Star Complexes, Eccentric Emphasis, & Natural Lifters Program

Hi Coach - in your article on star complexes, you state " Explosive work increases insulin sensitivity in the muscle tissue more than any other type of training. If you overemphasize the eccentric action, you decrease insulin sensitivity. In fact, intense eccentric work can decrease glycogen re-synthesis for up to 36 hours and that’s a killer!"

It seems as if this is in opposition to the training frequency and eccentric emphasis outlined in the Best Natural Lifters program, along with the difference in volume of work performed under the star complex rubric relative to the BNL program.

I really like both training approaches, but I’m not sure how to reconcile the apparent contradiction.

Thanks so much!

Different programs for different goals. Like a hammer and screwdriver both “work;” you just have to choose when to apply one or the other

Well, you’re perfectly correct, of course. I should have been more specific. The primary goal of the BNL is hypertrophy; the primary goal of the complex work appears to be fat loss through metabolic acceleration, but mass gain is also referenced.

The volume of the complex work is higher because the eccentric stress is avoided and greater volume can be sustained (i.e. Olympic lifting frequency vs classic bodybuilding frequency). Greater muscle damage and subsequent recovery and hypertrophy is incurred primarily through the eccentric stress, but natural lifters can only sustain a given threshold, thus the lower volume but greater frequency of the BNL.

But the coach has mentioned a number of times that strictly Olympic lifts are not conducive to hypertrophy due precisely to the reduced eccentric stress. In the same vein, the insulin sensitivity is increased due to concentric stress but reduced under eccentric stress.

So how is BNL eccentric stress producing hypertrophy if insulin sensitivity and glycogen synthesis is reduced for up to 36 hours? Along the same lines - what vector in the complex approach is producing hypertrophy? Is it primarily actin-myosin thickening and not glycogen synthesis?