Dan ... "In the Right Now"

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Dan, you used that phrase in regards to having strength in the workout -- cool phrase. I have noticed that I have more strength in the right now during this cycle than I have had before. Just wondering if creatine has this effect? This is my first HST cycle using it.

Also, this is my first cycle since a cut, and I'm actually eating again!!! Could this be the cause? (Not that I'm complaining.)

Also, I'm doing an A/B routine with one lift per muscle group instead of two lifts which I had previously been doing. (that is, bench one day, dips another, instead of both every workout).

Maybe all three of these factors are contributing to this perceived strength that I have?
 
Or you might just be stronger...
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Whilst you might be stronger, I find creatine giving me a fairly huge strength boost, don't know about others?

Incidentally the A/B dips one day bench the other is the same as I am currently doing!
 
I think keeping it simple is the way to go.

Why use 2 different exercises???...IMO.

I personally think 1 exercises keeps you fresher and stronger...most likely due to neural learning of the 1 exercise.
 
Here's how my cycle has been:

A
Deads
Dips
Pendlay Rows
Military press

B
Squats
Bench
Pull ups
Standing rows

Each routine has a lower body, chest, back, and shoulder exercise. Oreviously, I would do:

Squat/Deads alternated
Bench
Pull Ups(superset)
Dips
Rows (superset)
Military press

I just think the A/B routine is better for energy levels. Also, with the A/B setup, I do a total of 30 reps -- 2x15, 3x10, and 6x5. With the other workout I had been doing the standard 1x15, 2x10, 3x5 scheme.
 
eto, unless you have retested and found that your 1RMs have increased then it's difficult to know whether creatine has helped you with strength or not. My guess is that it will help with something like your 15 and 10RM and the effect would be that you might get an extra rep or two purely due to the effects of creatine (ATP being more readily available once you have filled up your muscle cells with the stuff). I certainly found this to be true and I also found that it had less of an obvious effect once I was near or past my 5RM. For me, this compressed the range of loading for my cycle and so I reckon I now have a bit more overlap (zig-zag) between mesocycles than if I didn't take creatine.

I might try a 'creatine-free' cycle soon and see if I notice the difference.
 
<div></div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">I might try a 'creatine-free' cycle soon and see if I notice the difference. </div>
I'm considering the same.
 
<div>
(etothepii @ Aug. 08 2007,16:46)</div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">Dan, you used that phrase in regards to having strength in the workout -- cool phrase.</div>
link?
 
<div></div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">Here's how my cycle has been:

A
Deads
Dips
Pendlay Rows
Military press

B
Squats
Bench
Pull ups
Standing rows

Each routine has a lower body, chest, back, and shoulder exercise. Oreviously, I would do:

Squat/Deads alternated
Bench
Pull Ups(superset)
Dips
Rows (superset)
Military press

I just think the A/B routine is better for energy levels. Also, with the A/B setup, I do a total of 30 reps -- 2x15, 3x10, and 6x5. With the other workout I had been doing the standard 1x15, 2x10, 3x5 scheme. </div>

e^3.141592654 x i, hehe sorry, i was wooondering, how long have you been doing your new routine?? is it working well?? cos that sounds really awesome doing something like that hey... something very compound and um to the point!!! plus increased volume hey. (are standing rows the same as upright rows? just wondering)

hehe sorry to go OFF the topic here but,
hmmm, that 'i' constant in your username confuses me... i've never heard of it before, but it's just well confusing haha, vl(-1) doesn't seem to be real in the context of the square root, well could you say that vl(-1) = 1?? so thus i=1?? or could you have it in an expression such as -(vl1), oh wait, no i learnt that you can't in high school i think, like just transferring the negative to the outside, but STILL i didn't think you could HAVE square root of a negative number. it COULD just equal: -1 x -1. which i see no problem with, but the square root III thought didn't use negatives (eccentrics HAHAHA!). unless it's like an idealistic number in the maths universe, or imaginary number which i haven't studied.
hehe i guess maths has always fascinated me, different philosophical theories about maths and reality as well...

anyways. BYE!
biggrin.gif
 
Simon: The routine is awesome. I love doing it this way. I add some arm isos in there every now and again, but keep the volume on those low, just one set or so. By standing rows I mean upright rows, yes.

In the heavy post 5s, I do less volume than 6x5, but I do as much as I can.

About the math ...

e is an irrational constant approximately equal to 2.718281828459. It is a constant very important in calculus.

pi is the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter, 3.14159... It is a constant very important in geometry.

i is the square root of -1. As you said, you can't really dp that, so i is aptly named the imaginary number. It opens up a whole new set of numbers called the complex number system. i is a very important number in algebra.

What is funny is that if you put these three unique numbers together as e^(pi*i), you get -1 for an answer!!! I'm a math teacher, and I've always been a bit of a pessimist, so calling myself &quot;negative one&quot; in a nerdy, math-geek way seems fitting.
 
AH cool, I'm thinking of cutting down my amount of exercises too (it just takes ages to do it all) and increasing volume (considering all of this reading i've been doing of 'not enough volume' and 'right now effect'. but yeah, i'm already half way through my 10s, i might consider changing Squat/Deadlift, Bench, Lat Pulldown, Close Grip Bench (switching to Dips at end of 5s), Underhand Pulldowns (switching to Chins at end of 5s), Military Press, Wide-grip Rows, and Shrugs to Squat/Deadlift, Bench, Underhand Pulldown (Chins in 5s), Military Press or Close Grip Bench Press... hmm... actually i might post this another thread seeing what everyone think...

and ahhhh ok haha i hadn't HEARD of the complex number system hehe, it must be like some whole other system of calculative rules i'm guess, i only studied Maths Methods (which is one below Specialist Maths) in my schooling. thanks for the explanation! ;)
 
<div></div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">What is funny is that if you put these three unique numbers together as e^(pi*i), you get -1 for an answer!!! I'm a math teacher, and I've always been a bit of a pessimist, so calling myself &quot;negative one&quot; in a nerdy, math-geek way seems fitting. </div>

I'm an actuary myself, and I've always found your user name a good one.
 
<div>
(etothepii @ Aug. 08 2007,16:46)</div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">Dan, you used that phrase in regards to having strength in the workout -- cool phrase.</div>
Actually it's referring to the need to do enough in the right now IE. each and every workout. Too little and you aren't creating enough of a stimulus, Too much and you may be creating a stimulus but it may be diminished due to overly increased metabolic needs.

I borrowed it from someone, perhaps it was MikeyNov. I don't remember now. I think it was Mikey though.

Mikey you remember?

Can creatine increase absolute strength? Probably not.

Can it increase relative strength or strength endurance? Maybe........Maybe not. Too much contradictory evidence either way.

If you feel good and strong then fantastic. Say it was the Creatine, write the manufacturer and let them know how wonderful their product is, maybe they'll give you a free bottle for your glowing referral. Worth a shot
wink.gif


Or do as LOL says, stop using it for a couple days and see what happens.
 
hmmm so Dan there IS a Right Now stimulus that needs to be attained? well of course there is haha of course adequate microtrauma is necessary, but what i MEAN is, there is a chance that i'm not doing enough volume to cause enough microtrauma, and i won't know? well i could judge by my growth results but it's VERY hard to tell that way IMO. HOW will i know? lol Do you believe the routine posted on your site is enough volume? Well that's hard to say, but HOW does one know one's current conditioning level (or volume limit that one has to pass/achieve for potential growth)?

and yeah i actually took creatine in the morning which WAS going to be about an hour before my workout but plans got in the way, so i did my workout later in the afternoon and boy was it tough haha. i didn't feel like i had as much energy or strength as i usually would. dunno if it WAS from not taking creatine shortly before my workout or not. just something that happened ;)
 
<div>
(_Simon_ @ Aug. 19 2007,21:50)</div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">adequate microtrauma is necessary,</div>
That's debatable.

I'm a firm believer that there are two separate and distinct adaptations going on here.

There is satellite cell donation occurring because of increased nuclear domain size and/or satellite cell donation occurring because of the immediate need to repair the fiber structure after damage.

So is micro trauma a necessity? IMO no.
Is increased accretion of proteins? Yes

This also goes back to what I am referring too as the right now. If too much is done and excessive damage is caused there are consequences that may impair your ability to 1. Lift an appropriate load and 2. Apply that load within a timely manner following the damaging workout. IOW reduced strength and reduced frequency. Neither is a good thing.
 
What I am finding most interesting right now (ha!) is how the amount of work required to produce a PS response relates to the load used. If I'm using &lt;60% of RM loads should I do a total of, say, 75 reps to trigger a response? Or will 30 do? As the loads climb and the TUT for each rep invariably increases, how do I alter the total reps performed? Obviously, for any particular exercise I'm not going to be able to do 75 reps with my 5RM load in one session and if I tried I wouldn't be training again for a good while anyway (that's if I was still kicking at all) so training frequency would suffer.

I am starting this cycle with around 50 reps per exercise (of which I am doing four or five) and will then be dropping the total rep count according to how I feel I am recovering between bouts as the loads climb. I think this is the nearest thing to 'instinctive training' that I have come. Double 'ha!' I have a feeling that by the time I get to my 5RM loads I will be lucky to get 20 reps per exercise.

This kinda goes against the grain for me as I've always tried to at least maintain the amount of work done over a cycle, if not increase it slightly. However, I have no chance of doing this for my current cycle unless I can get around 35 reps out with my 5RM loads.

Eg. For squats:

15RM 50 reps @ 100kg = 5000,
5RM 20 reps @ 140kg = 2800, OR 36 reps @ 140kg = 5040

Not much chance of that but it's more possible than 75 reps!

In the past I have added in extra work with a lighter load but I want to find out if I can do enough with a heavy load (in the time I have available) to trigger a response without adding in any extra work. This should allow for better recovery before my next session.

Anyone else tried this?

Edited to add:

Of course, I neglected to point out that by the time I am lifting my 5RM loads the TUT for each rep might well be double what it was during the 15s, despite my best efforts for it not to be.

So, without taking other factors into account, if you were just trying to keep TUT consistent over a cycle, then gradually reducing the number of reps, until by the end of the cycle you were down to half your starting rep count, would make some sense.
 
Good question Lol...I would like to see Dans response to this as well.

What is interesting to me is the total reps required for someone who can't / doesn't want to train heavy!

Due to injuries...etc!
 
So, without taking other factors into account, if you were just trying to keep TUT consistent over a cycle, then gradually reducing the number of reps, until by the end of the cycle you were down to half your starting rep count, would make some sense.  - lol[/quote]






The way I did this last cycle worked great for me -


For simplicity , I'll use one example  from my cycle instead of listing everything needlessly...


1)    Flat Bench
      incline bench


 I did not alternate , but did all exersizes each w/o.


MY set/rep scheme was:

 2x10
 1x10
 2x8
 1x8
 2x5
 1x5

*there were some exceptions to this but in general the above was my cycle. And this was EACH exersize not a/b style alternated- similarities to D.Yates way of thinking for those familiar (1-2 working sets , hitting from &quot;angles&quot; - yes I know not a currently popular way of thinking)yet unique due to hst frequency ect. .

   Because I used flat +incline, chest was getting the following total volumes (as was shoulders ect. as I did this with all muscle group/movements)-

wk1- 40/w.o. or 120/wk
wk2- 20/w.o. or  60/wk
wk3- 32/w.o. or  96/wk
wk4- 16/w.o. or  48/wk
wk5- 20/w.o. or  60/wk
wk6- 10/w.o. or  30/wk
PER MUSCLE GROUP (of course even more in some cases because of compound &quot;overlap&quot; and of course warm up sets are not counted , but lets leave that for sake of simplicity).

I did this with flat/incline , chest supported row/bb row , upright row/military - then I of course did deads and OH squats but not the same way.


          wiithout waxing eloquent about the why's and wherefores ,  suffice it to say this worked beautifully for me (I need to fine tune the reps , - as they would perhaps be more optimal with slightly further spacing between them or perhaps just accept that this ways &quot;cost of doing business&quot; entails 6 instead of 8 week cycles in general- I fell ill before another 2 week progression of 3's I had planned so I can't be sure EXACTLY the outcome  ..., but thats not the point I'm making here.)I have also used the less movements more sets scheme in the past , but this was a way to bump up &quot;right now&quot; volume while minimizing fatigue buildup and still manage the volume in load determined waves.

             Not saying it's the holygrail or anything but something I will definitely explore further as this was one of my most productive cycles hypertrophy wise and strength gains were above average relative to previous HST cycles.
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Not exactly what you proposed LOL , but similar in many respects.
 
I should add that mentally I felt alot fresher the second week of each rep range doing one set of bench 8 reps and one set of incline 8 reps (for example) than I have in the past doing 2 or 3 sets with the same movement.
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Also I would feel irresponsible if I didn't add that I'm not advocating this as a viable option for a lifter in the early strength/mass building stages over a straight forwards simplify/vanilla cycle(s).
 
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