“Willingness to Apply Yourself…”: Mike Mentzer Once Unveiled His Favorite Exercise for Arm Training

Mike Mentzer, during his time, advocated only one way of training method that stimulated muscle growth. One should train with maximum efficiency while minimizing the risk of overtraining. This meant that lifting heavy weights and pushing your muscles to failure, followed by complete rest and recovery to allow maximum growth.

Though Mentzer’s methods were unconventional, it has left an impact on many fitness enthusiasts. Mentzer who always shared training methods with his followers, once shared his favorite types of exercise for arm training. 

In a resurfaced video Mr. Heavy Duty shared a few of his arm training exercises. For his biceps, Mentzer loved training using the scot curls, nautilus curls, and concentration curls. For the triceps, he used to train with press downs, nautilus extensions, and dips. According to Mentzer, he felt that dips are the most effective and best exercise. 

“It’s also the best upper body, overall upper body exercise. I call it the upper-body squat. A very good exercise.”

However, Mentzer mentioned that before you get into training, there is a particular formula you should follow. The pre-training, intense training, and frequent training. Mentzer further mentioned that young bodybuilders should be careful while training and avoid doing too many sets on too many days for all body parts. 

Mentzer had noticed how bodybuilders who are willing and able to train significantly hard acquired a muscular physique. However, the mistake they often made was over train, which is not ideal for your body. Hence, Mentzer states that it is important to apply yourself while you train but overtraining is not the way.

“Results are usually linked primarily to motivation, and your willingness to apply yourself 100 percent.”

Mike Mentzer’s tip for achieving more gains from HIT training

Mike Mentzer’s heavy-duty training has seen a lot following ever since its inception. It’s been lauded and widely followed by fitness freaks and has almost achieved a cult status. The technique is aimed at performing a workout with intensity to maximize growth.

In a resurfaced video, the legend was seen exposing why heavy-duty training is imperative in fitness plans. He stated that HIT training never required the backing of equipment. He offered substitute exercises that worked the same set of muscles without equipment. 

The legend mentioned that one should focus more on strength and intensity and that if done right, it can give visible results. The results one yields from HIT depend completely on the efforts put in. That’s why Mentzer advises on going to failure for gains. 

This will trigger a recovery response from the body and further induce growth. Mentzer’s heavy-duty routine training included working till failure and going for a recovery period of 72 hours.

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