[mariozee]

Is that exercise intensity really useful?

Hey, so yes X amount of sets till failure.

Obviously the first set will be very strong.
Any other set after that will decrease in repetitions dramatically.
So what is the idea of this?
Hypertophy?
Strength?
Or maybe something else?

Cheers!

 

[Fremen]

So what is the idea of this?

Force your body to adapt as quickly as possible to the demands of training
You can do 100 push-ups or 10 in a row but with sets to failure you will still reach your limit every time and push it a little further.
Obviously training to failure must be done without overdoing it or you risk overexerting yourself too much without giving your body time to recover

 

[Shikari]

Generally, sets to muscle fatigue with short rest periods are to promote hypertrophy. Gets lots of quality sleep, adequate protein and alternate pull/push/leg and rest days.

 

[Damer]

@mariozee interesting question and the replies @Fremen and @Shikari gave you are both correct. The body adapts to stress and stress comes from either mechanical tension, muscle damage or fatigue (and there is an overlapping complexity to this which we won't cover here). Exercise intensity is a tool we use to accelerate change by amplifying experienced stress and this is why we use it. We cover some of this in the discussions we carried in our AMA here: https://www.community.darebee.com/t...raining-isometric-calisthenic-exercises.1183/ I hope this helps.

 

[mariozee]

Thanks for the detailed answers.

For a context the exercise is picked up from Strength Protocol Program which says:

It is a strength and size oriented program designed to level up your physical capabilities through the hyperloading of specific muscle groups

Based on my experience, such short rest intervals might promotes more muscular endurance and cardiovascular conditioning than hypertrophy or strength gains.

If you had the following, what would you choose?
A: 3 sets of pushups to failure: 30, 15, 05 (20 sec rest between sets)
B: 3 sets of pushups of: 20, 20, 20 (90 sec rest between sets)

I lean more toward option B if I had the above as goal.

I'll be happy to hear your opinion on the topic.

Keep pushing!

 

[Shikari]

Great question, and I think the # of reps in your example might be well expressed as:

A. 3 sets of push ups to fatigue: X, less than X, less again than X (where X = muscle fatigue, the one set max)

B. 3 sets of push ups to a # that is significant, but not your one set max.

In this case, I think A would require more work than B. Muscle growth is proportional to tension under time, which I think A is more likely to do than B. That's not to say that B would have no effect. Multiple hard sets will make you a lot stronger, for sure.

Lots more depends on what else the person does to support muscle growth: nutrition, sleep, destress come immediately to mind.

BTW, I propose we declare a moratorium on the term "muscle failure". I have seen patients who did pull ups, burpees, thrusters, wall balls, box jumps to "failure," until rhabdomyolysis turned their urine to the color of iced tea. That's muscle "failure" -- the tissue simply cannot handle the physiological stress on it.

I think a better term is "muscle fatigue", meaning you cannot do another rep _with_correct_form_. That is, not only the primary muscles but also the accessory/stabilizing muscles have been worked out.

@Damer , thoughts on this?

 

[Damer]

@mariozee the latest research findings from kinesiology and strength science show that hypertrophy is an adaptation that is primarily triggered by exercising to failure. We have two basic variables we can implement to achieve this most times: load and time (there is also intensity but intensity most times is the result of load and time). Using push-ups, in your example, the objective load (i.e. the weight of the body) is constant. Therefore we need to use the shorter recovery time to increase the subjective load (i.e. what the body experiences due to possible mechanical damage to individual muscle fibers and metabolic load) so the first example you use is the one to use for hypertrophy and the strength gains associated with it.

Your second example will not trigger hypertrophy but it will lead to strength gains regardless because it activates a different pathway. Strength may a component of muscle size but that is not the whole picture on how strength (which is an attribute) is generated which is why, these days, exercise science treats the two as different but slightly overlapping objectives.

@Shikari I think a better term is "muscle fatigue"

I could not agree more. And I totally get what you are saying regarding the patients you see. Unfortunately "muscle fatigue" is so hugely subjective that we never truly get to experience it unless it's in a supervised program. Muscle failure for all the problems associated with it as a term conveys a much better idea of how hard one should push and, from countless field tests we carried out, it usually ends up being closer to "muscle fatigue" than true "muscle failure" when applied in our workouts.

 

[mariozee]

I see your points. They make sense.
I do not disagree with them, that is for sure.
It might be just me going through different literature throughout the years. But that’s really not that important.
My original question was from pure curiosity, which you definitely satisfied with well backed up analysis.

In any case I’m just starting my experiment with the Darebee platform and I’m eager to check my results after awhile.

Thank you guys.

 

[Damer]

@mariozee thank you for the questions here and I will also add this: while everything we put together is field tested and backed by science it is also, once published, a formula designed to work as well as possible on as large number of people as possible. But we know that every individual is unique. The only expert on your body is you. So while you apply our workouts also explore what works best for you within that context. If you could, please share your journey. It helps many other people here who face similar difficulties better understand how to choose what will work best for them and it inspires them. Plus, it is always amazing to see someone's personal journey.

 

[broli]

Based on my experience, such short rest intervals might promotes more muscular endurance and cardiovascular conditioning than hypertrophy or strength gains.

the studies we have of late show that longer rest leads to better results. So, longer rest between exercises, as well as longer rest between sets, leads to better hypertrophy results.

From https://www.community.darebee.com/threads/push-pull-legs-resttime.585/.