Learn how to train - High Intesnity Training

[Rusty11]

when it says go to failure on the 6-8 rep that what it means, at the 6th rep you get another 2 out and push yourself to complete failure. Failure means you cant do anther rep even if someone had a gun to your head, then you do 2 forced reps which will kill you and all your positive strength will go then you do 2 negs and if you have used enough weight and you truely have gone to failure and then you have gone past failure by doing forced and negs then your muscle cant be worked anymore, if you think it can your not training right.....the videos show you how to do it my thread tells you how to do it but in the end its all down to you and how much intensity you give to your workouts, its down to you.....if you cant train more after doing one of these sets your aren't training hard or intense enough...watch and read

This is just an awesome, eye-opening quote. I read this, go workout, and think I went to failure. Then I read it again and think, "no, you didn't". It's taking me quite a while for this mindset to really sink in.

[bently]

This is a long lived thread. Love Mentzer! Have been using HIT training about three months after a long layoff. I have a question for the pros? I have honestly gotten about as big as I want. Now I want to start leaning up and building some muscular endurance. Recommendations? High number of sets/reps seems the obvious answer? More isolation type movements?

41 years old. On Trt, decent diet, 5'6" body fat high and that's all u need to know! Lol! Not its not horrible but a do have a belly I need to get rid of.

[>Good Luck<]

This is a long lived thread. Love Mentzer! Have been using HIT training about three months after a long layoff. I have a question for the pros? I have honestly gotten about as big as I want. Now I want to start leaning up and building some muscular endurance. Recommendations? High number of sets/reps seems the obvious answer? More isolation type movements?

41 years old. On Trt, decent diet, 5'6" body fat high and that's all u need to know! Lol! Not its not horrible but a do have a belly I need to get rid of.

Increase cardio and limit carbs to before and after workouts only.

Also hearing that eca stack is a miracle worker

[bently]

Thanks for the reply but being an A.d.d baby on Ritalin I'm thinking ECA might make my heart explode.

[Whiteboyy0]

Very inspiring thread thanks for posting, always heard about Dorian Yates blood and guts but never watched. Excited to start this. Do you guys just do a 4 day split in the order the videos go? Delts tris, legs, rest, back, chest bis, rest, rest.

[Rusty11]

For the first two cycles, I did it exactly like the videos. Since then(3 months) I've been doing the same body parts together, but changing up some of the exercises and incorporating rest/pause and drop sets more.

[oatmeal69]

Do you guys just do a 4 day split in the order the videos go? Delts tris, legs, rest, back, chest bis, rest, rest.

I've found that if I'm REALLY doing HIT - meaning I can't lift another ounce even if a gun was to my head... I can only do one muscle group a day - even on juice. So, I end up doing 5 days weekly of the groups you mention, and add a 6th day which is abs. Off cycle, I've been doing abs every other week. I often do the same with legs too. Two muscle groups daily would be too much for me.

[oatmeal69]

Drop-sets are my main bread and butter too.

[hulk1]

Thanks for the tips, will start some to see how i like them.

Regards

[carbman]

Hello! I'm about to start training with HIT after four weeks with 5-3-1 strength program. I was thinking about training dorian yates-style hit 8 weeks and then back to 5-3-1 strength program for 4 weeks. After that I would continue with hit for another 8 weeks. In that 8 weeks I might get some guality muscle with strength and with that four weeks strength program I might improve my strenght with keeping the muscle. And I get four weeks pause of failure training so there is no worries about overtraining. Any gurus here (marcus etc.) who could give me some opinions about my plan.

[marcus300]

Hello! I'm about to start training with HIT after four weeks with 5-3-1 strength program. I was thinking about training dorian yates-style hit 8 weeks and then back to 5-3-1 strength program for 4 weeks. After that I would continue with hit for another 8 weeks. In that 8 weeks I might get some guality muscle with strength and with that four weeks strength program I might improve my strenght with keeping the muscle. And I get four weeks pause of failure training so there is no worries about overtraining. Any gurus here (marcus etc.) who could give me some opinions about my plan.

If your going to try HIT I would try it for at least 3 months+ and see if you can build some muscle tissue. I would hit it hard for 6-8 weeks then take a pullback on intensity for 2-3 weeks then hit it hard again for another 6-8 weeks.

[carbman]

If your going to try HIT I would try it for at least 3 months+ and see if you can build some muscle tissue. I would hit it hard for 6-8 weeks then take a pullback on intensity for 2-3 weeks then hit it hard again for another 6-8 weeks.

Thanks! Should I still train to positive failure with each movement in those 2-3 deloading weeks and keep the volume down or should I increase the volume a bit and not taking the sets to failure?

[Anonymous-polack]

Very interesting I'Ll try it for my MMA feel like i'll become a lot stronger and will be able to win some combats

[marcus300]

Thanks! Should I still train to positive failure with each movement in those 2-3 deloading weeks and keep the volume down or should I increase the volume a bit and not taking the sets to failure?

Your body will tell you when it needs a pullback, I normally pullback on the intensity and make sure I get my body fully recovered. I wouldn't use any protocols like rest pause, drop sets, forced and negatives during the pullback

[Rusty11]

Too good to be on page 3.

[marcus300]

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[almostgone]

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Great candidate thread for a sticky!!

[ZenFitness]

Great candidate thread for a sticky!!

Agreed, I've been at this routine for almost a year now and the gains have been great.

[Edrick]

Hi Marcus,
Great video sharing and these links will be of great info and help for those who are new in fitness world. Like to suggest those people to consult their trainer or coach to avoid any injury or discomfort in future.

[marcus300]

Hi Marcus,
Great video sharing and these links will be of great info and help for those who are new in fitness world. Like to suggest those people to consult their trainer or coach to avoid any injury or discomfort in future.

This training is for the advance so they should have a good understanding of training under their belt

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[ZenFitness]

I'm generally a pretty humble guy, so I'm not trying to yammer on about myself here but I wanted to give more props to this workout.

Before going into this style of training, I basically did a modified 5x5 workout (which is good in its own right). I had been doing that for a year to a year and a half, and my PRs had moved up.

With this HIIT-style workout, I've gained 12 - 15 lbs. over the last year and my muscle mass has visibly increased as well. I haven't tested PRs in some time but I can tell I'm definitely stronger. I've also started receiving comments over the last few months. This morning at the gym a guy I know there told me I look "way more buff than you used to". I hadn't seen him in a few months, but he noticed I had bulked up in a visible way.

Yesterday at the pool all our family friends' wives were teasing me with comments about how great I looked and asked how it feels to be sexually objectified as a man. Obviously I didn't mind

As stated above, I'm not trying to pat myself on the back here but I want to emphasize how great this style of training is.

[marcus300]

I'm generally a pretty humble guy, so I'm not trying to yammer on about myself here but I wanted to give more props to this workout.

Before going into this style of training, I basically did a modified 5x5 workout (which is good in its own right). I had been doing that for a year to a year and a half, and my PRs had moved up.

With this HIIT-style workout, I've gained 12 - 15 lbs. over the last year and my muscle mass has visibly increased as well. I haven't tested PRs in some time but I can tell I'm definitely stronger. I've also started receiving comments over the last few months. This morning at the gym a guy I know there told me I look "way more buff than you used to". I hadn't seen him in a few months, but he noticed I had bulked up in a visible way.

Yesterday at the pool all our family friends' wives were teasing me with comments about how great I looked and asked how it feels to be sexually objectified as a man. Obviously I didn't mind

As stated above, I'm not trying to pat myself on the back here but I want to emphasize how great this style of training is.

welcome to the club

[ZenFitness]

Thanks Marcus. Not to carry on and on here, but another great aspect of this workout is that it is much shorter than other workouts I've done in the past. I can hit one of these sessions and be done in 30 - 40 minutes with weights because you move so fast from exercise to exercise. I feel way more taxed coming out of these than I have other routines in the past as you are essentially hitting the same muscle areas the whole time.

[marcus300]

Thanks Marcus. Not to carry on and on here, but another great aspect of this workout is that it is much shorter than other workouts I've done in the past. I can hit one of these sessions and be done in 30 - 40 minutes with weights because you move so fast from exercise to exercise. I feel way more taxed coming out of these than I have other routines in the past as you are essentially hitting the same muscle areas the whole time.

Check out marcus diary in the lounge and start reading from the beginning it will show you a lot more advanced hit protocols and some excellent motivation

[marcus300]

Thanks Marcus. Not to carry on and on here, but another great aspect of this workout is that it is much shorter than other workouts I've done in the past. I can hit one of these sessions and be done in 30 - 40 minutes with weights because you move so fast from exercise to exercise. I feel way more taxed coming out of these than I have other routines in the past as you are essentially hitting the same muscle areas the whole time.

Check out marcus diary in the lounge and start reading from the beginning it will show you a lot more advanced hit protocols and some excellent motivation

[tarmyg]

Just changed my dumbbell overhead press after watching this. Increased strength right away.

[marcus300]

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[marcus300]

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[kapper]

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Marcus have u had any experience with the 6/12/25 protocol? I have 4 weeks off work next month i really want to up the intensity inmy training, was wondering if you have any positive feedback from this system?

[marcus300]

Marcus have u had any experience with the 6/12/25 protocol? I have 4 weeks off work next month i really want to up the intensity inmy training, was wondering if you have any positive feedback from this system?

I haven't personally used that protocol I use HIT which is detailed in my diary in the lounge. 4 weeks at anything isn't long enough to see if you respond IMHO but if its intensity your after try HIT unless you have and its not for you.

[kapper]

I love HIT ive been following urs and dorian yates style for awhile now, i really appreciate ur threads and i cant thank you enough. I understand 4 weeks isnt enough time i was more leaning towards 'overtraining or overreaching' for the 4 weeks, think i mite just stick with what ive been doing as its working, cheers for the reply mate

[marcus300]

I love HIT ive been following urs and dorian yates style for awhile now, i really appreciate ur threads and i cant thank you enough. I understand 4 weeks isnt enough time i was more leaning towards 'overtraining or overreaching' for the 4 weeks, think i mite just stick with what ive been doing as its working, cheers for the reply mate

If something is working i'd carry on with it personally but with HIT you do need to take a pullback for a couple of weeks now and again and let the body fully repair . Also sometimes change is good and will create a good growth spurt because its not use it. If you do try it let me know how you get on.

[kapper]

Yeh im doing a bit of a deload program atm, as i noticed i was run down from the last 8 weeks, will do mate! Have a good day cheers

[marcus300]

Yeh im doing a bit of a deload program atm, as i noticed i was run down from the last 8 weeks, will do mate! Have a good day cheers

Good idea as soon as you start feeling like this just take a pullback couple of weeks and let your CNS and muscle fully repair.

[RewardingLabor]

Maybe throw some rest-pause in there too. I couldn't imagine a HIT session without rest-pause. It's my favorite. If working without a spotter I love....

Warm Up Set
Drop Set
Rest Pause x 3
and done

Rest Pause sets are absolutely brutal. I always drop the weight substantially so I can actually do this for more than 1 or 2 reps.

So drop set can replace the spotter doing help? As someone who doesn't know how to get someone to spot me consistently I always wondered if I could really ever say I am honestly doing HIT…

Also what about a set where i do as many as i can in a row, then hold at the top for a few seconds as a sort of rest and bang out another rep, then hold at the top for a few seconds and bang out another rep, is this another good way to replicate the spotter experience without a spotter and get closer to positive failure?

Are there any other methods to help get to true positive failure?

[marcus300]

Rest Pause sets are absolutely brutal. I always drop the weight substantially so I can actually do this for more than 1 or 2 reps.

So drop set can replace the spotter doing help? As someone who doesn't know how to get someone to spot me consistently I always wondered if I could really ever say I am honestly doing HIT…

Also what about a set where i do as many as i can in a row, then hold at the top for a few seconds as a sort of rest and bang out another rep, then hold at the top for a few seconds and bang out another rep, is this another good way to replicate the spotter experience without a spotter and get closer to positive failure?

Are there any other methods to help get to true positive failure?

To get to and beyond true positive failure you can use rest pause, drop sets, forced (need spotter) and negatives which will also need a spotter.

[marcus300]

Repost from my diary


Rep range The ideal rep range for building size and stimulating hypertrophy is the 6 to 12 reps. Less than 6 reps will more or less increase strength and a degree of size, performing more than 12 reps will help build muscle endurance. Make sure that your reps fall within this range and your hitting true positive failure for the best chance of hypertrpohy. If your implementing one of the beyond failure methods such as forced & negs, rest pause or dropsetting you use a weight what is heavy enough to bring your positive failure at the low end of the rep range. An example for rest pause you use a weight what you will hit true positive failure at around the 4th rep then you would rest for around 10-15 seconds and do another couple of reps, then rest again for another 10-15 seconds and hit another 2 reps with the same weight. In total your doing 8 reps which is within range and your going to failure on each rest pause so you have a high chance of stimulating the right fibers to produce the best gains. As your rep range and strength increases towards a total of 12 reps you simple increase the weight being used so your constantly increasing intensity and overload, the two keys principles of any HIT programme. You use feeler sets to determine what weight you will be using on your working set, as you use different methods like dropsetting always makes sure you don't drop the weight to much so your not going over 12 reps in total. If you are you need to be using heavier weight on the drops so your rep range hits below the 12 reps in total. I always like to use around the 8 rep range in total and increase the reps upwards until I feel i can increase the weight so my rep range falls around the 8 rep range again. We are aiming for maximum muscle fiber recruitment hitting these rep ranges at failure will have the greatest potential for muscular growth. The above advice is for someone who is already advanced and is looking to build bigger thicker muscles, its not for someone who is building a base and foundation because these people can really benefit from using a lower rep range aswell as the above.


Stimulating growth

Remember going to true positive failure like I've describe previously hits the toughest muscle fibers what grow the biggest these are the fast twitch type 2b fibers, you hit these fibers and you will have the biggest chance of increasing in size. What we are aiming for is progression overload so you keep hitting the muscles with an increased weight so they need to change and adapt to the overload its being put under. This kind of continuous stress will have a reaction on the body and it will have no other alternative but to grow. We keep within the right rep range what stimulates the biggest growth and we continuously try and increase the intensity by increasing the reps then once the reps increase you increase the weight to bring the reps down within the correct range again. I can't stress enough about taking your muscle to true positive failure, this takes a lot of mental preparation. Before any muscle contraction occurs it originates from the brain sending signals to the nerves, the stronger the signal the more forceful the muscle contraction, in other words control your mind set pre working set and you will be in the best position to take your body to failure and beyond. I've commented many times how I go about doing my mental preparation but you master the mental side and you will see huge leaps in achieving your goals.Release the aggression by talking to your inner self and you will take your body to places its never been before. Stimulate growth by overloading your body to a state were its screaming for you to stop and no matter what you couldn't do one more rep even if your life depended on it, if you don't train in this fashion your not training hard enough.





Advanced training techniques

Forced and negatives

When your going to be implementing forced and negatives you need to be using a weight what your going to be hitting around the 3-4 rep range at true positive failure, then your spotter with help you with another 2 reps. I say 2 reps because its about the limit you can do once you have come to true positive failure and your partner is taking some of the weight off you, these forced reps will dig very deep into your muscle fiber recruitment. Once you have finished the forced reps the weight will be at the starting position and you start to complete negatives by lowering the weight very slowly, make sure you resist and fight the weight coming down and once at the bottom your partner will assist you to get the weight to the top of again and you will do another negative and you keep going until you cant do another negative, usually its around 2 negatives. Negatives done at this stage of a working set after positive muscle failure causes serious trauma to the muscle which will stimulate the release of growth factors. Your also 40% stronger on the eccentric part of the lift so once you hit failure in the lifting part of the exercise by yourself and adding forced with your partner the negatives will take you beyond and recruit further fibres like nothing I've experienced with any other training routine. Once this as been hit there is no need to do anything else because the damage has occurred and no more can be recruited only burn out and exhaustion. If we add the reps up you would be doing around 3-4 reps on the positive then 2 forced and then around 2 negative so in total your hitting around the 8 rep range. You have 3 strengths you have the positive, static and negative, the negative causes the most damage to the muscle and is the biggest cause of DOMS, you master negatives and you will see a huge improvement in muscle size and fullness.

Rest Pause

Again use a weight what you will be hitting true positive failure around the 3-4 reps range, put the weight down and rest for around 10-15 seconds which should give you around another 2 reps, then repeat and rest again and hit another 2+ reps again. Your completing a set of around 8 reps than you would normally use but your rest a couple of times within the set for around 10-15 second so you recover just enough to complete another 2 reps each time. This will recruit those tough type 2b muscle fibers and if you use your feeler sets correctly you can really cause some serious damage to your muscle and create an extreme amount of over load your body isn't use to. I like the 8 rep total mark but this isn't set in stone, you may prefer 10 reps in total or even 6 but just try and makes ure your in the 6-12 rep range and work from that to increase the intensity and overload.


Drop sets

This method needs a bit more thinking about but first lets explain what a drop set is. If we use DB curls for an example you would pick a weight again were you would be hitting around 3-4 reps at true positive failure and then get a set of lighter DB's and rep again for another couple of reps and then drop the weight again and curl another set of lighter bells for another 2-3 reps. You have to make sure you drop the weight enough to make sure you get around 2-3 reps out at failure but make sure you don't drop the weight to much, if your repping loads of reps out remember your trying to be hitting around the 8 rep range so when your doing your feeler sets its crucial to make the lighter db set just enough so you keep within the total rep range. Halfs/quarters or partials With partials you are doing a standard working set to which will involve you conducting a strict full range of motion to true positive failure, at this stage you would carry on doing half reps until its impossible to complete another half rep then do a quarter reps right down till you cant move the weight. A fine example would be DB side laterals were you would do strict reps till failure then carry on doing half reps so the DB's are only coming up half way then keep going till your hardly moving the weight from the side. There will be a bit of body assistance and sloppy form come into play towards the end but at this stage its fine just to get those deep muscle fibers working by going beyond failure. Extremely effective way to recruit those tough fibers we require with a constant tension approach.



Hit Supersets

Hit supersets entail you doing one exercise right after another with very little rest as in-between the two movements. With these types of supersets your still hitting the 6-12 rep range so your not doing anymore than 12 reps over two exercises, this is very important. Example you would go to true positive failure lets say on DB shoulder press and be at failure around the 5-6 rep then go straight into db side laterals for another 6 reps at the most which would be failure again. You have to make sure you use the right weight to hit the correct rep range so you don't go over the 12 rep ceiling otherwise you will trigger the muscle endurance and exhaustion and you wont tap into the tough fibers we require. Great examples is coupling compounds movements with isolation.Combination This protocol would consist of a combination of any of the above methods, you could use rest pause and on the second rest pause you may not be able to do anymore reps so you could go straight into a drop set to finish the working set of to failure and beyond. You could even use drop sets with partials on the last drop set to really increase the burn and intensity. The combination is endless, its how you feel to complete the workings set and what you need to do to make sure its a productive one. These are great for a back up plan if your working set starts to go wrong for any reason.


Rest

Using the above protocols is extremely tasking on your body and CNS so you need to make sure the training session are short but intense enough to stimulate growth. You also need to make sure you rest enough and have a good solid diet to suit your requirements. There is one thing for sure its impossible to train like this correctly for weeks on end, no matter how anabolic you are your going to need to pull back on the above movements and decrease the intensity and let the body fully repair and heal. This doesn't mean you have to stop training in this style just take a pullback training routine for a few weeks and lower the intensity and increase the rest days. Cortisol will fight against muscle growth so if you experience any over training symptoms its time to change things around to help your body repair and heal.



Feel sets The feel sets are sets what you will do previous your working set, these sets are done so you can determine what weight you will be doing on your working set. Sometimes on my first feeler set it feels light and I'm very powerful so the next feeler set I will put some poundage on and see how that feels, again if that feels easy I know I can go heavier on my working set. I also take in consideration what I am going to be doing whether its forced and negs or rest pause or drops, I just judge a weight what I will be hitting failure around the 4th - 6th rep mark or less and then incorporate the beyond failure protocols. I also remember what I did last time I did that movement because in the back of my mind I know I have to overload my body. I am always pushing heavier weights or trying to increase the intensity


.Nutrition

Food is a major player when we are building muscle tissue or shredding bf. We need to eat enough energy releasing foods to fuel our workouts and also to promote muscle building. Nutrition is a very individual thing and nothing is set in stone no matter who tells you it is, its not. We are all different and have different levels of activity and we need to establish a baseline diet and work off this to suit your needs and goals. Make no mistake if you want to grow bigger thicker muscles than your going to have to eat big, train big and be consistent with everything you do. Once you establish your maintenance diet you can put a strategy together to add muscle and body weight or shred body fat. Learning how your body responds to different amounts of calories will be one most beneficial things you can do because this will open a plan to determine how you go about attacking and achieving your goals

[Machdiesel]

I've done pretty much all Hit, and the one mistake people make, IMO, is training to infrequent. I'm a big fan of DC, to me if your gonna go low volume you'll see much better gains. After all once a week with volume and once a week hit , to me, isn't much of a difference. Now if you can DOUBLE the amount of times you train a muscle, and double the amount of times you can add weight to the bar, now your onto something

For a long time my routine was push/pull/legs/off and repeat. DC inspired, one exercise for every muscle(2-3 for back), usually a "3 set RP", and progressive overload. A 3 exercise rotation so I don't stall out, and just keep Pushing it. Example of 1 of my rotations below. I did dropset RPs to keep all reps over 6

Push
Chest- Hammer incline warmups then x10 to failure, take some Weignt off then go failure, then repeat once more for 3 failure sets. Once I got to 12 reps on test first set add Weignt
Shoulders- smith military same as above
Triceps- dip machine same as above but keep reps alil higher

I would toy around with loaded stretches, or 1 20 rep ISO movement like a cable crossover, but that's it

Now I'm trying out an undulating periodization type routine. Mon-wed is same as above, but Thursday/fri/sat is push/pull/legs but volume, no failure, pump the crap out of the muscle. Seems to be going pretty well. It's a nice change of pace

[marcus300]

I've done pretty much all Hit, and the one mistake people make, IMO, is training to infrequent. I'm a big fan of DC, to me if your gonna go low volume you'll see much better gains. After all once a week with volume and once a week hit , to me, isn't much of a difference. Now if you can DOUBLE the amount of times you train a muscle, and double the amount of times you can add weight to the bar, now your onto something

For a long time my routine was push/pull/legs/off and repeat. DC inspired, one exercise for every muscle(2-3 for back), usually a "3 set RP", and progressive overload. A 3 exercise rotation so I don't stall out, and just keep Pushing it. Example of 1 of my rotations below. I did dropset RPs to keep all reps over 6

Push
Chest- Hammer incline warmups then x10 to failure, take some Weignt off then go failure, then repeat once more for 3 failure sets. Once I got to 12 reps on test first set add Weignt
Shoulders- smith military same as above
Triceps- dip machine same as above but keep reps alil higher

I would toy around with loaded stretches, or 1 20 rep ISO movement like a cable crossover, but that's it

Now I'm trying out an undulating periodization type routine. Mon-wed is same as above, but Thursday/fri/sat is push/pull/legs but volume, no failure, pump the crap out of the muscle. Seems to be going pretty well. It's a nice change of pace

A change is good for you hope it works out and you see some growth, best of luck

[marcus300]

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