We both started our pre-photo Shoot with Natalie Minh diets on Monday of this week.

Jay was on the road eating pre-made protein pancakes out of plastic bags layered with Almond Butter in between client visits while battling the blazing 117′ temperatures of Phoenix.

Anh was at home raising the Muscle B’s and maintaining her conditioning with Hot Pilates and sessions on the stationary bike.

She kept up with her diet as well and is looking really good about 11 days out from the shoot.  Daddy continues to beam with joy at Mommy’s dedication even as all hell breaks loose around her with the Muscle B’s constant need of attention.

ANH’S DIET:

Meal 1: Egg Whites with a Couple of Yokes, Small Sweet Potato

Meal 2: Tilapia/Chicken with Small Sweet Potatoe and Nuts

Meal 3: Same

Meal 4: Post Workout Shake with Natural Oatbar(Training Days Only)

Meal 5: Lean Protein, Salad with Healthy Oil as dressing

Meal 6: Same if she doesn’t fall asleep

JAY’S DIET:

Meal 1: Protein Pancake with 2 Tablespoons of Almond Butter

Meal 2: Same

Meal 3: Same

Meal 4: Same

Meal 5: Post Workout Shake with Oatbar(Training Days Only)

Meal 6: Lean Protein, Asparagus or Broccoli

Our diets are very simple right now and small portions.  Lowered kcals and Higher Protein/EFA’s is the order of the day.  Both of us eat about 10-13kcals per pound and cycle up and down accordingly based on training and intuitive feel.  If we’re starving or glycogen depleted from an incredibly hard HIT workout, we’ll add a few more carbs by eating another Oat Bar or splitting an extra sweet potato.

Last night we found this new High EFA Flax Granola that is low in sugar that can be used for post workout carb re-feeds.  Or even a late night carb meal with some water and casein protein powder to spike up thyroid/BMR.  Just have to make sure you don’t eat too much.

Because we’ve been doing this so long now, we don’t really need to measure everything out but recommend it as a safe and scientific practice for any of our readers new to dieting or competing.

We’ll eat like this up until next Friday including this weekend.  We’ll have some flexibility to eat salads with protein if we’re out and about tomorrow and Sunday with the Muscle B’s or perhaps a Vegas Pool Party or two.

In fact, our goal is to take a lot of pictures from this last weekend of pool parties and then do a TMC Mega Summer Blog Pictorial with all of our best photos of the summer.  You won’t want to miss that.  Trust me.

Here are some video’s we’ve recently taken at Any Time Fitness in Summerlin on West Charleston.

There are lots of good demonstrations of intensity techniques including:

• Negative Emphasis Training with 10 Second Eccentrics
• Stopwatch Training(more on that in an upcoming post)
• Slow, deliberate controlled HIT Rep Sets

10′ Negative Emphasis Training DB Presses

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Os54aQaUjCQ

Stop Watch Training

www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRIMkUSpRSw

Stop Watch Hammer Rows

www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9nPwDAVc0A

Nautilus Machine HIT Full Contraction Crunches

www.youtube.com/watch?v=PS1Z9CPDJG8

Wide Grip HIT Dead Hang Inverted Pullups

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hdj_egEvJo4

Super Strict HIT Shoulder Machine Presses

www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAzlBuMJoHE

As always, we appreciate your patronage of our site.

Check back on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday for some incredible photos from this past summer.

Have a wonderful Labor Day Weekend.

MIHWCS

IN OUR HUMBLE OPINION, NOTHING is AS PRODUCTIVE as HIT TRAINING DONE RIGHT!

Here are the bicep and shoulder videos!

Please ask questions or comment about anything you see related to any of our HIT Training.  For those of you planning on performing HIT, listen closely to Markus as he coaches and offers tips and pointers.

Delt HIT Training Video

www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJwaJiPzzio

Bicep HIT Training Video

www.youtube.com/watch?v=kuxlt83QICY

Have a great weekend!

MIHWCS

As requested, here are 4 recently made ones.

Assisted Dip Machine

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gY_kkAtKLao

Pull Down Machine

www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzXryw_PhQA

Standing Lateral Raise Machine

www.youtube.com/watch?v=00wAtcDyLBA

Seated Shrug Machine

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SBgbINpEFM

Stand by for the first week update from Anh with pictures.

There appears to be a noticeable difference after only 7 days of cardio and dietary restriction.  She won’t begin weight training for another week.

MIHWCS

We even have a couple of videos of the 7 Month Pregnant Anhski working hard.

Please check it out when you have a moment.

We believe this type of training will produce dramatic results for any population group.

It’s not a program for a beginner or novice weight trainer.

Anyone who has more than a year of weight training experience under their belt can derive great benefit from Rest Pause training.

We will probably use this form of training for the next year only changing the exercises about every 8-12 weeks.  It’s that good.

Feel free to ask questions on the blog about tailoring it for your lifestyle.

Enjoy!

MIHWCS

Full Body Day 1

• Standing DB Delt Press(Touching Delt Caps)x3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxHNr9SKtrE

• Palms Facing Pulldownsx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=GjCMc6i9Uz0

• Upper Pec Flyesx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SA_289bi3BM

• Rear Delt Cable Flyesx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnxFoIOah1Q

• Standing Triceps 1 Arm Cable Extensionsx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLeqNLsbObM

• Standing 2 Arm DB Curlsx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6BmfpVuj00

• Lying Hamstring Curlsx3

• Hanging Leg Knee Upsx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2M64EnU6cAA

Full Body Day 3

• Hammer Incline Pressx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7QneDyYm8w

• Hammer Row Undergrip Rowsx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCnXeAkGayI

• Standing DB Lateral Raisesx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=D34nd7qI2lo

• Bent Over DB Rear Lateralsx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=od1YcjdExRY

• Standing Tricep Push Downs SS/w Reverse Cable Pushdownsx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3mHeWzniQg

• Preacher Machine Curlsx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPfeq_BioVA

• DB Standing Lunges

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-D2VSeoRik

• Decline Ab Curls

Full Body Day 5

• Incline DB Inverted Pressesx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWVUhDosvqw

• Hammer Lat Machine 2Arm Pull Downx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=LuWUx0t-GLo

• Standing DB Front Delt Raisesx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dutlMls4nng

• Barbell Shrugsx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=nv-IRjqJqWw

• DB Skull Crushers SS/w x3
• DB Hammer Curlsx3

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Av1Ho04Dq1M

• Leg Press Machinex3
• Hanging Knee Ups

MIHWCS

The newest one we’ll discuss are DROP SETS.

DROP SETS are when you continue an exercise by dropping the weight once muscle failure has been achieved with the starting weight.  They are usually most convenient with machine exercises whereby you can easily manipulate/drop the weight or resistance.  You can also use them with Free Weights from time to time as well.

There are a lot of reasons to use them in your training program.  In our opinion, the #1 over all reason is to completely destroy and shock  muscle fibers.   Dropping the weight, extending the set and continuing  reps until positive failure will traumatize the targeted muscle allowing for an increase in muscle size.

It’s imperative you exercise caution with DROP SETS and only use them every so often.  A general rule of thumb is to do no more than 1-2 drop sets per muscle group per training session.   Doing any more than that can lead to serious over training.

There is no hard or fast rule of how much weight to drop each succeeding set.  We normally decrease the weight anywhere from 20-35% at each drop.

• DB Delt Press—-50 P0und DB’s for 8 Reps—-Drop to 35 DB’s for 5-6 reps—-Drop to 25# DB’s and rep til failure (usually no more than the first set-8 reps)

The Muscle Couple tends to employ this technique  to ramp up our intensity and blast the targeted muscle.

We love to use “Triple Drops” as displayed in the video below of Jay performing a DROP SET on the Delt Press Machine at Gold’s Gym Pasadena.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYVfWMWwyuc

Learn to incorporate DROP SETS into your routine for some new muscle gains.

MIHWCS

The first one we’ll discuss are SUPERSETS!

SUPERSETS defined are when you choose two different exercises and perform them in rapid succession of each other with the goal of taking each set til failure.  This ensures maximum calorie burning and a continual elevated heart rate.  Your body will work  much harder as it forced to perform when it would normally be resting in between sets.

SUPERSETS are a great combination when striving to tax bigger and smaller regions of the same bodypart.  You can also perform them in attacking two different muscle groups at the same time.

They are incredibly difficult but very productive.

The Muscle Couple will use them under the following conditions:

• Pressed for time
• Trying to stimulate a lagging bodypart
• Increasing the intensity of our workout
• Variation in our normal lifting protocol

The video below shows Jay working his entire shoulder region:

Seated DB Laterals SUPERSETTED with Behind the Neck Barbell Presses.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZwVxw6axkk

In the next installment of this series, we’ll examine REST PAUSE TRAINING.

As with anything we discuss, please don’t hesitate to ask questions about incorporating supersets into your routine.

MIHWCS

It continues to be a work in progress but it’s looking much better.   Please check it out when you are looking for some new exercises to add to your routine.

There are also a bunch of videos utilizing FAT GRIPZ. We recommend them highly for superior arm development and injury prevention.

There are not as many Videos of Anh as we’d like but it’s tough being 5 Months Preggo!   Zod Bless her for keeping up still!

Speaking of Anh-

We’ll be detailing a Brand  New Blog Section on her last 3.5 Months discussing:

• Pregnancy Nutrition(2nd and 3rd Trimester)
• Training(Do’s and Don’ts)
• Her Feedback and Commentary on a weekly basis

Look for it soon!

We hope everyone has a tremendous weekend!

We’re heading to Venice Beach to let The Muscle B go wild!

MIHWCS

We just changed our current workout in the last week and have updated the site to reflect it.

As a go forward, we’ll actually leave a blog post every time we change it, so we can catalog all of these different workouts for the future.

You can really do any number of sets/reps for these programs.  You can also add intensity extending techniques like “Giant Sets-Drop Sets- Rest Pause etc”.  We’ll have a blog post soon about how to best utilize these techniques. A few of the exercises lack videos.  We’ll be updating throughout the course of the week to make sure everything is here.

We hope you find these demonstrations useful and tell your friends and exercise buddies to check them out for insight into good form and technique.

Here you go:

Positions of Flexion (POF)4 Day Split

DAY 1-CHEST-BACK-BICEPS-ABS

• Incline Machine Press(2 Sets 8-12 Reps and 1 Set of 2 Drops(Stripping the Weight shooting for 20+ Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=wD5dU4DufXE

• Pull-Ups to the  Front Shoulder Width Apart(3 Sets of 12-15 Reps Per Set)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ArNwg3hcP4U

• Cable Flyes on Incline Bench(2 Sets 8-12 Reps and 1 Set of 2 Drops(Stripping the Weight Shooting for 20+ Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=15LoTYL0dGI

• Pullover Machine(3 Sets of 12-15 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgkEGV_QhIk

• Standing Barbell Curl(3 Sets of 8-12 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=jb_YMoSVx2E

• DB Hammer Concentration Curls(3 Sets of 10-15 Reps0
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZoK_yuItagA

• Hanging Leg Raises(3 Sets of 20 Reps Each)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2M64EnU6cAA

DAY 2-DELTS-TRICEPS-LEGS

• DB Shoulder Press(3 Sets of 8-12 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Bm7etjYiBM

• 1 Arm Cable Lateral Raises(3 Sets of 10-15 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQwOM1A3cYI

• Barbell Front Raise with Phat Gripz(3 Sets of 8-12 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=4asMwQOZGSU

• Barbell Close Grip Bench Press(3 Sets of 8-12 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Em4SDDTiT3U

• DB/Cable One Arm Tricep Extension(3 Sets of 10-15 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ogw7ZiPMUVE

• Machine Leg Press(3 Sets of 15-20 Reps)
  
• Lying Leg Curls (Hamstrings)(2 Sets of 15 Reps0
  

DAY 4-CHEST-BACK-BICEPS-ABS

• Seated Flat Machine Chest Press(2 Sets of 8-12 Reps and 1 Set of 2 Drops(Stripping the Weight)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0Hg5LHQCrc

• Parallel Close Grip Pullup(3 Sets of 10-15 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5v8kMRabQ0

• Machine Pec Dec(3 Sets of 15 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTezwMv1U2c

• High Cable Row(3 Sets of 12-15 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=smjhs0ijLAA

• Preacher Spider Curls w/Phat Gripz(3 Sets of 8-12 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=01apIpkP9QE

• DB Concentration Curls w/Phat Gripz(3 Sets of 15 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHFvXKFP2Hk

• Decline Oblique Crunch(3 Sets Til Failure)
  

DAY 5-DELTS-TRICEPS-LEGS

• Barbell Behind the Neck Overhead Presses(3 Sets of 10-12 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=zu64TzsV4A4

• DB 1 Arm Lateral Raise Contracted(3 Sets of 15 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMIfNLEq9Js

• Cable Reverse Flyes(3 Sets of 8-12 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CD6UmFyNNs

• Barbell Close Grip Skull Crusher(2 Sets of 12-15 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJCtq843guU

• Cable Rope Overhead Tricep Extension(2 Sets of 12-15 Reps)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Al4y_Nuw8aE

• 1 Arm Reverse Grip Tricep Pushdown(2 Sets of 15 Reps Each)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=nE3KB59Lhnw

• DB Front Lunge(3 Sets of 10-12 Reps Per Leg)
  

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-D2VSeoRik

• Weighed Crunches(3 Sets Til Failure)

MIHWCS

Check out our newly refreshed site!  We are now branding “TMC” in our right side Nav Bars.  What do you think?

We also tweaked the Main Nav Bar and added a highly requested and hopefully soon to be popular section:

EXERCISE VIDEOS

The goal of this section is to eventually catalog 100′s of different exercises for each bodypart.  They will be clear-concise and controlled to give everybody from advanced all the way to newbie trainers a solid video perspective of proper form and technique when executing each lift.

As always we encourage your support and feedback.  As the section evolves,  please don’t hesitate to request different or missing exercises for us to record and add to the library.

We are hopeful to add a number of additional exercises to the section by the end of the weekend.

This should allow for some serious cross branding  from our Youtube subscribers and visitors:

THE MUSCLE COUPLE ON YOUTUBE

Thank you so much for your patronage and support!

MIHWCS