Performance Based vs. Fatigue Based

Training Bodybuilding
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You know, the more I think about it, the less clear all of this becomes. I did some research on the RE method, and found a lot good information. I found it interesting that Westside sometimes uses timed sets of 1-5 minutes for recovery and/or hypertrophy. But I also found that this is not the only way.

Training to failure with moderate to high reps makes sense, because failure is the result of a large portion of intermediate fibers fatigued, plus all of the fast twitch fibers. And something like a drop set, or rest pause can be used to make sure you hit a lot of the largest fibers.

But CW’s methods make much sense also. If you train with heavier weights, and the intent of maximal acceleration, you recruit the largest fibers in the beginning. After a few sets, these fibers are no longer able to keep the speed or reps up, and the intermediate fibers have to take over. A few more sets like this, and the intermediate fibers will get fatigued.

Both methods will potentially stimulate and fatigue a large portion of the biggest muscle fibers. The first method will likely be better for endurance, due to the exposure of lactic acid, and glycogen depletion, while the second method might be better for strength, since the large fibers are exposed to heavier weights.

The point is, both methods can and will work. The key is to progress. Whether or not your actually hitting “true failure” doesn’t matter, as long as the stimulus is greater each workout.

There is one other thing I got out of looking into fatigue more. As a general rule, if your not fatiguing or very highly activating a MU then your not going to progress or stimulate hypertrophy. Whether fatigue is monitored by rep speed, or how close you are to concentric failure does not matter. If your training with higher reps then you can probably get away with stopping 1-2 reps short of failure, and occasionally use failure, rest pause, or drop sets to reach a new pr. If your trainig CW’s way, you NEED to take each set till the speed noticably decreases, and then likely decrease the weight and do one or more sets with higher reps to near failure.

This was a good discussion though, and it shows that whether you train with 3 reps per set, or 20 reps per set, you can stimulate hypertrophy if you pay attention to certain details.

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[quote]dankid wrote:
You know, the more I think about it, the less clear all of this becomes. [/quote]

And therein lies your problem.

Muscle is not built thinking about training. It’s built actually getting your butt in the gym and busting it under some heavy (for you) weight. Then busting your butt at the table and eating enough to allow your body to improve itself.

If you want to try out training to failure, just freaking do it. Stop thinking and theorizing about the “perfect” way.

Choose a split that makes sense to you (antagonistic, synergistic, upper/lower, push/pull, push/pull/legs, it doesn’t really matter), pick some exercises for each muscle group (the number will depend on the split) and freaking get in the gym and try it. You’ll learn astronomically more just getting in the gym and experimenting than you will feverishly reading articles on theory or thinking about the best way to train.

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I understand Sentoguy, and thats what ive been doing for the past couple of years. My training plans have greatly evolved to the point where I think I can honestly say they are more effective than 90% of trainers out there. I want to be better than 99% of trainers out there though, and thats why understanding this stuff seems essential to me.

It just seems to me that in this industry everything is based on extremes. Everyone has their “way” and nothing else works. It either has to be heavy weights low reps, or lighter weights higher reps. Or everything is based on science, even if it doesnt work in the real world, or it doesn’t matter what science says, just do the way people before you have done.

My opinion is to look at both sides and adjust accordingly, which happens to usually be the middle road.

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dankid, how much progress have you made in your body this year?

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Well, as far as body comp progress, its hard to say, because I havent been monitoring it regularly.

I can subjectively say that the areas Ive focused on have gotten bigger, and ive had minimal fat gains. Ive gained noticeable mass in my legs and arms, but would still like more.

In addition to that, ive been training a lot for strength and performance as well. Last week I hit a 400lb deadlift which is a new PR for me. I dont squat much, but I did a set of 5 on 1-leg squats with BW+80.

Im pretty happy with my strength as of now, and really need to just focus more on endurance and strength in the higher rep ranges (10-20). This is why ive recently started focusing more on TUT and its clear after only a few workouts that this is my weakness.

I think I have focused too much on the non-traditional “heavy” methods, but building up strength is still good, because i’ll likely respond better to hypertrophy training now.

As for goals, i have no intentions to be a bodybuilder. I really just want to be muscular and have a low BF%, and thats also why I recently decided to put a focus on getting down to 10%bf or less.

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[quote]dankid wrote:
Well, as far as body comp progress, its hard to say, because I havent been monitoring it regularly.

I can subjectively say that the areas Ive focused on have gotten bigger, and ive had minimal fat gains. Ive gained noticeable mass in my legs and arms, but would still like more.
[/quote]

So you have no idea whatsoever how much weight you’ve gained in the past year? How do you expect to know if what you are doing is working or not? And how can you say that your methods are more effective than 95% of trainers out there? Effective for what?

Also, this leads me to believe that your dietary habits are severely lacking and most likely at the heart of your over-thinking.

Well, if pure strength training is your goal, then just pick a proven strength building method (Westside, Shieko, etc…) and just eat like a horse. Any good strength program can put on muscle if you eat enough.

We were talking about building MAXIMAL amounts of muscle. Which BB’ing style training has proven most effective for.

[quote]
As for goals, i have no intentions to be a bodybuilder. I really just want to be muscular and have a low BF%, and thats also why I recently decided to put a focus on getting down to 10%bf or less.[/quote]

Well good luck, but don’t expect to make much (if any) progress in the muscle department if you do so.

Honestly, if you had no intentions of being a BB’er or even building the most amount of muscle that your body can build, why the heck did you spend all that time inquiring/arguing about how to build maximal amounts of muscle?

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[quote]Sentoguy wrote:

Honestly, if you had no intentions of being a BB’er or even building the most amount of muscle that your body can build, why the heck did you spend all that time inquiring/arguing about how to build maximal amounts of muscle? [/quote]

Well, regardless of whether I want to be HYUGE or more lean and muscular, im going to have to add muscle. It makes no sense to use less than optimal methods. Its unlikely that for someone like me, i’ll accidently add too much muscle. Using methods that will build maximal muscle will just help me achieve my goals faster.

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Oh and I dont believe that its been proven that BB’ing methods are superior for long term maximal mass for natural individuals with average genetics. If it had been proven, then there would be no questions about it, and this thread wouldn’t exist.

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The only reason threads like this exist is because there are people so insecure with themselves that they feel the need to attribute bodybuilding success entirely to steroid use, and pull things out of their ass like “oh this training wouldn’t work for someone who is natural” (even though that doesn’t make any sense because all steroids do is upregulate protein synthesis and they don’t magically turn an ineffective training system into the best one), and the losers can feel much better about their own complete lack of progress and achievement this way.

Bodybuilders? Steroids.

Natural bodybuilders? Genetics.

Why haven’t YOU reached your goals yet, and why hasn’t ANYONE ever gotten muscular using your methods?
I’m just not done theorizing yet!

There has NEVER been a study done to find out what methods work best for taking someone from skinny to very muscular. EVER. So there isn’t going to be any “proof”, except for what thousands of people have achieved in their own lives (with or without steroid or prohormone use), and what you personally achieve with your training and diet.

Which… apparently… isn’t much.

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HAHA!

Your so funny mr. popular. You just troll around the forums looking for a thread to come in and offer nothing.

First off, the methods I use are the ones that most of the authors on this site recomend, so in saying that nobody has ever gotten results with them, your basically saying this site is full of nonsense.

In addition to that, I understand that there wont be any research that can prove which system is better, but when people come on these forums and make claims like the RE method to failure is THE SUPERIOR METHOD, i have to question that.

I have nothing against steriods, and only bring them up, because in a debate like this, its like comparing apples to oranges. Sentoguy mentioned that the RE method is superior, but is for bb’ers that want maximal muscle. It makes sense to me, that its very likely they are getting better results not becaues the RE method is superior, but because they are on steriods.

This thread brought up a lot of good points regarding fatigue vs performance based training, but it was very one sided. You weren’t a part of the discussion, so its probably best you just stay out of it, unless you have something useful to add. Which I doubt.

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This is a great topic.

IMO, going to failure is a CNS failure, not a muscle fiber failure. This is the philosophy behind multiple sets that do not reach failure; because it works the muscle and keeps the CNS out of it as much as possible.

And I believe that most of the research shows that you do not need to go to failure to gain (hypertrophy). And keeping the CNS fresh is important because it allows you to use the most of your muscle fibers as possible.

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[quote]dankid wrote:
I have nothing against steriods, and only bring them up, because in a debate like this, its like comparing apples to oranges. Sentoguy mentioned that the RE method is superior, but is for bb’ers that want maximal muscle. It makes sense to me, that its very likely they are getting better results not becaues the RE method is superior, but because they are on steriods.
[/quote]

The majority of successful natural BB’ers also use the RE method.

[edit]
Also, if there truly were other methods that were superior (the prescence of steroids would be irrelevant), then elite BB’ers would use them. This is what these guys do for a living, the only thing that matters to them is results.

Programs like TBT have been around since the dawn of the sport of BB’ing, they are not new ideas. If they truly were superior, then elite BB’ers would be using them. The steroids that they are taking would simply augment the results that the method produced.

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[quote]Lorisco wrote:
This is a great topic.

IMO, going to failure is a CNS failure, not a muscle fiber failure. This is the philosophy behind multiple sets that do not reach failure; because it works the muscle and keeps the CNS out of it as much as possible.
[/quote]

No, it’s not CNS failure, if it’s any nervous system failure, it’s PNS (peripheral nervous system) failure. And even then it’s not. It has to do with the muscle fibers having used up all available energy.

Again, if you supplement/load creatine, you can increase the number of reps that you can do in a set. If it was CNS failure, this would not work. It does work because temporary muscular failure is not CNS failure, but due to a lack of readily available energy. The nervous system is involved in the process of course, but it’s not what fails.

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[quote]dankid wrote:
This thread brought up a lot of good points regarding fatigue vs performance based training, but it was very one sided. You weren’t a part of the discussion, so its probably best you just stay out of it, unless you have something useful to add. Which I doubt.[/quote]

It was one sided because only one side really has any substantial real world evidence to back it up.

That and the fact that we were talking about things from a maximal muscle building standpoint. Had this discussion taken place on the Strength Sports forum, I’m sure it would have gone very differently.

Because for sports performance (depending on the sport) there is some evidence that avoiding fatigue can be very beneficial (especially with very high skill dependent sports).

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[quote]Sentoguy wrote:
Lorisco wrote:
This is a great topic.

IMO, going to failure is a CNS failure, not a muscle fiber failure. This is the philosophy behind multiple sets that do not reach failure; because it works the muscle and keeps the CNS out of it as much as possible.

No, it’s not CNS failure, if it’s any nervous system failure, it’s PNS (peripheral nervous system) failure. And even then it’s not. It has to do with the muscle fibers having used up all available energy.

Again, if you supplement/load creatine, you can increase the number of reps that you can do in a set. If it was CNS failure, this would not work. It does work because temporary muscular failure is not CNS failure, but due to a lack of readily available energy. The nervous system is involved in the process of course, but it’s not what fails.[/quote]

Would you say it also depends in which rep range one fails? “Failing” at 1-3RM seems to be more connected to nervous system failure (as it will take a long time to be able to do the same weight). Failing at >15RM is connected with muscle failure (a short pause will allow you to do another rep).

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[quote]skor wrote:
Sentoguy wrote:
Lorisco wrote:
This is a great topic.

IMO, going to failure is a CNS failure, not a muscle fiber failure. This is the philosophy behind multiple sets that do not reach failure; because it works the muscle and keeps the CNS out of it as much as possible.

No, it’s not CNS failure, if it’s any nervous system failure, it’s PNS (peripheral nervous system) failure. And even then it’s not. It has to do with the muscle fibers having used up all available energy.

Again, if you supplement/load creatine, you can increase the number of reps that you can do in a set. If it was CNS failure, this would not work. It does work because temporary muscular failure is not CNS failure, but due to a lack of readily available energy. The nervous system is involved in the process of course, but it’s not what fails.

Would you say it also depends in which rep range one fails? “Failing” at 1-3RM seems to be more connected to nervous system failure (as it will take a long time to be able to do the same weight). Failing at >15RM is connected with muscle failure (a short pause will allow you to do another rep).[/quote]

Yes, because weights in the 1-3 RM also require significant rate coding, which is fairly nervous system intensive. But even then, it has a lot to do with energy. The more you rest, the more you allow your body to resynthesize energy to be used for work.

The more work you need to do (or the more intense the work) the more time you need to regroup/store up energy in the muscle(s) to repeat that performance.

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[quote]Sentoguy wrote:

It was one sided because only one side really has any substantial real world evidence to back it up.

[/quote]

I disagree Sentoguy. There are plenty of athletes that use other methods that have great physiques. Also, steriods DO make a difference when comparing methods. They alter the rate of recovery, and amount of work that can be done in a workout.

That is why bb’ers use body part splits, and athletes are more likely to use TBT or upper/lower splits. I think the reason there isn’t a “superior method” is because its like comparing apples and oranges. Training based on fatigue and failure will work better for some, while training based on performance will work better for others.

It doesn’t have anything to do with the RE method being superior for growth, or lower reps being better for strength and functional hypertrophy. The point is, there are many variables, and as long as you understand them ANYTHING will work.

Theres a common sayiing I see, “everything works”, but “only for so long”. You can build endurance with lower reps, and you can build strength with highers reps. This thread is a clear example of some of the problems this field has. Most individuals pick one said and say that it is far superior, but if everything works, but only for so long, then you’d better be willing to use all methods.

I myself am an example of this. Beginner programs like 3x10 took me to a point, and then more strength based routines continued my progress. Now I need to focus more on endurance, but thats not to say I wont go back to 3x10 or a strength based routine in a short time.

I understand this is a bb’ing forum, and arguably T-Nation may or may not be geared toward bb’ers. We clearly need a forum for individuals that want to be big and strong, but not bb’ers.

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Actually, by your logic - since anabolic steroids increase recovery and possible work load - all pro bodybuilders would be doing 3 hour long fullbody sessions several times a week.

But they don’t, and neither do the natural guys that get big.

There, that’s my “useless contribution”.

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[quote]dankid wrote:
I disagree Sentoguy. There are plenty of athletes that use other methods that have great physiques. Also, steriods DO make a difference when comparing methods. They alter the rate of recovery, and amount of work that can be done in a workout.
[/quote]

“Great” maybe. Sandow worthy, nope.

Also, no steroids do NOT make a difference because all professional BB’ers are on them and no natural professional BB’ers are on them (at least not while on stage, but that’s a topic for a different thread).

So, the fact that all the pros are on them cancels out their involvement. If TBT or some other form of training truly were superior, then the pros would be using it.

Besides, you think that athletes don’t use steroids? Hahahahaha, ok you keep on telling yourself that. :stuck_out_tongue:

Or…maybe it’s because they have different objectives. Did it not occur to you that athletes generally are not trying to put on as much muscle as possible, but instead to simply improve their performance in their sport?

Yeah, but not all things will work optimally for all goals. That’s why you see different groups of athletes (BB’ers included) training differently.

That’s just a catch phrase that authors have come up with to sell more workout books/videos/programs IMO. I agree this thread is a clear example of some of the problems in the field, but what it illustrates is that people in this field have been so blinded by the use of flashy words and programs that they fail to open their eyes and see the real world that surrounds them.

Yup. :stuck_out_tongue:

Seriously? Ah, maybe the strength sports forum?

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[quote]Sentoguy wrote:
Lorisco wrote:
This is a great topic.

IMO, going to failure is a CNS failure, not a muscle fiber failure. This is the philosophy behind multiple sets that do not reach failure; because it works the muscle and keeps the CNS out of it as much as possible.

No, it’s not CNS failure, if it’s any nervous system failure, it’s PNS (peripheral nervous system) failure. And even then it’s not. It has to do with the muscle fibers having used up all available energy.

Again, if you supplement/load creatine, you can increase the number of reps that you can do in a set. If it was CNS failure, this would not work. It does work because temporary muscular failure is not CNS failure, but due to a lack of readily available energy. The nervous system is involved in the process of course, but it’s not what fails.[/quote]

You are talking apples and oranges.

When I say -CNS- I mean the PNS enervation of the MU. And when you lift a very heavy load over 90% 1rm it is NOT a muscle energy issue. It is a neural mechanism that stops the muscle from hurting itself based on the muscle tension. This is related to the GTO and other factors.

Also, while you may see a difference in rep volume with creatine, maxing out in a higher volume set (8-10 reps) is more related to muscle metabolite buildup than muscle energy.