No Chest Exercise in Viator's Workout to Remember

Dr Darden,
I was reading the Casey viator workout in your new high intensity book. Seems to be supersets. mostly pre exhaust for each body part, 4 or 5 exercises for back, but no direct chest exercises. except for the dips that seem to be clearly aimed at triceps being they are trained back to back. Was there a “B” workout that was a companion to the one printed. Or maybe was chest a strong point for Casey at the time?

In The New High Intensity Training book, which page are you referring to related to Casey’s workout?


At work. Don’t have the book on me, but found the workout on google.

This was the workout Arthur Jones had Casey do in June of 1971, a couple of days before he won the AAU Mr. America contest.

Jones always changed Viator’s workout each time he trained him. So, Jones had A, B, C, D, and many more workouts that he applied to Viator.

Any chance a log exists of the complete set of workouts involved in the experiment?

I have most of them in my notes, but many of the exercises need substitute listings. In the future I’ll make them available.

That would be awesome. Even consider a paid ebook. Lot of interest in that experiment

Dr Darden, if the individual is ‘skilled’ at all of the exercises/machines within the gym, is there a benefit to deciding on the exercises of that days workouts depending on motivation/recovery and progress? During the Colorado experiment Casey did not appear to do the same workout (give or take), and as I understand Arthur Jones often didn’t tell the trainee the order or what in fact the next exercise was going to be until it came to doing it? Could changing techniques (30/30/30 - 30/10/30 - standard reps) be administered in this way also?
Thanks

Yes, I believe so. I’ve been doing that for more than a year with some of my trainees.

Hypothetically if progress was being made (more reps/more weight etc) why change anything? What would be the stimulus for making change?

If you are pleased with your progress, don’t change. Keep doing what you’re doing.

What I’m asking is why Arthur Jones would keep switching workouts. I assume viator was improving each time.

Jones was fond of variety.

Do you have guidelines when working with clients regarding variety/ program changes?

I use my more than 50 years of experience in working with trainees. I don’t know how to roll that into a few guidelines related to variety, but I’ll think about it.

Arthur Jones would answer the question this way:

Success comes from good judgment.
Good judgment comes from experience.
Experience comes from bad judgment.

4 Likes

beautifully said !

That’s just one of many workouts. Jones changed it up every time. And for the record, when you give your all on Dips, the Chest WILL be stimulated. Same thing for the PO machine!

My thinking was that even though dips were being done, they were preceded by tricep extensions. So triceps hit failure before chest. And 4 exercises for back seemed like it was not proportionate work. I would also like to know how a pullover machine stimulates pectorals. I always thought they would be used for ribcage expansion in a chest routine.

You’re talking theory. You gotta do that Triceps/Dips combination ALL OUT to see what I mean. Same thing with the PO Machine. From the stretch position the lats initiate the motion, but after a few degrees the outer chest (mainly via the attachment above your armpit) and serratus become the main drivers. At the bottom contraction, the Lats and Pecs are both engaged.

Not just theory. Been doing pullovers for years and never got a pump of any kind in the chest. Serratus and ribcage yes.