Men’s Health Huge in a Hurry: Get Bigger, Stronger, and Leaner in Record Time with the New Science of Strength Training
June 12, 2010 by Jim Made
Filed under Bodybuilding
Product Description
Men’s Health Huge in a Rush will add inches to your muscles and increase your strength, with noticeable results quickly, no matter how long you’ve been lifting. Author Chad Waterbury offers the most current neuromuscular science to debunk the fitness myths and conventional wisdom that may be wreaking havoc on your workouts and inhibiting your gains. Forget lifting moderate weights slowly for lots and lots of sets and reps. The best way to get huge in a rush is to … More >>
If you know anything about weight lifting this is not the book for you. Thought I would of read more information regarding technique, proper exercise form, proper warmup etc. The lay out of the workout plans are confusing and bone idle at best. Huge huge pictures repeated over and over. How can you have an exercise book without a quick cheat sheet. Does he expect you to carry this huge stupid book with huge stupid pictures with you to a gym? Most of the book is filler. Lift heavy weights quick….Just like he states all you need to know.
Rating: 1 / 5
Take it from someone who has some credentials: I have critically reviewed the information in this book and crossed referenced it with many resources. I have a strong exercise physiology background including studying under the founder and former president of the American Society of Exercise Physiologists; I am a personal trainer certified through multiple accredited associations including the American college of Sports Medicine; I am a student physical therapist; cross referenced this with an person who is not only an athletic trainer, but a physical therapist and has a doctorate related to exercise physiology; and cross referenced it with a Ph.D in Neuroanatomy. The book seems like it would work; the principles are in some ways right. But, this book is a quick track to injury. I gave it a honest shot despite some honest warning. I sustained a SLAP lesion of the shoulder, bicep tendonitis, non specific back pain, and radiculopathy (meaning nerve pain). At best, you can take some of the thoughts from this book and apply them. But, this is not a book to live by or follow. DO NOT FOLLOW THIS PLAN “TO A T.”
Rating: 1 / 5
I am a college student who picked up this book with the intention of gaining muscle. I had been lifting weights with no general plot for two years prior and had not seen any results. Mr. Waterburys book is very convincing and lays out a persuasive argument for his approach. But I strongly recommend that this exercise book should be used as a means of last resort. I believe I followed his instructions to the letter: lift heavy, lift quick, use proper form and follow his diet plot. Yet I have sustained two major back injuries and seen no appreciable gains in muscle size. I had never experienced back pain until this book. One injury was in week three of the Get Huge phase 1 doing front squats, and another in week two of the Get Strong phase 1 doing deadlifts. Both injuries prevented me from participating fully in my studies and left me in pain, preventing me from sleeping, for weeks. I sunk a lot of money, attention, and time into this book and finished up fatter, immobile, and broke. I am not an expert but I reckon Mr. Wateburys plans are more suited to experienced weight lifters and that he does not fully appreciate the dangers of lifting near maximal loads as quick as possible. Please carefully consider other options, and make sure you have excellent health insurance, before committing to this book.
Rating: 1 / 5
I gave this book four stars because it’s more effective than most other conventional strength-training plans, in that it recommends that you opt for using heavier weights and doing fewer reps, which generally is more likely to generate higher levels of intensity than using lighter weights and doing more reps. Also, it’s well organized, and it covers a broad range of information about conventional strength-training exercises. And as a bonus, it contains some stretching exercises, which most other books don’t cover. So the book is worth buying if you want a excellent traditional workout plot.
But it’s still a conventional workout plot, and a such,it has the same limitations as other conventional workout plans in terms of generating maximum intensity, and thus maximum muscle growth. So you will not really get “huge in a rush” with this workout plot. But you might get “hurt in a rush” with the advice in this book. Here’s why:
The author states at the start of the book that you should “lift heavy”, and “lift quick”. Those are his two main rules for getting huge in a rush. Lifting heavy, of course, is essential to build maximum muscle in minimum in time; but lifting quick is terrible advice, since it will increase your risk for injury. That doesn’t mean you will get injured; but theres’ a greater chance for injury to occur. As Joe Weider states in one of his books, most serious injuries he’s seen over his many years in bodybuilding were due to “sudden jerky motions” that resulted in torn muscles, hurt joints, ligaments and tendons. He claims that he’s seen many promising, upcoming bodybuilders end their careers this way. And obviously the quicker you lift, the more “motion” you engage in per given amount of time, and the greater your risk for injury. And that’s especially right when you use heavy weights, which compounds the problem.
Additionally, “lifting quick” doesn’t increase the intensity of the exercise for any given amount of weight used; it really does the opposite. Lifting quick lowers the intensity of any weight-lifting exercise that you do, because the quicker you lift, the more you rely on momentum to carry you through the exercise, rather than the strength of your muscles. And that’s especially right during the eccentric phase of motion, where all of the momentum is generated entirely by gravity, not the strength of your muscles. So if you were to go as quick as possible, during the eccentric phase, you would have absolutely no muscular contraction, and thus zero intensity. It’s fascinating to note that recent studies have shown that super-slow reps are more effective for muscle growth than are reps done quicker. So for any given amount of weight used, the more slowly you do the exercise, the the higher the intensity of the exercise, and thus the greater the muscle growth stimulation. And the ultimate way to achieve this is to slow the weight down completely and do a “static contraction”, so that you have absolutely no motion; all you have is contraction of the muscles against a net external force. Static contractions (if they’re done right) are the only way to achieve maximum intensity and maximum muscle growth stimulation, so they are the only way you will get “huge in a rush”.They’are also the safest weight-lifting exercises, since they involve no motion at all. I clarify all of this in my book, which has not been published.
The only published book I know of that enables you to achieve maximum intensity and get huge in a rush, is John Small’s book “Max Contraction Training”. I would also recommend his earlier book (co-authored with Peter Sisco),”Static Contraction Training”, as an introduction to his later book. But I wouldn’t recommend the exercises in that latter book (SCT), since they too have their limitations; only the concepts.
I also disagree with the author when he states that isolation exercises are not necessary to develop a fantastic physique. He claims that all you need to fully develop your physique are compound exercises. That simply isn’t right, and I’m surprised that a person with the author’s credentional would overlook this error.
First of all, you have to do isolation exercises to achieve maximum intensity and maximum muscle growth; and anyone who believes otherwise, is probably using the incorrect definition for intensity, or the incorrect definition for a compound exercise, or both. And since this book doesn’t even define intensity, that clarifies why the author erroneously believes that isolation exercises are unnecessary. Additionally, there are certain muscle groups that absolutely require isolation exercises for full development, simply because there are no compound exercises that address those muscle groups effectively. Suppose you want to fully develop your calves for example: what compound exercise will do that? Obviously there are none. You have to use isolation exercises to fully develop your calves. And there are other muscle groups that require that you do isolation exercises as well, such as the biceps, the triceps,the glutes, the latissimus dorsi, the abductors, and your pectorals. The bench press, for example will not fully develop your pecs, because you cannot achieve maximum intensity in the pecs when doing any form of the bench press; it’s impossible, due to the way the exercise is executed. In fact, whenever you combine two or more motions into one exercise (as is the case with compound exercises), you have to make compromises in terms of intensity. And that’s why compound exerciss are overrated. You cannot achieve maximum intensity when doing most compound exercises; only isolation exercises can do that. But most people cannot know that fact, because they don’t have the right definition for intensity to start with.
Finally, I emphasize that this book “Huge in A Rush” can be of fantastic value for those who want one of the best conventional workout plans there is. But it is not the best way to build maximum muscle in minimum time, and it is potentially perilous, due to all of the motion involved, especially with heavy weights. For example, if you do “explosive motions” (even if they’re not actaully quick motions) at the start of the dumbbell flye, you could hurt the connective tissue in your shoulder joint when in that vulnerable position. Fortunately, building muscle doesn’t require repeated body motions anyway; all you need to build muscle is contraction, assuming it’s generated the right way, so as to generate maximum intensity.
Finally, as stated, I found no definition for “intensity” (as it relates to strength-training) in this book. And obviously, without the right definition for intensity, you won’t know which strategies work best to maximize the intensity of any weight-lifting exercise that you do.And if you don’t achieve maximum intensity, you won’t build maximum muscle in minimum time. In fact, without that definition, you won’t build maximum muscle at all, even if you were to stick with these exercises for 100, 1,000 or even 1,000,000 years.
But then maybe building truly “maximum” muscle, or “maximum muscle in minimum time” isn’t your goal anyway;and you can build a lot of muscle with this plot, regardless of the limitations of connventional workout plans.
Rating: 4 / 5
Excellent read but not much new info if you have already read chad waterbury’s articles. I was expecting more. But a excellent resource and much better book than the typical mr. olympia or celebrity books out there with the same dull info.
Rating: 3 / 5