Bigger Leaner Stronger

by Michael Matthews

  The close-grip bench press is just a regular bench press but with a narrower grip, and is a great way to focus on the triceps.

  Pinto RS, Gomes N, Radaelli R, Botton CE, Brown LE, Bottaro M. Effect of Range of Motion on Muscle Strength and Thickness. J Strength Cond Res. 2012;26(8):2140-2145. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e31823a3b15.

  Chandler TJ, Wilson GD, Stone MH. The effect of the squat exercise on knee stability. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 1989;21(3):299-303; Magni NE, McNair PJ, Rice DA. The effects of resistance training on muscle strength, joint pain, and hand function in individuals with hand osteoarthritis: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Arthritis Res Ther. 2017;19(1):131. doi:10.1186/s13075-017-1348-3; Susko AM, Fitzgerald GK. The pain-relieving qualities of exercise in knee osteoarthritis. Open access Rheumatol Res Rev. 2013;5:81-91. doi:10.2147/OARRR.S53974.

  Steiner ME, Grana WA, Chillag K, Schelberg-Karnes E. The effect of exercise on anterior-posterior knee laxity. Am J Sports Med. 1986;14(1):24-29. doi:10.1177/036354658601400105.

  Solomonow M, Baratta R, Zhou BH, et al. The synergistic action of the anterior cruciate ligament and thigh muscles in maintaining joint stability. Am J Sports Med. 1987;15(3):207-213. doi:10.1177/036354658701500302.

  Schoenfeld BJ. Squatting Kinematics and Kinetics and Their Application to Exercise Performance. J Strength Cond Res. 2010;24(12):3497-3506. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3181bac2d7.

  Ariel BG. Biomechanical analysis of the knee joint during deep knee bends with heavy load. In: Biomechanics IV. London: Macmillan Education UK; 1974:44-52. doi:10.1007/978-1-349-02612-8_7.

  Myer GD, Kushner AM, Brent JL, et al. The back squat: A proposed assessment of functional deficits and technical factors that limit performance. Strength Cond J. 2014;36(6):4-27. doi:10.1519/SSC.0000000000000103.

  Schwanbeck S, Chilibeck PD, Binsted G. A Comparison of Free Weight Squat to Smith Machine Squat Using Electromyography. J Strength Cond Res. 2009;23(9):2588-2591. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3181b1b181.

  Kay AD, Blazevich AJ. Effect of Acute Static Stretch on Maximal Muscle Performance. Med Sci Sport Exerc. 2012;44(1):154-164. doi:10.1249/MSS.0b013e318225cb27.

  Blanchard TW, Smith C, Grenier SG. In a dynamic lifting task, the relationship between cross-sectional abdominal muscle thickness and the corresponding muscle activity is affected by the combined use of a weightlifting belt and the Valsalva maneuver. J Electromyogr Kinesiol. 2016;28:99-103. doi:10.1016/j.jelekin.2016.03.006.

  Hackett DA, Chow C-M. The Valsalva Maneuver. J Strength Cond Res. 2013;27(8):2338-2345. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e31827de07d; Fleck SJ, Dean LS. Resistance-training experience and the pressor response during resistance exercise. J Appl Physiol. 1987;63(1):116-120. doi:10.1152/jappl.1987.63.1.116.

  Colado JC, Pablos C, Chulvi-Medrano I, Garcia-Masso X, Flandez J, Behm DG. The Progression of Paraspinal Muscle Recruitment Intensity in Localized and Global Strength Training Exercises Is Not Based on Instability Alone. Arch Phys Med Rehabil. 2011;92(11):1875-1883. doi:10.1016/j.apmr.2011.05.015.

  Cholewicki J, McGill SM. Lumbar posterior ligament involvement during extremely heavy lifts estimated from fluoroscopic measurements. J Biomech. 1992;25(1):17-28.

  Beggs LA. Comparison of muscle activation and kinematics during the deadlift using a double-pronated and overhand/underhand grip. University of Kentucky Master’s Theses. 2011.

  Green CM, Comfort P. The Affect of Grip Width on Bench Press Performance and Risk of Injury. Strength Cond J. 2007;29(5):10-14. doi:10.1519/00126548-200710000-00001.

  Duffey MJ, Challis JH. Vertical and Lateral Forces Applied to the Bar during the Bench Press in Novice Lifters. J Strength Cond Res. 2011;25(9):2442-2447. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3182281939; Madsen N, McLaughlin T. Kinematic factors influencing performance and injury risk in the bench press exercise. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 1984;16(4):376-381.

  Duffey MJ, Challis JH. Vertical and Lateral Forces Applied to the Bar during the Bench Press in Novice Lifters. J Strength Cond Res. 2011;25(9):2442-2447. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3182281939.

  Part 6

  Don’t Buy Another Supplement Until You Read This

  25

  The Great Supplement Hoax

  Your love for what you do and willingness to push yourself where others aren’t prepared to go is what will make you great.

  —LAURENCE SHAHLAEI

  “Pills in a bottle, brother.”

  I frowned. Was he serious?

  “It’s pretty slick, right?” Anthony said with a sideways grin.

  Anthony had a simple business. His supplement company spent about $2 million per month on pay-per-click advertising and brought in close to $4 million in sales.

  What kind of “pills in a bottle” was he selling, exactly?

  Anthony didn’t know. He couldn’t tell me a single ingredient. What he did know, however, is a bottle cost him $3 to produce and sold for $39.99. He also knew that, on average, he got close to $100 out of customers before they finally figured out how to cancel their subscriptions.

  Oh, and he also knew that his million-dollar renovation of his multimillion-dollar mansion was coming along splendidly.

  When I first entered the fitness industry, I thought Anthony was an anomaly. A bad apple in the orchard. Sadly, I was wrong. People like him are more the rule than the exception.

  In fact, the supplement industry is best described by Ben Kenobi’s famous words: a wretched hive of scum and villainy.

  Seriously. Fake news, fake science, fake products—you can find it all in the supplement racket. It’s almost funny . . . in the not so funny kind of way.

  Don’t believe me?

  In 2015, the New York State Attorney General’s office accused four national retailers of selling dietary supplements that were fraudulent and in many cases contaminated with unlisted ingredients.1

  The authorities said they had run tests on popular store brands of herbal supplements at the retailers—Walmart, Walgreens, Target, and GNC—which showed that roughly four out of five of the products contained none of the herbs listed on their labels.

  In many cases, the supplements contained little more than cheap fillers like rice and house plants, or substances that could be hazardous to people with food allergies.

  According to lab tests obtained by the Michigan law firm Barbat, Mansour and Suciu in 2015, a number of sports supplement brands including Giant Sports, MusclePharm, CVS Health, 4 Dimension Nutrition, NBTY, and Inner Armour were mixing cheap fillers into their protein powders to bring down costs and were falsifying their supplement fact panels to cover their tracks.2

  Even worse is the supplement company Driven Sports, which was busted in 2013 for putting a methamphetamine-like drug in their popular preworkout supplement “Craze.”3 Apparently meth makes for some pretty intense workouts.

  Oh, and their CEO was also previously busted for selling anabolic steroids and illegal weight loss drugs.4

  Yet another supplement company, USPlabs, was slapped by the FDA in 2013 for selling a preworkout supplement (“Jack3d”) spiked with a dangerously powerful stimulant called DMAA, and then again in 2015 for selling a fat loss product (“OxyELITE Pro”) laced with fluoxetine (Prozac) and drugs that caused liver damage and failure.5 After making over $400 million from 2008 to 2013, I might add.6 A genius plan, if you love jail.

  The sad lesson I’ve learned is the majority of supplement companies, especially sports supplement companies, are first and foremost marketing companies.

  Most are in the game of, as one supplement company CEO put it to me, “telling people what they want to hear to sell them what they don’t need.” He thought that was pretty clever.

  That’s not a hard game to play, either. Anybody can reach out to a contract
manufacturer, ask for some off-the-shelf formulations full of useless ingredients, slap some fancy labels on bottles, recruit some steroid-fueled Instagram celebrities to shill for them, and have a shot at moving a lot of product.

  A smart marketer once said that you can persuade people of just about anything if you can convince them it has science or history on its side. If you want easy evidence of this, just browse through workout magazines and check out some of the supplement advertisements.

  The copy will be loaded with phrases like “science-based,” “evidence-based,” and “clinically dosed,” and for good reason—they work. Most people don’t really know what these buzzwords mean or how to validate the claims, but the connotations and promises are enough to drive billions of dollars per year in sales.

  At first glance, it sounds like a scientist’s wet dream for companies to care so much about the love and passion they put into their research. The fantasy evaporates when you look a little closer, however.

  Most supplement companies don’t want to be backed by science, they want to appear to be backed by science. To them, science is a family of slogans to sling around for more revenue, and while these companies’ errors, inaccuracies, and exaggerations are sometimes honest mistakes, they’re more often deliberate deceptions.

  This is easy to do because the supplement industry is completely unregulated, so anyone can fraudulently appeal to science with virtual impunity. And when there are millions and millions of dollars on the line, you’d better believe that many supplement marketers are willing to cut every corner they can.

  An illustrative example of this is the controversy surrounding the supplement β-Hydroxy β-Methylbutyrate (HMB), a natural substance derived from the amino acid leucine.

  According to a study conducted by scientists at the University of Tampa, people supplementing with HMB gained triple the amount of lean mass as those taking a placebo, lost over twice as much body fat, gained far more strength, and were significantly less sore from their workouts.7

  In other words, according to this research, HMB was about as effective for muscle gain and fat loss as anabolic steroids.8

  Sorry to interrupt, but do you smell something? You do too? What is that?

  Let’s follow the money to find out. Who funded this study? The company Metabolic Technologies, which owns several patents related to HMB. Oh, and look at that, three of the study’s authors worked there as well.

  Could that stench be a steaming pile of conflict of interest?

  Several other studies on HMB have reported similarly astounding benefits, but it’s hard to get excited when you learn they were conducted by Steven Nissen, who owns Metabolic Technologies.9

  Even more telling is that quite a bit of unbiased research has been conducted on HMB with very different results. For instance:

  A study conducted by scientists at Massey University found that HMB supplementation improved lower-body strength but had negligible effects on body composition.10

  A study conducted by scientists on the Singapore Sports Council found that HMB supplementation had no effect on strength or body composition.11

  A study conducted by scientists at the University of Memphis found that HMB supplementation didn’t reduce catabolism or enhance body composition or strength.12

  Researchers from Massey University also conducted a review of HMB research and concluded the following:

  Supplementation with HMB during resistance training incurs small but clear overall and leg strength gains in previously untrained men, but effects in trained lifters are trivial. The HMB effect on body composition is inconsequential.13

  This little anecdote teaches us a very valuable supplementation lesson: if a supplement sounds too good to be true, it probably is. If even a minority of these products worked half as well as their advertisements claimed, we’d all be fitness models by now.

  Why all the skulduggery and shenanigans?

  Filthy lucre, of course. Morals can become surprisingly supple and relativistic when plied with cash (“What’s right and wrong anyway?”). When you’re presented with an unethical opportunity to make millions of dollars fast, you learn who you really are. And many pill and powder pushers are frauds to their bones.

  All this is why most workout supplements are completely bogus and can’t deliver a fraction of the results they promise. They are, for lack of a better term, worthless crap. And some are even dangerous.

  This shell game will continue until something is done about it, and for my part, I don’t want to wait and see if the FDA is ever going to get serious about cracking down.

  We consumers hold more power than we think. Our dollars determine everything. If we keep giving them to these shady operators, we’re giving them permission to keep exploiting us.

  If we don’t, however—if we withhold our money and demand change—we can send a powerful message to the entire industry: shape up or ship out.

  When you take a supplement, you’re putting your health in the hands of complete strangers who work in an industry overflowing with cash and crooks. This is why many people have decided to stay away from supplements altogether, which is a perfectly reasonable position considering what I’ve just told you.

  It’s too bad though because not all supplements are junk. There are safe, natural supplements that can help you gain muscle, lose fat, and get healthy faster.

  No, they’re not going to transform your body or life, but high-quality, unbiased research shows they can give you a slight edge in your journey to a fitter and healthier you.

  The trick, then, is knowing which supplements are actually worth buying and which aren’t, and that’s exactly what you’re going to learn in the next chapter.

  O’Connor A. New York Attorney General Targets Supplements at Major Retailers. New York Times Website. https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/02/03/new-york-attorney-general-targets-supplements-at-major-retailers/. February 3, 2015. Accessed August 23, 2018.

  Morrell A. Lawsuits Say Protein Powders Lack Protein, Ripping Off Athletes. Forbes Website. https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexmorrell/2015/03/12/lawsuits-say-protein-powders-lack-protein-ripping-off-athletes/#14fbd4467729. March 12, 2015. Accessed August 23, 2018.

  Young A. Popular sports supplements contain meth-like compound. USA Today Website. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/10/14/tests-of-supplements-craze-and-detonate-find-methamphetamine-like-compound/2968041/. October 14, 2013. Accessed August 23, 2018.

  Young A. Sports supplement designer has history of risky products. USA Today Website. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/07/25/bodybuilding-supplement-designer-matt-cahill-usa-today-investigation/2568815/. July 25, 2014. Accessed August 23, 2018.

  Young A. Firm in outbreak probe has history of run-ins with FDA. USA Today Website. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/10/24/usplabs-has-history-of-fda-run-ins-ceo-with-criminal-history/3179113/. October 24, 2013. Accessed August 23, 2018; U.S. Food & Drug Administration. DMAA in Products Marketed as Dietary Supplements. U.S. Food & Drug Administration Website. https://www.fda.gov/food/dietarysupplements/productsingredients/ucm346576.htm. August 7, 2018. Accessed August 23, 2018; U.S. Food & Drug Administration. Public Notification: Oxy ELITE Pro Super Thermogenic contains hidden drug ingredient. U.S. Food & Drug Administration Website. https://www.fda.gov/drugs/resourcesforyou/consumers/buyingusingmedicinesafely/medicationhealthfraud/ucm436017.htm. February 28, 2015. Accessed August 23, 2018; National Institutes of Health. Drug Record: OxyELITE Pro. National Institutes of Health LiverTox Website. https://livertox.nih.gov/OxyELITEPro.htm. July 5, 2018. Accessed August 23, 2018.

  United States Department of Justice. USPlabs and Corporate Officers Indicted. United States Department of Justice Website. https://www.justice.gov/usao-ndtx/pr/usplabs-and-corporate-officers-indicted. November 17, 2015. Accessed August
23, 2018.

  Wilson JM, Lowery RP, Joy JM, et al. The effects of 12 weeks of beta-hydroxy-beta-methylbutyrate free acid supplementation on muscle mass, strength, and power in resistance-trained individuals: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study. Eur J Appl Physiol. 2014;114(6):1217-1227. doi:10.1007/s00421-014-2854-5.

  Bhasin S, Storer TW, Berman N, et al. The Effects of Supraphysiologic Doses of Testosterone on Muscle Size and Strength in Normal Men. N Engl J Med. 1996;335(1):1-7. doi:10.1056/NEJM199607043350101.

  Panton LB, Rathmacher JA, Baier S, Nissen S. Nutritional supplementation of the leucine metabolite beta-hydroxy-beta-methylbutyrate (hmb) during resistance training. Nutrition. 2000;16(9):734-739; Nissen SL, Sharp RL. Effect of dietary supplements on lean mass and strength gains with resistance exercise: a meta-analysis. J Appl Physiol. 2003;94(2):651-659. doi:10.1152/japplphysiol.00755.2002.

  Thomson JS, Watson PE, Rowlands DS. Effects of Nine Weeks of β-Hydroxy-β- Methylbutyrate Supplementation on Strength and Body Composition in Resistance Trained Men. J Strength Cond Res. 2009;23(3):827-835. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3181a00d47.

  Slater G, Jenkins D, Logan P, et al. Beta-hydroxy-beta-methylbutyrate (HMB) supplementation does not affect changes in strength or body composition during resistance training in trained men. Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab. 2001;11(3):384-396.

  Kreider RB, Ferreira M, Wilson M, Almada AL. Effects of Calcium β-Hydroxy-β-methylbutyrate (HMB) Supplementation During Resistance-Training on Markers of Catabolism, Body Composition and Strength. Int J Sports Med. 1999;20(8):503-509. doi:10.1055/s-1999-8835.

  Rowlands DS, Thomson JS. Effects of β-Hydroxy-β-Methylbutyrate Supplementation During Resistance Training on Strength, Body Composition, and Muscle Damage in Trained and Untrained Young Men: A Meta-Analysis. J Strength Cond Res. 2009;23(3):836-846. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3181a00c80.