After reading the preceding few chapters concerning the new types of equipment, some impressionable readers may be left thinking, "... since I don’t have the new equipment, why bother to train at all."

But if such an impression has been gained, then it is in grave error; properly used, barbells are extremely productive tools -- and to at least some degree, they should be used even by people who do have the use of the new types of equipment.

Men like Schwarzenegger, Coe, Pearl, Columbu -- and many others -- are products of barbell training; all of the above named men have, or soon will have, used Nautilus equipment -- but it was not responsible for their development, all of them were well-known long before they ever heard of the new types of equipment.

Even greater degrees of development will probably be produced by some few individuals in the future -- and it is very likely that most such men will use Nautilus equipment; but that will still not reduce the well-proven value of barbell training -- and barbells will be in even more common use a hundred years from now than they are at the present.

Twenty-five years ago, I had the distinct impression that the "exact program" was of greatest importance -- and such considerations are, of very real importance; but I have long since realized that "how" you train is of even more importance. Properly performed, even in a very few basic barbell exercises will produced good results -- improperly performed, and no amount of exercises or sets will produce equal results.

Using only a barbell, one light pair of dumbbells, a flat bench, a chinning bar, parallel bars, a squat rack and one fairly-simple pulley device, an enormous amount of results can be produced in a fairly short time by the proper practice of the following training program...

The above program -- consisting of a total of 27 sets, to be performed in one hour and sixteen minutes, three times weekly -- will build great overall strength and muscular mass in almost all cases; and in individual cases where the results produced are below expectations, it is probable that the program should be reduced, rather than increased.

I used the above outlined training program more than twenty years ago -- and produced very good results with it -- but in light of knowledge gained in the meantime, I would now alter it in several ways; instead of standing presses with a barbell, I would use a slightly different exercise with heavy dumbbells, strict presses with the elbows held back in line with the shoulders and with a parallel grip (with palms of the hands facing each other) -- behind-neck chins would be performed with a fairly narrow grip and I would use a bar that permitted a parallel grip in this case also -- a set of dumbbell supine lateral raises with nearly-straight arms would be added immediately before each set of bench presses -- the barbell curls and pulley triceps curls would be performed alternately -- and I would substitute a set of behind-neck presses for the second set of dumbbell side raises.

Performed in the proper manner, the above routine is certainly NOT an easy routine -- on the contrary, it is an almost unbelievably hard routine; most trainees are not willing to work as hard as this routine requires for the production of best-possible results -- and many trainees are simply not aware that it is even possible to work that hard -- but if performed at a normal pace, or in the usual manner, then only a fraction of possible results will be produced.

If a wider selection of training equipment is available, then the previously-described routine involving three leg exercises -- leg-presses, thigh-extensions, and squats -- could be substituted for the squats in the routine outlined above; and, depending upon the exact equipment available, other changes could be made to improve the workouts -- but since the possibilities are almost infinite, I will not attempt to outline all such possible changes.

If the pre-exhaustion principle is clearly understood, then any reasonably-experienced trainee should be able to design his own workouts in order to incorporate this principle; and beginning trainees should limit themselves to much shorter, less complex routines.

An underweight individual desiring to increase his overall size and strength would be well advised to limit his training activities to a program somewhat along the lines of the following routine.

Most beginning trainees are far too anxious to make rapid gains in bodyweight -- and in most cases, this results in the addition of fatty tissue; an underweight but mature individual can usually gain at least an average of a pound a week for a period of six months by following a very brief (but hard) training program three times weekly -- some subjects will respond much faster, but caution is required if addition of fatty tissue is to be avoided, as it almost always should be.

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