How Many Get Results with Low Weight?

Training Bodybuilding
21

[quote]dankid wrote:
LankyMofo wrote:
I get what you’re saying, but I thought being racist was attributing negative stereotypes to an entire group of people, not positive stereotypes.

All black guys have huge birds!

Am I still racist?

OP - work out like this guy for a few months and see how far you (don’t) get.

Its actually being racist whether or not its possative or negative. I think its kinda dumb and people have become way too sensitive about these things. For example, with your statement, if there happens to be a black guy with a small “bird” then he is going to feel bad because he doesn’t live up to the expectations.

Then at the same time, its being racist against anyone that is not black, because you are basically saying they have small “birds”. Really silly, but this is the world we live in.

As for the OPs original question. I have to agree with everyone else, that if you are implying that you are going to get results with LOW weights, you probably will fail. There are the anomalies that can get pretty big with calisthenics and KB’s, light weights, etc. but this doesn’t work for most people.

Most people need to overload their muscles and require more force/tension, which means HEAVY weights.

Having said that, I think something can be gleaned from your observation of this guy in the gym. I think lifting with a controlled but fast eccentric and an explosive concentric is a great way to put out maximum force and overload CERTAIN muscles and connective tissue. But from my recent experiences, this may not be sufficient.

I recently started slowing down my concentric portion of lifts a bit, and found that im a lot weaker than i’d expect. I attribute this to being very reliant on my stretch reflex and and momentum generated by the muscles at the beginning of the ROM of a lift.

For example, on something like bench: my pecs/shoulders produce most of the force and get the bar moving fairly fast, and the only way my triceps are really going to get worked, is if enough weight is used to where the speed is slow no matter what. This is fine for heavy lifting, but moderate weights will have this problem. And the middle part of the ROM is usually neglected, which also happens to be where my sticking point tends to be.

There are many solutions though. I think partials, paused reps, or slowing down the concentric are very beneficial at “covering your bases”. Another thing that seems to help is the “mind-muscle” connection type of thing and “squeezing” the weight through the ROM. Ive always been skeptical about these methods, but now im starting to see things differently.

So in summary: I think most of the time you should focus on progressing to heavier and heavier weights, as this is going to be what really gets you big. But for a certain portion of your training, you should worry about not neglecting muscles / parts of the ROM by minimizing momentum or using methods like pauses.

Still working on this myself, but something like ramping up to a max set of say 8 reps, and then backing off for a set or two, and “working the muscle” may be a good way to get the best of both.[/quote]

I think you should stop doling out advice about training methods you haven’t personally used to gain size. Clearly you haven’t because you discuss a different method every week. It’s like a fucking sit-com. Last time on The Dankid Show, you were waxing lyrical on how pro bodybuilders could benefit from TBT because they lack the skill necessary to get full benefit out of a given exercise.

Please tell me how, on God’s green earth, a trainee lacks the “skill” to get full benefit out of a given exercise? Once you start gaining muscle, it’s a pretty safe bet that anyone, even a beginner, has moved past the point where what you call ‘skill’ in a specific exercise is necessary. And, in bodybuilding, gaining muscle is benefit enough, I’d have thought.

Yes, there is a small window where a new trainee develops motor efficiency in a given movement the before the actual muscle building process starts, but it is too small to have to worry about devising some kind of convoluted “skill building” phase.

For fuck’s sake, put the textbooks down and read this site.

Oh, and how can somebody be “positively” racist? I’m all ears…

P.S. I think LankyMofo was talking about birds of the avian variety, not slang for women.

22

Bird is slang for penis, I thought everyone knew that!

23

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:
Bird is slang for penis, I thought everyone knew that![/quote]

My apologies. I’ve been reading too many of JackUrboady’s posts…

24

[quote]Professor X wrote:

Most people lose perspective about how much someone should weigh much over 200lbs. That also doesn’t count the many lifters out there with round muscle bellies that may weigh only 180lbs yet LOOK like they weigh 230+.

[/quote]

So accurate.

RE Mr. Butt…anything that’s based on a selective sample, and then only being generalized to people who choose one particular avenue of training (since the devotees say this doesn’t apply to/include professional athletes) is something to laugh at.

25

@ Roybot

Racism - The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.

Discrimination or prejudice based on race.

So having any stereotypes, possative or negative makes you racist.

As for your other comments; you are wrong. I DO change things aroud quite a bit, but I only change little things and the methods. I follow the same principles week in and week out and thats all that really matters.

And as for my speculation on this topic without having experienced teh results yet of what I suggested; well thats the advantage of reading books and knowing the “science” im able to make inferences and hypothes. And this isn’t something that I just came up with out of the blue. Its been published here many times as well.

26

Its possible he started off very weak.

The guy who increases his bench from 45 to 315 is going to be bigger then the guy who benched 315 his first time and increased it to 405

27

[quote]dankid wrote:
@ Roybot

Racism - The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.

Discrimination or prejudice based on race.

So having any stereotypes, possative or negative makes you racist.[/quote] Um, no it doesn’t. There is no such thing as positive racism. That is just idiotic. How does forming a positive stereotype around a particular ethnic group enforce the idea that (to use your own definition) “a particular race is superior to others”?

[quote]
As for your other comments; you are wrong. I DO change things aroud quite a bit, but I only change little things and the methods. I follow the same principles week in and week out and thats all that really matters. [/quote]

No, I’m not wrong when I say that you are advising people to train with methods you haven’t used yourself for any length of time and with any significant results. Why are you being so persistent? If I’m wrong, then post your specific experiences (I know you can’t do that because you’ve apparently got experiences with every training method under the sun).

No it hasn’t. I have yet to see another non-troll give out so much unsolicited, misleading info with such bare faced self-assurance. Reading from a book, misinterpreting the information therein and regurgitating the results onto these forums doesn’t make you qualified to educate others. You may as well just post up a reading list. Oh, wait, that wouldn’t actually benefit you in any way.

28

[quote]Superman wrote:
Had an interesting conversation with this guy at my gym today. I noticed he was about 230 pounds , very good muscle definition. I also noticed on everything he did, he was at least 25% less weight than i was, but that he was doing reps that were very slow and very very controlled.

Talked to him for a bit and found out that’s all he does.

Now i know the stigma that bodybuilders typically are not strong and yadda yadda, and its more about controlling the weight and really breaking down the muscle, but i have never seen results like that before on that type of workout.

Anyone else have alot of luck with this. Im thinking about dropping the weights on all my lifts and adopting some of his techniques.[/quote]

Yes. This makes total sense. High speed uses lots of momentum (a.k.a. cheating), and basically works a very limited amount of your muscle (fibers), both in terms of range of motion (as the momentum is giving you a free-ride through some of the distance), and in terms of number of fibers (you’re working the same ones over and over, because the lower-reps/faster-movement allows more recovery, so you keep hitting the same fibers over and over).

There is a very strong arguement to be made for slow, controlled movements… and when you do that you’ll find you have to do less weight. I’d still shoot for a weight that allows no more than 12 reps though.

People tend to conflate speed and intensity. You can have a extremly intense workout doing your lifts very slow.

29

[quote]Spartiates wrote:

[quote]Superman wrote:
Had an interesting conversation with this guy at my gym today. I noticed he was about 230 pounds , very good muscle definition. I also noticed on everything he did, he was at least 25% less weight than i was, but that he was doing reps that were very slow and very very controlled.

Talked to him for a bit and found out that’s all he does.

Now i know the stigma that bodybuilders typically are not strong and yadda yadda, and its more about controlling the weight and really breaking down the muscle, but i have never seen results like that before on that type of workout.

Anyone else have alot of luck with this. Im thinking about dropping the weights on all my lifts and adopting some of his techniques.[/quote]

Yes. This makes total sense. High speed uses lots of momentum (a.k.a. cheating), and basically works a very limited amount of your muscle (fibers), both in terms of range of motion (as the momentum is giving you a free-ride through some of the distance), and in terms of number of fibers (you’re working the same ones over and over, because the lower-reps/faster-movement allows more recovery, so you keep hitting the same fibers over and over).

There is a very strong arguement to be made for slow, controlled movements… and when you do that you’ll find you have to do less weight. I’d still shoot for a weight that allows no more than 12 reps though.

People tend to conflate speed and intensity. You can have a extremly intense workout doing your lifts very slow.[/quote]

Bullshit. Most of the people I see doing true slow reps are tiny. Also, a 3 count is not that slow. Also, define “high speed”. I do controlled reps but my reps are also fairly quick much of the time aside from warm ups. That has led to significant growth.

One guy who is using light weight as transcribed by a poster who GUESSES that he was 230lbs is not a strong argument for anything.

First, we don’t even know what this guy looks like. We don’t know how he trained for the last 5 years or more. All we have is hearsay which is straight bullshit 90% of the time.

30

[quote]Professor X wrote:

Bullshit. Most of the people I see doing true slow reps are tiny. Also, a 3 count is not that slow. Also, define “high speed”. I do controlled reps but my reps are also fairly quick much of the time aside from warm ups. That has led to significant growth.

One guy who is using light weight as transcribed by a poster who GUESSES that he was 230lbs is not a strong argument for anything.

First, we don’t even know what this guy looks like. We don’t know how he trained for the last 5 years or more. All we have is hearsay which is straight bullshit 90% of the time.[/quote]

Most people you see doing slow-reps are probably also not doing it intensely. Like I said, most people conflate speed and intensity because 99% of the time they are the same. No amount of 10 pound dumb-bell curls will get you massive. My guess is also that most people doing it slow (just because they like doing things slow, not because it’s a technique) stop at the top and bottom of each rep and thus loose all intensity and allow that 80-90+% muscle recovery that happens pretty quick.

I would define “slow” as 2-4 seconds positive, and 4 seconds negative. Slow enough that you are not taking advantage of momentum on the way up (cheating), and not letting the bar just drop on the way down (cheating). The negative should be almost as hard as the positive effort IMHO. Also, you get that intensity by not stopping at the “top” or “bottom” of your lift, so you get zero rest during a set. This is just being efficient. Obviously it’s not the only way to get big and strong, but you get the most shock per rep this way.

31

Can you please stop calling it cheating?

It is not.

32

[quote]Spartiates wrote:

[quote]Professor X wrote:

Bullshit. Most of the people I see doing true slow reps are tiny. Also, a 3 count is not that slow. Also, define “high speed”. I do controlled reps but my reps are also fairly quick much of the time aside from warm ups. That has led to significant growth.

One guy who is using light weight as transcribed by a poster who GUESSES that he was 230lbs is not a strong argument for anything.

First, we don’t even know what this guy looks like. We don’t know how he trained for the last 5 years or more. All we have is hearsay which is straight bullshit 90% of the time.[/quote]

Most people you see doing slow-reps are probably also not doing it intensely. Like I said, most people conflate speed and intensity because 99% of the time they are the same. No amount of 10 pound dumb-bell curls will get you massive. My guess is also that most people doing it slow (just because they like doing things slow, not because it’s a technique) stop at the top and bottom of each rep and thus loose all intensity and allow that 80-90+% muscle recovery that happens pretty quick.

I would define “slow” as 2-4 seconds positive, and 4 seconds negative. Slow enough that you are not taking advantage of momentum on the way up (cheating), and not letting the bar just drop on the way down (cheating). The negative should be almost as hard as the positive effort IMHO. Also, you get that intensity by not stopping at the “top” or “bottom” of your lift, so you get zero rest during a set. This is just being efficient. Obviously it’s not the only way to get big and strong, but you get the most shock per rep this way.[/quote]

my class sucks.

33

Thanks Roybot, you supported my original feelings that trying to “discuss” things on here with people is like trying to discuss calculus with a 3rd grader.

Your kinda an idiot really. My advice is “un-solicited”? Hmmmm… I seem to remember the OP asking a question. ADD much?

I agree with spartiates line of thinking, but I still hold that you cant take it all the way to “slow training”. The idea would be to use the maximum amount of weight, while still creating MAXIMUM tension throughout the range of motion. This works fairly well with heavy weights when the speed slows down, but there are a few problems. You’ll only get a limited number of reps and thus a limited TUT, and protein degredation and this type of work is stressful.

This would lead to the need for “heavy” training in the 90%+ range, where momentum is less of a probmlem. In addition, “speed” work is useful. And I wouldn’t say this is just speed work as in plyo’s and up to 75% of 1RM. But instead this “speed” work would be the way a lot of people are training. They are using fast eccentrics and explosive concentrics. This method also produces high levels of force, but since the speed is higher, and there is momentum, it would neglect certain parts of the ROM and invariably certain muscles. And lastly, there would be “moderate-hypertrophy” lifting. This would be what im working on now. When im doing something along the lines of 8-15 reps, the goal is to produce maximum force while minimizing tension. The key here is CONTROL. As is often said, you should be able to pause at any point of the ROM if you had too.

And based on individual needs, you’d deligate a different amount of your training to each area.

If you dont believe me, thats fine. But next time you do a 10RM on something, try this:

Say your 10RM bench is 225 (and this is with the “fast reps” approach)

Slow down your concentric just slightly. Or even better, pause each rep for one second at mid ROM on each concentric rep. I GUARANTEE you that you will not be able to get as many reps like this, or as much weight with the same number of reps.

Sure part of this comes down to a greater TUT, but also you are creating more total tension, and putting tension on muscles that are not used to being worked this much.

And simply put more tension = more muscle.

34

[quote]dankid wrote:
My advice is “un-solicited”? Hmmmm… I seem to remember the OP asking a question. ADD much?[/quote]

Simple logic, try and follow;

  1. OP talks to guys bigger than him and thinks about how maybe to incorporate what they actually do in the gym that helped them get bigger.

  2. Therefore he wouldn’t be asking you for advice.

Roy wins danny boy.

Shocking.

He’s 195 after five years @ roughly my height with a 10% BF range listed, which means it isn’t anywhere near 10%. (In case your curious, that is small as fuck outside of contest condition.) It took you a decade plus to bench 250.

Can you see where I’m going with this?

35

@ counting beans

I really dont care about you or Roybot. You guys are trolls. The OP asked if anyone has used these methods with success. I told him im using them now, but different and haven’t determined the results yet.

My opinions were unsubstantiated, not unsolicited. Nice argumentative skills and logic though.

36

Oh man countingbeans dankid cares so little he posted TWICE! Bam take that!

37

I regret every occasion I expirimented with slow reps. I always lost size and strength. Watch the pros train on youtube, you will see plenty of “cheating”.

38

[quote]dankid wrote:
You guys are trolls. [/quote]

Keep telling yourself that weakkid…

I’m starting feel bad for you. Like I’m going to go to hell for picking on someone who is mentally incapable of distinguishing reality from delusion.

39

I don’t know what’s worse

a boring thread

or

a thread that dankid posts his theories in

40

I know a couple pro BB’s that train time under tension, that being said, I don’t know if they train as light as you mentioned. I personally use a blend of progressive overload and time under tension throughout my programs.