Lower body muscle type vs upper body muscle type

Training HIT
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I know that this has surely been discussed here before - so I apologize for the redundancy.

I have heard Arthur Jones state that upper body muscles are of a type that is ‘made’ for short duration, high intensity work – whereas lower body muscles are ‘made’ for more endurance tasks. As such, he recommended high reps for the legs and lower reps for, say, the arms.

Dr. Darden (and any others on the discussion board), did any further research ‘post-Jones’ really support this muscle type difference between the upper body and the lower body that Jones talked about? I know that he was probably referring to slow-twitch vs fast-twitch muscle fibers.

Any info much appreciated.

Jesse Lee

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I’m not familiar with the study or people you brought up, but if you break it down to its simplest form it makes sense. In a natural sense, your legs are used to get around. Your arms are used to climb, pick stuff up and use tools. God/nature built us this way as the default setting.

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In the video clip I was able to find, Jones says that the muscles of the lower body “are built” for endurance and those of the upper body “are built” for short heavy work. He then speculates that this is why higher rep work was more productive for the lower body. There was no specific mention of fast or slow twitch fiber, though that could well be what he was thinking.

The video clip does seem pretty old, 1970’s maybe. I doubt there was much, if any, science back then which unambiguously supported the idea that the lower body was more slow twitch dominant. I would speculate that Jones had observed that higher rep work was more productive for the lower body, and rationalized it was because the muscles have evolved to serve different purposes, and perhaps contained different proportions of slow and fast twitch fiber.

Based on the research which has been done since then, it appears that the classification of muscle into slow and fast twitch is highly oversimplified. Current thinking seems to be that muscle fibers lie on a continuum, with lots of different metabolic factors influencing how they perform. I think more recent research also suggests that a high percentage of the fibers in your muscles exhibit a good deal of plasticity, meaning that how you train will influence the relative percentage of fibers that appear more oxidative or more glycolic. So perhaps there is a chicken and egg question here: do leg muscle appear to contain more slow twitch fiber because that is what evolution dictated, or do they appear to work that way simply because of the kind of stimulus that have gotten through exercise and daily life.

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This video says that the HIT guys discovered that the legs had lower Neurological Efficiency than the upper body. It’s “easier” to fully contract all the fibers in the muscles of the upper body.

And more difficult to fully contract all the fibers in the lower body. So each upper body rep is more Fatiguing and “effective” for growth.

This was verified a couple years ago by modern science nerds. When the scientists made newbies do leg extensions it took like 30 sets to recruit and fatigue their quads.

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30 SETS ?! Not REPS?? I would like to know more about that study. Do you have info about how I can read the study details?

Jesse Lee

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Longer discussion here. Including explanation that if you suck at going to failure and estimating RIR, you gotta do more sets.

Quicker one. Mentions name of study.

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Thanks much for posting the videos – certainly the longer one. I also watched it on YouTube to read the comments.

Such a high number of sets seems wacko to me. I would love for Arthur Jones to still be around – and to hear/read his response(s) to that. To me, he was the real deal guru on all things associated with resistance exercise such as weight training with barbells & machines – and his thinking still holds top ranking.

Jesse Lee

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Good input; thanks.

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Thanks.

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I would really like to get Dr. Darden’s input on this topic. Does anyone know how I can make that request directly to him? He worked with Arthur Jones for many years, training people for Arthur (and training people for his own gym business), accumulating an enormous amount of experience and knowledge in the entire field of weight training.

How can I touch base with Dr. Darden? Any info much appreciated.

Jesse Lee

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Dude wrote 50+ books. How many reps for legs and why Has to be in one them.

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One would think.

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Nippard is currently strong on HIT, after doing it for a year and making his best gains. Keep in mind, his version of HIT is 45-min workouts 4 times/week…
The main difference being 2-3 min rest (minimum) between sets.

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