Advanced Weight Training Techniques

Let’s be honest, lifting weights can at times become boring, finding the motivation to visit the gym and lift weights several times per week can be tough, to make things interesting you should try advanced training techniques to help breakup your normal weight lifting routine. Advanced training techniques help you break out of plateaus, which can be a common occurrence if you stick with the same workout routine for months at a time.

Advanced training techniques are designed to shock your muscles by adding additional intensity and variety to your workouts, because of this you shouldn’t be doing them every time you workout, if you do they will become ineffective in helping you build muscle.

I personally experienced a plateau myself only a few weeks ago, I tried so hard to increase my barbell bench press (normally I increase the weight or number of repetitions week after week) but this time nothing seemed to work. Therefore I decided to try an advanced training method to help me. The method that worked for me was negative repetitions. Whilst this worked for me it may not work for you, so make sure you try one of the following to see which one works best.

Supersets

Supersets are fantastic for those looking to move up to the next strength level, improve their cardio vascular levels and decrease their workout time.

Supersets are two or more exercises performed back to back targeting similar muscle groups or opposing muscle groups. If you are performing super sets with opposing muscle groups you must ensure they have an agonist/antagonist relationship (this means when one muscle is contracting the other is relaxing).

A good example of a similar muscle group super set would be barbell bench press immediately followed by dumbbell incline press. A good example of an opposing super set would be barbell bench press immediately followed by lat pulldowns.

Supersets are different from regular sets because there is no rest between sets, the idea is to continue working until you have completed the super set. Because there is no rest between sets your muscles will tire out much quicker compared to a normal routine, this means you will not be able to lift the same weights as you normally lift. Also if you do add super sets to your workout routine make sure they are performed at or near the start of your workout when you have the most energy.

Here is an example of a superset I often use:

Set 1 – 8-10 reps barbell bench press
Set 2 – 8-10 reps lat pull downs
Set 3 – 8-10 reps barbell bench press
Set 4 – 8-10 reps lat pull downs
Set 5 – 8-10 reps barbell bench press
Set 6 – 8-10 reps lat pull downs

Pre-Exhaust Sets

Pre-exhaust sets are supersets designed to pre-exhaust the muscle in question. Pre-exhaust sets consist of performing an isolated exercise, exhausting the muscle in question then immediately performing a compound move for the exhausted muscle without rest, this ensures the muscle tires completely, causing you to recruit more muscle fibres.

The most popular example of a pre-exhaust set is performing chest fly then immediately moving onto barbell bench press. Doing this pre-exhaust exercise keeps the triceps fresh, that way when you perform the barbell bench press your chest muscles will exhaust before your triceps do, allowing you to keep driving the bar up using your triceps, this ensures the muscle fibres are worked to their absolute maximum.

Giant Sets

Giant sets are basically supersets consisting of 3 or more exercises, these exercises are performed back to back without rest. This is similar to a circuit training style workout but more intense. If you are short for time and feel you have the energy to perform a giant set go for it.

Drop Sets

Drop sets are great for adding additional intensity to your workouts, a drop set is when you perform the same exercise for a given number of sets without any rest. As you progress through the sets you decrease the weights you lift but try to complete the same number of reps, again without any rest between sets.

With drop sets you should pick a weight for each set where you can only manage a certain number of reps, for example if you know you can barbell bench press 300lb for 10 reps start with this, then on the second set drop the weight for another 8-10 reps, then on the third final set drop the weight a 3rd time and do as many reps as you can until you fail. Example using barbell bench press:

Set 1: 10 reps of 300lb barbell bench press
Set2: 10 reps of 220lbs barbell bench press
Set3: 10 reps of 150lbs barbell bench press
Set4: as many reps as you can with 100lbs

Drop sets allow you to increase the intensity of the movement and force more blood into the muscles. Because you reach momentary muscular failure at the end of every set it will work more muscle fibres, which is fantastic for those of you hitting a muscle building plateau.

Drop sets can be used on almost any exercise and if you have a workout partner they become more effective as they can take the weights off the bar or pass you a set of dumbbells so that you get minimum rest between sets, allowing a higher intensity workout and better strength & size gains.

Negatives

Negative sets are great for building overall strength and power and with strength and power comes muscle gain. Weight lifters, power lifters and even athletes use negative sets as part of their training routines to help increase their explosive strength.

No matter what exercise you do there is a negative, static and positive phase. The positive is when the muscle contracts, the static is when the muscle remains still and the negative is when the muscle stretches back to its normal state.

Negative repetitions focus on the negative (stretching) part of the movement, which is also the strongest part of the movement. By performing only the negative phase this will allow you to increase in strength, mainly because you can lift heavier weights than you normal would on the full movement.

The best example of negative repetitions is with the barbell bench press. You start with a weight heavier than you can perform 1 rep with, I recommend around 20-30% increase of your 1 rep maximum. So for example if you bench 300lbs as your 1RM you should perform negatives with 360-390lbs. You must also make sure you have at least 1 spotter lifting the weight for you, negatives using bench press are ineffective if you don’t have a spotter or spotters lifting the weight back to the start position.

Using the barbell bench press example the spotter(s) lift the weight off the rack with you, you then slowly lower the weight down to your chest in a controlled manner. Once the bar reaches your chest the spotter(s) lift the weight back up to the start position and you repeat again.

The longer the weight is controlled by the lifter the better, it is generally recommended to take 5 seconds to control the weight in the negative phase, once you go under 3 seconds to control the weight in the negative phase it means your muscles are too tired to carry on, so stop at this point.

One set of negatives is generally enough for most of us, you should not need to perform any more than this (especially with barbell bench press). You have to be careful because you are lifting a weight that is generally too heavy for your joints, tendons and muscles. Not performing negatives in a controlled and safe manner will inevitably lead to injury, so be cautious when doing them.

If you have never performed negative repetitions before I suggest trying them with a weight you can handle, maybe stick to your 1 rep max for negatives until you are completely comfortable with the technique.

10 second Training (Super Slow Training)

10 second training (sometimes referred to as super slow training) is great for eliminating any momentum and keeping the muscles under constant tension throughout the movement. The idea is to make each repetition last 10 seconds (5 seconds in the positive phase and 5 seconds in the negative phase). So using an example of barbell biceps curls it should be 5 seconds to lift the weight up and 5 seconds to control the weight down.

When you perform 10 second training it is strongly advised that you lift much lighter weights, normally around 40-50% of the weight you normally lift with.

10 second training can be performed with almost any exercise and performing them on some compound moves such as deadlift or pull-ups can be very challenging but at the same time very beneficial.

This type of training will also work more on muscular endurance, for this reason you must ensure you slow your breathing down when performing them, don’t breath like you would a normal repetition.

Pyramid Sets

Pyramid Sets are great for working on your muscular endurance and strength all in one exercise. Pyramid sets start light with a high number of repetitions, as you go through the sets you increase the weight and decrease the number of repetitions, also you must rest between each set.

Here is a brief example of pyramids using the close grip bench press exercise (assuming your 1 rep max for this exercise is 200lbs):

Set1: 12 reps of 60 lbs
Set2: 10 reps of 90 lbs
Set3: 8 reps of 120 lbs
Set4: 6 reps of 140 lbs
Set5: as many reps as you can with 165 lbs

To get the best benefit from pyramid Sets you should perform them on compound moves, because more weight & intensity can be handled with compound moves you will be able to push your body harder. Also as compound moves work your bigger muscles they won’t fatigue as quickly in comparison to smaller muscles such as the biceps or triceps.

For me personally, I perform pyramid lifting with barbell bench press and barbell squats and sometimes I may perform them with deadlifts if I have the energy.

So now you have all the relevant information to keep your workouts exciting and challenging, which means you have no more excuses for not building muscle.