Let me say that I am sorry to hear about the health issues of your dad and son as well as yourself. I hope all of you guys are doing much better now.
I am still confused though, mentioned a few posts up about wanting to look big at the beach and in the above post competing at a heavier weight.... then earlier in the post you mentioned that you wanted to increase a chosen lift from 225 x 12 to 315 x 12...... which leads me to ask....
Are you training for strength or training to get bigger?
I think you give such a passionate response because mainstream bodybuilding has defined who you are as a person.
DO You truely believe that Golds gym or Worlds gym is an Elite level training center?? They are recreational gyms for the everyday gym-goer, the regular lay-person.
Here are a few Elite level training centers:
http://www.ppcchicago.com/index2.php
http://www.ihpfit.com/
These are serious Elite level performance training centers which caters to Olympic level athletes and highly paid professional athletes and the lay-person who wants optimal training.
If DC is so optimal at building strength and muscle why dont Elite level trainig centers like these use it? WHy dont professional strength/performance coaches use it to build strength?
Why dont Dave Tate or Elitefts.com and Luoie Simmons of Westside use DC instead of their own meathods to build strength>??
Pleas ehelp me to understand this because I am confused.
mostly the examples I gave were to illustrate certain points. The bottom line and the overall theory behind dogcrapp-as I understand it-is if you get stronger, for reps not for singles you're going to grow. DC talks about the guy we all know who can put up 405 for a rep but doesn't have a chest but how many guys do you know who can put up 345 for 12-15 reps in rest paused fashion that show no develpement? Over all if I go from 225*12 to 315*15 over 6 months on the close grip bench press my tri's are gonna grow, so you are training for strength but you're doing it in a way that also promotes musclular growth. Lets put it this way, what do you think is gonna give you better results doing close grips with 225 for 2 sets of 10 in january and then doing the same movement in july using 235lbs or busting your ass and making yourself strong as an ox while focusing on recovery?
I talked about the beach just to say if you look big and you're getting the results you want it doesn't matter if you use a smith or free wieghts or machines....as long as it works you use it.
as far as the elite fitness facilties...how many people on this board are gonna train at the facilities you mentioned? Most guys here train at a golds or a powerhouse...hell, I've never been in those places. I think once you subscribe to the dogma of "I've got to use freewieghts" you limit your options too much. There are good things about alot of machines, now I wouldn't tell a guy to train on a hammer strength machine for 6 months then go enter a powerlifting meet, that would be stupid but if that guy trained on a hammer strenght machine and was improving the bodypart he was training why tell him to stop? Again it's bodybuilding not powerlifting. There's a guy on the G&O boards named daddywaddy who claims to just do bodyweight pushups for hours at a time and he's gotten good results, I'm not gonna tell him to stop, is it what I "think" he should be doing? No but it's working for him.
as far as the strength training aspect of it goes, to be perfectly honest I don't know enough about it to debate it. I know I've gotten very, very strong on certain movements using this type of training. I know DC is working with powelifters but I dont' know what he has them doing. The main aspect of this type of training is that you're always lifting more weight or you loose that movement from your rotation, I got brutally strong on some things so I dont' see why it wouldn't translate. Go on youtube and look for vids of Justin harris or Steve Kulco, both train with DC and both are as strong as mules. I know rest pause techniques have been used in the past by some olympic trainers but that's all I know.
I hope i addressed everything, I've got a ton going on, maybe to make it easier if we want to continue this we can cut down on the length of the posts so I can get the answers out a little quicker otherwise I have to do it during my spare time and that rushes things, I'm on the road right now so it's a little rough to put all my thoughts down.