I've read and leafed through many books and articles about muscle mass workouts, but the problem I have always had was time constraints. Then I found the book Huge in a Hurry. After doing a couple phases, I had great results. Of all the books containing muscle mass workouts, this served me best.

It was pretty surprising to me, because I was an old school lifter who thought more was better. Before marriage, kids, and business stole all my time away from lifting, I spent many hours a week at the gym. Much of it was socializing, but much of it was lifting as well.

Then I had kids and got into the rat race of life that leaves many people, including myself, with no muscles and tons of blubber. Finally deciding this year was going to be the year, I started looking for muscle mass workouts that could be done quickly, and that is when I stumbled on Huge in a Hurry.

Huge in a Hurry focuses on muscle mass workouts that use compound exercises. Although I don't look like a professional bodybuilder at this point, I have gained nicely over a short period of time, and with the proper diet, I've lost much of the fat.

I've completed the program, and now as we head into the holiday, I'm looking to just maintain until the new year. After the new year, I'll jump back on the routine and focus on gaining size again. While it isn't really a muscle mass workout, I've altered the huge in a hurry program a little for increasing strength while I maintain my size.

In the new routine, I have two workouts that I alternate. Both workouts have three exercises that consist of 15 total reps. The first set can be no more than five reps, so you need to choose a weight that you can't do more than five times.

Day 1, I do bench press, pullups, and squats. Day 2, I do dips, rows, and deadlifts. I do this three days a week, so each routine is done three times every two weeks. So far, I've been gaining strength almost weekly.

As you can see this maintenance routine is not very time consuming. It's perfect for me at this time of year, and I'm hoping that come the beginning of the year with increased strength, I'll be able to get back to the muscle mass worksouts and start putting on size again.