In most of our mass-training e-books we say that the semi-elongated, or stretch, position on an exercise’s stroke is most important to pack on muscle weight. Why?
Here’s a quote we used in The Ultimate Mass Workout from strength and hypertrophy researchers Steven J. Fleck, Ph.D., and William J. Kraemer, Ph.D. (Don’t fall asleep as you read it; we will translate—lol)…
There is an optimal length at which muscle fibers generate their maximal force. The total amount of force developed depends on the total number of myosin cross bridges interacting with the active sites on the actin…. Below this optimal length, less tension is developed during an activation because with excessive shortening there is an overlap of actin filaments so that the actin filaments interfere with each other’s ability to contract the myosin cross bridges.
So as a muscle approaches the contracted position, like at the top of a leg extension, the fibers have less leverage, are crowded and bunched, and produce less force and fiber activation…
That would explain why you get weaker at the top of a leg extension and leg curl. And why the contracted position of other exercises with continuous tension is harder—like cable crossovers, triceps pushdowns, and pulldowns.
So is there a way to make those exercises, moves on which there is resistance in the contracted position, better for more fiber activation and size stimulation? Yes…
Stage Sets: Do the hardest half of the stroke first, close to failure, then do the easiest half last…
For example, on leg extensions you’d move to the top, contracted, position, then lower only halfway. Do eight to 10 of those half reps, then lower all the way to the bottom and raise halfway up for as many LOWER-STAGE partial reps as possible.
You do Stage Sets in reverse for exercises with NO resistance in the contracted position, like squats, bench presses, etc. That is, the bottom, semi-stretch segment, first for a new size burst…
For more on Stage Sets—as well as Double-X Overload, X/Pause, X Fade, Ronnie Coleman’s training and our second-year X-Rep Transformation Workout as well as the Split-Positions Mass program, see Beyond X-Rep Muscle Building.
Till next time, train hard—and smart—for BIG results.
—Steve Holman and Jonathan Lawson
X-Rep.com