Why 2 weeks ?

M

Major Twang

New Member
I'm curious why the HST system has you training at each rep range for 2 weeks. With a progression of 75%, 80%, 85%, 90%, 95% & 100%, this looks to me like you are basically spending every other week working at quite sub-optimal levels, and only hitting what I would think of as 'working poundages' in the last couple of workouts.

I'm sure there is a good reason for this, but my first thought here is "why not have 1 week cycles so you max out more often ?"
 
How much reading have you done here so far? This have been covered hundreds of times and is covered in the articles as well. Check out the articles themselves on the main site: http://hypertrophy-specific.info/articles.html

You don't have to work with maximal loads to grow. What you would think of as "working poundages" isn't necessarily what the body responds to. HST isn't about doing what you think you have to do in order to grow. HST is about doing what science is showing us causes hypertrophy. Structuring our training in order to most effectively implement what studies have shown causes growth.
 
To more directly answer your final question, why not 1 week? Because you will have less progression and therefore less time spent growing before you max out and cannot go any further. Remember, once you hit your max, you can't really do much more unless you wait for strength gains to accrue and maxes to go up, assuming you don't end up burning yourself out or hitting a plateau. HST gives you more time to grow (and grow stronger) before you hit your max so by the time you do hit your max, you've probably already increased it. And then you go to the next rep range and spend 2 whole weeks growing (rather than just one week) before hitting your max again.

Would you rather do one week rep ranges, grow for 3-4 weeks before starting over, or grow for 6-8 weeks before you start over again?
 
Totentanz said:
How much reading have you done here so far?
Click to expand...

I've read pretty much everything on the main site now - though I only discovered this on Monday, and to be honest it's a bit of a head-f**k. I've spent years hitting each muscle with intensity & volume every 5 - 7 days with split routines, working on the principle that a workout that doesn't go at least to momentary failure is a wasted workout - so the idea that I'll grow from 2 sets of 75-85% of my normal working weights is taking a bit of getting used to.

This is why I'm asking.

Also I haven't started yet. Maybe I'll see it differently when I'm doing it.
 
Totentanz said:
To more directly answer your final question, why not 1 week? Because you will have less progression and therefore less time spent growing before you max out and cannot go any further. Remember, once you hit your max, you can't really do much more unless you wait for strength gains to accrue and maxes to go up, assuming you don't end up burning yourself out or hitting a plateau. HST gives you more time to grow (and grow stronger) before you hit your max so by the time you do hit your max, you've probably already increased it. And then you go to the next rep range and spend 2 whole weeks growing (rather than just one week) before hitting your max again.

Would you rather do one week rep ranges, grow for 3-4 weeks before starting over, or grow for 6-8 weeks before you start over again?
Click to expand...

Thanks for this.

I guessed it was something to do with recovery. As I said, I'm still getting my head around the idea that you can grow from sub-max effort.
 
You actually grow more from sub max work than from maxing out all the time. Because maxing out is too taxing and ends up compromising everything - sleep, immune system, appetite.

You only need something like 60% of your 1 RM to illicit a growth response, although obviously this depends on some factors. But even the most conditioned individual does not need to give a maximal effort just to grow.

It also is important to note that fatigue is not the primary growth stimulus and is not the most important factor when it comes to hypertrophy.
 
Adding to what Totentanz has said, it's also greatly dependent on your current condition which is why SD is rather an important concept within HST. If you were to go from HIT and hitting near max then strait to 15's you wouldn't see much at all. So before judging the merits of it, be sure you are coming into it detrained.
 
Major Twang said:
I'm curious why the HST system has you training at each rep range for 2 weeks. With a progression of 75%, 80%, 85%, 90%, 95% & 100%, this looks to me like you are basically spending every other week working at quite sub-optimal levels, and only hitting what I would think of as 'working poundages' in the last couple of workouts.

I'm sure there is a good reason for this, but my first thought here is "why not have 1 week cycles so you max out more often ?"
Click to expand...
Look at it this way. It's really only a means to an end. So starting from the beginning coming off SD, your muscles are now re-sensitized, so to speak, to loading. In that any novel tensions applied should elicit a response. Yet each loading with the same load will again begin to de-sensitze the tissue to that load so they won't be as productive time after time. So in order to stay ahead of the curve the loads are incrementally increased from a low to your RM. Now the only way to continue that novel experience is to work through a series of loads that is heading upwards ala 15's, 10's, 5's, negs. The exact time to advance through to your RMs is really of little importance as long as you increase the load when you see less results. So in essence you can repeat loads several times making each RM cycle last 4 weeks, 6 weeks, 3 weeks, if you wish. But typically when you do this you may have to use larger increases as well.
 
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