John Little
Who is Mike Mentzer, really, and why is he considered so controversial?
Prolific Author and High-Intensity Training Expert John Little returns to talk about the new book on Mike Mentzer: American Odysseus — why is it so important to know the truth about Mike Mentzer and everything that happened to him?
John goes into Mike’s confrontation with Arnold Schwarzenegger, how his views on high-intensity training changed over the years, what type of HIT workouts he may prescribe if he were training clients today, and more.
With the surprising amount of misinformation about and pushback against Mike Mentzer today, you’ll want to tune in to this episode to learn why all of this is really going on.
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Show Notes
- 00:33 – About the new book on Mike Mentzer: American Odysseus
- 03:00 – When Mike Mentzer confronted Arnold Schwarzenegger — why?
- 11:00 – The reactions to the new book
- 12:12 – John’s motivations for writing the book
- 16:43 – John’s thoughts on the days of Bruce Lee and Mike Mentzer’s respective deaths
- 18:23 – The process of writing the book and why John did it the way he did
- 26:12 – How Mike Mentzer would actually think about strength training
- 28:51 – Mike’s little-known mental health challenges
- 34:14 – Mike Mentzer VS Dr. Doug McGuff and John Little on HIT
- 37:32 – If Mike were alive today, how would he approach exercise?
- 54:29 – John Little’s approach to HIT workouts nowadays
- 1:02:30 – How does John’s current approach affect his business?
- 1:08:11 – On acquiring the Mike Mentzer estate with Simon Shawcross
Note: these are the timestamps for the audio edition. For the video edition’s timestamps, please see the YouTube description box for this episode.
The Books Mentioned in this Episode
- Mike Mentzer: American Odysseus – John Little
- High-Intensity Training The Mike Mentzer Way – Mike Mentzer and John Little
- Heavy Duty II: Mind and Body
- Mr. America: A biographical novel – Nicolas Chemla
- Body by Science – Dr. Doug McGuff & John Little
- Muscle, Smoke & Mirrors – Randy Roach
- The One-Minute Workout – Martin Gibala
- The Ultimate Exercise Bulletin #1 (through a link in Dr. McGuff’s web shop)
People Mentioned & Selected Links from this Episode
- John Little | Nautilus North | Books | Heavy Duty College (Mike Mentzer YouTube Channel) | HIB Episodes
- John’s Mike Mentzer Course on HITuni (Use Code “HIB10” for a discount!)
- The Official Mike Mentzer Website
- Randy Roach
- Boyer Coe
- Ben Weider
- Joe Weider
- Bruce Lee
- Dorian Yates | Official Website | HIB Episodes
- Dr. Doug McGuff | Official Website | Ultimate Exercise Studio | | The Body by Science Q&A Book | HIB Episodes
- Dr. Ellington Darden | Dr. Darden on Amazon | On Google Books | The New High-Intensity Training (book)
- Ryan Hall | Exercise Science LLC | On Facebook | HIB Episodes
- Bill DeSimone | Bill DeSimone on Amazon | Bill on Instagram | Optimal Exercise | Bill’s YouTube channel | Joint-Friendly Fitness YouTube Channel | HIB Episodes
- Simon Shawcross | HITuni | HIB Episodes
- Nicolas Chemla
- Martin Gibala
- Ayn Rand | Official Website
- IFBB | Official Website
- A Beautiful Mind (film)
477 – Muscle Gains or Marketing Gimmick? The Truth Behind the Colorado Experiment (with Pete Cerqua)
461 – Simon Shawcross and John Little: The Life and Legacy of Mike Mentzer
417 – Efficient Fitness: Unpacking the ‘Done in One’ Method with John Little
Overall, I enjoyed listening to Mr. Little, and especially the part
describing his current workout routine. In the same vein of thought, I believe that I have reached my genetic limits as regards any additional muscle hypertrophy. Therefore, I too started experimenting with one set workouts.
Pete Sisco wrote many years ago that the leg press was the greatest stimulus for muscle hypertrophy, as no other exercise could claim to lift a weight over a distance that compares to the leg press. It stands to reason
that the greatest indirect effect would be present while utilizing the leg press.
Christopher, over on highintensity.net had a file on a Leg Press Only routine which concurs with Mr. Sisco’s belief on the leg press. There was discussion of the isometronic leg press being used.
I started with a leg press, pulldown, Nautilus decline press done 1 set to failure on MWF’s followed by a 5-minute ReHiT on an Assault Bike. this quickly led to staleness; I switched to one exercise a week followed by a 5-minute ReHiT. This quickly made a huge difference as training enthusiasm returned and mood and energy improved. I use pure static hold on the decline press and leg press, and SuperSlow on the pulldown.
In The future, I may go to every 2 weeks if progress goes stale, but ReHit will continue, as this is an area of exercise I cannot agree with the HiT mainstream. Cardiovascular conditioning is not as simple as “Pyruvate stacking up” at the mitochondria.
I agree with Mr. Little that Mike Mentzer would have moved to even less exercise and dietary calories. I was shocked when he mentioned 550 calories in his dairy prior to the 1979 Mr. Olympia.
Dr. Roy Taylor, and Dr. Michael Mosley championed 800 calories daily for 12 weeks. It’s also rewarding to see Mike Mentzer did lots of cardio. What could have been!
I’ve been thinking about the Power Factor Training range of motions and the Static Contraction Training ranges that John and Pete wrote about way back in the 90s. There is also another trainer the advocates doing isometrics in some of the same and or very similar ranges, that got me thinking as well. The effort that I will be contracting with though won’t be a maximum effort. Also I will likely be doing the dynamic contractions and with maybe more range of motion than what was recommended in Power Factor Training, or maybe not, but still conservative. Not locking out. I am interested in the neural, strength stimulation, the bone stimulation, and staying in leverage advantaged ranges.
I think back to working out with a friend of mine many years ago. We were doing dumbbell bench presses. My friend said something along the lines of trying to use only my chest muscles to do the exercise. Granted I don’t think this was the first time I had heard of this type of recommendation, this type of intent. The idea of trying to “uninvole” muscles that automatically come into play for a given range motion, a given kinetic chain, seemed strange to me all those years ago. John talking about doing the hybrid full body exercises and doing the more traditional multi joint exercises really got me thinking a lot about this as well. As of some what recent I have been doing exercises that are absolutely multi joint, multi muscle involving, that seem to work very well with the whole body, synergistically. Not where you feel like you are trying to uninvole or inhibit, almost fighting against your body to do the movement, exercise. I also think back to the the ranges John was using in the Max Pyramid Protocol videos that he put out several years ago and look at the great full body involvement of the 3 or 4 static holds therein. Doing one big movement or hold in a work out is very interesting indeed to me. Embracing the intuitiveness to bring into play the many muscles rather than trying to fight against this happening and then trying to use the same “inhibited muscles” again in another exercise.
Years ago, Pete Sisco involved a similar “hybrid “ approach to a weight training program. He referred to this as a SuperRep in his CNS workout book. This SuperRep varied and mostly consisted of a close grip & wide grip bench press combined together, a deadlift combined with a shrug, and a leg press-toe press combination. I felt that the secondary part of the SuperRep got less effort after the primary lift. YMMV!
The human body instinctively tries to handle heavy loads in leverage advantaged positions , so I have always favored that type of position for training purposes, especially for statics.
Dr. Keith Baar has brought to light how to strengthen and heal tendons and connective tissues. His work on isometrics is one of the most important discoveries on physical training in years, not to mention his work on mTor!
Great stuff indeed. I am all about reaping the benefits and doing so in the least wear and tear way possible. I do remember some about Pete’s SuperRep that you brought up. He and John have long made me think outside of the box. I have been working out at home for the last several months. Working out at the gym, it takes longer to get to and from the gym than the workouts. I have a decent amount of free weights, more weight than I’m likely going to ever need for the exercises I can do practically and choose to do. I do miss having access to a leg press, you were talking about the press a bit. I do like being able to do a compound leg exercise and taking the lower back out of the mix. I still do a deadlift type of lift and sometimes barbell squats, but I am conservative on the amount of weight. I might eventually see about setting up some type of belt squat type of configuration or try to find a way to do static leg presses against something very sturdy. I need to make more time for steady state type activity as well. Whenever I do steady state type activity, sometimes inadvertently, I feel really good.
With strength training. My concern is to keep that upper level strength as much a possible. But not testing my absolute limit, if that makes sense? I have experienced hypertrophy over the years as well, which is great, but my intention, my concern when I strength train, is to be able to lift and or contract against a challenging weight, a challenging resistance. I am not really concerned about “going to failure”, or reaching a deep level of fatigue or inroad. Though some fatigue happens of course.
One of the more interesting SuperRep combinations was One-Rep Abs!
This was an weighted crunch/weighted oblique crunch/weighted side bind.
This was done with a static contraction performed in one slow semicircular motion. He uses 5-10 seconds for statics. I personally use 1 minute statics.
Yeah I know…..HiTers don’t need any ab work…..but …there it is.
One of the more important points of isometric static contraction is frequency of training. Sisco states that if in a WO a failure to improve on 3 of 5 exercises (60%) , that an extra 3 days off between workouts is to be added. Additionally, a failure to improve on any 2 exercises of 5 total exercises requires those 2 exercises to be skipped for the next workout. This aspect of training is hardly ever discussed, but for alpha trainees like myself who have likely tapped their genetic potential this is salient information.
That is interesting regarding the SuperRep for the abs. I also hear you with the 1 minute static vs. a 5 to 10 second static. For me it is a mixture of feel and still attempting to contract against a challenging weight/resistance.
If it feels to overbearing, too heavy, I lower amount the resistance. Regarding HITer’s not needing ab work, I hear your comment with that as well. I am most certainly influenced by HIT, but I do things in the realm of strength training that also do not go along with HIT. I would also say what I do is probably more MIT (moderate intensity training). I think I work my muscles to a decent degree, but I’m just not into the whole, go to failure or the sky will fall, or go beyond failure or you’re not giving it your all, yadda, yadda, yadda. I also get the intention of getting to all the fibers, recruiting all the fibers. I’m not trying make anybody upset. To each their own, and maybe I’m not accurately articulating what I’m trying to say.
I do this to stay strong and feel good. Regarding frequency that Pete recommended. I think he has really made a point of trying to tell people that workouts can be done very infrequent and you still reap the many benefits. I don’t want to take away from what you said , because his writings and recommendations are very precise as you pointed out and very much encourage keeping detailed records.
Lots of interesting, applicable, information out there that I didn’t think of until I happened upon the writings of the likes of Mike, John, Pete, and many others.
I apologize for my comments regarding training to failure. I will refrain from commenting further. I enjoyed the podcast a and your comments Marcrph.
Perhaps to ultimate Super Consolidated exercise owing to the SuperRep ideology is a Sumo deadlift (Ed Coan style).
I do a SuperSlow rep then at the top position of the repetition Lower the weight with an eccentric-emphasis via a stiff-legged style of performance.
Combining this with a chin-up will get the job done. I am surprised that heavy squats illicit very high calf EMG readings, as deadlifts certainly would also. Any need for calf exercises….who knows… study that!
During the interview conducted here, a brief mention by John Little of a cardiac study consisting of a once a week frequency was stated. This study was mentioned in concert of Martin Gibala’s book, “The One-Minute Workout.”
Little mentions 56, 000 participants over 16 years resulting from this once weekly session.
This study is mentioned in detail on pages 180, 181 of TOMWO.
Ulrik Wisloff, has several studies About cardiovascular interval training , as he just was one of the authors. This study was not proof that Body by Science HiT-style weight training done circuit style supplanted or replaced any traditional cardiovascular training , or especially HiIT interval training. Ulrik Wisloff was renowned for cardiovascular interval training.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17001221/