person.

Back to supercompensation. It breaks down into three parts.
Part One- Liquid Carbs (0-12 hrs)
Lean bodyweight in kilos x 12 / 6 meals. That'll tell you how many grams of carbs per feeding. Thus, my feedings are:
170x.93=158 lbs lean mass. I then divide by 2.2 for kg = 71.81
So, I then multiply my lbm in kg by 12 grams of CHO, and get a total of 861.81, and divide that by 6 meals, which gives me 144g of carbs every two hours.

Part two- Solid carbs (12-24hrs)
Same deal but half of the carbs, and they are high-glycemic solid carbs (he likes Lucky Charms).
72 g of carbs for me, and I'm going with Cap'n Crunch

Part 3- Solid carbs again, but halved again. I doubt I'll do this.

So, this morning I awoke for my first feeding at 6AM to start refilling my glycogen. I made two shakes last night so I wouldn't have to stand around mixing while half asleep. The shakes were so big that I had to put them in Tupperware, rather than my shaker bottle, and consisted of 3 cups of nonfat milk, 1/2 cup of Hershey's Syrup, 2 tsp of creatine, and 1 scoop of whey protein. Thus, I had two meals of 44g PRO (double what he recommends, but I got a lot of pro from the milk), 142g CHO, and 1.5G of fat, and 20g of creatine in two hours.

My stomach informed me at about 930AM that those shakes were not my best idea. I never drink milk, due to its pasteurization and homogenization (which I'll address another time), so I was whacking back a couple Multi-Enzyme pills with the shakes to help me digest the lactose. Either that or the creatine disagreed with me though, so I switched to three lemonade vitamin waters (I needed the water anyway), a scoop of protein with 1 tsp of creatine, and 1/4 cup sugar, which gave me in the neighborhood of 148g CHO, 17g PRO, and no fat at all. That's waaaaaay too much to drink in a sitting, so I'm switching to 3/4 cup sugar in my protein shake for the next meals.


11 February 2009

*I'm a Hardgaining Ectomorph, and Stuart McRobert and a bunch of Other Pussies Say I Can't Lift Hard or Get Big! Whaaaaaa!

Guess what? Go fuck yourself. I will guarantee you right now that none of you, and yeah I MEAN YOU, have read the book detailing the various somatotypes, yet nearly everyone has classified themself as either a Mesomorph, Ectomorph, or Endomorph. I would also venture to guess that since you've been reading the bodybuilding mags, most of you think that you're either Endo- or Ectomorphs, because the mags have told you that only a couple of people on the planet are blessed enough to be mesomorphs. Well, you're wrong. Know how I know? I read the book, fuckers. Allow me to feed you, baby birds.

Somatotyping was the brainchild of a psychologist named William Sheldon, who originally began his study of body types as part of a study of the physical and psychological attributes of criminals. This grew into a massive project that culminated in his book "Atlas of Men", which he published in 1954. Sheldon published the book to promote a method by which people could differentiate between specific body types, and proposed it as a sort of alternative BMI.(1) To achieve this goal, Sheldon studied and diligently cataloged 46,000 men, proportionately representative of America's ethnic mix at the time. 13,000 were from 31 different colleges, 12,000 came from various social, industrial, and military agencies of the WW2 period, 9,000 were patients of hospitals, and the remainder were men 30 years or older who were totally random volunteers. (2) It's important to note that all of the subjects were either untrained or detrained.
Ectomorph, or an ambiguously gay man?  Science says the latter.

Sheldon then developed a unique, three digit system by which each person was rated on their endomorphic, mesomorphic, and ectomorphic features, giving them one of 88 somatotypic identifiers that he then named according to the physical attributes. A score of one meant the person showed none of the tendencies of that somatotype, and a 7 meant you were all up in that bitch.

So, Stuart McRobert have you convinced you were a "hardgainer"? Either a fatass or a skinny fuck practically hopeless in the gym? Well, you're in a mighty small minority if you are. 3 men in 10,000 are pure mesomorphs (the most common of the three pre types!), while 2 in 10k are pure ectomorphs, and 1 in 10k is a pure endomorph.(3) How the fuck have those Beyond Brawn books sold so many fucking copies? YOU'RE NOT DOOMED. YOU'RE JUST A LAZY PUSSY.

The most common somatotypes are 4-4-3, 3-4-4, and 3-5-3, at 60, 57, and 56 in 1000, respectively, and every somatotype with a frequency over 34 in 1000 has a 4 or a 5 for mesomorphic traits, meaning just about everyone can put on a decent amount of muscle.(4) Likewise, your chances of being a 6 or a 7 in each somatotype are 33/1000 for endomorphic, 70/1000 mesomorphic, and 41/1000 for ectomorphic.

So, chances are far likelier that you're mesomorphic than anything else. But wait, there's more! YOU CAN CHANGE YOUR SOMATOTYPE. Sheldon doesn't actually explain how, but he details how true ectomorphs (Walking Sticks) change from looking like extras in Schindler's List to Wasps, with a bigger ribcage and a little more muscle, over time.(5) This echoes my own experience, and the experience of a lot of people I know, who started out skinny-fat, or fat, or simply skinny, and are now jacked and ripped to pieces.
It's not that he's genetically gifted- it's that he breaks his ass in the gym and at the dinner table.

Sheldon attributed a lot of ridiculous psychological tendencies toward each body type, and is now a bit of a laughingstock in the psychological community as a result. He was also a noted numismatist, but apparently used his knowledge to steal a lot of rare coins, so is a pariah in that field as well.(6)

So what have we learned? SOMATOTYPES ARE HORSESHIT. Your real genetic potential relies on a variety of factors ranging from heredity to diet and training styles. Modern reliance on the produce of agriculture has degraded the human form considerably, so that humans are only now reaching the stature we attained as Cro-Magnons. (7) Know what that sounds like to me? Train like a fucking beast and eat like a Neanderthal, and you'll end up built like one.

No mercy for the weak.

  1. Sheldon, William. Atlas of Men: A Guide for Somatotyping the Adult Male at All Ages. New York: Gramercy Publishing Company, 1954. P. 3.
  2. P. 11.
  3. P. 30.
  4. Ibid.
  5. Pp. 38, 136.
  6. "William Herbert Sheldon", http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Herbert_Sheldon. Accessed 2/11/2009.
  7. Eaton, S. Boyd, and Marjorie Shostak. The Paleolithic Prescription: A Program of Diet and Exercise and Design for Living. New York: Harper and Row, 1988. P. 72


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Now playing: 01-the_irish_front-carnavorium
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*What the fuck is ChAoS and PAIN?

This is a bit of a rehash of a couple of earlier posts, but I'm posting it because I had to write it for the broad who is putting the design I conceived for C&P into Photoshop, so I'm posting it for the edification of anyone who gives a shit about why I started training like this.


Chaos and Pain is a training and diet methodology I designed in response to the spate of nutrition and exercise physiology texts that espouse a one-size-fits-all philosophy that typically presents little challenge, and thus yields few results. As any student of finance knows, there are essentially three types of investments- low risk-low yield, medium risk-medium yield, and high risk-high yield. Just as most people invest their money into low yield mutual funds or CD’s, many people adopt pathetically inane, nearly useless training and nutrition philosophies designed to be all things to all people, and are thus yield mediocre results at best. Chaos and Pain spits in the face of these philosophies and embraces the concept that:

MODERATION IS MEDIOCRITY
EXCESS IS EXCELLENCE

If I wanted to be a mediocre lifter, I'd jock Mark Rippetoe like half the fucking idiots online, spend the bulk of my free time blathering on about how efficacious his ridiculous philosophy is, and generally suck at life. Pendlay Rows? Are you fucking kidding me? So, 5x5 with 135 on ultra-strict Pendlay Rows will yield the same results as some 10x2 with 405, rocking straps and a bit of body swing on bent over rows? Sure. And I'm a fucking Chinese jet pilot. If you're scared of injury, stay the fuck out of the gym and out of my way. Frankly, if you avoid doing anything that's not outright suicidal out of fear of minor injury, you'd best look elsewhere for training advice. Nothing risked, nothing gained, my fuckers.

This fucking retard is a Rippetoe mark. Whee!


Nowhere in this philosophy will one find a prescription for sitting on a padded bench and lifting light weigts. People sit all day at work. Modern life is cushioned enough. Hard bodies are forged with hard work, and extreme strength and body composition is achieved only by extreme methods. At the same time, this philosophy is a fluid, organic, living thing. Nutrition on this plan is guided by a combination of Metabolic Typing, Biochemical Individuality, Paleolithic Nutrition, and cutting edge sports science. As such, the very best physiques will not be a once-a-year, flash in the pan phenomenon, but will be maintained year round by optimizing individual nutrition to achieve strength and body composition goals simultaneously.

Me, three days out from a powerlifting meet.


The end result: the strength and physique of a superman, a Neanderthal, and a godlike archetype. The cost- pain. Lots of pain.

The Farnese Hercules, circa 3rd Century AD. I guarantee you the guy who posed for this never did a single set of leg extensions, seated anythings, or any exercise that didn't involve being a complete and total badass.

Lastly, this program is not simply the demonic conjurings of a depraved mind. Nor was it designed by a meathead with no conception of how the human body works. I'm an MBA with personal training certifications from NSCA and ACE, in addition to group fitness certifications from Les Mills in BodyPump and BodyCombat- I lack a CSCS because I see no reason to go back to school once more to get a degree in Exercise Physiology, relearning shit I already know (and shit that is probably less cutting-edge than what I shall impart to you). I'm also a winner of multiple regional push-pull meets in Arizona, the 2007 WNPF International champion at 165 lbs., and the best lifter in that meet. I back my nutrition and training philosophies with hard science, however esoteric, and draw upon such diverse sources as population genetics, longevity nutrition, and little known sports science studies, in addition to the programs developed by renowned trainer Chad Waterbury, the immensely successful and unbelievably brutal Bulgarian training regime, Arnold Schwarzenegger high volume routine, and an abject hatred of Mike Mentzer and his idiotic High Intensity Training philosophy (look for an upcoming blog ripping all of his shit to shreds and pissing on the remains) thrown in for good measure.



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Now playing: suicide silence - no pity for a coward
via FoxyTunes

09 February 2009

**Uncle! Training Style

For years, bodybuilders and strength athletes have wondered what, if any, set/rep/rest scheme was ideal for the purposes of maximal strength and/or hypertrophy. Coaches and laypersons alike seem to believe that the 5x5 system is ideal, apparently due to its endorsement by the likes of eat lead and shit bullets-style brutal hardasses like Ed Coan, Captain Kirk Karwoski, and Bill Kazmeyer, all of whom used that system religiously.

That system might have worked fine for them. It might work fine for you. I do know this, however- Kaz benched 350 THE FIRST FUCKING TIME HE EVER LAID DOWN ON A BENCH AND ATTEMPTED THE LIFT. We could have spent all of his time doing pushups and eating Pez and would have rocked a 400 lb bench.

I personally never got a goddamned thing out of 5x5 training, and would be happy to explain at great length to Mr. Mark Rippetoe how shitty I think his 5x5 system is. Instead, I do a shitload of ultra-heavy singles, doubles, and triples, and I manage to gain size, strength, and cuts, simultaneously.

“How the fuck did you do that?” “That’s impossible!” Well, no, actually, and go fuck yourself for thinking that. My training style incorporates a ton of different methods, but I’ll address the Uncle style first and foremost.


The Uncle! System

This arose out of nothing more than competition, and a tidbit I recalled from Arnold’s Encyclopedia of bodybuilding. He used to do something called handoffs, where he and Sergio would load up a barbell with some weight and take turns doing singles with it, handing it off at the completion of each rep. I did this in high school, and while it appeared to do nothing whatsoever for my biceps, it was fun as hell. Thus, when trying to decide what to do in the gym one day, I challenged my lifting partner to a game of Uncle, in which we’d keep doing singles of power clean and press until one of us quit. Knowing I could edge him on that, he countered with fat bar c&p’s with 200 lbs, knowing my little hands would kill me on that. Having resolved that we would then tie, we chose a stone load with a 200 lb stone as the tie breaker. The competition went pretty much as we envisioned it- I won the regular c&p, and he smoked my ass in the fat bar. By the time we got to the stone, we were dropping it on ourselves and collapsing on the ground after each attempt. After we both failed, we declared it a tie, having looked at the clock and realized that we DID NONSTOP SINGLES ON C&P FOR TWO HOURS with about 85% of our one rep max in the two barbell exercises. I shit you not, gentle readers. Our Uncle workouts, which we did as GPP, hahahaha, became a staple that made us legendary nutcases in Iron Sport Gym, and is the exact thing that spawned the moniker Chaos & Pain for our workouts- they were totally unplanned, and they always ended in horrifying amounts of pain.

As Matt demonstrates, Uncle can be done with snatches, too, or with any full body, balls out exercise.


When I departed the fair city of Philly, I found that I had to modify my training accordingly, and did not want to abandon Uncle simply because my lifting partner, in all of his selfishness, failed to follow me hither and thither around the country. Thus, I began conducting one man Uncles against the clock- I would pick a weight between 85% and 95% of my 1RM and lift it as many times as I could in a set period of time, which usually ended up being 30 minutes. This is a fucking man-maker.


Why, you might ask, should you do this? Because I fucking told you so. Other than that, it incorporates a variety of training methodologies into one, and give you a great benchmark for your personal strength endurance. Lastly, it increases your capacity for performing brutal, volume heavy workouts, and generally transforms you from a slack-jawed faggot into a goddamned sexual Tyrannosaurus.

Roux-Lange, the oft-quoted turn-of-the-century exercise physiologist, laid out the following in his Funktionelle Anpassung Usw:

Only when muscle performs with greatest resistance in a unit of time than before, will its functional cross section need to increase... hypertrophy is seen only in muscles that must perform a great amount of work in a unit of time.

This is the philosophy on which John Little built his Power Factor training, and the ideology on which Charles Staley created EDT. Both systems are essentially the same idea. Power Factor Training measures workouts by pounds lifted per minute, so it uses the formula weight x sets x reps / time = Power Factor. Staley uses a slightly different measurement, calling the result of the same formula average force per rep, but the idea is essentially the same (though he would dispute this claim, I'm sure). Staley's system uses 15 minute blocks of 2 exercise supersets. Both systems, however, caution their followers against using ultra-taxing full-body exercises, as they carry too much risk. Any student of economics knows that one can only see maximal returns with maximal risk, and that low risk funds and stocks invariably produce low yields. I'm not about low yields, and I'm not about low risks. Nothing risked, nothing gained, right? Thus, the principle tenet of Chaos and PAIN is this:


MODERATION IS MEDIOCRITY

EXTREMITY IS EXCELLENCE


The Bulgarians are proof that ever-increasing training loads with full-body, high risk shit is the way to go. Additionally, the European Journal of Exercise Physiology published an article by Andy Fry in 2002 that stated that "heavy intensities must be used to result in a maximal growth response as measured on a cellular level. You can't get the best possible results without using the heaviest weights possible." As such, it behooves one to use the heaviest weight possible, as many times as possible, over the shortest period of time, as it achieves all three of the types of ways to achieve maximum muscle tension: lifting a maximal load, lifting a non-maximal load to failure (as you can repeat it after a short rest), and the repeated effort method. Thus, utilizing this technique, you can simultaneously achieve four goals:

  1. Increase muscle cross sections
  2. Increase ME strength
  3. Increase muscular endurance
  4. Look like a total fucking badass
This, combined with the fact that it makes you into a metabolic inferno, makes Uncle the cornerstone of the ChAoS and PAIN training style, and something any bonafide badass should incorporate into their training, stat.

Go forth and conquer, fuckers.



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Now playing: Dr. Acula - Why I'm Afraid Of Bees
via FoxyTunes

06 February 2009

*It Ain't Skinny Bitch Day, Is It?

"It ain't Skinny White Bitch Day, is it?"
"Naw man, it ain't skinny white bitch day"

Few things are quite as irritating as know-it-all sorostitutes who pontificate at length about subjects so far beyond their capability to comprehend that they can't even articulate intelligently what they DON'T know about a subject. Well, my friends, you're about to be treated to a publication written by those very same vapid, Cosmo-sipping, bulimic whores, packaged so that any woman who's ever enjoyed Sex In The City will stop surfing trendy clothing websites for shit they can't afford faster than an 18 year old slut drops to her knees for a bout of cock slobbing at a Donald Trump party.

Feast your eyes on this horseshit: 


Yep. These two vapid, uneducated cunts decided to impart a spectacular combination of bad science and idiocy to an entire generation of women too stupid and lazy to actually exercise.

Though this book has already been bashed all to be damned and is roundly thought to be a steaming pile of horseshit by anyone who knows anything about nutrition, the book still manages to find an audience amongst women too stupid to know better, too lazy to actually research nutrition themselves, and too enamored of the consumerism-laden, superficial claptrap of failed models like those on Sex In The City to know better.

Though I'm sure those soulless and conscienceless whores are too busy counting the ill-gotten receipts from their book sales to care, allow me to pick apart their inanity for the amusement of my gentle readers.

The basis of Skinny Bitch apparently comes from two books: Fit For Life and Eat to Live. Fit is a semi-religious nutrition text by Harvey Diamond that claims that the gods have ordained that we eat "live"(raw) foods. He suggests we eat fruit (which he lists as nature's most perfect food) until noon each day. His reasoning? Jewish/Christian Muslim god must have wanted us to eat it constantly, because it tastes good. I am not making that up. He apparently doesn't know how fruit bearing plants spread their seeds. Additionally, we should eat raw fruits and vegetables, because they're filled with "energy." Wild dogs and cats are never fat, he posits, because they only eat raw foods! Certainly not because they run around all day killing shit and eating fucking meat. Douche. Eat is similarly shitty, though without the odd new wave religious bent that makes Diamond's shit creepier than a naked old guy on a kindergarten playground. Joel Fuhrman, the author of Eat, asserts that people should focus on eating "nutrient dense" (i.e. plant) foods. He fails to understand, however, that organ meats are far more nutrient dense than are plants, so his entire book is essentially a null set.

On page 5, the Skinny Bitches assert that fruit is indeed "the most perfect food in existence", as it "barely requires any work to be digested" and "because it is made mostly of water, fruit hydrates the body and aids in cleansing, detoxifying, and eliminating." Woe betide the person who eats even a spear of broccoli with their fruit, however, as combining anything with fruit, which is usually "so quickly and easily digested," causes it to "rot and ferment in our stomachs." Fascinating. So, what they're saying, is that the most perfect possible food is transformed into a virtual poison whenever it is eaten with any other food. Odd.  Also odd that they don't know that the body NATURALLY FERMENTS CARBOHYDRATES IN THE DIGESTIVE TRACT TO AID IN DIGESTION. Later in the book, the Skinny Bitches treat us to a diatribe against meat, which I'll address later, but they assert that humans are the only animals who "have food rotting, decomposing, and fermenting in our intestinal tracts and colons." And yet the Cornell Sun states that "Within the rumen, there are many different types of bacteria that aid the cow in digesting plant fiber, like the pulp in citrus fruit, which humans and other non-herbivores cannot easily digest." Guess what happens in the rumen? FERMENTATION. Whee! Apparently the Skinny Bitches lack Google in their lives.

These asshats continue their war on common sense, firmly established science, good grammar (the entire book is rife with sentence fragments), and anthropological evidence by warning their idiot readers against the consumption of "refined sugars" (page 29, if you're following along). That's all well and good, as well all know that refined sugar sucks for a multitude of reasons. They, however, continue to say that ALL "simple sugars" are the devil, apparently forgetting the FRUCTOSE IS A FUCKING SIMPLE SUGAR.

Holy fucking hell, that book should have been called Stupid Cunt, not Skinny Bitch.

Much of this shitbox book is a diatribe against meat eating, which is a neverending source of amusement. People don't need meat in their diets, apparently, to perform at their best. Bill Pearl and Andreas Cahling are held aloft as two bodybuilders who ate no animal protein and yet suceeded at their sport. These two men, however, ate a fucking boatload of animal protein at every meal. They might not have been sitting down to a steak that'd choke John Candy's fat ass to death, but Pearl ate a couple of dozen eggs a day and drank fucking GALLONS of milk a day, while Cahling ate nothing but open faced goat cheese sandwiches.(peep it) Mind you, Cahling was a shitty bodybuilder, but that's beside the point. Tony Gonzalez abandoned veganism after a month of sucking, and Prince Fielder became a vegan after reading SB and then promptly abandoned it after being blasted in the press because his batting average dropped lower than his daily protein consumption. Dairy's out too, since it comes from animals, and because these vacuous sluts think that the dairy industry has been lying to us for years, as they assert that milk is made of fat, and can thus not be made low fat or fat free. Are they that fucking stupid? They've never heard of Little Miss Muffett, with her curds and whey. Along came a spider and sat down beside her and said "Hey! What's in the bowl bitch?" Never heard of that? Hmmmm. Methinks they must be idiots.

My thoughts are confirmed when they assert that adult humans need no more than 18-60g of protein per day, and that no one in the history of our species has ever had a protein deficiency. Sweet jesus. That'll be a post for another day, because that's wrong in way's I cannot articulate without volumes of writing. In addition to making the above specious claims about protein, they follow up with the idea that high protein has been linked to "obesity, heart disease, and cancer" citing either Diamond or Fuhrman for that gem. Nothing of the sort has been shown in any clinical trial of which I am aware, and I'm far better acquainted with Pubmed than are the Starvation Twins.

I'll skip over a bunch of other points that are simple to cherry pick to end on this bombshell:
"Look at what we evolved from. We looked like friggin' apes and had massive heads, strong jaws, and brute strength. maybe back then we were supposed to eat meat. But last time I checked, we aren't cavemen any more."


Wow. Not only did they jam several million years of evolution and a wide array of different hominid types into one short description of the prototypical caveman, but they failed to notice that the Robust types (like Paranthropus Robustus and Australopiticus Bosei) had the big heads, sagittal crests, and strong jaws to MASTICATE FIBER DENSE VEGETATION.

May those stupid cunts burn for eternity for foisting their stupidity on an even dumber American female readership.

A Look at Longevity of Carnivorous Diet Advocates vs. Vegan/Strict Vegetarian Diets:
Carnivores
William Banting (1797 – 16 March 1878) 81 years- Initially popularized the low-carb diet. He was a mortician who lost 60 lbs following a diet comprised of nothing but meat, veggies, and dry wine.
James Henry Salisbury, M.D. (12 January 182323 September 1905) 82 years- Salisbury was the inventor of the Salisbury steak, and a proponent of a diet consisting of two parts meat, one part veggies.
Vilhjalmur Stefansson (November 3, 1879 – August 26, 1962) 83 years- He advocated the diet of the Eskimos, which consists of nothing but meat. After returning from the Arctic in good health on this diet, he participated in a year-long study at a NY hospital proving the efficacy of his diet.
Richard Buckminster “Bucky” Fuller (July 12, 1895 – July 1, 1983) 87 years- Most well known for his invention of the geodesic dome, Fuller applied his energy theories to diet as well, following and espousing a meat and veggies diet of a Paleo Diet sort throughout his life.

Vegetarians/Vegans
Sylvester Graham (July 5, 1794 – September 11, 1851) 57 years- This asshole advocated a nearly vegan diet consisting of whole grains, fruits, and veggies, and preached abstinance from both sex and masturbation throughout his life. While he did invent Graham crackers, this was the only positive thing the Presbyterian minister did in his short, shitty, sexless life. According to Wikipedia, "Grahamism was influential in the vegan movement. Sylvester Graham focused on meat and milk, which he believed to be the cause of sexual urges. In fact, he claimed animal byproducts produced lust; Grahamism thus rejected meat, animal byproducts, and alcohol in order to develop a purer mind and body." May he rot in hell.
John Harvey Kellogg (February 26, 1852 – December 14, 1943) 90 years- If possible, this asshole actually outlived Graham, whose foundation paid Kellogg's way through medical school. Kellogg followed in Graham's footsteps, echoing the same diet and anti-sex, anti-masturbation nonsense. When not prescribing daily yogurt enemas, Kellogg was busy NEVER FUCKING HIS WIFE OF 40 YEARS, giving circumcisions sans anesthetic to teenage boys to curb "unnatural urges" or sewing their foreskins closed, and for the love of fuck, applying pure carbolic acid [phenol] to the clitoris as a means of allaying "abnormal excitement" in broads. He's got a special place in hell, I'm sure.
Reverend William Cowherd (1763–1816) 53 years- Founder of the Vegetarian Society in England, known for being the first modern society to advocate abstension from meat products.

Notice anything funny? Perhaps it's the fact that the MEAT EATERS LIVED FAR LONGER. Additionally, they do a lot more fucking, since vegetarianism has been associated with being a fucking eunuch since the dawn of the shitbox idea.

A piss poor showing by the vegetarians, all the way around. As if it wasn't bad enough that they ignore the fact that anthropologists attribute the evolution of early hominids into modern humanity to the hearty consumption of meat, and the spate of evidence showing the dietary efficacy and importance of meat, the Skinny Bitches and their followers shall remain woefully ingorant.

Thankfully, we can rest assured knowing that these poor fucks will put up no fight when we start eating them, if we run out of livestock, as they'll be weak as kittens. Additionally, evidence from Fiji shows that people actually taste really good (the Fijian word for human flesh translates to 'the long pig'- yes, they have a word for human flesh as food, haha), so these silly fucks will at least serve a purpose in their timely deaths.

If only that were one of the authors of SB, ready for roasting over an open flame. A bit of salt and pepper, and a nice rubdown with garlic, and we'd have a meal.







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*A Declaration of War

Consider this blog a manifesto. A declaration of war. A paean to the gods above. Whatever you consider it, it will stand as a bulwark against the close-mindedness and defeatism of the fitness and health industries, and a call to arms for like-minded individuals to pick up a steak and head to the fucking gym to move brutal weight.

You won't read the same hackneyed shit you see in the mags on here. Hell, you won't even read this on the most out-there sites. What I propose is unique, and is a fluid and evolving system by which anyone can get lean as hell and strong as fuck.

Topics to be covered:

Somatotyping

Metabolic Typing

High Volume Training

Dinosaur Training

HIT

Old School strength athletes

The evolution of physical culture

Paleo dieting

and whatever else I feel like touching on.

Look for three posts a week. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. They will come in the form of reviews of various diets/books, profiles of strength athletes, and my ruminations on everything strength and diet. My knowledge has built me into a fucking machine, starting as a small boned chubby kid of 5'6" 130 into a brick shithouse at about 175. It didn't happen overnight, but my failures can be your gains.

Br00tality.