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Reddit mentions of Mass Made Simple

Sentiment score: 4
Reddit mentions: 6

We found 6 Reddit mentions of Mass Made Simple. Here are the top ones.

Mass Made Simple
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Release dateDecember 2011

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Found 6 comments on Mass Made Simple:

u/JohnBeamon · 4 pointsr/weightroom

This is a semantic point, but it's a point I hope you take to heart. By definition, anything named after Occam's razor does not have all the additions you made. That was already a 2-day program (easily adapted), with 4 big lifts and ab work and KB swings. You've eliminated one of the big lifts and added 4 new things to a (by definition and name) minimalist program, then asked for internet help getting it organized. So, there's a point to be considered that only 4 months into the gym, you don't follow programs. I'd like you to follow one for 3 straight months, minimum. Let it do what it's meant to do, then you can do something else afterward. You have your whole life ahead of you to experiment.

There is not much support for training only twice a week, but I can heartily recommend Dan John's Minimalist Training and Nick Horton's 2 Lift Workout, which is actually 3/wk but is similar in ideology. And quit trying to strictly program additional stuff. If you want grip work, carry your CoC around with you and squeeze it every day. Also, your diet will be key. John's Mass Made Simple only trains every 4th day, specifically to put on weight. You'd do well to find a third day, even just a run on the weekend.

u/jazzjunkie84 · 3 pointsr/xxfitness

I would highly recommend Dan John's original strength program

https://www.amazon.com/Mass-Made-Simple-Dan-John-ebook/dp/B006HXPR66

The downside to this program from what you're looking for is that the movements are basically the same each workout, but with variation. He has a website that details a similar workout but where you can craft your own daily routine using a a ratio for different kinds of movements. I am not sure what your size is, I am a little more petite at 115 lbs so I found this workout plenty challenging with just the barbell for the squats and the complexes. Even if you don't complete the program, I found it absolutely essential in crafting solid form. Since he highly recommends resting for two days between workouts, you can use the days between to do pilates or a WOD crossfit thing or something else.

u/discobolus_ · 3 pointsr/marriedredpill

So I'll preface all of this by saying I'm not a trainer...so I'm heavily biased toward my body type and what I've trained for. But I know how to get bigger, I know how to get stronger, and I've learned how to eat well for what I want to achieve. I've not been able to take myself down to shredded levels of bodyfat, and if I wanted to go much below say 12% I don't have the knowledge to get there. But even in my fat and beta days, This stuff - lifting programs and strength training was something I spent a lot of time reading and trying out. Wasn't very disciplined until recently, but I'd say I've got 15+ years of trial, error, and failure under my belt.

As I said in my other post, I was running myself in circles basically trying to get strong and leaner and fitter all at once.

So I think the first step is assessing the goal you've got and making a clear hierarchy. I always wanted to have bigger muscles, less fat, and be strong and able to perform athletically. But that's too many things to chase at once. So I set a longer term goal - that I was going to set PRs in all my lifts, and especially press my bodyweight at 230 lbs. I focused all of my fitness energy on that. And while that is technically two of goals (weight and strength), I had a clear hierarchy between them. Scale number goes down, first and foremost. But I also wasn't going to sacrifice more strength than necessary in order to get there. By setting this longer term goal, I was able to subvert the "Your shoulders/arms look small, you should do something else" hamster. By making it a strength goal, I had a tangible number to shoot at rather than a mirror and a feeling. I flat out don't know how to program to aesthetic goals. So I didn't try. I stuck with what I knew I could accomplish, and let the chips fall where they may on the other stuff. I figured that I'd get some carryover in aesthetics and athletic performance, but I was OK putting them out of mind for the time being.

So with that goal in mind, I said to myself "The scale number needs to go down, period". I was 260 and I needed to get in the 230s. So diet came first. With my diet, I think it was pretty basic stuff, except that I focused more on the mental part rather than on the "what's the best way to lose weight" part. Rather than trying to drop a bunch of weight with a low carb diet - over the years I had gotten really good at losing 20-25 lbs in 2 months and then packing it back on. I went with the sidebar "You are what you eat" method. This was a new thing for me, counting calories. Diet was -500 calories. I went with 15% carbs, 230+ grams of protein (based on 'goal' weight), and the rest was fat. Again, pretty basic stuff. And it worked really well to a point.

But I also geared it all around making sure I wasn't wearing out my willpower. My focus was more on consecutive days of compliance than anything else. So while a guy who is on a cut's instinct might be to ramp up the cardio, cardio makes me fucking miserable. Jogging, hiit, etc. Fucking hate it. Jogging is boring. Stationary biking is boring. I always get injured trying to sprint or HIIT. I also realized over the years that when I ramp up the cardio, I'm hungry all the time. Doesn't matter what my diet is, all I want to do is eat peanut butter between meals if I'm going hard on the cardio. So rather than ramming my head into the wall again, doing the boring ass cardio and feeling a magnetic pull to the pantry every time I walk by it, I just cut out the cardio shit. I didn't do any cardio aside from walking, and just maybe 2 miles 3X/week or so. With a cut, I think morale is more important than anything, and cardio saps my morale. In theory, a hardcore motivated beast mode bro can do all this shit on a diet. But I can't. So I focused on 2 things - lifting and diet.

I was also experienced enough to know that losing weight too fast hurt strength and morale. So I was cool with the slow going on the weight loss at times. I think that helped mentally.

All of this also worked really well, to a point.

In terms of lifting, I've been doing some variation of 5/3/1 for years. It allows for lots of variety and is just flat out the best program I've used for what I do. Any time I stray too far from it, my results suffer. Use it or don't, this is just my preference. But if you use it BUY THE BOOK AND READ IT ALL. Don't just pull the sets and reps off of a website or an app. 5/3/1 is much more than 5-5-5+, 3-3-3+, 5-3-1+ with .9 * your %. Read it, pick a variation you fully understand, and do it.

Things I've learned: I used to take an approach of do the strength stuff for the big lifts (5/3/1) and make the assistance lifts all of the bodybuilding shit we all like to do....curls, triceps, shoulder raises, flys, etc. etc. etc. This also seems to be the approach that the typical message board bro takes with 5/3/1. It's a bad plan for me. It worked ok for a while, but once you get to the point where you're decently strong, it's not really lining up with helping you progress. I think that's why many guys struggle so much to push past plateaus.

Your supplemental and assistance movements need to support your strength movements (big 4). So little triceps movements, burn-out curls, pec flys, all that shit....none of it makes you stronger. If your big 4 are compound movements, most guys probably benefit the most from making their secondary movements fairly compound as well, ie - Dips > tricep pushdowns; Pull ups > Lat Pull Downs; Barbell curls > dumbbell curls. Make them half body moves.

I've found that I get the biggest bang for the buck out of the big 4 (Press, bench, squat, dead) dips, pull ups, barbell curls, Kroc rows, goblet squat, and the ab wheel. I just stick to those. Pull ups and dips, I think are non-negotiable. The others, YMMV.

And to save time, I usually do a short set of my assistance lift between sets of my big lifts. So if it's press day, I do set of press, 5 pull ups, change weight, press, 5 x pull ups, change weight....etc. On 5.3.1 Boring but Strong, that ends up being 15 sets of 5 pull ups. Squat/DL days, I usually do dips between sets. Then at the end, I might do a short circuit of abs/goblet squats - 5 ab wheels, 10 GS on Squat/DL day or abs/barbell curls on bench/press day.

So anyway, on a -500 cut, I can do the full 5/3/1 Boring but Strong, plus 50-100 assistance lift between sets. I knock it all out in 50 minutes or so. The key there, on the cut, is for it to feel like a solid workout, but not be too taxing. Leave the gym feeling stronger (not sore, tired, and beat up). Don't hang out for another 30 minutes doing wrist curls and sit ups.

For me, this type of work-out allowed me to cut 25 lbs, and I set some sort of rep PR in the big 4 at least once a week. And while I never got to Lou Ferigno level ripped or symmetry, I was pretty f-ing strong at an all-time low adult bodyweight. It looks pretty damn good relative to all of the other 39 year olds I know.

Again, the keys were:

  • Focusing mental energy on the diet compliance

  • Skipping Cardio (could probably be personalized to include cutting out things that sap your mental energy)

  • Focus your lifting efforts on gaining strength - which means for me not distracting yourself with chasing mirror exercises.

  • Perhaps a more meta point, but get to know yourself and note what gives you the biggest bang for the buck.

    The sad ending to the story here is that I felt fucking awesome in February and started really pushing the PRs and getting out of balance with my training. One weekend I tested myself....pressed 250 x 1 and 5 repped 485 in the deadlift. Both felt great when I did them, but that same weekend I tweaked my shoulder cutting tree branches, and it went crazy on me on me the following day. Took 6 weeks for the doc to get me straightened out with stretching & ART, and another 2 months of very limited lifting. Basically push ups and goblet squats were the only things that didn't set my shoulder off. So now I'm back to working this same old routine trying to get back to where I was 9 months before (slowly!). Moral of the story here is that old guys need to stretch, and don't get greedy when testing. Stay in the program and eventually you'll hit the number you covet.

    One more thing, with regard to bulking. I don't do this much anymore, as I'm pretty satisfied hanging out at my current bodyweight and can still make gains. But it appears to me that your first mistake is that when you bulk, you're working out too much. The key that most guys miss when trying to build muscle is rest. You'd be better off doing 3 pretty intense workouts a week than 6 if you want to put on muscle.

    I didn't understand volume, rest, and eating until I did this program:

    Flat out, it is a motherfucker. I've done it twice. It's not something you can do more than maybe once a year. The first time I did it, I limped my way through the whole thing. It was ugly, but I got it done. I probably put on 6 lbs of legit lean body mass, a few lbs of fat. And my bench went through the roof when I did this. It's a good program. And it does a great job of putting you through the process of what it really takes to really pack on muscle.

    If you try it, buy the book and read it all. Then, follow it to the letter - the workouts, the timing, the "tweaks". Dan John, the author, is a really sharp guy, a top tier coach, and a good writer. By the end of the program, at the very least, you learn a good deal about what type of things work or don't work for you, and what types of things to add to your 'regular' routines that help you gain.

    That's all I've got for now. I could go on about this forever, but hopefully you can pull some nuggets out for yourself.
    /u/MRPsurf, hopefully there's some value for you as well.
u/Reach180 · 3 pointsr/marriedredpill

> Need to add gallon-of-milk-a-day to increase cals to 4,000+.

You can't rush progress. GOMAD is a ticket to bloated fatass. Fine if your only goals are lifting more weight, BMI be damned....but if you want to just build muscle, there are better ways. Not for the faint of heart.

Sepaen is right about your bmr.


u/IGaveHerThe · 1 pointr/leangains

Cool. Buy Mass Made Simple and follow the manual to the T. Start with the Six-week squat 101 workout and then do the 6 week bulking plan. You should be ready for football come fall.

u/GrippingHand · 1 pointr/Fitness

Some programs are designed for building mass, like Jim Wendler's Building the Monolith ( https://jimwendler.com/blogs/jimwendler-com/101078918-building-the-monolith-5-3-1-for-size ) or Dan John's book Mass Made Simple ( https://www.amazon.com/Mass-Made-Simple-Dan-John-ebook/dp/B006HXPR66 , and he has some related articles you can Google for). Note that they both have diet recommendations, as well as things to do in the gym.