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[Scott Stevenson]

Thanks Scott!

That's a fair point Scott and one I expected . My reasoning is I was making superb progress using rest pause (specifically for tricep mass) to the degree that they appeared to be growing after every workout. So I'm a little hesitant to drop a technique that's working so well if I can fit it in and not tax the CNS (with it being a relatively small muscle group in comparison with back for example).

That's a great point - if it ain't broke, don't fix it!

On a related note, I remember seeing a study fairly recently where they compared triple drop sets (with three failure points) to three single sets with three failure points and the triple drop set group resulted in something like 50% more hypertrophy. I remember people putting this down to time under tension but i'm convinced that it's more to do with intensity.

Probably this study: 1. Fink J, Schoenfeld BJ, Kikuchi N, and Nakazato K. Effects of drop set resistance training on acute stress indicators and long-term muscle hypertrophy and strength. J Sports Med Phys Fitness 2017.

In that study, the training load (reps x load) was identical for the drop sets vs. straight sets groups.

Intensity as defined by load (%1RM was higher in the straight set group), but RPE (equivalent of bro-science "intensity") was higher after the drop set

E.g Having so many failure points in such a short space of time results in knocking off the slow twitch fibres (a simplification i know) and recruiting the fast twitch the closer to each failure point the trainee gets. I believe this is why DC's rest pause method is so damn effective and why it seems to build thick, dense looking muscle. I was just wondering if you had any thoughts on this, either relating to FT or my pseudo-science theory behind rest pause?

I don't know what you mean by "knocking off" the "slow twitch" fibers (I put slow twitch in quotes b/c no one is measuring individual twitch speed in most human studies unless they're using very specialized techniques. I have a youtube video explaining all of that), but pretty much every intensification technique (forced reps, forced negatives, drop sets, rest-pause / cluster sets, etc.) is in some way an attempt to perform more repetitions when the high threshold (type II) fibers are activated.

[When I'm asked for my "thoughts" on something as broad as this I kind of have to bow out, as I could type for hours on this topic...]

I

'd really like to integrate some kind of dropset/rest pause into FT..because it seems so damn effective and i'm the kind of guy who hates the thought that he's not doing something optimally hypertrophy wise. I'd also be really interested in learning the specifics of how you developed FT, in regards to did you start out with DC two way split and then find that you had recovered by day 3 so started adding in pump work to increase protein synthesis? Or how/why you originally had the rest pause setup and why you decided to get rid of it as a mainstay technique etc. Are there any of your earlier podcasts which covers this as I think it would be a fascinating subject to hear of the process you went through.

GO for it, man. If you think you already know without doing Muscle Rounds that it's not optimal, in conjunction with Pump set for arms, then more power to you!!! (I would guess you're being a bit myopic here in that the overall context in which arm training occurs in FT is different than in DC, so on whatever days you'd be doing RP or drop sets you'd be in a different state of recovery compared to when doing DC...)

I trained DC for nearly a decade and have gone into this over I can't count how many different places now. I can't remember for sure, but a good podcast.

I think this was a good one: #13 Scott Stevenson, PhD - DC training and developing fortitude; Muscle hypertrophy and hyperplasia

And this one: #13 Scott Stevenson, PhD - DC training and developing fortitude; Muscle hypertrophy and hyperplasia

And this was a very good one, too: #13 Scott Stevenson, PhD - DC training and developing fortitude; Muscle hypertrophy and hyperplasia


I do explain - and have here on the board extensively - why I only include one failure point in a FT MR... vs. 3 failure points (plus the pulsing negative at the end) in a DC style RP set.

Apologies for the bombardment of questions.

No problem! Probably best to start a new thread with new questions as these responses will get buried here in this Intro thread.

-S