Extra hours to the gym vs knee surgery, muscle tears, spine problems ...
I train heavy but I know I have to change my methods... I dont like to do like centopani, coleman and others...
Juan diesel is damn big with high volume approach. Do what work for you
Yes, but Juan is also very strong. He may not use massive weights at every training session, but the point is that his body can lift those kind of weights...which is the main reason he is the size he is. I saw the guy inclining 4 plates for quite a few reps on one of his videos from a couple years ago. If he was not capable of lifting that kind of weight, his chest would not be nearly as big as it is. He had to first reach that level of strength in order to build that size.
There are a lot of "volume" trainers out there who are very strong. For example, a lot of people have said "look at Cutler...he uses lighter weights for a lot of sets, with short rest periods...and focuses on the pump...and he is huge!" This is true...partially. What they often neglect to realize is that Jay was ALSO enormously strong and was capable of incline pressing 405 x 14 reps (saw him do it on video), flat benching 550 x 2 reps...squatting with 7 plates, doing barbell rows with 4.5 plates (per side, of course), and a bunch of other similarly impressive lifts. The guy was strong as hell. He never would have reached the size he had if he hadn't gotten that strong. He just didn't "always" use those kind if weights during training, but his body retained the ability to.
The point here is that a volume approach can work for getting massive IF it allows the person to become very strong. This does not mean they have to constantly push huge weights in the gym, but if their body is not continually getting stronger (the ability to push heavier and heavier weights), then neither are their muscles. Their muscles grow with their strength levels.
Like with most bodybuilders, even the pros known for a high volume approach, such as Ronnie, Jay, Arnold, etc...all stopped growing when their strength gains stopped. They were all also very strong. For all of those guys...and many others, they continued growing throughout their careers as their strength levels rose...and when their strength gains stopped, so did their size gains, regardless of how many sets they performed in the gym or how pumped they got.
All of those men were at their very largest when their strength was at its peak. Again, this does not mean they were always pushing maximum weights in the gym, but it does mean their bodies were capable of doing so...and as that capability increased, so did the size of their muscles.
The guys who are able to get very strong with a pump-based, high volume approach are the guys who get very big with a high volume approach. The guys who don't get very string with a high volume approach are the guys who stay small. Unfortunately, there are a LOT of guys out there who struggle to make considerable strength gains with a high volume approach, especially after using it for a while.
This is not an anti-volume post...because I do think that volume training offers certain benefits that can "add" to the size gains made through strength increases...but when evaluated on their own, they're not impressive. In other words, someone can get as pumped as possible at every workout and experience extreme metabolic waste build-up...yet if their strength level stay the same, so will their size. They may gain a small amount of size through increased glycogen storage and fluid retention, but it will be very minor and quickly reach its limit.