# Ego's aside: weight or time under tension?



## justheretosnoop (Jun 15, 2012)

As per the title, what's the general view? For example: bench 100kg at normal pace of lift half of that with say a super slow neg and a powerful positive?


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## justin case (Jul 31, 2012)

i used to just bang out the reps, but now i do a proper 3 second slow negative and a fast positive, my poundage's have suffered slightly but are creeping back up, my ligaments and joints are much better, but the most noticeable thing is that my muscles feel tight all the time.


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## justin case (Jul 31, 2012)

also with slow negs you can target a muscle much better as you can actually feel that muscle resisting the weight, as an example triceps dipping, you can really put the emphasis on the tris...if you are just pumping the mental control over the exercise is gone.


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## bornagainmeathead (Nov 26, 2011)

I agree with Justin.

If you don't have that mind-muscle connection you will not get the best out of any exercise.

Sent from my own little world


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## justheretosnoop (Jun 15, 2012)

Justin, I take it all this came about from DC?


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## justin case (Jul 31, 2012)

Dorsey said:


> Justin, I take it all this came about from DC?


absolutely, the most productive schedule i have ever tried, i only did it for a few weeks as it was killing me but i kept the slow negs because it was like a revelation for me about how training should be done.


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## The Trixsta (Sep 6, 2009)

I switch things around a little, I will try both techniques for a set period of time and continuously change what I do throughout the year. Isn't that one of the keys to not plateauing?


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## justin case (Jul 31, 2012)

The Trixsta said:


> I switch things around a little, I will try both techniques for a set period of time and continuously change what I do throughout the year. Isn't that one of the keys to not plateauing?


well not really to do with form, a plateau is usually the result of doing the same exercise for too long and the body just building endurance instead of muscle and strength.

good form should always be a constant and never be sacrificed.


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## The Trixsta (Sep 6, 2009)

justin case said:


> well not really to do with form, a plateau is usually the result of doing the same exercise for too long and the body just building endurance instead of muscle and strength.
> 
> good form should always be a constant and never be sacrificed.


Form will always be a problem when lifting heavy weights, you cannot escape that. When you see guys pressing 180 the back you will see is massively arched and it really isn't going to be strict. The bloke curling on the EZ bar will be swinging a little to get that extra heavy weight up, so many examples there are to give. You cannot in my opinion get to lift big ass weights without sacrificing a little form along the way. Be honest, the next time any of you are at the gym look around and count the people you see using strict and perfect form. In an ideal world perhaps but it's just not the case, not for a weightlifter who wishes to constantly grow/to get bigger and bigger.


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## justin case (Jul 31, 2012)

if you just want to lift for the sake of saying i lifted that weight then fine, i have seen blokes benching with 4 towels on their chest and their hips off the bench. the weight only moves a few inches but it satisfies their egos...if the exercise is strict standing curl then that is what you do, or else swap it for standing cheat barbell curl...why *******ise a routine for your ego?


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## The Trixsta (Sep 6, 2009)

It's not for a persons ego, it's to increase a persons strength. I think you misunderstood what I was trying to convey. What I was trying to put across is that sometimes people will have poor form, people will swing their arms a little or arch their back in order to finish their set. In turn by sacrificing a little form a person will be able to finish a heavy set/weight which in turn will allow them to become stronger. That's my opinion anyway, I'm not saying it's correct or that anyone will agree with it but thats my view on the issues and I have to disagree to what you have said regarding form, in an ideal world yes, in reality no. Form won't always be perfect and inevitably will be sacrificed as a person goes on his/her journey getting stronger/lifting heavier weights.


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## justin case (Jul 31, 2012)

i do understand what you are saying mate, but i think we have to draw a line that one shouldn't cross..if a rep goes up on bench with an elbow 6ins below the other one you should not count that as a lift...bad form is where the rot sets in, if you cant complete a set or even a rep in good form then you have compromised your self and your training will turn to crap..we all have different ideas about things, and for me i hate it when i start bad form.


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## The Trixsta (Sep 6, 2009)

justin case said:


> i do understand what you are saying mate, but i think we have to draw a line that one shouldn't cross..if a rep goes up on bench with an elbow 6ins below the other one you should not count that as a lift...bad form is where the rot sets in, if you cant complete a set or even a rep in good form then you have compromised your self and your training will turn to crap..we all have different ideas about things, and for me i hate it when i start bad form.


I think we got it confused over the bad form part, what you are describing is absolutely terrible form. What I was referring to was a a little sacrifice in form, nothing like you have just described, that I can understand.


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## crazycal1 (Sep 21, 2005)

slow and heavy.. no sacrifice in form, cos for me that usually ends up in an injury.. cant train when i`m injured.. and i`ve still had more comebacks than rick flair.. WOOOO!


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## justin case (Jul 31, 2012)

yeah i agree, i am just misinterpreting your meaning because I've had a few too many vodkas, i shouldn't post on forums when I'm like that, take my last few posts with a pinch of salt..lol


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## roadrunner11466868009 (Mar 28, 2011)

If for example you are doing z-bar curls 3x10 with a new weight and you have to cheat by using some body momentum on the last few reps, stick with that weight till you can do 3x10 strict. Then on next workout increase the weigh I bet you cheat again on the last few reps so repeat the aforementioned.

So really both are true.


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## justheretosnoop (Jun 15, 2012)

TheCrazyCal said:


> slow and heavy.. no sacrifice in form, cos for me that usually ends up in an injury.. cant train when i`m injured.. and i`ve still had more comebacks than rick flair.. WOOOO!


When you say slow do you just mean controlled or we talking X number of seconds? I think the likes of DC promote 5+ seconds neg with an explosive positive.

PS the last thing I remember from wrestling (WWF) was Legion of Doom entering Sumerslam on their Harleys! An old bird across the road used to record everything for us onto VHS!!

Always liked the Texas Tornado myself, think it was the hair!!


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## AChappell (Jun 1, 2011)

Good post I'll add my insights later.


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## ElleMac (Sep 20, 2011)

I do both, I mix up my training technique a lot, it keeps me 1. Interested! 2. I get much better gains from it 3. My strength actually increases when I alternate between heavy and lighter and slow.

Sometimes I'll do both in the same session, for example, I trained legs a couple of days back and did 10 reps x 10 sets leg extension, light weight, slowly, pulse at top. Then ham curls the same way, stiff leg deads heavy, leg press heavy... I listen to my body, I love training negative with shoulders because my shoulders are weak, they've improved most too the past couple of months!

Sent from my HTC Desire S using Tapatalk 2


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## AChappell (Jun 1, 2011)

I'm not sure I agree when you say that you need to drop form a little to lift heavy. Look at olympic weight lifting and powerlifting. In these two sports the most efficient range of movement is the one that follows strict form.

I don't condon sloppy form, I don't encourage it and all the best lifters, powerlifters, olympic lifters and strong men all have great technique. I'm talkign lads that squat upwards of 300kg and Pull the same from the floor. If it's not deep enough on a squat or the bar doesn't touch the chest then nobody counts it.

When it comes to progressive overload though, things are different. you can make an allowance for a small deviation from perfect form to get the rep. But rest assured the following weeks perfect form is always restored once a lift has been made.

As for rep speed, it's always important to take the eccentric part of the rep, so long as it's controlled and not bounced you'll get great results, while the concentric phase for me is always explosive to emphasis fast twitch fibers. So you end up with a slow downwards phase to eliminate the stretch shorten spring effect of training and then work the muscle threw the concentric. I've tried super slow training but never anything quite as slow as DC training. As always like Cal I always emphasis Poundage to ensure progression.


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## crazycal1 (Sep 21, 2005)

Dorsey said:


> When you say slow do you just mean controlled or we talking X number of seconds? I think the likes of DC promote 5+ seconds neg with an explosive positive.
> 
> PS the last thing I remember from wrestling (WWF) was Legion of Doom entering Sumerslam on their Harleys! An old bird across the road used to record everything for us onto VHS!!
> 
> Always liked the Texas Tornado myself, think it was the hair!!


i find 5 secs down to be unrealistic as i focus on poundage progression usually, i might do sommat ultra slow on a warmup occasionally at best.

i think a long 2 secs for the negative is usually about right, brawn suggests 3x3 secs but i just cant go that slow and add weight, altho again on occasion i might try it.

you can i beleive lower 40% more than your can raise so whatever youre lifting i always think 40% slower for the neg at least, altho tbh i just go as slow as i can manage on the day and power up with as much control as poss, i tend to have 1 speed going up, but from most vids ive seen its slower than most.

the shortest distance between 2 points is a straight line, good form encourages this efficient plane of movement.

the more controlled your form the greater chance of this happening.

the more efficient your form the greater the weight or the slower the style you can use.

i pretty much agree with andys post regarding last reps etc..


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## The Trixsta (Sep 6, 2009)

TheCrazyCal said:


> altho tbh i just go as slow as i can manage on the day and power up with as much control as poss


This is exactly what I do.


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## crazycal1 (Sep 21, 2005)

ive seen your squats and you do.. 

quite often as people do theyre reps, the ones in my clients heads vary somewhat from reality shall we say lol


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## justheretosnoop (Jun 15, 2012)

I think we all THINK we're going slowly on the neg than we actually are. Some of the vids over the past 12 months defo proved that, I'd say it's something we all pretty much noticed within ourselves.


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## AChappell (Jun 1, 2011)

Dorsey said:


> I think we all THINK we're going slowly on the neg than we actually are. Some of the vids over the past 12 months defo proved that, I'd say it's something we all pretty much noticed within ourselves.


Your probably right Dorsey, I only really notice my rep speed on the downward phase when I looked back at some of my videos. But rep speed changes with the rep range. I always lift slower during the eccentric phase for a heavy set compared to a lighter set, 5 reps vs 10 reps for example. It's often par for the course though when it comes to a heavy set, controlling the eccentric phase is important to avoid injury, while the concentric phase will always be slower when the weight is heavier. However as I said before I'm not to concern about this since I always feel the muscle threw the whole range of motion, while my rep speed on a lighter set gives me great power transfer over to the sticking point on the heavy set. Weight as I said before is always the easiest and best indicator of progress in my opinion.

Another point I've not discussed is the amount of DOMS you incur by doing slow phase negative reps. It's a little bit of a cheat if you ask me something like DC training, I've no doubt you can get results off it, but then you'll get results from a structured program, especially if you've been following something stale, you simply need to try and progress in the choice program to get results. Going back to one of my older posts on muscle soreness, eccentric reps are a great way to induce this but it doesn't necessarily correlated with muscle damage or strength gains. Likewise is causing massive amounts of damage to tissues in and around areas close to connective tissue correlated to improved force generation compared to causing more damage in the belly of the muscle, not sure on that one or how it compares to concentric reps, from here it becomes a discussion on satellite cell activation, something park might know a little more about than me.

Just my thoughts.


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## Loz1466868022 (Oct 12, 2011)

Both for me, tuts good to mix things up from time to time on varying exercises, i seem to get a good pumped muscle from tut when doing it, more so than my standard lifts unless inless much heavier, just started doing slower negs on bi curls and pre exhausting them, always try and keep your body guessing, i should remember this more


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## crazycal1 (Sep 21, 2005)

i think the heavier the RELATIVE weight and lower the reps you do the more control you need to use, its easier to go a bit quicker and stay controlled with reps if you choose the higher you go.

altho reps get slower the heavier they are the rhythm of the reps stays the same, ie there will be parts of the rep that are slightly faster and slower than others, but as the overall speed slows down as you go thru a set the rhythm just slows as you push harder each time from slightly lower each rep..

lol didnt say that well


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