I wish I could tell you that the 57 Pounds of Muscle Gain displayed in the “After Photo” was accomplished in JUST 1 YEAR but the TRUTH is it took me 12 long years and I was under the guidance of some of the world’s most advanced, and respected, bodybuilding coaches.  My muscle gain factor averaged only about 5 pounds a year!  Suffice it to say I wasn’t exactly a genetic superior as a bodybuilder.

It has been said that all men are created equal! Do I believe that?  Does a chicken have lips? I know I wasn’t created equal because from that day I was born until my 16^th year I was weak, skinny and timid.  I struggled mightily just to be on par physically with other males my own age but to no avail. Basically I was a bone rack with buggy whip arms, a chicken chest, Venetian blind ribs, legs that looked like a pair of pliers in boxer shorts and shoulders so narrow they almost choked my neck (which looked like a pencil balancing a medicine ball “my head”).

I know one thing.  I was always the guy everybody put in a corner and then picked dead last, first time every time, when it came to games and team sport.  It’s no wonder with things like this happening to me that I’d start thinking if I was the only person in a contest I’d still only place 2^nd.

Not only was I underweight and weak but in addition to that I wore enormously thick ‘Coke bottle bottom glasses’ and had the worse case scenario of acne imaginable. To put it bluntly, I was an unfortunate kid while growing up that the other kids gravitated to when they wanted to ‘pound someone to a pulp’. And ‘do me ugly’ they did. It wasn’t uncommon to get the living dog crap out of me on a weekly basis IF I could be caught.  I say IF because I was a super fast runner but if I got cornered I was basically screwed.

I remember another time as a freshman in high school and some really BRUTALLY HUGE guys in the senior class cornered me and were going to haze me. I broke into tears and sobbed uncontrollably and they shoved me, sneered with distain and said “Let the baby go.” That was a close one. Whew!

Suffice it to say I sometimes felt as worthless as ‘tits on a Boar Hog’ most of my childhood and teen years.

People used to call me “WEAKLING WEIS” and as a result of this I became very insecure regarding my physical stature.  I guess in one sense I was the Classical weakling because I remember when I was a freshman in high school and I tried pressing 80 pounds overhead one day during PE. I lost control of this monster

poundage and fell over backwards with it putting a huge dent in the gym floor and even a more gigantic dent in my fragile self worth as a person. Why?

Because not only the guys but some of the most popular girls in school saw this incident (some laughed and some sneered) and I was embarrassed beyond belief. It was incidents like this that kept my self esteem at low ebb socially and as a result I didn’t even attempt to start dating women until I was 21 years of age.

Oh yeah, I did eventually manage to finally press the 80 pound barbell overhead while in PE class, and without falling backwards but the only problem was  when I was lowering the weight down from my shoulders. I had my thumbs sticking straight out from the bar (reminiscent of the ‘thumbs down signal’) rather than wrapped around the bar. Well as a result I ended up ripping the pockets out of my shirt when my thumbs got hooked in them.

Or how about the time, one Monday morning, when I walked into the men’s restroom at the high school and promptly got thrown out through the door and landed on my back up against the wall in the hall way.  The next thing I see is this HUGE (he reminded me of the ex WWE Pro Wrestler Brock Lesnar) senior classman with his size 13 shoe on my throat.  He looked like Mr. Tomato Head as he screamed obscenities in my face.  I was so scared I almost pooped my self.  No joke! What brought on altercation?

Ah, well I had hit him in the ear with a very hard snow ball (if I’d had stuck a rock in the snowball I’ll bet it would have hurt even worse J) two days previous and then was laughing at him hysterically because he couldn’t catch me as I ran away. This is probable the only incident where I deserved to get beat up.

 When I wasn’t getting the stew beat out of me I took a lot of guff in the form of tainted name calling (besides “WEAKLING WEIS” I was called “DENNY DIMWIT”, “COKE BOTTLE EYES” “MR. MAGOO” “SISSY BOY” and a host of other, what I considered back then, awful names) which gave me even more of an inferiority complex.  I felt like worm food back then.

I wanted so badly to be a Fitnessaurus (A creature craving physical perfection or put another way; Any beast gratified by muscular development) that I used to read the George F. Jowett and Charles Atlas ads in the comic books all the time and dream of looking like either one of them someday so I could get my evens (revenge) with every one of those school yard bullies.

Finally after getting beat up for the hundredth time and my eye glasses broken at least a half dozen times I decided no more being weaker than a flea fart for me so…  I responded to George F. Jowett's three-month power lever&Fulcrum Bell course ad.

The Jowett course was the catalyst for surmounting my physical weaknesses and overcoming my inferiority complex but I still wasn’t the HE-MAN I envisioned myself to be (I wanted to be Mr. Excitement with muscles and a babe magnet all in one), BUT that all begin to change suddenly one day when….

I walked into the local drug store here in my home town of Ketchikan, Alaska.  I was perusing the magazine rack and was shocked when I saw the rugged and massive physique of Chuck Sipes on the cover of the May 1962 issue of Joe Weider's Mr. America magazine.

For the first 3 years of this journey I trained in the kitchen of my parent’s home and the next 27 years in Spartan like conditions in unheated sheds and warehouses where the temperatures hovered in the teens during the winter months. 

As a newbie bodybuilder I gleaned as much information as I could from the Weider magazines but I wanted to learn more.  Around May of 1965 while reading the Weider magazines I saw an ad for Chuck (Sipes) American Bodybuilding Club.  It only cost a measly $2.00 a month to have Chuck make up an exercise routine and answer questions. 

Having read articles by or about Chuck he became my bodybuilding hero from the onset so I quite naturally and eagerly responded to his ad. I began corresponding with Chuck Sipes through letters and then phone consultations regarding the "how-to's" of pumping the heavy iron for nearly 9 years until 1974.  Later (1976) when I became a bodybuilding journalist, I would ironically write articles about Chuck Sipes for Peary Rader's Iron Man magazine.

I must be perfectly candid here and say that while I did receive the above certificate I didn’t train exclusively with the Atlas 12 lesson System of “Dynamic-Tension” but used it in conjunction with my weight training.  However having said that I must say that the “Dynamic-Tension” exercises offered in the Charles Atlas course did increase the muscle gain factor (in my shoulders, arms, back and chest) beyond what the weight training alone would have provided. 

My burning passion for hardcore bodybuilding
was taken to a higher level
on June 11-12, 1965,
when I had the opportunity (as a spectator)
to attend the AAU Mr. America Contest
at the Embassy Auditorium in Los­ Angeles California.

Sergio posing at a contest

Here I was in the big city; I must have looked like I just got off the turnip truck. I accidentally walked backstage at the Embassy Auditorium, during pre-judging of the AAU Mr. America, and couldn't believe all the Herculean physiques milling around. There was one huge black man who stood out above all the rest, in my mind. Someone said his name was Sergio Oliva.

It was at this ’65 AAU Mr. America contest that I became aware of the existence of Iron Man magazine through the meeting of Mabel Rader (Peary’s wife) the associate editor.  I flew back to Ketchikan and began a new assault on my bodybuilding endeavors, armed now with not only Mr. America magazine but Iron Man as well; they became my best friends and why?  

I was the only person in Ketchikan crazy or dumb enough to do the bodybuilding thing and more than a few people made fun of me and even laughed at my new found hobby at least to begin with.  My Dad even said I wouldn't amount to anything lifting the darn weights. My Mom however gave me tons of encouragement to keep lifting weights.  Still being the only one around lifting the weights I was as lonely as a fever blister on a snowball.  But that was about to change.

In addition to the articles he wrote several books including YOUNG AT 73 and a nutrition book used as a text at Oregon State University. 

Doc Tilney revealed to me that he had in many decades past formed a partnership with Charles Atlas and wrote the famous Atlas course plus the dynamic ads and sales materials associated with it.  Even though at this time I had no aspirations to be a muscle writer it is still pretty cool to know that I was in the presence of a prolific bodybuilding writer.

Donne seemed to sense early on that bodybuilding wasn't going to be a short-term love affair for me.  He realized it was going to be a part of my lifestyle forever, and he pulled out all the stops to supervise my training and nutritional needs during the 9 months I lived in Miami. 

I must digress for a moment and say prior to meeting Donne Hale I was self-taught through the mainstream muscle magazines as to the “technique-emphasis” of certain exercises.  Actually, I did pretty well, but it wasn't by accident, because I would wade through them with a fine-tooth comb in search of highly guarded tips and secrets.

I would buy any and all magazines, books and courses pertaining to bodybuilding and powerlifting etc.  There were a couple of reasons for this.  

First, I didn’t have many friends to speak of I sought refuge “Home Alone” 24-7 by reading and memorizing all of the magazines, books and courses, page for page,  while the guys in my peer group was out dating the chicks and partying big time. 

Second, and most importantly I felt in the back of my mind that there was some jealously-guarded bodybuilding secrets that I wasn’t privy to relating to the discovery of a perfect workout system for creating Unsurpassed Strength and a Massive…Symmetrical…Physique! After 43 years of collective research I have found there is just enough biomechanical and biochemical individuality within each of us that “All bodybuilding programs work, but some better than others,” and “All bodybuilding programs work, but not all the time.”

Suffice it to say I had a HUGE bodybuilding library.   I still do!  Only now I have hundreds of audio’s, video’s, CD’s and DVD’s added to my bodybuilding library.  I wasn't called "Dennis, the Mail Order Maniac" for nothing! I wish I’d had a copy of my eReport “Buyers Beware” back then. 

Enough digressing!  Donne Hale's training beliefs commanded my attention.  He taught me not to let my expectations get out of proportion.  He said it would take a lot of hard work and perseverance to succeed in the iron game.  I fired questions at him continuously -- how much exercise, rest, nutrition?

Donne Hale’s gym: Posing my forearm at 11:00 p.m

 This went on for a couple of weeks during my squatting sessions. Donne's old-fashioned, hard-core training instructions made Vince Gironda seem like the late Fred Rogers (star of the Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood TV show). But, lo and behold, all of a sudden, during a 20-rep squatting session, I got an adrenalin/endorphin rush I'll never forget.  From then on, high-rep full barbell back squats would be my core exercise for any workout. 

I moved back to Ketchikan in 1967 and continued with a lot of extra incentive to train in a 12x16-foot shed with no heat source.  I continued to correspond with Donne, Chuck Sipes, and ultimately Peary Rader for years to come.  These three men collectively became my mentors for learning how to lift the heavy iron and awakened my admiration for their well-rounded lifestyles.  They taught me to have tremendous ambitions but not just in the physical realm.  They said for most people a 20-inch arm will not put food on the table or money in the bank.  They went on to say I must develop mentally, socially and spiritually in order to achieve success and happiness in life.

I'd crawl out from under the weight, rest five minutes and then squeeze myself back under the barbell, drive it off the wood safety boxes to lock-out, and then rack it.  I'm not going to say it was easy, because it wasn't.  I was pooped and usually had to wait 20 minutes before I could do another repetition set of squats.  The best I ever came out of the hole with (without having to unload some poundage) from a dead stop was 485 pounds at a bodyweight of 212-pounds

Of all the exercises I learned from Donne, Chuck and Peary, the one that they universally agreed was of paramount importance was the Barbell back squat. I learned that this exercise was the anabolic equalizer for entire body when performed with perfect form and motion and with lots of deep breathing and high-reps. Eventually after a few years of doing this exercise I was able to do 405 pounds for 20+ reps (without a specific warm-up) while weighting under 215 pounds.  

The value of this exercise has left a lifetime impression on me and it is with this in mind that I'd like to give some of the parameters that personally prepared me eventually to do 20+ full reps in the Barbell back squat with 405 pounds.   

I rarely if ever used training gear such as my rayon durene weightlifting singlet, cowhide lifting belt (this wasn’t a stiff, thick belt like the ones used today, where it takes the help of a training partner or two and the use of a power rack to get it buckled) or York Barbell lifting shoes when squatting in training -- loose-fitting York Barbell Club maroon training pants, and a pair of tennis shoes (with a good support base) was fine for me. During the cold winter months I would wear a pair of BH (Bob Hoffman) rubber-like Knee Bands to keep heat and circulation around the vulnerable knee joints. 

I was anatomically blessed to squat deep and I never had any knee, back, or Achilles tendon injuries associated with doing them. Squatting deep for me was when the tops of my thighs were below parallel and beyond.

Strong erector spinae muscles, of the lower back, is necessary because they work in conjunction with the squatting process. I developed my lower back strength to the point where I could pull 500+ pounds in the Conventional dead lift (without any specific warm-up what-so-ever) for an initial set of 10 reps. I did these standing on a raised wood platform where the bar touched my instep.  As well, to be strong up the middle, I would do 60 reps in the Roman chair sit-up (a no-no by today's standards) with 60 pounds for that little extra boost in abdominal strength. 

For years (especially when I was in hard training for powerlifting & bodybuilding  competitions in the early 1970s) I didn't have a training partner (spotter), so on an exercise like the deep Barbell back squat I would use wood safety boxes (to dump the barbell on) if I got stuck in the bottom position. 

The rarest of the rare, an actual photo of me Bench pressing (around 275-pounds).

For years (especially when I was in hard training for powerlifting & bodybuilding  competitions in the early 1970s) I didn't have a training partner (spotter), so on an exercise like the deep Barbell back squat I would use wood safety boxes (to dump the barbell on) if I got stuck in the bottom position.I'd crawl out from under the weight, rest five minutes and then squeeze myself back under the barbell, drive it off the wood safety boxes to lock-out, and then rack it.  I'm not going to say it was easy, because it wasn't.  I was pooped and usually had to wait 20 minutes before I could do another repetition set of squats.  The best I ever came out of the hole with (without having to unload some poundage) from a dead stop was 485 pounds at a bodyweight of 212-pounds.

At times I would do slow single rep negative Barbell back squats with 550-600+ pounds down to the wood safety boxes. I'd then have to crawl out from under the weight, unload the bar to around 225 pounds, power clean it and rack it onto the squat stand apparatus. I’d reload the bar to the amount of weight that I would be using next. After a short rest-pause I’d do the next single rep negative. This was a most time consuming procedure to say the least.

While my squats were decent, pressing movements of any type were sub par and worse.  For example my best Barbell press overhead for a triple was 225 pounds and my bench presses SUCKED even more! 

It was a lucky day if I could bench press 300 for a triple, and then I would need a 3/4 ton hoist and David Copperfield (the magician) to help me levitate the bar up.  Maybe that's why I never excelled at benches.  I had the 3/4 ton hoist but Copperfield was just a kid back in the '70s.

Seriously I tried every bench press program offered such as…

See  ADDENDUM SECTION for an outline of : You Can Bench Press 400 Pounds

None of the programs catapulted me beyond a paltry 325-pound max single.  Interestingly though the poundage that I used in the associated ancillary exercises would suggest that I was capable of a 350-375-pound Bench press but it was not to be. I know that when actually performing the Bench press it was like a light switch being shut off mentally in my head. But just ask me to demonstrate some really heavy back or leg work and it was just the opposite.  Enough about my pathetic bench pressing!

I want to talk in more detail about the Barbell back squat. Fifty percent of the time I would use a conventional straight bar for squats, and other times a Jackson cambered bar (weight is carried lower in the center of gravity).  I always padded the bar with Armoflex (a pipe insulating material). 

Eventually these commando-tough workout sessions got me to the point where I was able to do 20 rock-bottom Barbell back squats with 405 pounds (in pause squat style), without a warm-up of any kind.  I wrote about it in a series of articles for Iron Man magazine in the late '70s, entitled "Bits of Advice & Routines."  Then a funny thing happened. . . . 

One evening during the late 1970s, in the month of June, I heard a knock at my door.  I opened it and saw two guys in their early 20s.  My first though was, “Oh, great, I’ll bet these two are going to tell me they are selling fur-lined bathtubs or, worse yet, Air in a Jug.”  They said, "Are you Dennis B. Weis?" to which I replied, "If you're from a collection agency or the IRS, then No!"

They assured me they were from neither, so I admitted I was in fact the person they were seeking.  They went on to say that they were up here (Ketchikan, Alaska) on a commercial fishing boat from San Francisco and wanted to stop by and chat, since they were avid readers of Peary Rader's Iron Man magazine. 

They had read in my "Bits of Advice & Routines" series that I could do full Barbell back squats with 405 for 20 reps without a warm-up, and they said, quite frankly, “We didn't believe it!”  A  direct comment such as this might irate some people as it could be a reflection on their truthfulness as a writer per say.  One of my favorite motto’s was (and is to this day) “An ounce of action is worth a pound of talk” so I found their comment challenging in a positive way.

I remembered writing that in the article, but I said that while I was capable of that feat, it didn't necessarily mean that it was an everyday occurrence that could be done at any time during, say, a five-year span.  Peaking levels vary, but I told them they were in luck because I was indeed in shape to perform 405 pounds for 20 reps.

We left the house and walked down the road a couple of blocks to my 12’ x 16' workout shed and went in.   There was just enough light coming in through the windows, even though it was late evening, which meant I didn’t have to crank up the propane lamp.  I was lucky it was June and not December so I didn’t have to scrape off frost from the bar.  I directed their attention to my squatting apparatus, a York portable dip bar attachment hooked to a Peter Dodge Dynatron A-Frame.

No. 2

Dynatron A-Frame

I asked them to stand back as I prepared to squat.  I took 20-30 seconds and mentally, through visual imagery, saw myself successfully completing 20 deep squats with perfect motion and form.  I was getting an inner rush, so I knew I was ready.  What follows is my…

I continue on in this manner for 8 more reps – three deep and determined breaths and do the rep.  Finally, at rep 10, it starts to get easier, because I’m finally getting warmed up. 

This goes to around rep 14, and I start to fade a bit, so I start taking 6 breaths between each squat.  I of course never racked the bar during the pauses, and while it allowed the blood to free up and circulate through the thigh muscles for a rejuvenation effect, the spinal erectors were always under tension and swollen beyond belief at the end of a set.

After the completion of the 20^th rep I stepped forward and racked the bar.  I never counted from 1-20 when doing the reps but would in my mind divide the whole thing into two 10-rep sets.  I’d count 1-5, then the next five I’d count backwards from 5 to 1.  That left 10 reps to go.  From here I’d radically change up these remaining 10 reps. I’d say to myself, “I’ve got just 3 triple sets to go and one single.”  I’d do 3 reps, then I’d say “I have only 3 sets of doubles and one single.” 

I do two doubles and finish off with three singles.  This mental exercise in counting worked for me then and still does today. I really varied this rotating reps countdown mind game once when on a bet for a hamburger I full-squatted 300 pounds for 75 reps. I never worked so brutally hard for a hamburger in my life.  Never again!  I’ll buy my own hamburgers from now on, thank you very much. J 

Regarding the numerous rest pauses that I took between some of the varying reps of the set, some people might say that deliberate rest pauses between reps make the set less impacting than doing a set where there is only one deep breath and no more taken between each rep.  This is speculative at best, because the bodybuilder who is used to taking only one breath between each rep may not fare any better by taking 3-6 huge breaths between reps and may even do worse, and vice versa. 

The two guys from San Francisco were impressed with my 20-rep feat and heartily congratulated me. They appreciated the fact that I could back up the claims I had made in the Iron Man article.

Elite Soviet lifter Dave Rigert, a holder of 54 world Olympic  lifting records in  the ‘70s is hoisting nearly 500-pounds

Sometimes however if I wasn’t into a particular squat workout mentally I would have the imaginary elite Soviet lifter, Rigert, winning the world championship.  But let me tell you that really fired me up for the next squatting session to not only beat the imaginary lifter but exceed my own PR in poundage lifted or reps increased. 

Actually I used the imaginary lifter technique with tremendous success on all the compound core exercises mentioned before with the exception of the Barbell bench press. 

A crazy technique?  Maybe but it seemed almost perfect for me during the years I was training era appropriate 3-3.5 hours 5-6 days a week for powerlifting & bodybuilding competitions back in the ‘70s because I never saw any signs of going stale training wise and my enthusiasm grew steadily, never declining.  Perhaps some of you can profit from the Imaginary Lifter Technique.

Epilogue 

When I first started pumping the iron as a weak, skinny teenager I couldn’t help but notice the little regard people in general gave me.  They might give me a little tiny nod of the head and with eyes downcast hurried on by, too busy to talk and  if they acknowledged me verbally it was almost a lip synch whisper of  “Weis!” compared to the gregarious greeting of “Hi Guys!” they gave to others.  

Most of the time though no greetings were exchanged and we were like two ships passing in the night. And if there was two or more of them together they’d all ignore me and act like they didn’t know who I was. 

However when I began packing on pounds and inches of muscle naturally on my skinny frame people stopped exploiting me and I started really winning their respect.   

This was never more evident that when I won some State powerlifting competitions in the early ‘70s.  And all those previously doubting people, many of whom looked like they were weaned on a dill pickle and others who looked like the deadpan Jon Arbuckle from the Garfield comic’s, were now wildly congratulating me, and reaching out to give me the glad hand or slap me on the back in their enthusiasm.   

Even my dad, who had previously given me little encouragement, was showing my iron game trophies to his friends out in the front yard.  Needless to say I now felt confident and successful.  And those school yard bullies I mentioned earlier? After my second year of high school they never ever bothered me again!!! 

What you have just read is a personalized glimpse and glance into my world of bodybuilding in the early years.  I am proud to say that my personal accomplishments in the iron game have been achieved as an anabolic drug-free power-bodybuilder.

My Story-The Early Years
can be expressed
in the following formula: