Less Time, More Muscle: Pulling the Growth Trigger
Less Time, More Muscle: Pulling the Growth Trigger Arthur Jones, the creator of Nautilus machines, is considered the father of high-intensity training, and he had some great ideas. But, unfortunately, many people just didn’t respond well to his abbreviated programs. Why? We think
we’ve discovered the reason. It could be because a key point he made about exercise performance has been completely forgotten—something that may be the ultimate growth trigger for those looking for bigger results in less time. Let me explain…
Jones said that one all-out set is enough to get the muscle-growth machinery moving. But a lot of scientific research says that the nervous system craps out before you can activate a lot of fast-twitch fibers during that one set. In
other words, too many muscle fibers are left understimulated or completely untouched at the failure point.
Did Arthur Jones know about the nervous system roadblock? Possibly. It may be why he often told people who were using low-volume, high-intensity training that to get the best results in size and strength, they must train to failure and then—and this is a key point—they should move the resistance as far as possible and hold it for an isometric contraction till failure. That hold at the sticking point had a lot of anabolic power, but most trainees never did it and rarely do it today. That’s too bad because it’s a key to making shorter workouts much more effective!
Short pulsing actions, or X Reps, at the end of a set are much better than static holds. That’s because muscles are used to movement to prime optimal fiber activation. In other words, short partials are much more effective at getting the max number of fast-twitch fibers engaged.
For example, on leg curls, first do one or two progressively heavier warmup sets to prime hamstring contraction. Now increase the weight and do a controlled work set—one to two seconds up, one to two seconds down—till failure. You probably felt your hamstring muscles a little when you failed at around rep nine, but not much. That’s because nervous system failure forced you to quit on that set, but that’s okay. That first work set is really just a heavy warmup—to prime the muscle to fire maximally on your X-Rep set.
Rest about a minute for fatigue-product clearance, then fire out your X-Rep set. Take the same weight and rip out as many reps as possible. When you can’t get another rep, curl the footpad to just above the fully extended
position—about halfway between the bottom and the middle—and pulse, moving the footpad in about a five-inch range and focusing on your hamstrings. Those are the X Reps that will force the target muscle to continue contracting at the max-force-generation point (the semistretch position) where you can activate the most fibers. You should feel your hamstrings screaming for relief with each partial, but force out as many as you can. Then, hold the pad statically for a few seconds to fry the fibers further. (If you can’t pulse when you hit failure, simply hold the weight statically, as Jones suggested, for as long as you can. You should be able to start pulsing after a few workouts when you get used to extending your sets.)
When you release the weight, you’ll realize why we believe that one X-Rep set has about the same grow power as three to five regular sets. It’s efficient muscle training at its best! Try it at your next workout. You’ll feel the
difference immediately—and new visible mass increases are only a few workouts away!
