Comments on: Feel The Muscle, Not The Weight

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Thu, 13 Oct 2016 19:49:54 +0000

In reply to James. @James. Very good points, my man :)

By: James

James — Thu, 13 Oct 2016 17:30:31 +0000

Sometimes it helps to borrow some mentality from the biggest guys.

They don’t give a sh*t if a bunch of GOMAD squatters (who are always injured) laugh at their 10 kilo bicep curls, and who attribute anything other than mad quad gainz to steroids. They just do their curls (amongst many other things) and enjoy their pumps and gains.

Everyone says “Ah, but they no doubt did something like [insert strength program here] when the started out”. Hogwash! The biggest guys in my gym would not know a popular 3×5 routine if you printed it out and put it in front of them!

Like Mark M, I’m not anti-strength training at all. I think it has a very valid place in bodybuilding, as it’s a way to get strong enough to subject longer TUT on the muscles with a heavier weight than you could previously…

But people need to get some perspective. Bodybuilding — that is, working the muscles hard but under full control — is the BEST way to lift throughout most of your life, in terms of avoiding injuries and anguish. Especially if you’ve already got strong off a standard linear progression and are ready to stick an inch or two around your arms.

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Thu, 13 Oct 2016 09:14:55 +0000

@The CHI Sports Fan. Great that implemented this advice. Makes a huge difference!
@Jason. Yep. I call that “re-setting” and we all have to do it from time to time when we’ve went too heavy.

By: Jason Mazepa

Jason Mazepa — Wed, 12 Oct 2016 15:12:21 +0000

Great reminder Mark, I’ve fallen victim to going too heavy too quickly and not getting the total range of motion felt sometimes. Just getting too excited over the past year and realized I had to lessen the weight to get proper stimulation. Oops! But hey its excellent to check yourself regularly and adjust for max benefit. Cheers buddy great stuff.

By: The CHI Sports Fan

The CHI Sports Fan — Wed, 12 Oct 2016 13:22:16 +0000

Not to nitpick but you need to check your math. If a guy had “zero” growth, and then dropped weight and did set properly “double his gains” would still be zero.

But I get the point. In THT you made this point and it has helped me tremendously to quit worrying about how I look to others – (or what NUMBER) I’m hitting on the Universal – to keep constant tension in good form.

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Fri, 03 Oct 2014 11:11:23 +0000

In reply to abishek. @abishek. After you cook something, there are still the same amount of cals, if that is what you mean. But if you mean does 50g uncooked rice have the same cals as 50g of cooked rice, no. Uncooked will weigh much more after cooking. You have to refer to labels or sites like fitday.

By: abishek

abishek — Fri, 03 Oct 2014 04:11:20 +0000

mark,
do we assume same calories for foods wheather they are cooked or uncooked?

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 15:18:27 +0000

In reply to Joe Ciulla. @Joe. That's awesome buddy. You'll love it. And you'll feel your muscles working, not your joints. Let me know how you get on, here or on Facebook or Twitter.

By: Joe Ciulla

Joe Ciulla — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 13:49:07 +0000

Mark, Thank you so much for this article and videos. I have recently gotten back into training after a very long layoff. I am 50 years old now and I have been training the past 12 weeks, like I used to train. The heaviest weight I can lift for 8 reps. While I have definetely seen my body starting to transform, I have been suffering with severe joint pain. Elbows, knees even my lower back. I was just recently thinking about trying to lower the weight and go for higher reps but I’ve been hesitant because i was always taught you have to lift big to get big. It’s not that easy at age 50. This article was like a Godsend for me. I have decided to take a week off to try and let my body completely heal. After that, I will be back at it, but this time, I will be training with this new philosophy. Thank you again. This was poerfect timing for me. I was affraid I would have to give up on training because of the pain it’s been causing me, but now, I have a new perspective that I’m energized and excited about.

By: JaSoN

JaSoN — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 13:44:26 +0000

I noticed this awhile back but didn’t really think about it but there were many training in the same gym as me older and younger and lifting a hell of alot more weight than me, i was never worried what people would think about the weights i lifted, they were much lighter, although their weights were much heavier, their form was sloppy and they weren’t as built as me and when you saw me training, you would think by my facial expressions and heavy breathing that I was lifting heavier than them. I wasn’t.. not by a long stretch, i was simply contracting the muscle harder. You need to be lifting for awhile before you can really focus on doing this. I remember someone said to me…when you flex your bicep hard to impress the girlfriend, this is what you should be doing when you are curling with a weight, the weight doesnt have to be heavy, pick that weight up and curl it and flex HARD, like you were posing for a hot girl watching, i got into the habit of doing this and saw faster gains on my arms than before, soon i was doing it with all body parts. So I have to say that I agree with this article 100%.

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 10:13:36 +0000

@Steve. True, those guys have great genetics and are on gear, but it doesn’t follow that all of their advice regarding training is therefore wrong. On this issue, they’re very much correct. Imagine the opposite advice, focus on the numbers, don’t focus on stimulating the muscle you are actually trying to build, it’s simply about what weight you can say you lift. No-one (I hope) would buy that. However, we all fall prey to this, myself included. So it’s good for a reminder to always check our form.

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 10:09:17 +0000

@Rezox. First, apart from deadlifts, I don’t think you should be training at a 1-4 rep range. But if so, it should still be worked by feeling the muscle. You won’t be stimulating anything by throwing a weight around. You’ll still be pushing as had as you can, however, for the positive part of the rep.

By: steve

steve — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 07:47:16 +0000

Mark,
I like your site and the useful information it provides but less face it, these 2 could do anything like and still grow due to amount of chemicals they heave taken. Any solid program coupled with a decent diet and some consistency should give us mere mortals some good returns

By: abhishek

abhishek — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 05:39:55 +0000

@steve maddison,
bro
any increase in muscle size is directly proportional to increase in strength as you have to continuously use the concept of “progerresive overload”,that will mean your strength is also increasing,until your strength wont increase muscle mass wont increase.

By: abhishek

abhishek — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 05:29:53 +0000

ok mark,i am gonna watch cereal killer aninfd you have also shared that i guess somewhere,i will find that.
love the genuine infoisrmation you prove and that too just not say this thing is way but also provide scientific studies to prove it.keep up the good work bud !! (Y)

By: Rezox

Rezox — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 23:42:10 +0000

Mark,

Thank you for posting this article. It is great! my question is on how to deal with lower rep ranges of bench presses and squats. Should one still focus on feeling the intended muscles when the person performs these two within 1-4 rep range considering the fact that there are other higher rep ranges of the exercises in the workout routine? should the person lower the weight in 1-4 rep range of the so called exercises to feel the muscle or should they press as hard as they can on the lower rep ranges to fire up CNS and then focus on feeling the muscles when they are subsequently doing higher rep ranges of the exercises? thanks.

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 20:20:18 +0000

@Jay. No I don’t agree with that. I agree with reverse-pyramid training. Train in the same rep range. Start with as heavy as you can in the first set and the weights necessarily decreasing in each set. More here https://musclehack.com/reverse-pyramid-training-start-at-max-strength/

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 20:16:04 +0000

@Abhishek. You should watch Cereal Killers. It would take a book to answer your question, but no. There’s nothing wrong with dietary cholesterol.

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 20:14:17 +0000

@Steve Maddison. The point would be to have big muscles. To train primarily for hypertrophy, for the aesthetics of it. Like I say at the beginning of the article, “Ask yourself what your goal in this game is. If it’s size gains, if it’s aesthetics, read this…it’s important.” So that’s the target audience for a post like this.
However, I’ll say this – you can’t get bigger without getting stronger. If a huge guy wants to increase the weight and lower the reps it wouldn’t be long before he’s stronger than the strength guys, in my opinion. The reason it would take some time is that his body would need to adapt neurally to the new style. But once that’s done, we’d see who’s really stronger. But anyway, that’s not my interest, and that’s why I call my system Targeted Hypertrophy Training.

By: Jay

Jay — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 17:01:36 +0000

Mark,
First off, awesome article man. My question is how do you feel about Rich talking about doing it right but moving up the weight each set when he was talking benching…or any exercise for that matter?

By: Abhishek

Abhishek — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 17:00:38 +0000

Mark,
I have been worried since I have read that the 6 eggs that I included in my diet ,on nutrition data it says (423% of daily recommended chalesterol intake based on a 2000 calorie diet).i hve read your article on “saturated fat” but it about chalesterol conent.should I lower my egg intake.should I be worried?

And I follow “slow negative part of rep” thing from I first read it in tht4.i feel the muscle not the weight.another great read!

By: Steven Maddison

Steven Maddison — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 16:49:36 +0000

In reply to Mark McManus. @Mark. It depends on your definition of "functional". In this case I am referring to the function of physical strength and my point is if one guy can lift as much as another guy whose muscles are twice as large, then what's the point in having those big muscles?

By: Anand

Anand — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 16:10:05 +0000

Excellent article Mark. An eyeopener.
The tip by Dai is wonderful. It helps experience the difference.
So a big thanks to both of you.

By: Scott

Scott — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 15:41:57 +0000

Very timely post. I read this before this morning’s workout and was able to bust through some plateaus. I had been mentally saying “I have to lift this heavy weight” instead of “feel the muscle, feel the work”. Changing my mindset from the labor of lifting weight to a mindset of feeling my muscles and the work they are doing made a huge difference. Thanks!

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Wed, 01 Oct 2014 15:39:37 +0000

@Steven Maddison. I have no beef whatsoever with strength training. My beef is with *some* strength trainers making false promises about making size gains with those training modalities. Unless you’re a freak, it’s not going to happen.
Furthermore, they claim low reps are better for building muscle and that you don’t need to do isolation exercises lol. All this rubbish needs to be called out and put straight lest people actually end up believing it.
Plus, if my arms are twice the size of a strength trainers, why aren’t my arms functional? Here’s a good article on “dys”functional training https://www.exercisefraud.com/dysfunctionaltraining.html
On THT training, we do also take time to prioritize strength by dropping the rep range to 6-8. This periodization back and forth allows for “chronic hypertrophy”. More on that here https://musclehack.com/reps-and-sets/