+ 5 10 repetitions? Really?
We are tired of hearing that we need to do between 8, 10, 12 and even 15 reps in each set, aren´t we? We all have heard that when we started working out, I’m sure about it. What we probably don’t know is that this “Around-10-reps” sentence can be linked to real science and they are the answer to one of the most essential aspects when looking for hypertrophy.
Those essential aspects to get muscular hypertrophy are:
1.- Metabolic stress.
2.- Muscle laceration.
3.- Time under tension.
I would like to write here a bit about the third one listed, the most important in my opinion, though.
If we are going back to the first scientific checks and experiments to get to know what was the appropriate time to create hypertrophy (no matter if we are talking about sarcomedic or about sarcoplasmic hypertrophy) the results were working out at 80% of your capacity while keeping a time under tension where we reach the failure in around 40 seconds. Related to those 40 seconds the “unit” called rep was created.
According to that, basically you should be doing do 2 seconds in the eccentric phase + 2 seconds in the concentric one, or even 3 + 1 seconds, so each completed repetition has 4 seconds.
Following with this 4 seconds each repetition AKA 40 seconds each series, how many of us are complaining saying “My calves are not growing and I swear I do 4 series, 12 repetitions each every 3 days”? Maybe you didn’t realised but as the movement is short, you usually do each repetition in 2 seconds. It means your 10 rep series lasts 20 seconds. Far away from those 40 that are recommended, don’t you think? Here you have the reason why your legs look like a little birds ones. It also applies for biceps, for instance.
Doing your series by time and not by repetitions can give you some great things. To do the same working out you may need less weight so the risk to get injured is lower; when finishing your training you will feel more tired, with more muscle congestion and more stimulated; protein synthesis will be extended until 96 hours, instead of until 72, for instance…
I wish this post can help you or, at least, will encourage you to learn a bit more about those series based in time and not in reps.
If you had ever trained this way, please help all the community and leave your comment below :-)
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BigCactusHow should that 40s time under tension look for something like lateral raises though?
You have some options to do so:
A) Raise the dumbbells in around a second, keep the weight there for around 2 seconds and go down slower than up (around 2 seconds). Count the time, not the repetitions.
B) Raise the dumbbells in around a second, keep the weight there between 5-10 seconds and go down slowly in a controlled movement. Count the time, not the repetitions.
By doing that you are sure the muscles involved are in tension for enough time each set.
Try to get the perfection in the technique. This will bring you a perfect V shape.
Useful information friend.
Usually in the gym you see more and more guys with excessive weights and wrong movements.
In the end you'll train all the other muscles except what you wanted. .lol...
+1 friend
Technique rules.
DobermannMuscle inteligence by Ben pakulski
I trained with him its the same principal it works wonders
Although failure also works but less of a pump for me.prefer time under tension better mooore struggle =more muscle
Most of the biggest guys are using this principle, yes. I´ll write about it, I think.
PallMallHmm
I’m going to give this a try on my next workout and I’ll se what happens
Cool. Let us all know how do you feel after couple of days.
Not my thing. Failure is what has yielded my best results. I strive for that every workout.
As an example go look at the guys on Dr Dardens Hitt site. Then come back here and look at the guys on this site...
Big Jim and those guys setting the clock look like shit.
Just my opinion.
Failure is basic to get hypertrophy. Actually it´s in the definition I just posted:
the appropriate time to create hypertrophy the results were working out at 80% of your capacity while keeping a time under tension where we reach the failure in around 40 seconds.
The trick here is to play with the weights and the intensity to reach this failure in 40 seconds or do the repetitions slowly enough to do each of them in around 3-4 seconds. Depending on the weight you can also do them faster, but then it will be more effective if we are not just counting 10-12 reps but if we continue for around 40 seconds, I meant, to failure (I'm preparing a post about it for the next days, actually). This will implies a lot of technique in order not to get injured (which most probably I´ll be writing about in the next weeks).
I would agree with you.I personally,as I’ve gotten older I find that a volume approach works best for me.Pump in the blood and I grow.Now I usually do reps of 20 and several sets.Once so get some fatigue setting in,I bump the weight and and go to failure on last set.I call it working in the pump.I must also admit that I use slow and controlled reps but nothing like 4/2.
This is interesting, but i think it varies from individual to individual for best results. We are all different.
Absolutely. When talking about those 40 seconds its an average. For some people it may be 50, for some, 30.