learner202
Banana
Despite the overwhelming proof to the contrary, some would still have you believe that intensity is all about the weight you can lift. This is a total myth that has haunted our sport for years. You have to lift big to get big. I can't hear that anymore without wanting to throw up. I'm sorry, but I guarantee you that there are thousands of bodybuilders out there who are the living proof of the opposite. Even the great Arnold, who was known for his extremely heavy approaches to bodybuilding, held back on some exercises. He did only 60-pound flyes. I can do 80. So we all know he could do more, but the 60's allowed him to do his flyes deep and strict giving him what is probably still the best and most developed outer chest this world has seen. I myself can only bench 315, considered very weak by most standards, but I am fully convinced that had it only been 250, I'd still be this big. While I hold it in high regard that you have to keep pushing the envelope where strength is concerned, we aren't power-lifters. If we were we'd be fat unsymmetrical bastards. Our fair sport is the evolution out of power-lifting. Using the density that weight can give us and perfect it with other means of intensity that bring out the qualities muscles have to offer. These aren't my sentiments, that's an adapted quote of Mr. Olympia Ronnie Coleman himself. I'm here to instruct you in other means of increasing the intensity. I assure you your choice will not be limited. After all, the muscle only knows what it feels, it can't read the numbers on the plates.
Ronnie Coleman Lifts With Intensity
Fast or Slow Reps
By controlling the speed of the motion as you perform an exercise you can place new strain on a muscle. A super-slow set will take the maximum contraction point at every angle to new extremes, not only providing extra-gravitational resistance, but carving new striations in your dense muscle tissue. By increasing the speed you are forcing the muscles to lift more weight, technically. The speed factor requires more energy and will give the set a heavier feel. Many pros are known for their faster reps, and it is commonly believed that a truly talented athlete will develop a faster stroke as he matures. This should be the result of increasing strength without adding too much strenuous resistance as is common among power-lifters. So experiment with the rep-speed and explore the benefits of these very hard systems.
Decrease rest between sets
While you shouldn't attempt to lift the same weight if your muscle hasn't recovered adequately, all too often we take prolonged rest-times between sets because we feel flushed, fatigued or out of breath. But odds are the muscle will have recovered much sooner, making all this extra time a total waste. I usually keep 45 seconds between sets, but when in a mass or contest-prep phase I will cut that time to 20 seconds. That's all I need, so that's all I use. This maintains the pump much longer and thus stimulating more growth. Because of the pump it also increases the perceived intensity as your workout progresses, making the last sets extremely hard.
Training partners
As far as motivation goes, training partners are as good as it gets. If you aim to keep intensity high, nothing gets the job done as a bellowing maniac screaming insults in your ear as you crank out your last reps. Nothing is as satisfying as being able to squeeze out more reps, knowing that you are safe with someone to aid you. All factors that contribute to more intensity and more growth. The one catch is that you'll have to find someone to meet these characteristics, because if he'll be chatting up chicks as you get crushed beneath a barbell, I assure you your intensity will falter immensely in the coming weeks. When looking for a training partner, look for the biggest sadist you can find. Someone who will gladly move the pin up the rack when you're not looking or not let you stop until you break your old record. Someone who likes to see your suffer and doesn't mind that you make him suffer. No mercy between two iron brothers, remember that. Nothing short of an injury should interfere with your training sessions. So be on the lookout for someone who will always be there for you. If he makes you wait instead of weight, and is unreliable, ditch him. You'll progress better on your own.
HIT-workouts
This is the only good thing you'll ever hear me say about HIT. Whilst I abhor advocates of this style of training as a given, I don't deny it's a useful tool for anyone. Sometimes over-training does set in, or you are just having a bad day. Such things will screw with your concentration. When that happens it may be smarter to focus on cranking out a few very intense sets, with weight-drops, negatives, spotters, the works. Even if just for ten minutes. It's always better than not training, and in some cases a true lifesaver. These workouts will give you more time to recover as you prepare for your next big session. I would never suggest making constant use of this, but once in a while, especially in times of low recovery or a depressive mood, or even because you feel to lazy to concentrate on a long session of intense work, doing a bit of HIT may be best.
Forced Reps
Common practice among all genuine trainers, forced reps are one of the best ways to see if someone is serious about working out. When you are near the end of a set, and can't push any harder no matter what you try, a spotter jumps in and helps you gently to squeeze out a few more. The spotter gives you a very gentle lift that provides more of a mental boost than actual help. This way you can really stimulate all fiber in a muscle to total collapse.
Super-setting within a body-part
There are two fashions of super-setting that are often used in the sport of bodybuilding. They differ only in the fact that one combines two exercises within a body-part and that the other combines two exercises of different body-parts. By performing two exercises within the same body-part you can hit a muscle from two different angles without rest, so as to hit them completely as one muscle. This kind of stimulation assures a more complete "flowing" kind of physique. You can superset any two exercises basically, but generally it is more of application when referring to pre-exhaust supersets, which require you train the more isolative exercise first. But one of the most popular generic superset setups is when you hit different heads of a muscle:
Shoulders: Front Raises with Side Laterals
Biceps: Preacher Curls with Hammer Curls
Triceps: Pushdowns and reverse pushdowns
Tri-sets
The logical result of super-setting is tri-setting, and thus combining three exercises in a cycle. This is often used when training back, when you can really hit the fiber by starting off with dumbbell rows on the incline bench, then quickly moving on to 1-arm rows and finishing off with barbell or seated cable rows. This kind of exercise combinations will have your muscles screaming in agony. I don't really advise you use it on smaller muscles like biceps or triceps, as this could potentially lead to injury. The intensity of a correctly performed Tri-set is not to be underestimated.
Giant Sets
I'm not going to go into it, as this is no longer a commonly practiced form of weight training. Not many people have the concentration to do four or more consecutive exercises for a single body-part. Most body-parts don't really lend themselves to this anyway. Again, back is the only muscle that was normally trained in this fashion. Some people who believe that you should train 3 or more body-parts in a workout which is total insanity. Usually HIT-advocates, but some just plain idiots who don't understand the principle of concentration. In HIT this has its uses because you would only have two or three workouts. And super-setting 2 exercises for 4 different muscle-groups to form an 8-tier giant set is sometimes a lifesaver to keep time short and intensity high and doing it this way will leave you breathless. But the other kind are obviously morons, suggesting you do 12 or more sets for a giant set and then repeat it three times. Not even the most extreme of high-set advocates would tell you to do 36 sets for a workout. This way you'll get good stimulation of the first muscle on the first giant set, but that is all, You will derive little or no benefit from this and yet there are some high-acclaimed magazines that publish this kind of routines...
http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/ice4.htm
Ronnie Coleman Lifts With Intensity
Fast or Slow Reps
By controlling the speed of the motion as you perform an exercise you can place new strain on a muscle. A super-slow set will take the maximum contraction point at every angle to new extremes, not only providing extra-gravitational resistance, but carving new striations in your dense muscle tissue. By increasing the speed you are forcing the muscles to lift more weight, technically. The speed factor requires more energy and will give the set a heavier feel. Many pros are known for their faster reps, and it is commonly believed that a truly talented athlete will develop a faster stroke as he matures. This should be the result of increasing strength without adding too much strenuous resistance as is common among power-lifters. So experiment with the rep-speed and explore the benefits of these very hard systems.
Decrease rest between sets
While you shouldn't attempt to lift the same weight if your muscle hasn't recovered adequately, all too often we take prolonged rest-times between sets because we feel flushed, fatigued or out of breath. But odds are the muscle will have recovered much sooner, making all this extra time a total waste. I usually keep 45 seconds between sets, but when in a mass or contest-prep phase I will cut that time to 20 seconds. That's all I need, so that's all I use. This maintains the pump much longer and thus stimulating more growth. Because of the pump it also increases the perceived intensity as your workout progresses, making the last sets extremely hard.
Training partners
As far as motivation goes, training partners are as good as it gets. If you aim to keep intensity high, nothing gets the job done as a bellowing maniac screaming insults in your ear as you crank out your last reps. Nothing is as satisfying as being able to squeeze out more reps, knowing that you are safe with someone to aid you. All factors that contribute to more intensity and more growth. The one catch is that you'll have to find someone to meet these characteristics, because if he'll be chatting up chicks as you get crushed beneath a barbell, I assure you your intensity will falter immensely in the coming weeks. When looking for a training partner, look for the biggest sadist you can find. Someone who will gladly move the pin up the rack when you're not looking or not let you stop until you break your old record. Someone who likes to see your suffer and doesn't mind that you make him suffer. No mercy between two iron brothers, remember that. Nothing short of an injury should interfere with your training sessions. So be on the lookout for someone who will always be there for you. If he makes you wait instead of weight, and is unreliable, ditch him. You'll progress better on your own.
HIT-workouts
This is the only good thing you'll ever hear me say about HIT. Whilst I abhor advocates of this style of training as a given, I don't deny it's a useful tool for anyone. Sometimes over-training does set in, or you are just having a bad day. Such things will screw with your concentration. When that happens it may be smarter to focus on cranking out a few very intense sets, with weight-drops, negatives, spotters, the works. Even if just for ten minutes. It's always better than not training, and in some cases a true lifesaver. These workouts will give you more time to recover as you prepare for your next big session. I would never suggest making constant use of this, but once in a while, especially in times of low recovery or a depressive mood, or even because you feel to lazy to concentrate on a long session of intense work, doing a bit of HIT may be best.
Forced Reps
Common practice among all genuine trainers, forced reps are one of the best ways to see if someone is serious about working out. When you are near the end of a set, and can't push any harder no matter what you try, a spotter jumps in and helps you gently to squeeze out a few more. The spotter gives you a very gentle lift that provides more of a mental boost than actual help. This way you can really stimulate all fiber in a muscle to total collapse.
Super-setting within a body-part
There are two fashions of super-setting that are often used in the sport of bodybuilding. They differ only in the fact that one combines two exercises within a body-part and that the other combines two exercises of different body-parts. By performing two exercises within the same body-part you can hit a muscle from two different angles without rest, so as to hit them completely as one muscle. This kind of stimulation assures a more complete "flowing" kind of physique. You can superset any two exercises basically, but generally it is more of application when referring to pre-exhaust supersets, which require you train the more isolative exercise first. But one of the most popular generic superset setups is when you hit different heads of a muscle:
Shoulders: Front Raises with Side Laterals
Biceps: Preacher Curls with Hammer Curls
Triceps: Pushdowns and reverse pushdowns
Tri-sets
The logical result of super-setting is tri-setting, and thus combining three exercises in a cycle. This is often used when training back, when you can really hit the fiber by starting off with dumbbell rows on the incline bench, then quickly moving on to 1-arm rows and finishing off with barbell or seated cable rows. This kind of exercise combinations will have your muscles screaming in agony. I don't really advise you use it on smaller muscles like biceps or triceps, as this could potentially lead to injury. The intensity of a correctly performed Tri-set is not to be underestimated.
Giant Sets
I'm not going to go into it, as this is no longer a commonly practiced form of weight training. Not many people have the concentration to do four or more consecutive exercises for a single body-part. Most body-parts don't really lend themselves to this anyway. Again, back is the only muscle that was normally trained in this fashion. Some people who believe that you should train 3 or more body-parts in a workout which is total insanity. Usually HIT-advocates, but some just plain idiots who don't understand the principle of concentration. In HIT this has its uses because you would only have two or three workouts. And super-setting 2 exercises for 4 different muscle-groups to form an 8-tier giant set is sometimes a lifesaver to keep time short and intensity high and doing it this way will leave you breathless. But the other kind are obviously morons, suggesting you do 12 or more sets for a giant set and then repeat it three times. Not even the most extreme of high-set advocates would tell you to do 36 sets for a workout. This way you'll get good stimulation of the first muscle on the first giant set, but that is all, You will derive little or no benefit from this and yet there are some high-acclaimed magazines that publish this kind of routines...
http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/ice4.htm
