How we're used to thinking: "I saw a bunch of videos with cool pros. And all of them say that muscles grow best from high reps, and that it's important to "feel" the muscle. So I don't do strength sets for 6-8 reps, since I don't feel the muscle working. The most important thing is pump, pros wouldn't lie!"
How it really is. And they really aren't lying! But you should understand one simple truth—what pros do is only suitable for pros. Serious experienced athletes have a completely different level of training than beginners. And this primarily concerns strength indicators.
The fact is that muscle volume depends extremely heavily on strength indicators. Despite everything. And at the same time, strength indicators depend little on muscle volume. It sounds paradoxical, but there's an explanation for everything. Let's figure it out.
"High strength indicators with small muscle mass"
Mostly powerlifters are huge fat guys, but this applies more to open categories. If you look at those competing in light weights, you can be very surprised to see guys weighing 70kg lifting 2-3 times their own body weight. These are serious numbers even for professional bodybuilders. How did this happen?
The answer is simple. Try to imagine that muscles are like energy tanks, a kind of batteries. And the bigger the volume, the more such muscles can work with conditionally large, but not maximal weights.
Strength itself depends on the strength of ligaments and tendons, which become stronger during training with peak weights. Lifters train in a short rep range, usually no more than 5-6 reps per set. Accordingly, this is enough for thickening the ligament apparatus, but insufficient for serious muscle growth. Big muscles simply aren't needed. For short sets, the creatine phosphate and glycogen (energy substrates) that will be contained even in small muscles is sufficient.
"Dependence of muscle volume on strength indicators"
It's different when we need muscle growth. As we already understood, muscles are like batteries that provide working capacity with conditionally large weights for some period of time. Longer than required for a 4-6 rep set. And now we've approached what pros talk about.
Indeed, effective muscle growth is possible through high-rep work, for example from 12 to 20 repetitions. The favorite range of almost every one of us. In this range, creatine phosphate (the fastest energy) is completely depleted first, followed by glycogen. And as compensation, muscles try to store them in larger quantities. This causes growth.
Everything seems clear. Eternal pump = eternal growth. But no. Unfortunately, without constant progression in weights (strength growth), muscle growth quickly hits a wall.
✏This happens for two reasons:
1) Without strength growth, sufficient demand for muscle fiber increase isn't formed.
When working with the same weight in the same range, simply nothing changes. And this is a vicious circle also because when working for 15-20 repetitions, there's practically no strength growth. The ligament apparatus doesn't receive sufficiently large load for thickening; its volumes are quite sufficient for constant work with conditionally medium-light weights. All this forms a vicious circle of absence of any results.
Despite great pump, great sensations and many other great things, except, actually, progress;
2) A certain balance exists between muscle and tendon. The muscle won't become bigger than the tendon can allow itself. Otherwise any contraction would be fraught with tears. The potential of muscle contraction is always much higher than what our brain allows us to do.
Special tendon receptors exist—Golgi receptors. They analyze ligament strength and artificially limit muscle contractility. Thereby preventing muscle tears.
Have you heard about the incredible strength of ordinary people in extreme situations? This is a reduction in Golgi receptor influence. Since muscle tear is better than death of the entire organism.
Knowing this, it becomes even easier to understand why great strength with small muscle volume is possible, but not vice versa.
👨⚕💪🏻And now we've approached the pros' secret. Why can they grow working only in high reps? The answer is embarrassingly simple—pros have huge strength.
But you won't see this in promotional videos and demonstration workouts. Bodybuilding is a business, and it has its own psychology. Bodybuilding is primarily a product, and a product should be accessible. They won't sell you protein with huge bodybuilders who easily bench 200kg. This distances, making goal achievement simply impossible in the potential buyer's mind. Therefore, in any videos professionals work with light weights so as not to traumatize the tender psyche of the potential consumer. All this still resembles truth in the final stages of cutting, when equipment weight is really secondary. But in all other cases, we have an ordinary performance.
Upon reaching a certain level of strength indicators, further weight increases become impractical. If your working bench for 8-10 sets equals 150kg, and squat and deadlift already go beyond 200kg, then believe my experience—more isn't needed. From this moment you can go into pure pump and use various pro tricks. Further strength growth will be associated with increased injury risk and doesn't bring significant benefit in muscle growth matters. Since even for 20 repetitions you'll have huge working weights.
But if you're a beginner or simple amateur, and huge working weights aren't your story, you shouldn't be embarrassed by the "empty" sensation in muscles when working in strength ranges for 6-8 repetitions. The feeling of pump and fullness comes from blood flow to muscles. So far your muscles aren't large enough to have substantial blood filling with low work volume, and thereby give sensations of bursting and working out. But this is normal, and it doesn't mean they're not working. Everything has its time.
My advice to beginners. Leave any pro tricks for pros. The old advice "more basics" is still relevant. But I'll add "more personal records" to it (watch technique!). Even if your goal is to increase muscles, until you have strength at the level of 100kg in bench and 130-150kg in squat and deadlift—your main goal is constant strength growth, not pump and "feel good work." Many guys get caught on this, puffing "for pleasure" for years, but having absolutely no real results.
Conclusions
Pro techniques are only suitable for pros. Don't let yourself be deceived by beautiful videos and loud statements with fine print footnotes.
And remember, as I like to say: "No one has ever built muscle with pink dumbbells. No matter what great pump you experience from them."
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