Notes on Tom Venuto’s Hugo Rivera Interview – Part 1

Recently Tom Venuto of BodyBuildingSecrets.com posted the questions and answers to an interview that he held with natural bodybuilding champion Hugo Rivera. Here are the links to the original interview: The Hugo Rivera Mega-Interview.

This interview is full of a lot of good advice and information. I thought it would be a good idea to go through the interview and just highlight a few of the comments that Hugo made. So here you go!

• To develop the back, Hugo focuses mainly on Pullups. He does different variations and doesn’t worry about things like deadlifts and and bent over rows. Check out this picture and you’ll see that Hugo has an amazingly well-developed back: Hugo Rivera, back.
• Overall weight doesn’t matter much in bodybuilding. It’s all about how you look! From the interview:
  

  The key thing Tom for enhancing that illusion of size is to do the exact opposite of what most people do: stay lean and not get fat! When one maximizes growth in all areas while staying lean you are just bound to look bigger than what you are…

• Average bodybuilders cannot afford to get fat and then trim down. It is a much better idea to work on staying lean all year round. Set a goal to never go above 10% body fat.
• If you are a teen or someone that is just starting out, don’t just focus on your favorite body parts. Pay equal attention to all body parts!
• For the physique goals that most people have, steroids are completely unnecessary. Training and nutrition should always be the mainstay of your bodybuilding program
• From the interview:
  

  While I don’t think one has to become an exercise physiologist nor a molecular biologist to gain muscle, I do think a certain amount of education is necessary simply to do things in a safe manner, avoid the mistakes that we did at the beginning and thus gain muscle as quickly as possible by doing things right.

Special thanks to Tom Venuto for conducting this great interview. There is a Part 2 that we’ll comment on later as well.