In the last training newsletter, I mentioned that I was always perplexed that the biggest bodybuilders did most of their sets with a fast rep tempo.
Even high-intensity advocate Mike Mentzer, who preached lifting in two seconds and lowering in three to five, used a faster tempo much of the time—1.5 to two seconds per rep.
In Old Man, Young Muscle, I discuss how I used Speed Sets to increase my muscle gains in my early 60s…
I was doing half my sets in Speed style—1.5 seconds per rep. But after OMYM was released and I got a cable machine for my home gym, I stopped doing Speed Sets. Bad advice; bad idea…
Within weeks I started losing muscle size. Panic. I didn’t make the connection, so I began to think that perhaps it was my old age finally catching up with me. Fortunately, I was wrong…
I figured out that Speed Sets had been one of the keys to optimal hypertrophy. That was especially important with short workouts for variation and more fast-twitch stimulation (more on that below)…
Once I went back to using Speed Sets for half my workouts, my bodyweight shot back up from 180 to over 190—no fat gain.
After more research, I discovered why Speed Sets are so damn effective at building muscle. They…
1) Reduce “garbage negatives,” the easy lowering, or eccentric, strokes that cause lots of damage without much growth stimulation; the negative stroke on a Speed Set is less than one second. Only a few slower sets are necessary for the specific growth response they produce—heat-shock proteins, etc.
2) Increase fiber activation via the myotatic reflex at the rep turnaround: When you more abruptly move from the negative to the positive stroke, you get an emergency neuromuscular response—a muscle-fiber call to arms, so to speak.
3) Provide fiber-recruitment variation—you get more fast-twitch fibers involved from the very first rep due to a faster tempo: speed is a fast-twitch enabler.
That last one is the reason a Speed Set works especially well after a 20-rep set of standard slower reps. It’s a supercharger within the slow-twitch exhaustion method, STX…
That first slower high-rep set exhausts the slow-twitch fibers, bringing in the fast-twitch at the end. After a short 20-second rest, you launch into a Speed Set with the same weight and immediately continue the fast-twitch assault—from the very first rep.
Glad I finally made this realization for new mass accumulation. At age 63 it’s been the key to a more muscular physique with 35-to-40-minute workouts three times a week.
Your Efficient Mass-Building Handbook: For more mass-building tips like the above plus complete workouts that include the ideal exercise for each muscle and the best stretch and contracted add-on moves, get your copy of Old Man, Young Muscle.
And you still get The Muscle-On, Belly-Gone “Diet” ebook FREE for a limited time when you add Old Man, Young Muscle to your mass-building library. Go HERE.
Till next time, train hard—and smart—for BIG results.
—Steve Holman
Former Editor in Chief, Iron Man Magazine
www.X-Rep.com
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ATTENTION OVER-40 BODYBUILDERS
One of the most interesting read-me pages on Testosterone and other muscle-building hormones we’ve seen is The Truth About Testosterone.
It even talks about a fruit, a specific part, that can up your T naturally. Cranking up your testosterone will not only get you jacked in the gym, but in the bedroom too—not to mention help rip up your midsection as it ignites fat burning. If that interests you, there’s more from our colleague and registered dietician, HERE.