This Lifting Technique Shifts Your Focus for Even More Gains

That is Your Quick Training Tipan opportunity to learn how to work smarter in just a few moments so you can jump right into your training.

IF YOU HANG around the weight rack long enough to move past the rookie wins stagesurely you will find the concept of progressive overload. It’s a very nuanced subject, but the cliff notes version is that you need to regularly increase the challenge to your muscles if you want them to continue to grow in size and strength.

That goal can be achieved in several ways. You can add additional reps or sets, lift more slowly or explosively, increase your time under tensioneither decrease rest between sets, for instance. But by far the most popular approach to progressive overload involves consistently hitting heavier weights.

However, what many men don’t realize is that when it comes to optimizing muscle growth, it’s not just about how much get upbut also how much lower. In short, if hypertrophy is one of your goals, your program should include eccentric-resistance training.

What is eccentric overload training?

It doesn’t matter if you’re performing squats, bench presses, deadlifts, bicep curls, push-ups, or any other exercise, each rep you do contains two distinct phases: concentric and eccentric. The concentric phase is when you contract the target muscle (eg, quads in the squat, biceps in the curl, or hamstrings in the deadlift), while the eccentric phase is when you lengthen that muscle (eg, the hamstring). , when losing weight).

Studies show that emphasizing the eccentric phase in most exercises can significantly improve muscle growth, perhaps to an even greater degree than the concentric phase. While most people understand that they should lower the weight more slowly during each repetition, an equally (if not more) advantageous strategy is to increase the weight or “load” that is lowered, a strategy known as eccentric overload training.

How to include eccentric overload training in your program

There are many ways to integrate eccentric overload training into your weekly routine. With some exercises, like the Nordic Hamstring Curl, is embedded in the DNA of the movement. With others, like Dumbbell Preacher Curl Y leg extension, you have to build it on yourself. For the exercise above, grab a heavier weight than you would normally lift and have a spotter help you lift it, but back away as you lower it. For the last exercise, lift the stack with two legs and lower it with one. (Don’t worry about going too heavy, almost everyone is stronger eccentrically than concentrically.)

Regardless of how you approach eccentric overload training, don’t overdo it too much. Here’s why: Strength tends to be direction-specific. Focusing on the concentric phase of each rep tends to improve your ability to lift heavy weights, while focusing on the eccentric phase tends to improve your ability to lower them, but not the other way around. That’s why it’s critical that you emphasize both strategies in your program to build strength that carries over beyond the gym.