My first cycle of HST...WOW

I understand your point of view but I still dont believe that if someone trains with 8-12 reps and get stronger in that rep range his hypertrophy is "worse" and will shrink. IMO there is just 1 kind of hypertrophy (sarcoplasmic hypertrophy for me is just glycogen and water, not really muscle). In fact there is a routine in the bodybuilding.com forum that only trains in the 8-12 rep range to failure in a rest pause manner and they seem to be doing great, they are much stronger and bigger than when they started.

If a bodybuilder stops training for a long time he will shrink no matter what he did to obtain that muscle.

And, as stated, this is just my opinion based on what I read and what I see, I can be mistaken.

Are you referring to DC training?
 
I usually reframe from writing this type of post because it typically raises more arguments verses discussions, but here I go.

Science has stated that they can not determine what actually causes muscle growth, mechanical stress (heavy lifting) or metabolic stress (higher rep range) but they can determine that progression is the mother load of muscle gain, regardless of rep range.

With that being said, you have to progress and a person is more likely to progress, if they work in all rep ranges, being, hypertrophy, strength and power, or know as 8-12, 5-6 and 1-3 respectively. The discussion on sarcoplasmic hypertrophy, as I know it, comes from working in a higher rep range, to where the muscle depletes glycogen and super compensates by bringing in more glycogen, thus attracting more fluid (usually at a rate of 2.7-3 to 1 ratio) and this is what we consider sarcoplasmic hypertrophy.

Both have been proven to work together synergistically on building lasting muscle. If a person works solely for the pump (higher rep range exclusively) he will lose a great deal of that, over a matter of a few weeks of not lifting, when the water retention leaves.

If a person works in lower rep ranges, it is harder to get a pump (less time under tension and depleting glycogen) but they will still grow but it will take longer to show but will not dissipate as quickly (atrophy) because there wasn't as much water retention in the muscle, so less shrinkage.

Remember, this is what I've learned, through some schooling and an obsession to read about the subject. I'm in no way saying that I'm 100% correct and I'm always trying to learn more, that's why I'm here.
 

There has been some awesome research done with trained athletes that advocates a closer approach to HST and DUP style of training. Not to say that, that routine won't yield benefits but I've lifted in that manner for years and hit more plateaus than I care to admit. Once I applied lower volume and higher frequency, I began to grow again. Of course, everyone is different and what has worked for me, might not work for you. But that's my two cents, for what it's worth.

I do however, like bouncing ideas off of each other, as we've done here.
 

Same here.

You can certainly 'be bigger' my utilising a workout structure that induces greater glycogen storage (with all of the water, minerals, salts etc. that come along), however this is not muscle fiber hypertrophy.

Low-load volume doesn't create hypertrophy; this is why endurance training does not lead to hypertrophy. Compare the legs of a sprinter to the legs of a marathon runner. Yes, you can carb-load//maximise glycogen storage, but that isn't hypertrophy and as soon as you remove the stimulus you lose the size (it's just sugar, ions and water remember).
 
Fair enough. Just for the heck of it then, is it reasonable to say that most of the people on this thread are of the opinion, no matter how they formed that opinion, that to grow functionally big, you need some combination of high load, low rep and medium load with traditional hypertrophy reps (8 -12)? Ignore for the moment various iterations such as myo reps, DUP, declining sets, SD, etc. as well as total volume and frequency.
 
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