Bruce Lee Workout Program Bruce Lee Fitness Secrets revealed : Here are some of Bruce's truly amazing real life feats, which I consider to be absolutely outstanding. All of this information is taken from various documentaries and magazines. There's also some quotes from his closest friends. A few of Bruce's awesome feats: Bruce Lee's striking speed from 3 feet away was five hundredths of a second. Bruce could throw grains of rice up into the air and then catch them in mid-flight using chopsticks. Bruce did press ups using only 2 fingers.
Bruce could thrust his fingers through unopened cans of Coca-Cola. (This was when soft drinks cans were made of steel much thicker than today's aluminium cans) Bruce was able to explode 100lb bags with a simple sidekick. Bruce would ride for 45 minutes (10 Miles) on a stationary bike, when he'd finished, a huge pool of sweat was beneath him. Bruce once caved in a protective headgear made from heavy steel rods, rods that had previously withstood several blows from a sledgehammer. Bruce's last movie "Enter the Dragon" was made for a modest $600,000 in 1973. To date, is has grossed over $300,000,000. Quotes From Bruce's Friends about his Amazing Feats: Herb Jackson - "Bruce was interested in becoming as strong as possible". Jesse Glover - "When he could do push ups on his thumbs and push ups with 250lbs on his back, he moved on to other exercises".
Herb Jackson - "The biggest problem in designing equipment for Bruce was that he'd go through it so damn fast. I had to reinforce his wooden dummy with automobile parts so he could train on it without breaking it. I had started to build him a mobile dummy that could actually attack and retreat to better simulate "Live" combat, sadly Bruce died before the machine was built. It would have been strung up by big high-tension cables that I was going to connect between two posts, one on either side of his backyard. The reason for the machine was simply because no one could stand up to his full force punches and kicks, Bruce Lee's strength and skill had evolved to point where he had to fight machines. Bruce was very interested in strength training, you could say that he was obsessed with it".
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| Elbows anchored against waist to concentrate on biceps curls |
Danny Inosanto - "Bruce was only interested in strength that he could readily convert to power. I remember once Bruce and I were walking along the beach in Santa Monica. All of a sudden this huge bodybuilder came walking by, and I said to Bruce "Man, look at the arms on that guy" I'll never forget his reaction, he said "Yeah, he's big, but is he powerful???". Chuck Norris - "Lee, pound for pound, might well have been one of the strongest men in the world, and certainly one of the quickest". Joe Lewis - "Bruce was incredibly strong for his size. He could take a 75lb barbell and from a standing position with the barbell held flush against his chest, he could slowly stick his arms out, lock them and hold the barbell there for 20 seconds, that's pretty damn tough for a guy who at the time only weighed 138lbs. I know 200lb weight lifters who can't do that." Danny Inosanto - "Bruce had tremendous strength in holding a weight out horizontally in a standing position. I know because I've seen it. He'd take a 125lb barbell and hold it straight out".
I remember getting knocked up against the wall by that punch. I didn't think it was possible that he could generate so much power in his punch, especially when he was just laying his hand against my chest, he just twitched a bit and Wham!!!, I went flying backward and bounced off a wall. I took him very seriously after that." Jesse Glover - "The power that Lee was capable of instantly generating was absolutely frightening to his fellow martial artists, especially his sparring partners, and his speed was equally intimidating. We timed him with an electric timer once, and Bruce's quickest movements were around five hundredths of a second, his slowest were around eight hundredths.
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| Grip machine in action! |
Bob Wall - "Bruce had the biggest forearms proportionate to anybody's body that I've ever seen. I mean, his forearms were huge. He had incredibly powerful wrists and fingers, his arms were just extraordinary". Van Williams (Green Hornet) - "Me and Bruce used to have these wrist wrestling contests. The two combatants arms are fully extended with the aim of twisting the opponent's wrist in a counter-clockwise direction to win. I was the only known person to best Bruce at this and he used to get really mad at that. But it was simply a matter of weight ratios, I outweighed him by damn near 40lbs. Still, Bruce had a pair of the biggest forearms I've ever seen". |
| Home made rack for isometric work and abs |
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| Grip machine made for Bruce by George Lee |
"I used to run with him up and down Roscamore Road in Bel Air when we trained together during the summer of 1970. It was a very hilly terrain, which Bruce loved, and we'd do that at the beginning of each of our workouts". Mito Uhera - "He'd ride a stationary bike for 45 minutes straight (10 Miles) until the sweat would form in pools on the floor beneath him." Herb Jackson - "Bruce would wear a Weider Waist Shaper (a type of sauna belt) when riding his stationary bike. It was all black and made out of neoprene. He'd put it on before getting on the stationary bike. Then he'd turn the resistance up on it. He'd pedal the hell out of the bike. Sweat would pour out of him. He'd ride that bike for a series of 10 minute sessions. He felt that the sauna belt focused the heat onto his stomach and helped keep the fat off. Now maybe it worked and maybe it didn't, but you'd be hard pressed to find any fat anywhere on his body".
Dan Inosanto, another of Lee's close friends and himself an instructor in Lee's art, adds that Lee was only interested in strength that could readily be converted to power. "I remember once Bruce and I were walking along the beach in Santa Monica, out by where the 'Dungeon' (an old-time bodybuilding gym) used to be," recalls Inosanto, "when all of a sudden this big, huge bodybuilder came walking out of the Dungeon and I said to Bruce, 'Man, look at the arms on that guy!' I'll never forget Bruce's reaction, he said 'Yeah, he's big -- but is he powerful? Can he use that extra muscle efficiently?" 
Power, according to Lee, lay in an individual's ability to use the strength developed in the gym quickly and efficiently; in other words, power was the measure of how quickly and effectively one could summon and coordinate strength for "real-world" purposes. On this basis, according to those who worked out with Lee from time to time such as martial arts actor Chuck Norris, Bruce Lee -- pound for pound-- might well have been one of the most powerful men in the world. Bruce Lee Unbelievable Strength Lee's feats of strength are the stuff of legend; from performing push-ups - on one hand! - or thumbs only pushups, to supporting a 125-pound barbell at arms length in front of him (with elbows locked) for several seconds, or sending individuals (who outweighed him by as much as 100 pounds in some instances) flying through the air and landing some 15 feet away as a result of a punch that Lee delivered from only one-inch away, the power that Bruce Lee could generate -- at a mere bodyweight of 135 pounds -- is absolutely frightening. Not to mention some of his other nifty little habits like thrusting his fingers through full cans of Coca-Cola and sending 300 pound heavy bags slapping against the ceiling with a simple side kick.
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| simplified cardio jumping rope! |
It was this fight more than any other single event that had given Lee sufficient cause to thoroughly investigate alternate avenues of physical conditioning. His conclusion? He would need to develop considerably more strength -- of both his muscles and cardiovascular system -- if he was ever to become the complete martial artist he had envisioned becoming. The Bodybuilding Connection Knowing that the muscle magazines were the only existing source of current health and strength training information, Lee immediately began to subscribe to all of the bodybuilding publications he could find. He ordered bodybuilding courses out of the magazines and tested their claims and theories. He made a habit out of frequenting second-hand bookstores and purchasing books on bodybuilding and strength training, including one written by Eugene Sandow entitled Strength & How to Obtain It -- which was originally published in 1897. Lee's hunger for knowledge in the field of bodybuilding ran so high, that he purchased everything he could get his hands on -- from "hot off the press" courses to back list classics. No price was too high for knowledge, particularly if its application resulted in the acquisition of greater bodily strength, power and physical efficiency.
From this point on until his eventual death in July of 1973 (of a cerebral edema), Bruce Lee amassed a tremendous personal library of books on philosophy, martial art and an extensive selection of tomes that dealt extensively with physical fitness, bodybuilding, physiology and weight lifting. Lee would underline certain passages of text that he found particularly meaningful and would constantly jot down thoughts of how this information could be applied to martial art in the margins of the books. "Bruce used to come into his school in L.A.'s Chinatown with an armful of articles from the muscle magazines," recalls Inosanto. "He'd say 'look at this: these bodybuilders all say that they do this in order to increase their strength -- it's a common denominator running throughout all of their writings.' He'd look for consistency in things like that and would compare and eliminate the additional data that he felt was superfluous." The Routine After much research, and with the help of two bodybuilders who were also his close friends and students in the San Francisco Bay area, Lee devised a three-day-per-week bodybuilding program that he felt fit his strengthening and bodybuilding needs perfectly. According to one of these men, Allen Joe, "James Lee and I introduced Bruce to the basic weight training techniques. We used to train with basic exercises like squats, pullovers and curls for about three sets each. Nothing really spectacular but we were just getting him started." This program actually served Lee well from 1965 through until 1970 and fit in perfectly with Lee's own philosophy of getting the maximum results out of the minimum -- or most economical -- expenditure of energy. The every-other-day workout allowed for the often neglected aspect of recovery to take place. Lee coordinated his bodybuilding workouts in such a way so as to insure that they fell on days when he wasn't engaged in either endurance-enhancing or overly strenuous martial art training. The program worked like magic; increasing Lee's bodyweight from an initial 130 pounds to -- at one point -- topping out at just over 165 pounds! According to Glover, however, Lee wasn't particularly pleased with the added mass; "I noticed that he was bigger after he was weight training. There was a time after he went to California that he went up to 165 pounds. But I think it slowed him down because that was real heavy for Bruce. He looked buff like a bodybuilder. And then, later on I saw him and this was all gone. I mean, one thing that Bruce was [about] was function -- and if stuff got in the way, then it had to go. Bruce wanted his weight training to complement what he did in the martial arts. A lot of what Bruce was doing was about being able to maintain arm positions that nobody could violate in a fight. Like, if you take most people who are into bodybuilding or weight training, most of them are interested in simply building up their muscles to a bigger size, particularly the major muscle groups -- not much attention is paid to the connective tissues, like ligament and tendon strength. Well, Bruce's thing was 'let's build up the connectors and we won't worry so much about the size of the muscle.' Again, Bruce was about function." Gearing his training for function, Lee's bodybuilding routine incorporated the three core tenets of total fitness- stretching for flexibility, weight training for strength and cardiovascular activity for his respiratory system -- the original cross-trainer!(performed on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays) Exercise Sets Repetitions Clean & Press 2 8 Squats 2 12 Pullovers 2 8 Bench Presses 2 6 Good Mornings 2 8 Barbell Curls 2 8 The Breakdown of the Routine: 1.)
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| Isometric device, reverse curl |
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| Bruce and Brandon working out;) |
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| Forearm club device |
The first thing I showed Bruce was the Principles of being a good fighter: 1. The Heart In a confrontation, one must desire to win; When under pressure, one must maintain calm. Famous quotation from Bruce Lee: " No matter what you want to do, don't be nervous (you should not let your muscles nor your mind be effected by nerves). Just keep calm. No illusion and no imagination, but to apprehend the actual situation you are in and find a way to deal with it. No excessive action is needed. Just keep your body and mind relaxed to deal with the outside emergency." 2. The Eyes The eyes should be able to pick up as much information as possible prior to and during engaging the physical struggle. Watching the elbows and the knees is essential to get the best result. Also at no time, should the practitioner blink or turn his head because he would give away the most important instrument which supplies him the visual information of the current situation. Extract from taped Bruce Lee conversation with Danny Lee (one of his students) in 1972: Danny: Have you thought of Tai Chi as a form of self defense? Bruce: Well, if you were there ......... you would be so embarrassed, so it is not even a free brawl .......where a man who is capable of using his tools and who is very determined to be a savage legless attack whereas those SOBs are cowards. Turning their heads and swinging punches and after the second round they are out of breath. I mean they are really pathetic looking - very amateurish. I mean even a boxer because a boxer when they concentrate on two hands, regardless of how amateurish they are, they do their thing, whereas those guys haven't decided what the hell they are going to use. I mean before they contact each other they do all the fancy stances and all the fancy movements, but the minute they contact they don't know what the hell to do. I mean that's it. They fall on their arses and they .. and hold and grapple. I think the whole Hong Kong - they call it Gong Sao- Challenge Match in Hong Kong - can you imagine that, I mean even those guys see it that way. What do you think of the appreciation of people here? So what I'm hoping to do in film is raise the level." 3. Balance This means the practitioner should be balanced at all times so that his mobility and stability are maximized. This also means that the practitioner must develop conditioning so that his legs do not give up under strenuous pressure. Furthermore Bruce was very innovative. Back in the 50's, the Chinese Martial Artists were very conservative. They believed that weight training would slow down the practitioner's speed. But Bruce found a way to beat it. He would start his program with heavy weights and low repetitions first, then he reduced the weights and increased the repetitions. He continued to do that until his repetitions reached maximum and the speed of the exercise also increased. In this way he built muscles and developed power without losing speed. One of the most important discoveries from his Wing Chun training was that Wing Chun teaches the practitioner to train with the individual muscle or group of muscles first, then co-ordinates the movement together by combining the muscles to make a collective movement in order to get the most out of the technique. Bruce had mastered this training.
The following is a subtle pose of a seemingly simple movement but it really does condition a few essential muscles on the arm in question. The other arm is pulled back, placed high but not resting on the body which is very tiring, enabling the brain to think about two arms at the same time. Hence the practitioner will be able to use both arms independently at the same time. Bruce was also very much against high impact training such as the heavy bag kicking because he understood that the result from the high impact would only develop bulk muscles and they would slow down the practitioner's speed. The following is the taped conversation ....Danny Lee 1972: "Danny: Danny ( Inosanto) was excited yesterday. Bruce: Yes, he was in my house the night before. Danny: He didn't want us to do any more heavy bag kicking. He wanted us to just kick at something light. Bruce: When you use your leg it is much better - to kick at the phone pad or whatever - watch out with the side kick on air kicking - not air kicking too much. If you snap it too much without contact at the end you can get hurt." And later they discussed: Danny: I think you have to pick a few die hard followers and say this is JKD, (Jeet Kun Do) Bruce: That's why I tell Dan (Inosanto) to be careful ... ......... Danny: So that's why - I've been working with Dan (Inosanto) a lot. Bruce: I told him last time he's becoming very stylized. And it seems like his consciousness is really - something is bugging him. Danny: I think its heavy bag kicking. Bruce: Too much heavy bag kicking and too much body twisting has affected him. Danny: Yes. The power and the momentum. He's working out real hard. I would like to conclude by saying that speed and power comes from relaxation and co-ordination which has everything to do with mind and body balance. From "The Bruce Lee Story" by Linda Lee and Tom Bleecker: The following is Bruce's recollection of one of many training experiences with Professor Yip Man: "About four years of hard training in the art of Gung Fu (Kung Fu) I began to understand and felt the principle of gentleness - the art of neutralizing the effect of the opponent's effort and minimizing expenditure of one's energy. All these must be done in calmness and without striving. It sounded simple, but in actual application it was difficult. The moment I engaged in combat with an opponent, my mind was completely perturbed and unstable. Especially after a series of exchanging blows and kicks, all my theory of gentleness was gone. My only one thought left was somehow or another I must beat him and win. My instructor Professor Yip Man, head of the Wing Chun School, would come up to me and say, "Loong (Bruce's Chinese name), relax and calm your mind. Forget about yourself and follow the opponent's movement. Let your mind, the basic reality, do the counter-movement without any interfering deliberation. Above all, learn the art of detachment." 
That was it! I must relax. However, right there I had already done something contradictory, against my will. That was when I said I must relax, the demand for effort in "must" was already inconsistent with the effortless in "relax". When my acute self-consciousness grew to what the psychologists called "double-blind" type, my instructor would again approach me and say, "Long, preserve yourself by following the natural bends of things and don't interfere. Remember never to assert yourself against nature: never be in frontal opposition to any problem, but control it by swinging with it. Don't practice this week. Go home and think about it."www.brucelee.com Bruce Lee, Bruce Lee Muscles, Bruce Lee Back, Bruce Lee Grip Machine, Bruce Lee Workout, Bruce Lee Exercise, Bruce Lee Weights, Bruce Lee Workout
Enter The Dragon, The Dragon.
By Chad "Maximus" Hilliard
Certified: Fitness Trainer
MMA Strength & Conditioning Coach
Muay Thai Fitness Instructor
US Army Veteran
193 S Acantilado dr.
St George, Ut 84790
707-234-8388
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