True one set to failure training reexamined valid arrow for the primitive quiver?
2 June 2005If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
Injuries are great. Not in the physiological sense but in the psychological sense. If in your heart and soul you are a real purposeful primitive when you incur an injury (not training is not an option otherwise you wouldnt be a primitive) you are forced to think outside the box. Thats when a lot of my more interesting and innovative training ideas take root. For exampleI tweaked a knee trying to get a lawnmower started two weekends ago. The machine eventually had to be taken to the shopI tried to start this contraption and pulled for probably 200 cranks. You should have seen me. I was crazed to get this thing started; my lawn was morphing into Sherwood Forest. I was determined and possessed good endurance and lots of strength. I had at it. My wife shudders when I’m like this; as well she should. When the combination of aggression, testosterone, pure physical capacity (you should see me shovel snow) and bull obstinacy achieve critical mass primitive fusion is triggered. She just avoids me altogether until I finally wear myself down. (In a related note: for $20, RW, my incomprehensible country mechanic who lives down the lane (( Perhaps I can help, I speak jive.)) tuned the thing up, inserted a new spark plug and told me I could have cranked on it for a solid week without success since the fuel line from the gas tank to the carb was totally clogged.)
Anyway the next day my left knee was sore as hell on account of all the identical violent twist reps Id donepulling, pulling, pulling, pulling… It all seemed so predicable and logical and easy to see after the fact. I was wracked and couldnt do Jack and walking around I looked like the limping Walter Brennan as Luke McCoy in the ancient TV show The Real McCoys. I was a hurting unit. I did nothing for 24-hours and next to nothing for 48 but as I rounded into 72 cabin fever took hold. I limped to the garage to do something anything.
Here was my idea born of boredom and necessity: pick a progressive resistance exercise, any exercise. The selected exercise need be a standard barbell or dumbbell exercise. Use a full and complete range of motion. Mix both compound multi-joint prime mover exercises with isolation exercises. Once you select your exercise pick poundage. Let us assume you are capable of lifting two fifty pound dumbbells (100-total pounds) for 10-reps in the bench press. Ask yourself this: what is the heaviest I can use without any warm up? In my case, if I can handle 100-pounds in each hand on a particular exercise, I can certainly pick up a pair of 50-pound bells and rep them for some indeterminate number of repetitions without requiring any warm up. Okay. What if you took this poundage, a weight that you can attack with no fear of injury and without prior warm-up, and rep to failure?
In my case, I can get between 12-20 reps using 50% poundage, depending on the exact exercise and technical protocol used. (Dead stops? Pauses?) Each day of the week pick two separate exercises and use 50-60% of max and rep out. Would this work? I think so. Doesnt this approach satisfy a lot of the requirements that define an effective set? What is an effective progressive resistance set? One capable of triggering muscle hypertrophy. The problem most progressive resistance trainees encounter is they dont train hard enough to trigger hypertrophy. If I take my weight to failure what more can I do? Albeit a relatively light weight compared to my absolute maximum for a single repetition dont I still satisfy all the requisite requirements for triggering hypertrophy? My failure occurs at a higher rep number but occur it does - by pushing until I can push no more have I not ensured and covered all the prerequisites for crossing the hypertrophic threshold? By pushing to capacity and seeking to extend that capacity I am doing all I can do. The intensity requirement should be satisfied. In five days I could hit two sets per session I could cover 10 muscles in five days using a total of 10 sets.
To avoid muscular conflicts, each day I would pick two muscles from different areas of the bodyshoulders paired with calves (a single set to failure as many reps as possible one leg at a time no weight), pectorals paired with hamstrings, lats and triceps, traps and biceps. I train at home and work (barely) from home so I can perform one set to failure in a particular exercise early in the morning then come back later in the day and the second one-set-t0 failure exercise. I was injured but handling dumbbells or a barbell while sitting or lying on an exercise bench would allow me to perform a wide variety of exercises without any knee stress.
In the five days I performed the following 1-set to failure/no warm-up exercises: day one - bench press, standing one leg calf raise; day 2 - dumbbell shrugs while seated, incline dumbbell curl; day 3 - chins, single-leg leg extension; day 4 - seated overhead dumbbell press, leg curl; day 5 - seated good mornings, seated overhead dumbbell tricep extensions. Optimally, each week I would be able to add a rep or two or three to my maximum. When I exceed twenty reps, time to add weight and begin anew.
With zero warm-ups this approach is the bees nuts when it comes to time efficiency. Is this an exercise end-all/be-all? No way. No one system trumps all others but this could be another valid arrow for the exercise quiver.
What if over the course of the training year (purposeful primitives think in terms of years and decades we got nowhere better to go) you were to use true one set to failure training a four week period? First off there are zero recovery problems with this type training. With a maximum of two sets per day using moderate poundage, session recovery, a big problem for high-volume trainers, is a non-starter. I could easily see four weeks of 1-set training synchronized with a high-volume cardio program done at the height of summer. Sync this with a super-tight diet. High volume cardio, low-volume progressive resistance, high-protein/low calorie (relatively speaking) diet. Back at Muscle and Fitness in the old days wed title this, Mondo Beach Lean-out Blitzkrieg.
Id be interested in comments.
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