Progressive Tension?

NWlifter

NWlifter

Active Member
Hey, has anyone on here ever tried, just for an experiment, daily progressive tension on a muscle? Like maybe biceps, a mid point weight-hold for some time period, raising the load a bit each day, just to see what just tension would do ? ( I know you'd have to have 'some' fatigue to get all MU's firing)
 
I've really really wanted to haha. To be honest it sounds like it would work really well, like, how could it not? I'm sure I've seen frequency routines where one or two muscle groups are specialised on, and you do one set in the morning and one at night to failure.

But your idea sounds cool, just an isometric contraction that you increase the loading on. It would be progressively loading it daily, and it wouldn't be overtaxing either as long as you don't smash it into oblivion. Just unsure what sort of volume/time you'd need, as you want a minimum to elicit growth, but not overdo it as it is daily...

I've also seen holding the top position of a chin up for as long as you can and fight the negative as much as you can, and doing that frequently. But that's exhausting hehe
 
NWlifter said:
Cool, your routine interests me, especially with the AB setup
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_Simon_ said:
I've really really wanted to haha. To be honest it sounds like it would work really well, like, how could it not? I'm sure I've seen frequency routines where one or two muscle groups are specialised on, and you do one set in the morning and one at night to failure.

But your idea sounds cool, just an isometric contraction that you increase the loading on. It would be progressively loading it daily, and it wouldn't be overtaxing either as long as you don't smash it into oblivion. Just unsure what sort of volume/time you'd need, as you want a minimum to elicit growth, but not overdo it as it is daily...

I've also seen holding the top position of a chin up for as long as you can and fight the negative as much as you can, and doing that frequently. But that's exhausting hehe
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I've also thought about this over the years and always wondered if it would work so thought I should just ask. I think of that 'bird wing' study Brian posted on here many years ago. It seems like it would be 'pure', and a great experiment to see what just progressive load does for bumping PS up every day. We know muscle size is the net protein, over time, almost like an average (all the MPD's factored with all the MPS's equate to gain or loss), so if we kept MPS up, just a bit, every day, it 'seems' like slow steady growth would happen (until we maxed out the level our nuclei could output).
 
Yeah I've thought about that study too in relation to this. But yeah I think in the study was it constant loading through the whole day? Can't remember... So any daily bout would have to be significant enough to signal things to grow, I wonder what that line would be! As through the day you'd be nonloaded, and during the bout you would be quite loaded, but then again normal style sets of training do this anyway, short bout of tension then rest... fascinating huh..
 
_Simon_ said:
Yeah I've thought about that study too in relation to this. But yeah I think in the study was it constant loading through the whole day? Can't remember... So any daily bout would have to be significant enough to signal things to grow, I wonder what that line would be! As through the day you'd be nonloaded, and during the bout you would be quite loaded, but then again normal style sets of training do this anyway, short bout of tension then rest... fascinating huh..
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Yes true, the birds were all day, one big HUGE stimulation, no thanks for me trying that! lol
BUT, it seems to me that muscle size is almost a 'homeostasis' model, all the up stimulations (tension and work) mixed with the down stimulations (dis-use, sleeping, etc.) average out to some level of PS vs PD over time. so maybe daily tensions would do this? I think of Gymnasts, laborers, people who 'apply' tension thoughout a day, thus increasing their 'average over time'.
 
NWlifter said:
Yes true, the birds were all day, one big HUGE stimulation, no thanks for me trying that! lol
BUT, it seems to me that muscle size is almost a 'homeostasis' model, all the up stimulations (tension and work) mixed with the down stimulations (dis-use, sleeping, etc.) average out to some level of PS vs PD over time. so maybe daily tensions would do this? I think of Gymnasts, laborers, people who 'apply' tension thoughout a day, thus increasing their 'average over time'.
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Yeah true, yeah as long as the load/work is higher than it's accustomed too adaptions would occur. Have always been interested in very frequent loading routines and also gymnasts and how much development occurs just from bodyweight movements (although I don't know if they do weighted or progressive loading of any sort..).

Am just curious about what the minimum threshold would be, or maybe it doesn't matter so much if there is progressive loading, but to some extent there'd need to be enough volume hmm... two minutes of an isometric contraction every day? Five?
 
_Simon_ said:
Yeah true, yeah as long as the load/work is higher than it's accustomed too adaptions would occur. Have always been interested in very frequent loading routines and also gymnasts and how much development occurs just from bodyweight movements (although I don't know if they do weighted or progressive loading of any sort..).

Am just curious about what the minimum threshold would be, or maybe it doesn't matter so much if there is progressive loading, but to some extent there'd need to be enough volume hmm... two minutes of an isometric contraction every day? Five?
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Yes, long as there is progression (something that's easy on the 'other stuff' , joints, tendons, neural, etc.) should cause a small bump in PS every day skewing the trend towards hypertrophy over just flat line.

Gymnasts - True, they don't have actual progressive loads. I think we know for sure now that tension is a factor in the equation, not THE prime driver, but it can be used as the primary factor, or as a lesser factor. Such as 20 seconds with 100 lbs is progressive over 15 seconds with 100 lbs. And 110 lbs for 20 seconds is progressive over 100 lbs for 20 seconds. But we also know from all those studies comparing RM's with equal hypertrophy that for example (random numbers for illustration..) 20 seconds with 100 might be equal to 120 lbs for 15 seconds even though the latter had a higher load, the exposure was shorter so it evens out.
 
NWlifter said:
Yes, long as there is progression (something that's easy on the 'other stuff' , joints, tendons, neural, etc.) should cause a small bump in PS every day skewing the trend towards hypertrophy over just flat line.

Gymnasts - True, they don't have actual progressive loads. I think we know for sure now that tension is a factor in the equation, not THE prime driver, but it can be used as the primary factor, or as a lesser factor. Such as 20 seconds with 100 lbs is progressive over 15 seconds with 100 lbs. And 110 lbs for 20 seconds is progressive over 100 lbs for 20 seconds. But we also know from all those studies comparing RM's with equal hypertrophy that for example (random numbers for illustration..) 20 seconds with 100 might be equal to 120 lbs for 15 seconds even though the latter had a higher load, the exposure was shorter so it evens out.
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You might be forgetting the resistance training that the gymnasts do outside of sport specific training?
 
Some do, I guess many don't, there was an article on T Nation, where they interveiwed a coach about this very thing, his never weight train, but still were really jacked.

https://www.t-nation.com/training/all-muscle-no-iron
T-Nation: Wait a sec, these guys with the killer biceps don't do barbell and dumbbell curls?

Coach Sommer: No, not a single one! In fact, their amazing biceps development isn't the result of any kind of curling movement at all, but primarily due to the straight arm leverage work which they do on the still rings.

b7JLkl.jpg
 
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Can’t even remember the last time I did a biceps curl ... 2006 maybe?

Still partial to hammer curls, my forearms always did seem to like those ... no DBs these days though.
 
If you're going to do extra work to get bigger arms, you should work on triceps rather than biceps anyway. That's the only thing that ever made a difference for me, and seemed to offer any carry over to compounds. I mean yeah, you can do both if you really want but if it's not making a difference then why keep doing both?
 
oh wow you guys are lucky, my joints I guess are setup where my arms dont get full benefit from compounds, especially for biceps so if I don't curl, I do have smaller biceps. I wish I didn't have to do them. I do direct triceps work too also.
 
Totentanz said:
If you're going to do extra work to get bigger arms, you should work on triceps rather than biceps anyway. That's the only thing that ever made a difference for me, and seemed to offer any carry over to compounds. I mean yeah, you can do both if you really want but if it's not making a difference then why keep doing both?
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Agree with that. Skull crushers with the lat pullover-style drop at the bottom have always made a big difference for me, brought up my triceps way back when.
 
Funny how this topic changed to “getting big guns” lol. My triceps have always been good, and with my long arms, my triceps get destroyed in any pushing/pressing movement. So benching and pressing overhead were always plenty for triceps. My biceps tend to struggle. Chin-ups and pull downs are great, but mainly my lats are strained. I need curls to really put some tension directly on my biceps.
 
Sci said:
Funny how this topic changed to “getting big guns” lol. My triceps have always been good, and with my long arms, my triceps get destroyed in any pushing/pressing movement. So benching and pressing overhead were always plenty for triceps. My biceps tend to struggle. Chin-ups and pull downs are great, but mainly my lats are strained. I need curls to really put some tension directly on my biceps.
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Of course, who wouldn't want an inch on the arms more than legs, or chest? I know I would!
 
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