Check out this vid Zach recently did with Vince Delmonte using some of his time crunched underground methods!
Check out this interview Zach did for Vince and his readers:
Vince: Tell us how you got into training?
Zach: I used to read bodybuilding magazines before I began lifting. My older brother was a real jock and was always buying the magazines, the weights, the dumbbells, the weider arm blaster…. I was impressed with being HUGE. I used to watch the original Incredible Hulk w/Lou Ferrigno.
I thought I was the Hulk, so I always wore green! I would wear swimmies in the pool because I really thought they were MY muscles! Ha Ha, I guess you can say I was addicted to the iron before I even touched it!
Vince: What were you workouts like in the teen age days and how did you get into competitive bodybuilding?
Zach: These workouts were totally off the wall as I would often train 30 days straight without rest days! I often did 1 body part a day so I could do tons of volume. I would 25 – 30 sets per muscle, NO kidding. It wasn’t odd for me to do squats for max sets for 1 hour, then leg press for max sets for an hour. Or for chest I would do the flat bench, incline bench, incline flys, pec deck flys, cable cross over and then dips, 5 sets of each. These were insane, but I had so much passion for lifting that I believed in “the more the better”.
Competitive Bodybuilding happened after high school and I finished wrestling. I competed my sophomore year in college in a natural show to stop the accusations of me doing steroids. I trained so hard and so often that people accused me of being on drugs. To me, this was passion. I loved the movie ‘Pumping Iron’ and when I saw them training for competition and battling on stage I envisioned this as me!
Vince: How did you transition into the strength and conditioning world as a coach?
Zach: In my mid 20’s I began to get the itch to compete in the combat arena again. So, I began training in jiu jitsu and shoot fighting. I was training like a bodybuilder and still getting beaten by those who skinnier and looked much weaker then me. I wound up tearing my ACL and this fired me up BIG time. I had torn my shoulder 2 years earlier while wrestling, and in high school injured my knee. It made me a bit bitter with the relation between bodybuilding and wrestling / combat sports. So I sought out the best of the best to help me teach others in wrestling and combat sports how to avoid the injuries that I experienced.
Vince: What is your training philosophy for building muscle?
Zach: Train heavy, train hard, use the basic lifts and constantly seek to break records and improve these lifts. Eat tons of clean, high quality food and get tons of rest. Back to basics!
Vince: What are the most important rules you must follow to build steel-solid muscle?
Zach: Never to stray from the basic lifts such as the squat, deadlift, bench press, military press, bent over rows, lunges, dips and pull ups. Get plenty of rest and lots of high quality food.
Vince: You work with lots of teenagers - any specific advice for teens on getting strong and big?
Zach: Don’t overtrain! Train 3 x week using an upper / lower split and focus on getting REALLY strong with the basic lifts.
Don’t just focus on the “beach muscles” – get your legs strong as hell from squats, work your back and every muscle you can’t see in the mirror intensely. These are large muscles that contribute to muscle mass and even hyping the metabolism helping you to burn fat around the clock!
Stay tuned for part II plus another kick ass video!
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