[quote]Stronghold wrote:
Yeah, Cue, maybe if you start pre-fatiguing those biceps before hitting back, you too can have a better back than Ronnie Rockel.[/quote]
HAHAHAHA I can’t get enough of this. You are the man stronghold!!! Keep it up!
I have a dream…that one day we can have a T-Nation without Prof.X. That lifters small and roided out(lol) can converse maturely on subjects pertaining to weight lifting. I have a dream gentleman!!!
[quote]Stronghold wrote:
As long as you NEVER EVER do rack pulls![/quote]
What are rack pulls? I’ve been lifting since I was 12 but I never heard of rack pulls…lol /sarcasam
On a serious note…
I pre fatigued by chest the other day with flys before my compound lift and it felt good.
Weights were down (obvi) but my chest was really feeling it and was considerably more sore over the next few days. (I know soreness isn’t the best indicator of a good workout)
I don’t see it as a big deal and I don’t relate to the romantic quest for an MMC that some people describe. If I go to the gym with the intention of training chest, I could do bb bench, db bench, and db flies for 3-4 sets each. To feel the chest I just focus on the bottom half ROM of the lifts, bring my elbows out somewhat wide when I lower them, and feel the chest stretch/contraction.
Those three lifts have pretty much the same effect on the chest. It’s just that most at the gym wouldn’t start off with flys like you did, because their ego wouldn’t allow it. People don’t want to bench tiny weights but are ok doing DB or cable flys at the end of a workout with baby weights. I definitely do see use in us discussing stuff like forearms before biceps or maybe hamstrings before quads, but something like shoulders before chest IMO is stupid.
It’s not just about the beloved MMC, which was only discussed here and there years ago, when pre-exhaust was a method decades old. It’s about actual increased innervation and intra-muscular pressure during the compound lift. Pre-exhaust did a lot for my hamstrings and pecs, so much that I started doing exercises in a normal fashion (compound then isolation) after those relatively impotent muscles became more efficient, so to speak.
Anyhoo, who the hell am I to talk about lifting–an ordinary, 9-to-5 middle-class schlep who likes lifting and only has a handful of acquaintances competing in the NPC, INBF, and WNBF?
[quote]ironmanzvw wrote:
I should have never started this thread lol. Gave way too many idiots (probably small, poorly developed idiots) a soapbox to vomit out insults and trash talk from.[/quote]
I’ll never understand this and its related “let the thread die” sentiment.
Its a discussion forum over the internet medium. On the former, your thread is a resounding success and enjoy what that latter entails. Or not.
Not for nothing, but being able to glean useful info while sifting thru junk is an important skill for life in general.
[quote]chillain wrote:
[quote]ironmanzvw wrote:
I should have never started this thread lol. Gave way too many idiots (probably small, poorly developed idiots) a soapbox to vomit out insults and trash talk from.[/quote]
I’ll never understand this and its related “let the thread die” sentiment.
Its a discussion forum over the internet medium. On the former, your thread is a resounding success and enjoy what that latter entails. Or not.
[/quote]
To his credit, this thread would have been left shredded by the lunk heads posting earlier until around page 12 or so.
I think all of us should want way less of that crap here. It is like some posters only come here to start shit lately.
[quote]super saiyan wrote:
[quote]Professor X wrote:
Hey guys…I have to go lift.
Work at making this to 15 pages at least. My guess is, due to the number of reads, some people actually did learn something in this thread. I know the OP did…and I know Dave Tate wouldn’t be calling it “weird stuff”.
Loved this.
To the guys more interested in getting swole than a popularity contest…ignore the idiots and grab what works for you.
[/quote]
Keep ignoring the stuff YOU wrote and it will make it to 20 easy.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
That is WHY you pre-exhaust a muscle group…so it fails first and doesn’t interfere with the TARGET muscle group.
That is why pre-exhausting chest on CHEST DAY makes little sense.[/quote][/quote]
This picture seems relevant.
[quote]gregron wrote:
[quote]super saiyan wrote:
[quote]Professor X wrote:
Hey guys…I have to go lift.
Work at making this to 15 pages at least. My guess is, due to the number of reads, some people actually did learn something in this thread. I know the OP did…and I know Dave Tate wouldn’t be calling it “weird stuff”.
Loved this.
To the guys more interested in getting swole than a popularity contest…ignore the idiots and grab what works for you.
[/quote]
Keep ignoring the stuff YOU wrote and it will make it to 20 easy.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
That is WHY you pre-exhaust a muscle group…so it fails first and doesn’t interfere with the TARGET muscle group.
That is why pre-exhausting chest on CHEST DAY makes little sense.[/quote][/quote]
This picture seems relevant.[/quote]
Not agreeing with the whole arguing bit…but this picture is funny as shit lol.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
[quote]cueball wrote:
[quote]Professor X wrote:
I haven’t even logged in since yesterday afternoon.
[/quote]
Yet here you are again, saying the same thing you’ve said in who know how many posts, continuing to divert to something nobody is talking about anymore but you.
[/quote]
Cue, spend more time working on that back than you do in this thread…please. I mean, I’m just looking out for you here, dude. I care.
[/quote]
Yea Cue, your back is entirely too lean. You need to add at least 10 pounds of pure fat before I’m impressed by that back.
[quote]ironmanzvw wrote:
Not agreeing with the whole arguing bit…but this picture is funny as shit lol.
[/quote]
Pretty funny huh? I saw it of FB today and have been wanting to post it somewhere so badly lol. I don’t know if this was the best place for it but I couldn’t wait any longer.
Trying this theory out on back day. Going to deadlifts and heavy ass db rows to pre-exhaust forearms and then do a couple of sets of biceps.
not trolling. srs
[quote]TheDon12 wrote:
Trying this theory out on back day. Going to deadlifts and heavy ass db rows to pre-exhaust forearms and then do a couple of sets of biceps.
not trolling. srs[/quote]
add some wrist curls and captain of crush training, and tell me how it works!
[quote]NikH wrote:
[quote]TheDon12 wrote:
Trying this theory out on back day. Going to deadlifts and heavy ass db rows to pre-exhaust forearms and then do a couple of sets of biceps.
not trolling. srs[/quote]
add some wrist curls and captain of crush training, and tell me how it works![/quote]
Obviously you and your sidekick completely have no understanding of the principal X has laid out.
But then your logic tells you that the flat earth is much easier to walk on that that ridiculous round earth, huh?
[quote]Iron Dwarf wrote:
[quote]NikH wrote:
[quote]TheDon12 wrote:
Trying this theory out on back day. Going to deadlifts and heavy ass db rows to pre-exhaust forearms and then do a couple of sets of biceps.
not trolling. srs[/quote]
add some wrist curls and captain of crush training, and tell me how it works![/quote]
Obviously you and your sidekick completely have no understanding of the principal X has laid out.
But then your logic tells you that the flat earth is much easier to walk on that that ridiculous round earth, huh?[/quote]
Please tell me how prefatiguing with wrist curls will help my biceps grow. And we are talking about prefatiguing, not warming up.
[quote]HeavyTriple wrote:
[quote]Professor X wrote:
[quote]cueball wrote:
[quote]Professor X wrote:
I haven’t even logged in since yesterday afternoon.
[/quote]
Yet here you are again, saying the same thing you’ve said in who know how many posts, continuing to divert to something nobody is talking about anymore but you.
[/quote]
Cue, spend more time working on that back than you do in this thread…please. I mean, I’m just looking out for you here, dude. I care.
[/quote]
Yea Cue, your back is entirely too lean. You need to add at least 10 pounds of pure fat before I’m impressed by that back.[/quote]
Finally, some information I can actually use.
Pre-fatiguing examples:
Pecs:
Lats:
Delts
Biceps:
Triceps:
Quads:
Hamstrings:
[quote]super saiyan wrote:
[quote]Fuzzyapple.Train wrote:
Geiger, B. (2006). Pecs in reverse: pre-exhaust your chest by flip-flopping your routine. Everything will be backward except the results. Joe Weider’s Muscle & Fitness: 70+. Canadian Periodicals Index Quarterly.
EDIT: I’m trying to find actual studies (journal article) about it but am coming up empty thus far. Perhaps this phenomena is “broscience” itself(?).[/quote]
I’ve wondered the same thing. I found the following article and would appreciate hearing comments from some of the seasoned guys here.
Bodybuilding Science
By Robbie Durand, M.A.
Exercise Pre-exhaustion for Muscle Growth: A Myth?
For years, exercise pre-exhaustion has been a staple of muscle growth for bodybuilders. In â??Pumping Iron,â?? Arnold routinely used leg extensions before moving into heavy squats. A number of bodybuilders have advocated pre-exhausting muscles for greater muscular growth. The premise of pre-exhaustion is that fatiguing a muscle with a single-joint exercise such as leg extensions or flyes, before a multi-joint exercise such as squats or bench presses, will lead to greater muscle recruitment.
Motor unit recruitment states that as a muscle is fatigued, a higher threshold of muscle fibers will be activated to compensate for the pre-fatigued muscle fibers. The pre-exhaustion method involves exercising the same muscle or muscle group to the point of muscular failure, using a single-joint exercise immediately before a multi-joint exercise.
A common exercise for pre-exhaustion is leg extensions, followed by squats or flyes before bench presses. Muscular Development leads the field in bringing bodybuilders the latest cutting-edge research on exercise science, so this study may come as a shockerâ?? because based on the research, pre-exhaustion may be just bullshit! A recent study in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research questions how valid exercise pre-exhaustion is for muscle growth and strength.
Previous Research About Muscle Pre-exhaustion
Before we get into the newest research, I think itâ??s important to take a look at whatâ??s been done in the past. In a previous study, researchers examined the motor firing of the quadriceps and hamstrings by using a leg extension pre-exhaustion before performing leg presses. Contrary to what bodybuilders would expect, muscle pre-exhaustion with leg extensions before the leg press resulted in a decrease in muscle activity of the quadriceps muscle during the leg press, compared to no pre-exhaustion.1 Pre-exhaustion has been touted for many years to increase the number of fibers activated during an exerciseâ?? but the research showed it decreased fiber activation.
Another study reported similar findings. Researchers investigated the effect of pre-exhaustion on upper-body muscle activation during bench presses, and reported that training chest on the pec deck immediately before the bench press lead to similar muscle activation of anterior deltoid and pectoralis major muscles. However, they observed an increase in the triceps muscle activation, and the worst performance during the bench press exercise was with pre-exhaustion.2
Based on these two studies, pre-exhaustion leads to a decrease in muscle recruitment or no change in the actual muscle group performed during exerciseâ?? not an increase, as so many people once thought. Muscle growth is about keeping tension on the muscle. Any time there is a decrease in motor unit firing during exercise, tension is being taken off the muscle.
New Study: Pre-exhaustion Does Not Lead to Greater Muscle Activation
Scientists in Brazil got together to retest the validity of muscle pre-exhaustion before exercise. They took young men and they hooked electrodes all over their chests and triceps to measure muscle activation, and separated the men into two groups who performed different exercises.
The pre-exhaustion group performed a set of flyes and immediately performed a bench press until failure.
The control group only performed the bench press.
When the researchers measured muscle activation of the chest muscles after pre-exhaustion, they concluded that there was no greater activation of the chest muscle, but there was a greater activation of the triceps by 17.8 percent. So how come the triceps were activated more with a pre-exhaustion set before bench presses? Because the chest muscle was fatigued, it relied on activation of the triceps to move the weight. This research is in alignment with other studies where scientists reported a significant (33.67 percent) increase in triceps muscle activation during bench press exercises with pre-exhaustion.
The bottom line is that pre-exhaustion is not going to lead to greater muscle activation, but it will lead to greater activation of muscle groups because the muscle is pre-fatigued.3 These studies suggest that the pre-exhaustion method must be reconsidered for its effectiveness in enhancing strength and muscle size gains.
Additionally, muscular weakness induced by pre-exhaustion affected exercise formâ?? changed the pattern movementâ?? of the men who performed bench presses. This change in movement pattern requires caution, because limited ability to control movement is related to abnormal mechanical loads at joints. These abnormal lifting patterns may be a factor in injury during exercise.
References:
Augustsson J, Thomee�´ R and Karlsson J. Ability of a new functional deficits after anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction. Knee Surg Sports Traumatol Arthrosc, 12: 350-356, 2004.
Gentil P, Oliveira E, Rocha Ju�´nior VA, Carmo J and Bottaro, M. Effects of exercise order on upper-body muscle activation and exercise performance. J Strength Cond Res, 21: 1082-1086, 2007.
Brennecke A, Guimar�£es TM, Leone R, Cadarci M, Mochizuki L, Sim�£o R, Amadio AC, Serr�£o JC. Neuromuscular activity during bench press exercise performed with and without the preexhaustion method. J Strength Cond Res, 2009 Oct;23(7):1933-40.[/quote]
NikH,
Read the above quoted post (from page 4 of this thread) and hopefully it will help you to understand the concept that X, Matty, and others are talking about.
In your example of wanting to hit your biceps better on curls you would most likely want to pre fatigue the brachialis, not the wrist flexors, so something like hammer or pinwheel curls would be a better choice than wrist curls.
[quote]Sentoguy wrote:
[quote]super saiyan wrote:
[quote]Fuzzyapple.Train wrote:
Geiger, B. (2006). Pecs in reverse: pre-exhaust your chest by flip-flopping your routine. Everything will be backward except the results. Joe Weider’s Muscle & Fitness: 70+. Canadian Periodicals Index Quarterly.
EDIT: I’m trying to find actual studies (journal article) about it but am coming up empty thus far. Perhaps this phenomena is “broscience” itself(?).[/quote]
I’ve wondered the same thing. I found the following article and would appreciate hearing comments from some of the seasoned guys here.
Bodybuilding Science
By Robbie Durand, M.A.
Exercise Pre-exhaustion for Muscle Growth: A Myth?
For years, exercise pre-exhaustion has been a staple of muscle growth for bodybuilders. In �¢??Pumping Iron,�¢?? Arnold routinely used leg extensions before moving into heavy squats. A number of bodybuilders have advocated pre-exhausting muscles for greater muscular growth. The premise of pre-exhaustion is that fatiguing a muscle with a single-joint exercise such as leg extensions or flyes, before a multi-joint exercise such as squats or bench presses, will lead to greater muscle recruitment.
Motor unit recruitment states that as a muscle is fatigued, a higher threshold of muscle fibers will be activated to compensate for the pre-fatigued muscle fibers. The pre-exhaustion method involves exercising the same muscle or muscle group to the point of muscular failure, using a single-joint exercise immediately before a multi-joint exercise.
A common exercise for pre-exhaustion is leg extensions, followed by squats or flyes before bench presses. Muscular Development leads the field in bringing bodybuilders the latest cutting-edge research on exercise science, so this study may come as a shocker�¢?? because based on the research, pre-exhaustion may be just bullshit! A recent study in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research questions how valid exercise pre-exhaustion is for muscle growth and strength.
Previous Research About Muscle Pre-exhaustion
Before we get into the newest research, I think it�¢??s important to take a look at what�¢??s been done in the past. In a previous study, researchers examined the motor firing of the quadriceps and hamstrings by using a leg extension pre-exhaustion before performing leg presses. Contrary to what bodybuilders would expect, muscle pre-exhaustion with leg extensions before the leg press resulted in a decrease in muscle activity of the quadriceps muscle during the leg press, compared to no pre-exhaustion.1 Pre-exhaustion has been touted for many years to increase the number of fibers activated during an exercise�¢?? but the research showed it decreased fiber activation.
Another study reported similar findings. Researchers investigated the effect of pre-exhaustion on upper-body muscle activation during bench presses, and reported that training chest on the pec deck immediately before the bench press lead to similar muscle activation of anterior deltoid and pectoralis major muscles. However, they observed an increase in the triceps muscle activation, and the worst performance during the bench press exercise was with pre-exhaustion.2
Based on these two studies, pre-exhaustion leads to a decrease in muscle recruitment or no change in the actual muscle group performed during exercise�¢?? not an increase, as so many people once thought. Muscle growth is about keeping tension on the muscle. Any time there is a decrease in motor unit firing during exercise, tension is being taken off the muscle.
New Study: Pre-exhaustion Does Not Lead to Greater Muscle Activation
Scientists in Brazil got together to retest the validity of muscle pre-exhaustion before exercise. They took young men and they hooked electrodes all over their chests and triceps to measure muscle activation, and separated the men into two groups who performed different exercises.
The pre-exhaustion group performed a set of flyes and immediately performed a bench press until failure.
The control group only performed the bench press.
When the researchers measured muscle activation of the chest muscles after pre-exhaustion, they concluded that there was no greater activation of the chest muscle, but there was a greater activation of the triceps by 17.8 percent. So how come the triceps were activated more with a pre-exhaustion set before bench presses? Because the chest muscle was fatigued, it relied on activation of the triceps to move the weight. This research is in alignment with other studies where scientists reported a significant (33.67 percent) increase in triceps muscle activation during bench press exercises with pre-exhaustion.
The bottom line is that pre-exhaustion is not going to lead to greater muscle activation, but it will lead to greater activation of muscle groups because the muscle is pre-fatigued.3 These studies suggest that the pre-exhaustion method must be reconsidered for its effectiveness in enhancing strength and muscle size gains.
Additionally, muscular weakness induced by pre-exhaustion affected exercise form�¢?? changed the pattern movement�¢?? of the men who performed bench presses. This change in movement pattern requires caution, because limited ability to control movement is related to abnormal mechanical loads at joints. These abnormal lifting patterns may be a factor in injury during exercise.
References:
Augustsson J, Thomee�?�´ R and Karlsson J. Ability of a new functional deficits after anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction. Knee Surg Sports Traumatol Arthrosc, 12: 350-356, 2004.
Gentil P, Oliveira E, Rocha Ju�?�´nior VA, Carmo J and Bottaro, M. Effects of exercise order on upper-body muscle activation and exercise performance. J Strength Cond Res, 21: 1082-1086, 2007.
Brennecke A, Guimar�?�£es TM, Leone R, Cadarci M, Mochizuki L, Sim�?�£o R, Amadio AC, Serr�?�£o JC. Neuromuscular activity during bench press exercise performed with and without the preexhaustion method. J Strength Cond Res, 2009 Oct;23(7):1933-40.[/quote]
NikH,
Read the above quoted post (from page 4 of this thread) and hopefully it will help you to understand the concept that X, Matty, and others are talking about.
In your example of wanting to hit your biceps better on curls you would most likely want to pre fatigue the brachialis, not the wrist flexors, so something like hammer or pinwheel curls would be a better choice than wrist curls.[/quote]
Pre-fatiguing brachialis makes more sense obviously. But it’s not considered a ‘forearm’ muscle. When you do curls bicep is the primary lifter and brachialis has little involment, unless you do reverse curls, then brachialis has alot more to do. Sounds like brachialis training when you first pre-exhaust it (like flys) then do bigger movement curls (benchpress) where brachialis is involved.
I’ve read the research and I am not neglecting results but sceptic of the conclusion.
for example:
Lets say you have 100 musclefibers, and you do bench press and you use 65/100.
Now if you do peckdeck first you use 35/100 on them, and now they are prefatigued, and then you use 50 more on bench press, so all together 85/100? But you used less on bench press, but over all more pec fiber requirement?
