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Steve’s Bodybuilding Pilgrimage
July 2000
The Zane Experience
After a 5 hour flight
from
Frank was milling
about, and we quickly got acquainted. My first impression of Frank was that he
is very focussed. Over the three days I spent with
him, that impression proved to be correct.
He is also very candid and open. There were always questions and
comments about “what is was like when … “
There were surprises.
One of those surprises was Frank’s tone when he spoke of competing. He did not
sound like he loved that time in his life, nor did he sound like a man who
missed being in the thick of things. In
fact, he spoke of his days as a world-class competitor as something he was glad
to be finished with. He indicated that to compete the way he did was a
sacrifice of epic proportion, a sacrifice on many levels. His focus was so
intense and complete in those days that he said he went for long periods were
he did not even talk to anyone. When I
asked him if he intended to enter competition again, perhaps in the Masters
Olympia, he said no, without hesitation. His goals were to reach peak condition
and to present his physique to the world at some point, probably at or around
his sixtieth birthday in 2002. But he seemed genuinely wary of putting himself
through the rigors of competition ever again.
The Zane Experience
is unusual, in that Frank is no personal trainer, in the conventional sense.
He’s Frank Zane, three
times Mr. Olympia, and one of the most unique bodybuilders in history in terms
of size, proportion, and posing. During the workouts, Frank was my training
partner. He did a set, and I did a set. I got to watch him, watch his form, his
approach, and his intensity. Then he would correct my form as I trained. That
in itself was invaluable.
We did Frank’s
routine. This is the routine that works for him, given his own level of
experience, his goals, and his limitations. On that latter point, Frank has to deal with a 58 year old body with its attendant quirks and
demands, as well as specific injuries and prior surgery. Of course I will
naturally have a different set of these parameters, and so my task is to
integrate these two blueprints, to come up with a revised blueprint for myself.
Frank has a new 3-way
split routine, which we did over the three days I trained with him. These three
days are orchestrated in descending order of physical taxation. Day 1 is upper
torso, including back, chest, and shoulders.
It’s a big workout. Day 2 is
legs. Day 3 is arms, including biceps, triceps, and forearms. Additionally, all
three days end with an ab workout.
As for the subject
matter covered in the non-training part of the sessions, we spent lots of time
discussing diet, nutrition, and supplementation. On the third day, Frank took outdoor pictures
of me posing, and then told me that it was important to have someone take
photos of my physique on a regular basis, in order for me to objectively see
the progress (hopefully not the lack of progress) and to have a pictorial
record of that progress. We spent a lot
of time on posing technique. Frank showed me that posing began with correct
foot placement, something I really did not have.
He even traced the position of
his on feet on a piece of taped-together construction paper with a felt marker.
He rolled it up and I took it home like someone fresh from a dance lesson. But the point was clear. This was the basic
stance, a home-base from which other foot positions were born, and from where
the poses grew upward like a tree would grow from its roots. The result is that
my poses are beginning to look a lot better.
Then came the
moment of truth – a critical assessment of my physique from a competitive
standpoint. Much of Frank’s comments were no surprise to
me: My back needs lots of work; my lats disappear when I raise my arms
overhead. Quads need more definition. Lower abs and serratus
needs lots of work. And calves. But then there
were other more surprising revelations. For example, Frank pointed out that my
outer calf was quite developed, but the inner calf was the part that needed
work. Moreover, he noted that the inner head was quite a bit longer than the
outer head (he even marked it with a marker to show me), and that meant that I
could develop a really huge inner head if I worked it. He then showed me the
proper technique to work the inner head of the calf, essentially by pronating
the feet somewhat while performing the various calf raises, putting more weight
on the ball of the foot.
Frank’s Pre-Competition Advice
This is how he did
it…
·
Sodium
maintained at 1 gram/day beginning two weeks out.
·
Last workout
on the Tuesday preceding the Saturday show (4 days out).
·
Legs: Stop
squatting two weeks out, but continued leg extensions every day and
constantly tensing and posing the legs.
·
In general,
increase volume and do more exercises as the date approaches.
Carbs For The Final Week
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday:
100 grams carbs/day.
Thursday 150 grams
carbs
Friday 200 grams
carbs
Saturday (day of the
show): Awakened at 6:AM. Ate a slice of baked yam, and
continued to each one slice every 45 minutes or so, up to one hour before the
show, for total consumption of not more than 2 yams or so.
Frank took no
diuretics and did no radical cutting of his water intake prior to the show.
Life In
Venice
After
saying goodbye to Frank, I got into my little rented car and drove to
I
called Gold’s Gym in
Next
morning, I arrived at the one-and-only Gold’s Gym in
Tito
was finishing up a workout. He was doing lunge-walks with an 80 pound DB in
each hand, each contraction pushing a web of vascularity
out from his quads. The 80 pounders then became 100s.
Tito was affable and communicative, and turned out to be an excellent trainer.
I explained to him I wanted to work my back, and that back was a weak point in
my physique esthetic. He responded with exactly what I needed. Unlike many pro-bodybuilders who train others
and who need to show you how great THEY are, Tito focussed
on my needs and my agenda. In fact, my new 4-way split is based on Tito’s
split, in terms of body parts. Back and Triceps, instead of back and biceps, as
the biceps are already partially spent by the time I’ve done back, but the
triceps are fresh. Similarly, a day of Chest-Biceps for the
same reason. I had previously been using a three-way split in order to
work each body part more frequently, but I’ve gone back to a 4-way, so I can
really work each body part more intensively.
To view my entire routine, go to
Here’s what Tito and I did
that day.
1. Wide-Grip Chins: When he saw my form on the chin bar, he insisted we go to the
Gravitron and take 50 – 80 lbs off my 180 lb load. I never liked using the
Gravitron before, because I thought it was a cop-out (you know, for wusses…) But Tito convinced me of the benefits of better
form, and he was right. Chins need to be done with elbows back, chest out,
shoulders back, rib cage out. That’s impossible to do when you’re struggling to
make the distance. On the Gravitron, using this proper form, I felt my lats
swell like never before.
2. One-arm DB Row: Again, focus on form so I can feel the muscles. This time he had me up
to a heavier poundage than I usually do, with
70 lb DBs. Here again, the end of the positive entailed a chest-out
movement. Also, we did not use a bench,
just a three-legged stance, with two legs back and one arm bracing against the
DB rack. Frank Zane also did them like
that.
3. Deadlifts: Tito likes full deads, not the halfs that I was doing. I have since decided to do both,
from time to time, because the halfs enable me to go
to a heavier weight and develop my upper back. For the full deads,
we took the weight down to single 45 plate per side,
as opposed to the peak of nearly three plates a side for my halfs. There was great attention to form.
4. Wide-Grip Pulldown: Again, the focus was elbows
back, and the buttocks back of the seat with chest out. For the first
time, I feel I’m doing this common exercise correctly. For the first time, I
felt my lats become rock hard and swollen as I pulled the bar down.
We
finished the workout with three tricep exercises –
single-arm pressdowns, EZ bar French Press / Close
Grip Press supersets, and machine dips.
Tito
was great, and I would highly recommend him to anyone who goes to
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