12 Weeks to Better Than Ever

Hello, I would first of all like to offer some insight into Benjamin Banks' review - which is negative, but completely understandable. This book, 12 weeks to better than ever, is a COMPLIMENTARY book to another one of Mark's books - Master Level Fitness. That is the book where it actually explains the different exercises complete with pictures. 12 Weeks to Better than Ever is a program that is divided into 3 levels - beginner, intermediate, and advanced with each being 12 weeks long - in this book no explanations of exercises are given - only which exercise to do, and how many repetitions to do them, day by day outlined in specific detail. The drawback to this program is that not everybody will be able to follow the 12 week program without hitting a plateau. There are built in routines to try to avoid plateaus, but they are still inevitable if you follow the book to the tee. In addition, at master level the repetitions get ridiculously high - nearing 500 pullups and 500 pushups in a single workout! This is obviously too time consuming for the average individual, but I am sure there are some athletes willing to test themselves with this. For those of you who already own this book and have been frustrated, and given up, here's what I recommend. The instructions say to allow only 15-30 seconds rest in between sets. I advise you to take as much time as necessary. This way you will increase your volume and be able to improve at your own pace. Those of you who have the book will understand what I'm talking about. For those of you interested in Navy SEAL fitness, I highly recommend Stew Smith's Complete Guide to Navy SEAL Fitness. I feel that it is more doable and more interesting than this program. Even though Mark's program starts out easier than Stew's it ends up being harder ten-fold by the end of the program. So I would recommend doing Stew's book first, then going to this book if you are still interested in high repetition calisthenics.

Very good book and worth buying. You may want to buy two because I use mine like a log book and its a 12 week program. Its a tweleve week program broken down to begginer, intermediate, and advance so all will like it. I highly recommend any of Mark DeLisle books as great buys.All of his workouts are designed to give like he states a "triathlete" body profile, not a bodybuilder profile. If your looking for practical fitness this is the place to start.