When we first embark on our journey through the iron jungle we often find ourselves looking to the bigger guys in the gym to see what they do to develop their physiques. At first, because we’re still a bit wet behind the ears and don’t know any better, all we see is big weight being thrown around. We therefore incorrectly believe that big weight equals big muscle.
While this is isn’t entirely untrue, you will inevitably reach a stage in your training where you’ll need to start training smarter instead of merely going as heavy as possible. After a good few years of training you start to feel the effects of your weekly labour, especially on your joints. By that stage hopefully you’re not so wet behind the ears anymore. So you stop thinking that you need to leg press and bench press mountains to see results and get smart in the hope that you can save your joints and prolong your time in the sport without the worry of pain and inflammation. Longevity becomes a new goal for you, both for the sport and your body.
Some of the best bodybuilders in the world would be completely destroyed in a strongman or a powerlifting competition. Why? Because big muscle and prodigious size are not always dependent on how much weight you can move. Bodybuilding is about breaking down muscle tissue and re-building it on an ongoing and timeous basis. I wrote numerous articles on instinctive training as I don’t believe that anything is more important based on my own personal experience.
To recap, instinctive training is about training based on what your body is telling you on any given training day. If you feel strong then by all means, push the limits of the weight you can move. But on the days when heavy weight just isn’t an option, then you need to get smart… and that’s what this article is all about.
Times are changing. If you look around the pro ranks you’ll see all kinds of training systems being created by some of the world’s most sought after trainers. Hany . Rambod’s FST-7, used by Jay Cutler and Phil Heath, and Neil Hill’s Y3T, used by local pro Hennie Kotze and 212 Mr. O Flex Lewis, are just some of the new training systems that incorporate volume training instead of simply relying on heavy weight training to deliver great results. Volume training works on the basic principle that in order to get a muscle to grow bigger you need to push as much blood into it as possible during training. The result is a huge pump which delivers more nutrients to rebuild damaged muscle fibres and also creates a greater stretch in the muscle fascia. The fascia is the muscle sheath that encases the softer, inner fibres. Without stretching the muscle fascia of each muscle you limit the growth potential of the muscle.
While we are touching on volume work in this article, we are primarily focusing on priority training and the concept of pre-exhaustion to pre-fatigue muscles before the actual training session or working sets begin.
PRIORITY TRAINING
This technique is commonly known as prioritising. It simply means that once you’ve been in the gym for a while and have built some decent meat on your wheels, you can start getting critical and look to “prioritise” what you need to do with regard to further leg development.
Prioritising itself could be a 50 page article and there are many different ways in which you can prioritise your training to bring weaker body parts on par with the rest of your body. But in the interim, drop your pants in front of a mirror the next time you’re alone (please don’t do this in a gym because you’re giving us all a bad name every time you do it) and look at your legs from the front – do you have an over- or underdeveloped outer quad sweep? Are your inner thighs lagging the growth of your outer sweeps? Stand to the side – do your hamstrings look like they’re growing at a realistic rate or do your quads look like they have completely stolen the show? Most untrained eyes won’t really be able to see subtle size weaknesses or understand what balance really is when it comes to good quad and ham development, but as time goes by you’ll be able to pick up what looks acceptable and what doesn’t as far as your legs are concerned. Failure to do so will undoubtedly end up with a competition judge or your mates at the gym telling you that you need to work on your legs. This in itself should be enough to tell you that you need to address the problem, whether it be size, balance or their overall look.
HOW DO I PRIORITISE AREAS OF MY LEGS?
That’s easy. You train them harder and more effectively at the start of your workout. You give them a ton of effort and energy and train them with maximum intensity. This will ensure that they submit to the demands you impose on them, in your effort to get them to grow or change in the way you intend to improve them.
PRIORITY TRAINING BENEFITS
- You get to identify weak spot and address them accordingly.
- You’re fresh from your preceding rest so you get to put maximum effort into training, thereby changing certain areas of your leg development.
- You can add more sets to the area/s you’re prioritizing to maximise the effectiveness of the workout.
HAMSTRING-PRIORITISED WORKOUT
Go for peak burn and contraction at the top of the range of motion. Select a weight that will only allow you to work 12 or 15 reps and adjust accordingly.
STANDING SINGLE LEG CURLS
PRE-EXHAUSTIVE SETS
- Standing single leg curls:
4-5 sets of 12-15 reps.
WORKING SETS
- Lying leg curls:
4 sets of 8-12 reps.
- Stiff legged deadlifts:
4-5 sets of 8-12 reps.
QUADS
- Leg extensions:
3 sets of 12-15 reps
2 drop sets of 8 reps/8 reps (x2)
- Leg press:
2 sets of 15-20 reps
2 drop sets of 12 reps/12 reps (x2)
- Squats:
2 sets of 8-12 reps
2 drop sets of 8 reps/8 reps (x2)
PRE-EXHAUSTION TRAINING
WHAT IS IT?
Simply put, it involves pre-exhausting and pre-fatiguing your legs through a series of sets before the main working sets of your training routine begin.
WHY THE HELL WOULD I WANT TO DO THAT?
Performing pre-exhaustive sets before working sets in a leg workout allows you to recruit maximum fibres during the working sets, without having to pile on the plates during leg presses or squats. You will also maximise the pump required to grow muscle and this form of training puts your legs through their paces in the quest for maximum muscle growth.
So, you get the same amount of muscle fibre recruitment, if not more, plus you don’t have to crush yourself under a leg press with 800kg strapped to it. Basically you can do the same amount of muscle fibre recruitment with less weight. Your body’s natural and most efficient method of getting physical work done is to minimise the effort needed to perform a movement, therefore saving you energy. Before a workout your muscles are primed with glycogen to ensure that you are ready for anything that the wilderness throws at you: from flight (running from people with knives for instance), to simple everyday tasks.
HOW IS IT DONE?
Work the legs through a series of lower intensity, higher volume sets that pre-exhaust or fatigue the muscle before you get into the heavier, lower volume working sets of your leg training session.
PRE-EXHAUSTION TRAINING BENEFITS
- Maximum muscle fibre recruitment when training through your working sets.
- Highly effective training with less weight.
- Promotes joint and skeletal system longevity.
- Greater attention on volume training.
- Helps people who have plateaued in training to overcome stagnant progress.
- Limited chance of injury due to the amount of exhaustive sets being performed before the main working sets.
QUAD-PRIORITISED WORKOUT:
PRE-EXHAUSTIVE SETS
- Leg extensions:
3 sets of 15-20 reps 3 drop sets of 10 reps/10 reps (x2)
WORKING SETS
- Leg press:
2 sets of 15-20 reps
2 drop sets of 10 reps/10reps (x2)
- Squats:
3 sets of 12-15 reps
2 drop sets of 10 reps/10 reps (x2)
- Walking lunges:
3 sets of 10 steps per leg
HAMSTRINGS
- Stitt legged deadlifts:
5 sets of 8-12 reps
- Lying leg curls:
5 sets of 8-12 reps
- Horizontal hyper extensions:
3 sets to failure (make sure that your heels are placed lower than your hips. Don’t hyperextend all the way back to keep the resistance focused inside the hamstrings).
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