Mike Mentzer was a proponent of the pre-exhaustion method—using an isolation exercise prior to a multi-joint, or compound, move. For example, using cable flyes prior to decline presses.
Another is eight-time Mr. Olympia Lee Haney. Here’s what he had to say in a recent interview (photo by Art Zeller)…
If you can get your leg to think you’re using 8 million pounds and you’re only using 500 or 300, that’s great. Because the leg doesn’t recognize how much weight you’re using; it only recognizes the feel. And if it feels heavy, then the response is going to be growth. So with pre-exhaust, like leg extensions before squats, guess what: You don’t have to use 8 million pounds. It saves your knees, your hips, and your back. So you fool your legs into thinking you’re using 400 pounds, but you’re only using 200. So I still use that same training principle. I have no knee problem, no joint pain, none of that. And I still have nice development to my legs.
In Old Man, Young Muscle, there’s a Mike Mentzer pre-exhaust workout laid out; however, with slow-twitch exhaustion you get a similar effect that builds muscle and saves your joints…
Doing a 1/3-tempo 20-rep set first on the ideal exercise pre-exhausts the slow-twitch fibers as well as warms up the joints and kicks in fast-twitch fiber at the end…
After a 20-second rest, you use the same weight but with a faster Speed tempo—1.5-second reps for around 10. You only get 10 or fewer because the weight feels a lot heavier. That combined with a faster rep speed quickly stimulates even more fast-twitch fibers from the very first rep…
You activate your growth machinery without joint-crushing poundages.
As Haney said, the muscle doesn’t recognize how much weight you’re using; it only recognizes the feel. And if it feels heavy, then the response is going to be growth.
OMYM is your efficient fast-mass blueprint: Learn how to accelerate your mass gains with the STX method, Speed Sets, and complete ideal-exercise-based training. The 35-minute workouts also include the best stretch and contracted add-on moves. Get 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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