Complete Keys to Progress: Review by Eliot Jordan, IRONMAN Feb '95

In this age of technological wizardry it’s easy to ignore the simpler things in life. You can see this by visiting any well-equipped gym. Personal trainers, particularly those not well-acquainted with the most productive weight-training exercises, tend to instruct their clients to do mostly machine work. Ostensibly, that’s because it’s harder to do an exercise incorrectly when you’re held captive in a machine.

I suppose many trainers avoid extensive free-weight exercises because they’re harder to do and they take more time to demonstrate and explain to novice trainees. To a trainer, time is money.

Years ago the now-defunct magazine “Strength & Health” ran a series of articles that clearly demonstrated how to achieve big results using simple techniques. The series, called “Keys to Progress,” was written by John McCallum in his own inimitable style. McCallum’s pieces ran from the June ‘65 issue to November ‘72 and were easily the most informative ever to appear in that publication.

Toward the end of its existence, particularly after the death of publisher Bob Hoffman, the quality of the features in “Strength & Health” took a severe nosedive. In fact, the magazine was moribund for years before it finally, mercifully, folded a few years ago.

McCallum’s articles, however, were published in S&H’s golden age. Despite Hoffman’s dislike of bodybuilding (he favored Olympic weightlifting), his offering of McCallum’s pithy wisdom provided an enduring and inspiring service to all bodybuilders, particularly hardgainers. The articles were mostly dialogue detailing McCallum’s efforts to educate his often dimwitted friends about what really packs muscle on the body.

McCallum never talked much about his personal life. I don’t recall ever seeing a photo of him, so I don’t know what his physique looked like. The wisdom and truth of his words, however, reveal a man who was obviously very fond of, and experienced in every aspect of the iron game.

His ideas about effective training are still accurate today. He railed against overtraining. Long before Arthur Jones expounded on the need for short, intense, workouts that feature heavy weight and basic exercises, John McCallum was relaying the message in his entertaining style in the pages of “Strength & Health.” He echoed the long-held belief of Iron Man’s founding publisher, Peary Rader, that the one best exercise for building a massive, powerful body is to do high reps of murderously intense squats.

You don’t see too many bodybuilders training like that today. The popular philosophy seems to be that getting big means taking drugs. McCallum’s suggested workouts and diets were not directed at potential drug users. He wrote for all the skinny guys out there who wanted to build muscle that lasted. It seemed quaint now, but there was a time when a bodybuilder’s main concern was maintaining health.

Besides advocating short workouts of heavy, basic exercises, McCallum pointed out the need to use mental techniques as an adjunct to successful training. He wrote about employing methods such as auto-suggestion and self-hypnosis for dramatically increasing strength. He wrote of th eneed for sleep, a factor often overlooked today.

One article I felt was especially fitting was called “Public Relations.” McCallum starts by telling a story. He and friend are in a nightclub one night, enjoying a stage show. In walk two exhibitionist bodybuilders in tight T-shirts, which is especially noticeable, since this occurs during a cold winter. McCallum gets increasingly angry as the bodybuilding duo prance and flex in a misguided effort to draw attention to themselves. He points out that this is the type of behavior that turns off the public, keeping bodybuilding a fringe activity.

Until recently, the only way to avail yourself of McCallum’s training wisdom was to search musty used bookstores for old copies of “Strength & Health.” It turns out that Randall J. Strossen, Ph.D., who writes IRONMAN’s Ironmind column, is a big fan of McCallum’s. As a result, he’s painstakingly compiled the entire “Keys to Progress” series, plus a few of McCallum’s earlier articles, and published them in book form, The Complete Keys to Progress.

You won’t find a more entertaining and informative guide to training anywhere. Although the last of his articles appeared more than (25) years ago, McCallum’s information is just as accurate today as it was then. It’s especially helpful for the hardgainers among us, who will surely recognize themselves portrayed in McCallum’s anecdotal wisdom.

No series was ever more aptly named, for what John McCallum offered was nothing less than the true keys to progress for anyone engaged in weight-training.