Charles Glass: kulturismi võluri nõuanded

Charles Glass: advice from a bodybuilding wizard

Charles Glass is perhaps the best-known personal trainer in bodybuilding. A whole galaxy of top bodybuilders, including Gunter Schlierkamp, have taken shape under Glass’s guidance. In the interview below, Charles Glass answers three practical questions: how to spare your shoulder joint in pressing exercises, whether an ascending or a descending pyramid is the smarter choice, and why today’s top bodybuilders all look alike.

Charles Glass on protecting your shoulder joint in pressing exercises

Q: I’m a recreational bodybuilder with 15 years of experience. Lately a shoulder injury has been giving me a big headache — it just won’t go away, and it’s been a long while. Barbell bench press is completely out of the question. I read that when bench pressing — with both wide and narrow grips — Victor Martinez doesn’t let the barbell touch the chest, but leaves a 15-centimeter (6-inch) gap between the barbell and the chest even at the bottom of the movement. Martinez said this puts less stress on the shoulder joint. I’ve tried it myself lately, and the pain hasn’t bothered me since. So my question: is it possible to get an effective muscle stretch if you don’t use the full range of motion and don’t lower the barbell to your chest? I know bodybuilders who swear that you can only get significant results with the maximum range of motion. But I remember how you trained Gunter’s chest — Gunter didn’t lower the barbell all the way to the chest either, and still has a really solid pectoral muscle.

A: You’re right. I don’t let Gunter lower the barbell all the way to the chest. More often we do power presses, setting the safety stop on the Smith machine barbell where it allows two-thirds or three-quarters of the movement. Sometimes we even do floor presses: Gunter lies down on the floor and presses a barbell or dumbbells. The floor naturally limits the range of motion, and Gunter has to focus only on the top part of the movement. For chest pressing, it’s a very effective way to train without having to put the relatively delicate shoulder joint at risk.

You shouldn’t worry too much about the deep stretch in pressing movements — it can be replaced with flyes or pec-deck work. That way you can focus more on the contraction in the press. One more tip: when I widen the grip by about 8 centimeters (6 inches) on each side, I feel it isn’t safe to lower the barbell all the way to the chest — the risk of injury becomes too high.

A simple truth: in the vast majority of cases where I’ve seen or heard of a pectoral muscle tear, it happened right in the deep-stretch position, when the barbell was just about to touch or had already touched the chest. A shoulder injury is one thing, but a torn pectoral muscle will put a serious dent in your training — for a year or even longer. I strongly recommend getting your shoulder joint treated instead of training and hoping it heals on its own. Many bodybuilders have found relief with deep-tissue massage.

Ascending or descending pyramid – which suits you better?

Q: Which is better — an ascending or a descending pyramid? Most bodybuilders increase the weight progressively during a workout, but I’ve heard that some like to warm up and go straight into the heaviest working set, then work down in weight from there. Lee Labrada did it that way. Labrada said the heaviest weights build the most muscle and that an ascending pyramid saps Labrada’s strength. My concern is injuries with heavier weights. Which one do you favor?

A: A descending pyramid can indeed let you use heavier weights, but you can’t do it regularly for years without paying a price. Take Dorian Yates. Dorian was known for going straight to the heaviest working set right after the warm-up. Many believed that this very training style ended Dorian’s career — one injury followed another. Dorian preferred lower reps, six to eight, which allowed heavier weights. Heavier weights can work brilliantly in powerlifting, but for bodybuilding it isn’t always the best route.

Let’s compare Dorian’s style with Ronnie Coleman’s. Ronnie rarely uses maximum weights — relatively speaking. For almost all upper-body exercises, Ronnie generally does 12 reps. Ronnie could certainly use heavier weights by doing even half as many reps, but then the work would no longer be felt in the muscle, and the muscle wouldn’t be pumped full enough for Ronnie to count the set as successful. I’m pretty sure that if Ronnie didn’t spend so long on warming up and on progressively heavier working sets, the weights would be almost 30 percent higher. But you know what? Ronnie would probably have suffered as many muscle tears as Dorian and would be enjoying retirement by now.

A descending pyramid does allow heavier weights, but it drastically increases the risk of injury. If you want to use heavier weights, try drop sets instead — they carry considerably less risk of injury and give a similar stimulus.

Old-school bodybuilding versus today

Q: I read a piece by Robert Kennedy in which Kennedy boasts that old-school bodybuilders generally had better physiques than today’s. Kennedy says that until the late seventies you could put the world’s best bodybuilders behind a curtain — so that you see only the silhouette — and still identify them without difficulty. Kennedy claims that today heavy steroid abuse, overeating and the shift in emphasis toward basic exercises and powerlifting-type programs have produced a herd of shapeless lumps who all look alike. And Kennedy feels that today’s bodybuilders don’t do enough shaping exercises. You started working with Johnnie Jackson, who is known as both a bodybuilder and a powerlifter. Did you steer Jackson more toward shaping exercises? And is Kennedy right about today’s bodybuilders?

A: I can’t agree with Mr. Kennedy’s remarks. Quite the opposite: in the past, bodybuilders put more emphasis on basic exercises, using more of the movements typical of powerlifters than they do today. We mustn’t forget that most of the fancy machines were only invented in the seventies and eighties. Before that, if you trained legs, you squatted. You didn’t have five different leg presses and three different hack squat machines in the gym — all you could do was put the barbell on your back and squat. On chest day there wasn’t a whole section of Hammer or Cybex machines. There was a flat, a decline and an incline bench press station, plus barbells and dumbbells. Today’s bodybuilders perform far more shaping and isolation exercises.

So what is really going on? No matter how committed I’ve been myself to developing different aspects of a muscle through various exercises and angles, I still believe that overall shape, form and body structure are what they are. Gunter Schlierkamp will never look like Dexter Jackson, with his fine joints and narrow waist — and Dexter will never reach a body weight of 300 pounds (135 kilos).

The main reason today’s athletes look so similar is that the standards for muscle size have risen sharply since Arnold’s day. Today’s bodybuilders aim to develop every muscle to the limit of its maximum potential. Just a few decades ago, it didn’t occur to most bodybuilders to develop their thighs and lats to the limit of their potential, the way they did with their chests and arms. Today’s standards demand that all muscle groups be equally gigantic and impressive. In the past there were many more men who were known for one or two downright freak body parts — think of Mike Katz’s chest or Tom Platz’s legs, even if their other body parts may have lagged slightly behind in development. Nowadays competitors can’t afford a single truly weak body part, because the level of competition is far tighter. In the seventies there were on average only a dozen professional bodybuilders; today there are already over two hundred. Judged by current standards, they have no choice but to be as big as is physically possible.

As for Johnnie Jackson, Jackson has indeed incorporated many new exercises that I have shown and recommended — mainly for the areas where there had so far been shortfalls. But the overall shape has not changed drastically. In closing, I want to say that I have boundless respect for Robert Kennedy and the views expressed, but professional bodybuilding is quite different from what it was 20 or 30 years ago.

FAQ: Charles Glass on bodybuilding

Does Charles Glass always recommend using the full range of motion in pressing exercises?

No. If there is a risk of injuring the shoulder joint, Glass recommends limiting the range of motion — using safety stops on the Smith machine barbell, doing floor presses, or widening the grip by 8 centimeters on each side. The deep-stretch effect can be achieved with flyes and the pec deck.

Which is better — an ascending or a descending pyramid?

A descending pyramid allows heavier weights but significantly increases the risk of injury in the long run. The safer choice is an ascending pyramid. If you want to use heavier weights, try drop sets — they are considerably less dangerous than a descending pyramid.

Why do today’s top bodybuilders all look so similar?

All muscle groups have to be at the maximum level — a weak body part can no longer be hidden. In the seventies there were only a dozen professionals; today there are over two hundred. Tougher competition means a more uniform but denser look.