Tips of the week training session

Don't judge a training session by its length

How long do your training sessions last? Don't answer that. It doesn't really matter. Here's why

Stop putting unnecessary time limits on your training sessions. The energy demands of a training session are related to the volume of work performed, not the duration of the session. Someone who performs 30 sets of 10 repetitions in a 60-minute training session will use more energy than someone who performs 15 sets of 10 repetitions in a 90-minute training session. The first exerciser will have higher cortisol levels after their training session than the second exerciser, even if their training session was shorter.

What about the testosterone to cortisol ratio?

A lot of trainers have preached the value of keeping workouts under an hour in duration. They often cite Bulgarian weightlifters who break up their daily training volume into several 30 to 45 minute sections. They say that this regimen was developed to optimize the testosterone to cortisol ratio and that training for longer durations lowers testosterone levels while increasing cortisol levels. The problem? This logic comes from a weightlifting nation that has been disqualified multiple times from international competitions because the entire team (or at least most of the team) failed a drug test. Call me cynical, but I find it hard to buy the "we want to keep our testosterone levels high" argument when it comes from athletes who inject ten times the physiological weekly dose of testosterone every day!

Antonio Krastev even went so far as to say that Abadjiev decided to segment the training to better control where the weightlifters were when they were at training camps and that maintaining optimal hormone levels had nothing to do with it. It is the volume that plays a greater role in the testosterone to cortisol ratio after training. Cortisol is released during exercise to help release stored energy for muscle contractions - and the more energy you need during a training session, the more cortisol your body will release.

Volume, mTor and glycogen

Excessive training volume can impair mTor activation. Increased cortisol levels are in themselves a factor that reduces mTor activation - and the same applies to depletion of glycogen stores. Depleting glycogen stores increases AMPK levels, which in turn inhibits mTor activation. In this context, remember that mTor is the switch that activates protein synthesis(muscle building). So it's true that too much training volume during a training session can hinder your gains - but it's not the training duration itself that's responsible for this.

Some of my training sessions can last 90 to 120 minutes. This happens when I have two different Olympic weightlifting exercises in my training session and perform plenty of warm-up sets to get my technique solid for the day. However, neither of these warm-up sets will use much glycogen as they only last less than 10 seconds each. So even if my training session is long, it doesn't mean that my hormonal milieu will be catabolic.

The 45 to 60 minute limit just allows a lot of personal trainers to squeeze more paying clients into their workday. Don't try to stretch your workouts out over several hours, but think more in terms of volume than duration.

• TIP: Stop training slowly

• TIP: Some exercisers truly believe in moving light weights as slowly as possible until muscle failure. They are lean and weak. Here's why.

By Christian Thibaudeau

Source: https://www.t-nation.com/training/tip-stop-training-slow

Methods for slow training have been around since the early eighties. Even today, there are still people "rediscovering" this idea or trying to reinvent it by using a slightly different training format. But for the most part, this training strategy is no good. It was no good in 1983 and it's no good today.

What is Super Slow Training?

Super slow training means performing an exercise using a very slow speed of movement in both concentric and eccentric phases. Advocates of this technique generally recommend a tempo of 5 seconds for the concentric (lifting) phase of the movement and 5 seconds for the eccentric (lowering) phase, but some super slow trainers even recommend up to 10 seconds to perform a single phase of the movement for each repetition. And they recommend using this speed to perform each set to muscle failure.

However, this training method has major drawbacks and I don't recommend it. But here's what fans of this method will tell you:

1. If you go to muscle failure, then it doesn't matter what weight you use. Even if you use baby weights, it doesn't matter because the load is irrelevant as long as you go to muscle failure using the super slow speed of movement.
2. If you move the weight slowly during the concentric phase, then you minimize or even completely negate momentum. Therefore, muscle contractions must do all the work during every inch of the movement. On the other hand, if you try to accelerate the weight, the momentum can reduce muscle activity at the top of the movement (since the weight has momentum, you don't need as much force to move it further up).
3. If you lower the weight slowly, then you activate mTor to a greater extent, which can be a potent activator of protein synthesis (muscle building).
4. Very slow movements are safer as less force is produced.

But where are the muscular bodies?

If the Super Slow method was so effective, then we would see results. To date, it should have produced numerous muscular and strong people. But we haven't heard of these people because they don't exist. We simply don't see muscular or strong people who have built their bodies exclusively using Super Slow Training - at least nothing like what more traditional training methods have produced. While Super Slow may sound promising in theory and in the context of lab studies, it doesn't work in the real world.

Why Super Slow is a no-go

1 - Super Slow doesn't make you much stronger

The same studies that show that training to muscle failure leads to the same gains in muscle mass regardless of the weight used, also showed that strength gains were much lower when using lighter weights. You may call me old-school, but to get more muscular, you need to get significantly stronger at the same time. Of course, people at the lower end of the muscle development scale may not need big strength gains to build some muscle, but to get really muscular you need to move heavy weights.

I don't know any very muscular people who aren't also strong. They may not be as strong as powerlifters, but they can move a good amount of weight. Once you have a lot of muscle, you may not have to train as hard, but to go from little muscle mass to a lot of muscle mass, you're going to have to get a lot stronger.

Even if muscular, strong exercisers reduce the weights and opt for higher reps and more isolation training, their "light" weights are still pretty damn heavy. Recently, Paul Carter said he would do just that. His definition of lighter weights? Over 180 kilos for barbell rowing and 265 kilos for deadlifting with fairly high reps.

Advocates of super slow training say that when you reach the point of muscle failure, regardless of what weight or movement speed you used, you end up recruiting all the fast contracting (stronger) muscle phases. They therefore argue that heavy training is not more effective when it comes to making a muscle stronger as it does not recruit more muscle fibers.

In reality, however, muscle fiber recruitment is only half the battle - if that. The firing rate of muscle fibers is more important in force production. The firing rate describes the frequency at which a muscle fiber "twitches" or contracts to produce force within a specific time window. And to train and increase the capacity for a higher firing rate, you need to move heavy weights or move weights explosively - two things you won't find with slow training.

2 - Super Slow minimizes force production

Super slow means keeping any acceleration of the weight as minimal as possible. And because you're moving the weight so slowly, you can't use heavy weights, which means a low mass factor. So both the mass factor and the acceleration factor are low, resulting in probably the lowest possible force release when training with weights. You could also call this type of training low force release training instead of super slow.

And what is the problem with a low force release? A low force release means that the fast-contracting muscle fibers that tend to grow the most are not activated. But wait - the super slow advocates say that when you reach the point of muscle failure at the end of a set, you also reach full muscle fiber recruitment because your body needs to recruit more muscle fibers to compensate for the exhaustion of the already recruited fibers. This is true, of course. But until you have fatigued the muscle fibers enough that your body is forced to recruit the fast contracting muscle fibers, you will not be using these motor units, which have the greatest potential for hypertrophy and strength gains, for the majority of the set. Performing super slow reps to muscle failure may allow you to recruit the fast contracting fibers for 1 or 2 reps of your set, but if you move heavier weights and focus more on acceleration, you will produce much more force and will recruit these fast contracting muscle fibers for virtually all reps of your set.

And to reiterate, super slow will not improve the firing rate of your motor units. It might even train your body to use a low rate of fire to move the weight, which could make you weaker when trying to move maximal weights or move heavy weights explosively.

3 - Super Slow will deplete your muscle glycogen reserves faster than other types of training

After about 12 seconds of intense effort, your body will start to use glycogen. The longer a muscle has to produce force, the more glycogen it will use. A slow set performed to muscle failure can last up to two minutes (although the average duration may be 75 to 90 seconds). This will burn a lot more glycogen than regular exercise.

Why is this important? Using glycogen and depleting glycogen stores increases AMPK levels, which inhibit mTor activation. MTor is basically the switch that activates protein synthesis. The more you deplete your glycogen stores, the more you risk inhibiting protein synthesis.

4 - With Super Slow, every set becomes a mental battle

This form of training is difficult to sustain in the long term. I like hard work, but super slow reps to muscle failure are agonizing. Trying to tolerate this pain can make you hate your workout. Loving your workout and being motivated to train is very important when it comes to getting maximum results. Many will fool themselves after a few weeks of super slow training and not really push themselves to muscle failure, negating any results this method might produce. But training sessions are not meant to be a test of mental toughness. There are no extra points for enduring the most pain. Only the results count. And it's hard to maintain good focus for 90 seconds (or more) when you're performing a set of an exercise.

5 - Super Slow is not really feasible with the heavy multi-joint exercises

Strictly speaking, Super Slow is not feasible with most free weight exercises (it was originally developed for training with machines). Performing Super Slow on leg extensions to muscle failure is one thing. It's uncomfortable, but it can be done. However, doing a super slow set of squats or deadlifts to the point of muscle failure will not only move you up a few points on the pain scale, it can also be really dangerous.

With these heavy exercises, your posture will give way long before the primary muscles involved. You will start to lose body tension and perform many repetitions of squats or deadlifts with poor form before the legs and gluteus reach the point of muscle failure.

This makes these exercises less effective as you are now forced to use lighter weights and when you reach the point of muscle failure, this is not even the point of muscle failure of the muscles you are trying to build. So you have all the disadvantages without any of the theoretical benefits. And the fact that body tension and exercise form will decrease can obviously lead to injury.

A good use for Super Slow

There is one scenario in which you can use Super Slow effectively: when you are trying to improve the mind-muscle connection for a specific muscle or isolation exercise. In this case, it would be a temporary use, as once you can feel the muscle working, further training of this type is no longer necessary.

It is foolish to intentionally try to move weights with minimal force production. There is no doubt that you can construct good evidence for the effectiveness of Super Slow using studies, but I trust real world results more than isolated studies.

• TIP: Build shoulders with pain and acid

This press exercise complex will get lactate (lactic acid) flowing like a raging river - just what the shoulders need for hypertrophy.

By Christian Thibaudeau

Source: https://www.t-nation.com/training/tip-build-your-shoulders-with-pain-and-acid

The shoulders need plenty of time under tension to grow. This means longer sets with lighter weights. During shoulder training, you should primarily focus on stimulating maximum lactate accumulation in the target muscles. You will need a high pain tolerance for this. Lactate accumulation through muscle work is maximized when the muscle is under tension for 45 to 70 seconds. This exercise complex will take care of this.

The multi-pressure exercise complex

This complex consists of 6 different pressure exercises. We go from the weakest to the strongest exercise - a concept known as mechanical descending sets. The goal is to complete 5 repetitions of each exercise, but don't worry if you only complete 3 or fewer repetitions of an exercise towards the end of the complex. For this complex, perform the following exercises one after the other without resting.

• A. Seated muscle snatch or barbell cuban press
• B. Seated neck press with wide grip
• C. Seated neck press with shoulder-width grip
• D. Savickas Press (shoulder press sitting on the floor with straight legs and without back support)
• E. Bradford Press (standing)
• F. Push Press (standing shoulder press with some momentum from the legs)

Perform 3 sets of this complex with about 90 seconds rest between sets.

By Christian Thibaudeau

Source: https://www.t-nation.com/training/tip-dont-judge-a-workout-by-its-length