Remember that the aim is not to increase weight week in week out, or seek improvement. The aim is to go to muscle failure with a minimum of four slow repetitions over a time frame of between 45 - 90 seconds. This will allow growth of new muscle tissue. Only after consistently exceeding 90 seconds is it necessary to add extra weight to bring repetitions back into the required time frame.I've done 9 workouts following this book. After the 6th workout, my data appeared to show that I plateaued at the 3rd workout. I decided to increase rest time, which had been 6-8 days. Days after previous workout increased to 9 days, 12 days, and 11 days for workouts 7 through 9. At the latest workout 9, there was a noticeable improvement in one of the exercises, so I will be increasing the weights for that exercise for workout 10.
I think people may quickly become impatient when they don't get week over week improvement and even have some regression. For me, that's a sign to increase rest time. I'm fine with the level I'm at, and it's a bonus to increase weights. My primary goals are just preventing total atrophy of muscles (use it or lose it) and relationship bonding with my wife as we are lifting partners. Having done static contraction for 3 years a long time ago, I know gains are slow, and after gaining a lot of strength over years, the ideal time between lifting can exceed a month.
I know the 45-90 seconds, though I wondered about how many repetitions because I didn't see it in the book. Was the four repetitions in the book?The aim is to go to muscle failure with a minimum of four slow repetitions over a time frame of between 45 - 90 seconds.
In the video with McGuff working out, he goes way beyond 90 seconds. So I'm going by 2 minutes before increasing weights.It also has a 10 min video with McGuff himself doing the exercises
My understanding is that it is the fast twitch muscles that need up to a week to recuperate. Your slow twitch muscles will have recuperated long before then, say after 2 days? So you could do 'traditional' exercises (weights or whatever) as long as you do the kind of 10 reps for 3 sets sort of thing and NOT to muscles failure, just muscle burn.Will do that!
One additional question I have regarding this training. It should be performed once a week. What about the rest of the week? Can I i.e. run or do other lighter workouts? Or the body need regeneration and I should not do anything else? What are your thoughts and experience about that? Thanks!
I waited a full 14 days after my previous workout. For the latest workout, I increased the weight for one machine because I reached 2 minutes at the previous workout. I also hit 2 minutes on a different machine in the latest workout, so I will be increasing the weight on that one at the next workout. I'm reaching 2 minutes and increasing weights with the time between workouts being increased to 11-14 days, rather than time between workouts at 6-8 days and experiencing no progress.
but if you’re after muscle strength and size and the health benefits that come with such development, there are many ways to get there.
doing one set of push-ups, pull-ups, and squats (or whatever exercises you like to accomplish the same effect) at a regular speed and like 1-2 reps shy of failure every day will develop strength and size very effectively. It can be accomplished 3-5 minutes before you shower and go to work. Feel free to take days off whenever, always listen to your body.
What I found over the years is consistency trumps all other variables.
The 3 other variables that are just as important as training is eating, sleeping, and stress management.
That's one thing I can do, and sometimes I have trouble breaking consistency.
I liked it, though there's some evolution nonsense to ignore and some profanity.Here is an interesting video of Drew Bayes interviewing Doug McGuff.