MAKING WEIGHTS SEEM HEAVIER

When working out at home or at a hotel gym heavy weight may be nonexistent or limited. There are 3 techniques I like to use when this is the case.

SLOWER TEMPO-The first is just changing your tempo. All this means it’s just slow down the rep or in some cases speed it up. In general when completing a rep I like to use a 3 second count on the eccentric phase (muscle lengthening phase) and 2 count on the concentric phase (muscle shortening phase). To make the weights feel heavier change the count. For example perform 7 second count to lower the weight and 4 seconds to push the weight up.

ALTERNATE REPS- My second favorite way to make the weight heavier it’s depicted in the video below. And that is alternating reps. Whether with a dumbbell press, dumbbell row, or any other exercise, by alternating reps it increases the time your muscles are under tension. Therefore making as lightweight seem heavier. A set that may usually take 20 seconds would easily double to at least 40 seconds.

PRE-EXHAUST - My third favorite is pre-exhausting a muscle. This is a favorite by many bodybuilders. Say you’re doing a chest press. Before doing a chest press you would perform an isolation movement (single joint moving) for the chest. So that would be a chest fly. By performing this movement at first the theory is it will exhaust the main muscle mover in the compound movement therefore making it harder and not needing as much weight.

Try one of these techniques out the next time you have limited access to weight.

To Your Health,

Mark Radio