Recently I stumbled upon a very simple method for adding calf mass. Though I have never had a problem with calf development, I knew that I had the potential for much better calves if I could only find the right combination. In four months on my new system my calves grew from 17 to 18 inches, and everybody noticed the change. Here’s how I did it.

For years I’d noticed that, when I worked the soleus or gastrocnemius first, the other would suffer. For instance, after a few grueling sets of standing calf raises, I always had a hard time feeling my calves work in the seated calf raise, and I knew my intensity levels were being negatively affected. Finally it hit me: Why not try doing each on its own on different days? On one day I did up to eight sets of standing calf raises or toe presses on the leg press, working each set hard for 10 to 12 reps. I waited until the soreness abated, usually two days, then I hit up to eight sets of seated calf raises for higher reps, 15 to 20, as the soleus is composed primarily of slow-twitch muscle fibers.

I know it doesn’t sound complicated enough to work, but if it brought me such substantial new growth after all these years, it has to have some merit. If your calves aren’t yet the glorious diamonds you want them to be, why not give it a try?

‘Ron Harris

Editor’s note: Check out Ron’s Web site, www.ronharrismuscle.com.

The biceps attaches to the shoulder joint and to the elbow joint on the forearm. It can do three things: flex the shoulder when raising the arm forward, as when doing a front raise with a dumbbell; flex the elbow, as in a regular curl; and turn the palm faceup when the elbow is in the bent position, which is called supination.

For building ultimate peak, the rotating, or supinating, aspect of the biceps muscle is the most important. You can only do that rotating motion with dumbbells. No amount of barbell curls ever produced the same intense contraction and resulting soreness that I got from rotating my palms upward and outward as far as I could at the top part of the curling motion.

‘Arnold Schwarzenegger, IRONMAN’s Ultimate Bodybuilding Encyclopedia