For the last week or so, I’ve been on the topic of Vince Gironda and his unconventional means of building muscle.
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Now, the program I’m about to speak of is one of his more famous programs in which he called his “10, 8, 6, 15 Sticking Point Buster”. He used this program with people to help them bust through training ruts.
The basis of the program called for sets of 10, 8, 6, then a final set of 15 reps. What you would do is use this rep scheme for one movement per body-part. You would want to work that bodypart 2-3 times per week max for 3 weeks then switch up your routine.
The weights used with these sets were as follows – Take your 6 rep max for a particular exercise and use it’s percentage for the different sets.
For the 10 rep set, you would use 50% of your 6RM weight.
For the 8 reps set you would use 75% of your 6RM weight.
You would then use 100% of your 6RM for the 6 rep set.
Then you would finish off with using 35% of you 6RM for the 15 reps set.
One might look at this and think that the volume and total work for this set up is rather low which is true but, Vince was more about QUALITY over QUANTITY. He believed in getting in just enough work to push the muscle enough for an effect and then back off.
He was a believer of the 3 weeks on, 1 week off routine as well, which I strongly follow with 
myself, my clients, and athletes. For 3 weeks, you basically hammer your workouts with tons of intensity then, for 1 week you back off and recover focusing on bodyweight movements and lighter weight sets.
More importantly, one of the main focuses Vince had for his workouts was to really connect with your muscle. This takes a ton of focus and intensity.
He would stress to really focus in on the muscle being worked. Total concentration was to be used on each and every rep.
For example, if you were working your chest, you would want to focus all of your mental energy in on your pecs as you performed the different movements.
This alone will increase your workout intensity if done right.
Have you ever really focused in on trying to connect your mind with your muscle?? If you have, you would know the level of concentration it takes and just how much more it cranks up the intensity of your training session.
Most people go through a training session with half of their actual focus being used to zero in on the workout and in return, their results are minimal to sub-par.
This is one of the main reasons I got out of the corporate gym setting and into my own gym as 95% of the people training in the these gyms are hardly even focused in on what it is their doing.
Are they there to train or to look good???
It was said Vince was against any type of music being played in his gym so his clients could focus more in on their training. I can totally understand how that would work but, I’m against that notion as I need some loud-a$$ music playing to allow me to focus in a bit better.
Not sure about you but, there’s just something about having Sevendust or Disturbed blaring over the speakers that gets me zoned into my training sessions… I’m sure you rockers out there reading this right now can relate with me this one! 😉
However, All people are different in how they work.
The bottom line – FOCUS is everything.
Just like with anything else, training takes a ton of mental focus. If you want to know what I’m talking about, READ THIS I won’t get too deep into the mental game right now but, all I will say is it plays 80% if not even more importance in the type of results you get out of your training.
So, if you happen to be in a training rut right now and more strength and muscle is your goal, give The Iron Guru’s “10, 6, 8, 15” Training program a try.
Live Aggressive and Get Strong!
PS – Stay tuned for a HUGE announcement tomorrow concerning The Iron Guru….
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