Don’t Murder Your Muscle Gains
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Jack finishes a focused set of exercises and re-racks the weight. His legs are wobbly, he feels light headed and he takes a big swig from his water bottle. He looks down at his watch and presses the start button to begin counting down backwards from 2 minutes.
He saw on TV that 2 minutes is the perfect rest time between sets, and what he wants is to do it exactly in that way. So, the watch beeps and he’s be back in the squat rack ready for his next set of exercises with the weights.
2 minutes is up. His legs still feel weak, his heart still beats frantically and he doesn’t quite feel 100%, but that watch beeped and that means his time is up. He must perform his next set regardless of how he feels.
He performs the next set. He is not really ready to exercise right now, so he puts forth a mediocre effort, finish the set, and waits for another 2 seconds. He is making a huge mistake, just as hundreds of lifters in another gyms.
By having a set rest interval between sets, he is forcing his body to train at an effort level that is far less than his maximum potential and is severely sacrificing the amount of muscle growth he can ultimately stimulate because of this.
Muscles grow because of an adaptive response to stress. You lift X amount of weight for Y number of reps, and your body adapts to this level of stress. In order to see continual gains in muscle size, you must continually force X and Y to higher and higher levels.
What you have to do then is to lift as much weight as you can again, and again, and again.
If you don’t rest enough between sets, you will not reach your maximum strenght potential sacrificing the amount of weight you can lift, and also sacrificing the amount of muscle you can build. So, to begin the next set qhen you are still tired is the big mistake you should not make.
A watch will never tell you when you are ready to begin the next set. Instead of it, listen to your body and you will know when to follow your training.
The set rest period theory is also highly flawed because it does not take into account the fact that certain exercises tax the body much more heavily than others and therefore require more rest between them.
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