June 24, 2012

Intrinsic Stability - Tips Everyone Needs To Know To Increase Strength Instantly


Stability or lack thereof, in my opinion, is the most important variable associated with lifting ‘heavy ass weights’ (as Ronnie Coleman would say). If at any point stability is compromised when lifting a weight, regardless of the exercise, performance will suffer.

What happens when there is a lack of stability is the nervous system will struggle in an attempt to create stability, even though you only really care to lift the weight. If the nervous system is ‘distracted’ with trying to fix the stability issue, than you can bet that much of the energy that would have gone into lifting the actual weight itself, is lost.

You see, the body’s primary concern is to remain safe, and it does so byattempting to create stability. It doesn’t care to lift heavy weights, as muchas we all wish it did. This is primarily why we can lift much more weight using machines as opposed to free weights.

June 17, 2012

How You Can Use A Technique Popularized By Japanese Researchers To Maximize Your Results

WHAT THE HELL IS A JAPANESE DROP-SET?

Japanese drop-sets, or back-off sets, refer to performing one final set of 25 reps at either the end of your workout, or as the last set of an exercise performed after the primary sets have been completed. Japanese literature suggests that this last set has a very positive growth hormone response, increases blood flow to the muscle, therefore bringing in more nutrients, which increases amino acid and glycogen uptake, and as a result leads to greater gains in muscular endurance (anaerobic lactic capacity), and strength.

Japanese drop-sets can be used as a very effective plateau busting technique for those training for hypertrophy, as they knock off the lower threshold motor units after you’ve completed your high quality heavy work, and further deplete glycogen storage.

June 10, 2012

Loading Patterns (Step Loading/Plateau Loading, Pendulum Loading, and The Cursed Pyramids)

A PRIMER ON STRENGTH QUALITIES

The amount of reps you choose to perform, assuming you perform as many reps as possible when you decide to do an exercise, will dictate the training effect. What that basically means is that differing intensities (amounts of weight relative to your strength levels) will lead to differing physiological adaptations.

To put that in layman’s terms, if you were to pick a weight you could lift one time (extremely high intensity), and just did that over and over again over the course of a training session, you would get a completely different result than if you picked up a weight you could lift ten times (moderate intensity), and did that over and over again over the course of a workout.

June 3, 2012

Periodization - Basic Principles And Theoretical Blueprints To Increase Performance In The Power Clean, Squat, Deadlift and Overhead Press


Periodization is a structured type of planning, or programming, with the intent of bringing one’s level of physical preparedness to a peak level (typically for some sort of competition or athletic event). Even those who train recreationally can benefit from properly periodizing their training, to accomplish specific strength related goals.

A major problem however, when it comes to periodization, is that there is a lack of practical information out there to help develop properly periodized plans. Most of the literature is very vague, leaving much to the imagination as to how to develop an effective plan to accomplish a specific goal.

This article will cover basic principles, as well as provide some theoretical approaches (blueprints) to help make improvements in some of the more common lifts performed in the gym (overhead press, deadlift, squat, power clean).