from: Dragon Door Publications
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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 613
EAN num: 9780938045250
ISBN number: 0938045253
Label: Dragon Door Publications
Manufacturer: Dragon Door Publications
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 128
Printing Date: December 01, 2000
Publishing house: Dragon Door Publications
Sale Popularity Level: 130981
Studio: Dragon Door Publications
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Product Description:
Discover How to Gain Maximum Muscle-Strength in Minimum Time, Using Breakthrough Techniques That Blow the Roof Off Traditional Ab Exercises
As a former Soviet Union Special Forces conditioning coach Pavel Tsatsouline already knew a thing or two about how to create bullet-stopping abs.
Since then, he has combed the world to pry out this select group of primevally powerful ab exercises—guaranteed to yield the fastest, most effective results known to man.
According to Pavel, 'Crunches belong on the junk pile of history, subsequent to Communism. ‘Feeling the burn’ with high reps is a waste of time!' Save yourself countless hours of unrewarding, if not useless—if not damaging—toil. Get with the program. Make fast gains and achieve blistering, rock-hard abs now.
Fry your abs without the spine-wrecking, neck-jerking stress of traditional crunches—using this radical situp designed by the world’s leading back and muscle function expert, Professor Janda, from Czechoslovakia.
No one—but no one—has ever matched Bruce Lee’s ripped-beyond-belief abs. What was his favorite exercise? Here it is. Now you can rip your own abs to eye-popping shreds and reclassify yourself as superhuman.
When it came to wanting titanium abs yesterday, the Soviet Special Forces didn’t believe in delayed gratification. Pavel gave them what they wanted. If you want abs that’ll put you in the world’s top one percent, this cruel and unusual drill does the trick. Also discover:
How to protect your back and develop exceptional abdominal muscle tone, with a landmark exercise designed for the special needs of Russian ballet dancers and gymnasts.
The secret weapon of an old time strongman famous for his exceptional strength and a sinewy, wiry physique.
How a little known secret from East German research radically transforms the traditional situp.
A drill Russian full contact fighters use to increase their striking power and toughen their midsections against blows. Unlike anything seen in the US!
A Yoga asana which tightens the internal muscles of the abdominal wall and makes your waist smaller—even if you have not lost a pound!
User popularity level:
Rated by buyers -
I would like to preface this review with the statement that the price of the book is, as with almost everything else Pavel has produced, completely ridiculous. The book itself is good, but I would recommend obtaining it via friend, as the actual substance, while useful, is not the bulk of the text.
That being said, it's possible you're wondering why I gave it four stars instead of, say, three, and my justification is that the six areas of truly useful information it contains detail the only four accessory exercises necessary for a complete 'functional' abdominal component in a decent routine (which, by merit of already containing Squats and/or Deadlifts in some form, already includes some level of 'core' stimulation), and two breathing 'exercises' that are very useful for improving the effectiveness of the valsalva maneuver (for general heavy lifting) and exhalation strength.
However, the bad first:
1) The entire Janda Sit-Up section after the very first ~3 pages is a very long infomercial and product manual for the gimmicky Ab Pavelizer, a $170 piece of steel that allows you to do Janda Sit-Ups (outlined in the book) without a partner. The issue is twofold - one, no non-business entity is ever going to spend that much on such a device, and two, even if you lack a partner, it's easy to put together a setup that accomplishes the same thing. The exercise itself is very good; the infomercial, not so.
2) There's a fairly large segment devoted to integrating ab function with the rest of the body once you've gotten to the stage that you can do the Janda Sit-Ups without dying. This is completely superfluous, since anyone who can afford $170 for the Pavelizer can also be reasonably expected to have acess to free weights, and most worthwhile free weight exercises involve full-body stimulation, with the midsection providing stabilization. Having an entire section devoted to exercises that aren't necessary is extremely annoying.
3) Much of the last quarter of the book is just ads for his other books and videos, plus more stuff on the Pavelizer.
4) The useful information is really just a more elaborate version of stuff you can find in a number of other places; bodybuilding.com, while normally useless, has some version of every one of them in its exercise directory (except possibly the suitcase single-side deadlift).
Yes, that's right - approximately two-thirds of the book is completely useless. However, the remainder is fairly good, going into some reasonable detail on form for:
Janda Sit-Ups (to the same end as the regular sit-up, but with better abdominal isolation and vastly reduced back stress)
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Saxon Side-Bends (superior to the regular side-bend primarily in that smaller weights can be used to great effect, due to the longer lever arm)
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Full-Contact Twists (arguably the most useful core exercise from a functional perspective, and easily the best twisting exercise)
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Single-Side Suitcase Deadlifts (used primarily to stimulate the quadratus laborum, and helpful for back injury prevention and improved grip strength)
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The Stomach Vacuum (used by older bodybuilders to reduce the apparent size of the stomach and emphasize the chest; it's fallen out of favor now, but can help to reduce the midsection size in those who are already lean)
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"Bending the Fire" (breathing technique; the picture of Pavel inflating a hot water bottle is a pretty good explanation of the benefits it can have for strength of exhalation).
The two breathing exercises also have some carryover to the Valsalva maneuver, frequently used by powerlifters to increase the weight they can lift through increased pressure inside the torso, which helps to stimulate stronger muscle contractions when used.
The descriptions and form details for these exercises are fairly good (if you ignore the fact that most of the Janda Sit-Up chapter requires the pavelizer to be useful), though short, and while you can probably find screenshots of the useful pages online, and the information on either the normal versions or some variants can be found on bodybuilding.com, the book itself is, surprisingly, more useful.
As stated above, it's not worth the price, and, as a few reviewers have failed to realize, it isn't intended as a scientific text. It's a training manual, and should be treated as such. However, if you can get a copy used or for free (ideally through legal means, though I'm told that you can download most of Pavel's books in eBook form for free), or at least obtain scans of some of the pages, the information actually worth having is very useful. As stated above, between the four non-breathing exercises, you've got everything you'll ever need for training forward-bending, side-bending, and twisting movement patterns, and if you train in high-weight, low-rep, high-set schemes, you will indeed have ... Read More
Rated by buyers 
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Overall I recomend this book. I like Pavel's stuff.
However I would say that the one bad thing about this book is that if you
wrote it in normal size type, and did not have huge pictures on every page, it would be a pamplet, not a book! Once again I am a fan of Pavel and I have made huge gains in working out from his material however it is like digging for pearls in oysters.
I have Enter the Kettlebell, Bullet Proof Abs, and The Naked Warrior and I think all these could be made into one book. That being said I plan of buying more of his stuff.
Rated by buyers 
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I purchased about 10 books from Amazon on abs in order to compare them. This one takes advantage of people who think that there are better "hidden" ways to do things or who believe in the myth of exceptional Soviet training. The book is mostly about selling the author's personality and advertising his own ab exercise machine. His most effective ideas seem to be found in some of the other books anyhow, and he doesn't address the importance of nutrition and fat loss for ab work. If you're looking for a good book to help you with your abs, here's my conclusion from comparing books...
If You Want to Trim Your Waistline: You can't trim your waistline without losing fat, and you can't lose fat around your waist without losing it everywhere (focusing on a muscle group like the abdominal muscles doesn't burn fat in that location, just a little bit of fat from everywhere on the body). So, if you want to trim your waistline, skip the ab workout books and go with a good, proven overall weight loss and fitness book like Bill Phillips' Body for Life. The Abs Diet is a similar program, but like all the Men's Health publications, it advertises a 6-week transformation, which is just a little unrealistic. Plan on more like 12-24 weeks to see really noticeable changes if you are fat.
If You Want Sculpted Six-Pack Abs: If you are overweight at all, see above--you can't get a six pack while you're overweight, and you can't lose abdominal fat by doing an ab workout, so go for overall fitness. However, if you are already lean, see below.
If You Want to Strengthen or Build Your Ab Muscles: If you're trying to improve for work, play, or rehab, you might consider the following books: The Body Sculpting Bible for Abs Deluxe DVD Edition contains decently up-to-date information and tells you exactly what to do and when to do it, based on a six-week fitness course. If you're looking for a similar book with more information, you can choose from The Complete Book of Abs or The Complete Book of Core Training. The Complete Book of Abs (1998) is a little out of date in terms of its dietary/nutritional recommendations, but it focuses more on exercises that develop the external abdominal muscles (the ones you see in a six-pack), including lots of variations on leg lifts, bicycle motion, and sit-ups. It will also give you more resources for creating your own program, and, if that's what you want to do, go with this one instead of The Body Sculpting Bible. The Complete Book of Core Training (2006) focuses more on the functional body core, including internal abdominal muscles, legs, etc., and includes more trendy exercises using medicine balls, exercise balls, yoga, etc. A different sort of book is Stronger Abs and Back (1997), which was written before the current fad of selling "core training," but contains the elements of core training because it gives good functional sports-focused advice. Its dietary recommendations are out of date, but it recommends a 24-week workout plan, which is much more realistic than the 6-week plans advocated by many of the other books.
If You Have Back Pain: See your doctor, and if he prescribes abdominal/core strengthening, see above.
My one-book recommendation: Body for Life.
My two-book recommendation: Body for Life + Stronger Abs and Back.
My three-book recommendation: Body for Life + Stronger Abs and Back + The Complete Book of Abs.
My four-book recommendation: Body for Life + Stronger Abs and Back + The Complete Book of Abs + The Abs Diet.
Hope this helps!!
Rated by buyers -
I am a former physiology teaching fellow, personal trainer and biochemist. Currently, I am employeed in the psychology field, but I maintain a personal interest in fitness, new developements, etc. I have had back surgery, herniated disks in my neck and other problems some of which are related to sports in part or in full. So... I have some academic credibility as well as personal experience in this area.
With this context out of the way, I want to very first say that I got some good ideas from this book and I don't doubt that a lot of the suggestions would be extremely effective. On the other hand, I wouldn't necessarily say the same for safety. If someone has perfect technique and doesn't bite off more than they can chew, they will probably be OK. On the other hand, I would check with a doctor, chiropracter and/or physical therapist before embarking on this program or at least the more risky exercises.
Many of the exercises that appear in this book are recycled from other places and are not new or innovative. The content is rather light and as other reviewers have mentioned there is no suggested routine, reps, sets or anything else. Given the price of this book and this man's reputation, I expected much more for the cost.
In fairness, I would rate the book a 3.5 on the strength of gathering some very useful material in one place. The hard reality for a lot of people is that washboard abs may be out of reach genetically. It doesn't really matter how many abdominal exercises they do or for how long. Dieting might be very helpful, but even then fat distribution patterns are largely genitically determined. Contour liposuction and moderate exercise without risking a need for back surgery might be a better option for some. This reality doesn't seem to be emphasized enough in this book.
I must admit that I was also turned off a lot by all the marketing hype particularly at the end of the book. It certainly didn't help the author to establish credibility in my eyes that some of the information is a general reference to soviet scientists, an unnamed doctor, etc. I would prefer to have heard more personal accounts with depth or even routines, reps, sets, days a week of exercise and results obtained.
For the money, there is very little content here. I would say 50% or more could be found in a yoga book or other abs books. My personal experience working with others doing abs training is that functional integration achieved by using the body in a coordinated way along with developing strength through progressive resistance is the shortest path to the goal.
I don't personally believe doing more than 20 reps of anything is useful for the abs, but adding weight gives you more bang for the effort if you can do it with good form. Also, exercises like squats and deadlifts strengthen the abs substantially by having them work against increased internal abdominal pressure from bearing weight. Pushups are also excellent for the same reason and the abs must also hold the viscera in place against gravity.
I applaud the author for including some yoga exercises. These have been empirically tested for thousands of years and even used in back rehabilitation e.g. see Back Care Basics: A Doctor's Gentle Yoga Program for Back and Neck Pain Relief. Also, the author Judith Lasater gathered real references from the Journal of Applied Physiology on the plank and variations. Almost counterintuitively, these are some of the best abs exercises and it's great that the author of this book includes them and gives a short explanation of why they work.
If I judge this book against other books in this genre based on content, density, added value, I think saying it's a 3.0-3.5 is very generous. Dollar for dollar, my favorite author in this area is Stuart McRobert. In particular I like the following: Build Muscle Lose Fat Look Great: Everything You Need to Know to Transform Your Body and the The Insider's Tell-All Handbook on Weight-Training Technique. Another very good book on correct technique is Starting Strength: A Simple and Practical Guide for Coaching Beginners.
In summary, if you are new to weight lifting or body building, I would steer clear of some of these exercises and perhaps the entire book. If you are advanced lifter, you will get much more out of it and you will already know about the potential safety hazards of some of these exercises from your experience. Personally, I think the author was remiss in not focusing more on technique, safety and a progression through the various exercises with guidelines about when it is safe or reasonably safe to tackle a more difficult variation.
All of this is simply my own opinion. There are people who know more about bodybuilding, physiology, etc. However, I am an expert on my own experience, I read a lot and I am more knowledgable than the average ... Read More
Rated by buyers -
The focus of the book is on the use of the Pavelizer exercise equipment. There are some other exercises described, but they are fringe exercises to be performed in addition to the Janda sit-ups.
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