Interesting piece of info about strength training

[Reidar]

"Lower the bar quickly, but under control. Lowering a bar slowly will build muscle mass but not strength. Please, I beg you, stop reading bodybuilding magazines. They have contributed greatly to ruining strength training in the United States."

Taken off of a westside-barbell.com article.

I know that's how I've been lifting all this time because I'm always hearing "go slow on the concentric portion". Apparently that's just for bodybuilding. Anyone else do this already, or is this something that most of you already knew?

Also, if you don't know about Westside, it's one of the most notorious powerlifting organizations around, with lifters achieving well over a 1000 pound squat, so this is definitely from a trusted source.

 

[Wrecking Ball]

Westside, dynamic lifting, and the lifting you described are well known around here. Welcome to the forums.

 

[Universal]

Picture this:
You're doing Arched Back Goodmornings for 5 reps with 360 lbs on your back...
You gonna contract nice n' slow to get that up?
No cause if you do, well, the weight ain't gonna go nowhere but down and so will you.
Doin heavy singles on the Deadlift? How you gonna get that weight up? Not by going slow.

Everything has a time and place but generaly when strength training you want the concentric portion of the lift to be explossive or else how you gonna get the weight up?

Even when doing lighter sets, working up to your heavy-ass working sets, you want the concentric contraction to be explossive. You wanna move heavy-ass weight? You need to be explossive. There you go :icon_chee

 

[Reidar]

Westside, dynamic lifting, and the lifting you described are well known around here. Welcome to the forums.

I wasn't trying to simply spread the word of Westside's name, but to bring to light that particular piece of info. But yeah, despite all the powerlifting studying I've done, Westside is the only source I've read about that.

And to Universal, I was talking about the eccentric part, not the concentric. I've always exploded up, but when going down I'd try to resist gravity and go as slow as possible.

 

[Barut]

WSB does NOT have lifterS with 1000lb+ squats. They have come up with a good training methodology though.

 

[Barut]

I wasn't trying to simply spread the word of Westside's name, but to bring to light that particular piece of info. But yeah, despite all the powerlifting studying I've done, Westside is the only source I've read about that. And to the second poster, I actually do try to go slow going down on heavy deadlifts. But I guess I'll have to change that since I'm not going for bodybuilding.

If you're doing heavy (near 1rm) singles on DL, you'll wreck yourself doing negatives.

 

[Reidar]

WSB does NOT have lifterS with 1000lb+ squats. They have come up with a good training methodology though.

Yes they do.

"We do them to produce world-record squats. The late, great Matt Dimel made 1010 in 1985 at SHW. Chuck Vogelpohl pushed the limit of the squat by doing 1025 at 220 pounds, the lightest man to do a grand.

...Paul Childress has made 1123 at 308."

http://www.westside-barbell.com/articles.htm "Box Squatting Benefits"

 

[Wrecking Ball]

Sorry I should have said westside's ideas are very familiar in this forum,the idea you spoke of is well known here.

Also I would think you'd lower the bar slowly, but not so slow you're counting a cadence right?

 

[Reidar]

If you're doing heavy (near 1rm) singles on DL, you'll wreck yourself doing negatives.

I've been doing 325lbs for 5 reps. I'm not going super-slow, but I am trying to resist the pull going down. But I'll definitely change the form of that and possibly go heavier.

And thanks for the answers. After getting my workout advice from Muscle and Fitness and bodybuilding.com, a lot of this is new stuff to me. I started out on bodybuilding and then switched to powerlifting, rather than vice versa like most seem to do.

 

[Wrecking Ball]

Barut, westside absolutely has guys that squat 1000 lbs. However, they are all geared out of their minds...equipment and juice.

 

[Barut]

I've been doing 325lbs for 5 reps. I'm not going super-slow, but I am trying to resist the pull going down. But I'll definitely change the form of that and possibly go heavier.

Thanks for the link on the 1000lb squatters. From an article I had read from Dave Tate, he mentioned that WSB had only 6 lifters squatting more than 800. It doesn't really matter though. They squat huge.

Personally, I believe that anything more than 3 reps on DL is high rep. I wouldn't really consider sets of 5 to be heavy.

 

[Universal]

And to Universal, I was talking about the eccentric part, not the concentric. I've always exploded up, but when going down I'd try to resist gravity and go as slow as possible.

Sorry I missunderstood.
You wanna control the weight on the way down. Nothing more.
If you're doing assistance work, it's ok to bring the weight down more slowly,depending on the exercise as well as your purpose for doing so of course.

 

[Ted-P]

I'm pretty sure the eccentric part of the lift is the one that builds the muscle and concentric part that does the moving.

 

[Urban]

so... uhh... wut? I thought this had been established for some time. even t-mag caught on. And as it happens, being explosive on the concentric portion of the lift is ideal for muscle growth as well because it stimulate the maximum number of muscle fibers you can.

 

[Mark Limbaga]

Lowering the bar under control but not slow also helps improve strength. Many powerlifters lower the bar undr control but not like HIT slow

 

[anvar]

If you read workouts with tempo on t-mag (usually old Ian King workouts) 1 always means explode not one second....

 

[Barut]

Thanks for the link on the 1000lb squatters. From an article I had read from Dave Tate, he mentioned that WSB had only 6 lifters squatting more than 800. It doesn't really matter though. They squat huge.

Personally, I believe that anything more than 3 reps on DL is high rep. I wouldn't really consider sets of 5 to be heavy.

I was wrong about this too. I was thinking of the Dave Tate interview where he states that WSB has 6 (or so) lifters who pull 800+. I stand corrected. I am the douchebag.

Barut