Stretching for Strength and Muscle Mass

Practical advice on getting the most out of this effective training method

by Charles Poliquin
2/24/2012 4:08:34 PM

You can use the timing and the nature of stretching to maximize gains in strength and flexibility.

The timing of stretching is critical to maximize the training response, meaning that a great method of stretching used at the wrong time can be disastrous. The regular practice of stretching will accelerate maximal gains in strength and hypertrophy. However, restrictions in fascial structures slow down hypertrophy gains and make it difficult to improve flexibility. Hence, the popularity of our FAT tool courses to remove limiting adhesions – especially when combined with a NO2 increasing cream such as Zanagen Ignite.

If you stretch with the wrong method, such as doing static stretching before strength training, you make the muscle temporarily weak and increase the risk of injury. This has been proven in multiple studies of various stretching activities, ranging from strength training to warming up for rugby and football. In most studies the decreases in maximal strength and power range from 7 to 20 percent. Who wants to train or compete at 80 to 93 percent of their best?

PNF stretching and ballistic stretching increase strength levels for workouts and competition. The key is to perform until you feel your nervous system being activated. Using bands to stretch the joint capsules also potentiates strength and flexibility gains.

To maximize your flexibility gains, four to six hours after strength training do a combination of stretching methods in this order: PNF, then ballistic, then static; following this protocol will accelerate your progress in the weightroom and on the athletic field. With PNF stretching make sure to gradually increase the tension to about 66 percent of maximal strength for 6-8 seconds for the highest return on your time investment.

When using the ballistic method, use the pendulum approach, by gradually increasing both range and velocity of the stretch. Although many physical therapists frown upon this method and argue that it increases the risk of injury, this is no more than the talk of glorified bartenders with their bags of ice. Successful kicks and throws are ballistic, so you can and should train the same way you compete! It’s all about the progressions. Weightlifters lift world records after progressive warm-ups. They get there by lifting heavy weights in a progressive manner. Why not apply the same principles to stretching?

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Sleep Enough: Get More Sleep and Make It A Habit for Optimal Body Composition

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Make it a habit to go to bed at the same time nightly and you’ll have a better body composition. Adequate sleep duration is linked to less belly fat (both visceral and subcutaneous) and a leaner body overall. It’s also essential not to vary the amount of sleep you get from day to day. Catching up on sleep on the weekends or other days after you’ve burned the candle at both ends puts you at greater risk for weight gain.

The reason is that sleep deprivation, even for a night or too, will get in the way of the body’s natural ability to maintain homeostasis. This leads to altered stress hormone levels that hinder rest and recovery. Longer periods of sleep deprivation or a very unbalanced sleep schedule will further hamper the body’s ability to regulate the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis of glands that help us deal with stress. This can lead to elevated cortisol, which is linked to fat gain and a poor body composition.

A new study in the journal Sleep Breath looked at the sleep habits of a large group of over 20,000 participants. Participants who had radically varied sleep patterns, sleeping for a few hours some nights and more than 8 hours other nights, had the greatest increase in body mass index over the 3-year study period.  Participants who got the same amount of sleep every night, generally at least 6.5 hours, had the least increase in body mass index. The key is to go to bed at the same time, preferably following an early-to-bed, early-to-rise pattern, and sleep the same amount every night.

Varying your sleep patterns will not only stress the body, putting you at risk for fat gain, but it will also lead to poor brain function. Although, it’s reasonable to suggest that varied sleep patterns may be associated with poorer lifestyle and health choices, the association between weight gain and varied sleep in the Sleep Breath study was independent of all other risk factors.

Another new study using a Japanese population in the International Journal of Obesity found that men who slept less had much greater waist circumference and greater belly fat than those who got adequate sleep. Among women in the study, there was no direct correlation between sleep duration and body composition, although the women who got less than 5 hours of sleep a night (the least amount measured) had significantly greater visceral belly fat than women who got more than 5 hours a night.

Five things you can do to ensure you get adequate sleep include the following: 
1)    Go to bed at the same time every night. Set a schedule that is regular and you can follow during the week and on the weekend. Make it a priority and stick to it even if you don’t feel tired. Your body will adjust.

2)    Do things in the hour or half-hour before your set bedtime to help you relax. For example, reading, meditating, and filling out a log of what you are grateful for can all be helpful to calm your mind and get your body ready to sleep.

3)    Turn off all screens during the hour or half-hour before bedtime. Really, it will make a huge difference in your ability to go to sleep and get good rest. Turn off computers, TVs, phones, and any other screens  for at least the final 30 minutes before you hit the sack.

4)    Have a very small snack with carbs about an hour before bedtime. Carbs can help elevate serotonin—the neurotransmitter that helps you feel good, calm, tired.

5)    Ensure you are taking adequate magnesium. The tip from yesterday talked about the critical importance of magnesium for health and highlighted the fact that the average American gets less than 25 percent of the magnesium they need a day from the diet. Magnesium calms the nervous system and will help you get adequate rest and achieve a lean body composition.

References:
Yi, s., Nakagawa, T., et al. Short Sleep Duration in Association with CT-Scanned Abdominal Fat areas: The Hitachi Health Study. International Journal of Obesity . February 2012. Published Ahead of Print.

Kobayashi, D., Takahashi, O., et al. High Sleep Duration Variability is an Independent Risk Factor For Weight Gain. Sleep Breath

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Do The Hard Stuff

by Charles Poliquin
The most common training mistake is choosing the easy way out: choosing the exercises that don’t recruit the most muscle. Leg extensions vs. squats, back extension vs. deadlifts, etc.
Basically, hypertrophy is a function of load time under tension within a certain limit. It’s always a matter of how many motor units you can recruit. Bench pressing with chains is going to do more for you than the same number of reps with a plate-loaded chest machine. You need to choose the exercises that give you the most bang for your buck.
Let’s say you have ten sets of twins and divide them into two groups. One group does squats with chains, deadlifts with bands, bench press with chains, and chin-ups. The other group does the leg extension, leg curl, machine bench press, and lat pulldown. The difference in hypertrophy would be monstrous between the free-weight accommodating resistance group verses the machine group.
The problem with plate-loaded machines is that the leverage is often too good. Every kid in high school can do five plates a side, but they can’t do five plates a side with any barbell exercise. And when in real life would you have to overcome resistance in a seated position? Never.
One more problem with machines is the fixed pattern of movement. For that same reason, I think dumbbells are a better choice for most exercises than barbells, particularly if you’re dealing with an athletic population.
Now, machines can sometimes be a good source of variation for the “beach body” lifter. In bodybuilding, the muscles don’t have to have any other function. They just have to look pretty. It doesn’t matter if you use rocks or selectorized weight machines, as long as you have enough load and you last long enough (time under tension), you can hypertrophy.
I’m not dogmatic enough to say that machines are “evil.” It depends on the population. The executive doesn’t care how heavy he can go on the incline dumbbell press; he just wants to look good in a bathing suit at the five-star resort. Whether he used machines or dumbbells doesn’t really matter.

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High Reps or Heavy Weight? by Charles Poliquin

The best studies on hypertrophy have been done in Finland, and they found that wrestlers, bodybuilders, powerlifters, and weightlifters all hypertrophy… but for different reasons. The most important thing for hypertrophy training is to actually do varied training. Look at Ronnie Coleman. He used to train as a powerlifter then he trained as a bodybuilder: varied training.

Look at pre-1980s bodybuilders, back when steroid usage was fairly light compared to today. Back then, they trained as part of a subculture with weightlifters and powerlifters. By society’s standards, people who lifted weights were weirdoes. So all these people lifted in the same gyms and shared training methodologies.

The forgotten element of hypertrophy training today is the principle of overload. People don’t try to lift heavier, they just double their drug dosage.

So, “going for the burn” and getting a pump with higher reps is one way to hypertrophy, but not the only way. For example, if I make you do eccentric squats and eccentric chins, you’re going to put some weight on, but you don’t have a burn.

Hypertrophy is a function of load vs. time under tension. Since it’s a product, you can work at one end or the other, or both. Let’s say you can squat 135 pounds for 10. Well, if you go on to squat 135 for 30, your legs will grow. But if, instead, you go on to squat 225 for 10, your legs will grow too, only for a different reason. And if you can eventually do 225 for 50, then your legs will really get big!

Both systems work.

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