Gymnast and credentialed bodybuilding coach Charles Glass continues to shape athletes from around the world. In his very first podcast, he discussed the best protein source for gains and broke down exercise selection, offering his number one movement for building muscle.
Glass’ experience training top-tier competitors from the IFBB Pro League is second to none. He’s helped shape the late Shawn Rhoden, Chris Cormier, Flex Wheeler, Brandon Curry, Dennis James, and Kai Greene. Aside from bodybuilders, Glass has had a hand in training the likes of Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, ‘Hollywood’ Hulk Hogan, and Wesley Snipes.
Boasting years of experience inside the gym and made famous for his intricate routines, Glass’ understanding of biomechanics and exercise turned him into an authority within the community. With protein selection and exercise optimization among his top priorities, he laid out his best practices to build muscle below.
Godfather of Bodybuilding’ Charles Glass Reveals His Favorite Protein Source for Gains, Reveals His No. 1 Exercise to Build Muscle
When it comes to choosing the best protein source, Charles Glass says beef is king. If muscle growth is the goal, he believes it’s best to consume chicken first to speed up digestion and then follow it up with beef.
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“I like beef. I like beef. I made my better gains using the beef. What I would do, I’d split it up. I’d eat a little chicken first because your body can digest the chicken quick then I put the beef right behind it.
Then, now, once your body starts to digest food, it’s not going to stop and start back, it’ll just keep right on digesting. So it works better for me.”
“Yes, [white meat and then red meat],” adds Charles Glass.
According to Glass, there’s no one ultimate exercise for muscle growth. He advocates for different movements depending on the body part. For the chest, he favors decline variations.
“There’s no one because you have chest, you have back, you have legs, you have arms. So, what I do is I split them up, and each one I’ll use differently. If I’m doing chest, what’s the one that’s going to hit my chest the most? It’s decline. Because I’m going to hit the whole chest. Then, I’ll start working on other sections. People say, ‘Oh, you can’t do that.’ That’s not true.
If you look at Dexter, look at how his chest was sitting up. We did inclines all the time, high inclines, then we did mid, then we hit lower, then we hit champagne, which hits right in the center of the chest. I take it in stages. When we do arms, there’s certain exercises we do to hit the brachialis. We got two heads on the biceps, three on the triceps, so we try to split it up,” explains Charles Glass.
He adds that squats are an optimal exercise but won’t hit the chest. Glass says squatting has always been a part of his routine since becoming a gymnast.
“How can a squat hit your chest? So, that’s what I’m saying. Squat is the best exercise because why? It really hits those legs hard. That’s one thing I did since my legs from being a gymnast, I always hit my legs first. I’d hit my legs first, and I mean I could front squat just as much as I could rear squat because I wanted to be strong at it.”
“It worked for me,” adds Glass. “Yeah [decline] because it hits overall chest, everything. Not they [people] don’t do it. Think about this, if you push decline, it don’t stay at the bottom, you feel it go all the way to the top. It doesn’t hit that top lip up there but it moves up. Why not do it first and get it out of the way.”
If he had to pick just one exercise for building muscle, Glass would choose the rowing machine.
“When you do seated rows, you start pushing with your legs, you’re not doing the seated row right.
See, you can do it because it’s going to hit your legs, it’s going to hit your lower back, it’s going to hit your back, it’s going to hit your biceps, and as you extend out it’s going to hit the triceps, but it won’t affect the chest.”
“If you had to pick an exercise like you said, seated rowing would probably be the closest to the one you need for the rest of your life.”
Charles Glass hasn’t shied away from offering exercise advice in his spare time. Of late, the ‘Godfather of Bodybuilding’ shared a German volume training lesson for maximum chest growth. He has also offered tailor-made workouts for arms, which he says have produced insane results.
Charles Glass’ command of training and nutrition has defined his legendary coaching career. He believes beef to be the best protein source for gains and stands by the rowing machine as one of the best movements for building muscle.
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