Date: 07/16/02 05:30 PM
Author: dumbbellpress
Subject: RE: RE: Hogg
Hogg, just thought I would add something....
My first year and a half of training, I did about 25 sets per major
muscle group and 15 sets for minor muscle groups. My workouts lasted
3 hours. The only reason I grew the first 6 months or so was because
I was a beginner - even if your nutrition is crap, you get one hour
of sleep per night, you train with terrible form and what not, a
beginner will always grow. But after about 6 months even beginners
hit that plateau and stop growing. So the first 6 moths I grew. The
next 12 months I did not grow at all, even though I was killing
myself 3 hours per day, 6 days per week.
Then I made the smartest decision in my life. I bought
Dorian Yates'
book Blood and Guts. To me Dorian is a God. My workouts switched
from 3 hours to 60 minutes for two bodyparts. My strength went
through the roof. My size went through the roof. I took his routine
- 5 to 6 sets for major muscle groups and 4 sets for arms and
modified it into my present routine - 12 sets for major muscle
groups and 6 sets for arms. I am as big and strong as I have ever
been, thanks to taking EVERY SINGLE SET TO TOTAL, 100% MUSCULAR
FAILURE, and only doing 112 sets for majors and 6 sets for arms.
dumbbellpress - Future Husband of Jennifer Love Hewitt
(
http://www.mesomorphosis.com/forums/...ssage_ID=91253)
Date: 07/16/02 06:06 PM
Edited: 07/16/02 06:20 PM
Author: Hogg
Subject: RE: RE: Hogg
Well, truth be told, though this sounds weird, I made my greatest
gains in training poundage strength - not limit strength - by
doing 3 sets of an exercise and the last set was balls out to
failure. I did 3 exercises, 3 sets, last set to failure, gave each
bodypart a week, and I was able to put more weight on the bar or
grab more reps each week. However, I did not grow as much as when
I attempted to train bodyparts roughly 2x per week. Now mind you,
I did not develop the strength but I noticed gains constantly. I
am referring to my periods of natural training between 1999 and
2001.
My current program is evolving and I am beginning to incorporate
failure and near failure training (edit - again)after having read
Zatsiorsky's "The Science and Practice of Strength Training". In
terms of gaining strength endurance, training to failure is more
effective than the submaximal method. In terms of hypertrophy, the
submaximal method taken "near" failure (a relative term) is just
as effective in producing sarcoplasmic changes in muscle fibers
and is thus equally as effective as training to failure. Now mind
you, we are talking about bodybuilding training with volume, not
strength training and it appears that even one of the most
reknowned trainers of eastern bloc athletes finds a suitable
purpose for training to failure (actually, zatsiorsky refers to it
as the repeated effort method). Zatsiorsky states that training to
failure is necessary to ensure maximum recruitment of slow-firing
MU's and if all MU's are not called upon, then the training result
is less than optimum yield. Now, the argument is that training
"near" failure ensures a high enough percentage of MU's stimulated
to thus bring about a similar change in the muscle as repeated
effort. Mind you, "near" may very well constitute being within one
rep of failure. Training poundages are in the 10-12 rep range or
80% 1RM or less. I believe there is also a mention of 7-9 reps in
the text but I cannot cite the author nor the context in which
this rep range is discussed (if at all). (edit - because I do not
have the text here with me at the office)
What was my point? Ummm, I guess my point was that yes, you are
right, lower volume and training to failure will produce good
bodybuilding results in some individuals. Others can make gains
training with higher volume and lower intensity, and yet others
can make gains with lower volume, lower intensity, greater
frequency. But bodybuilding is much different than power training.
I dont really see the purpose of doing doubles and triples as a
bodybuilder. I could see a heavy 5 rep phase for thickness and
power development but bodybuilders do not need to do the
superheavy near max efforts that strength athletes use. (edit, I
see that I failed to make an argument as to the different training
methodologies, I guess I might have been saying that all methods
will work to an extent and that mixing up the intensity, volume,
frequency is important and that all are related in terms of
training effect)
(
http://www.mesomorphosis.com/forums/...ssage_ID=91269)