A few weeks ago I looked at the resistance training variables from the point of view of achieving muscle endurance, muscle strength, and muscle hypertrophy today I will take you through training the sub-qualities of strength, which can be summarised as follows:
- Control and Stability
- Hypertrophy and General Strength
- Maximal Strength
- Power (Speed) Strength
- Power/Strength Endurance
Control and Stability is just that, being able to control and stabilise the muscles during movement. This can be trained by using Swiss balls, Bosu balls or any surface that has a bit of give therefore making necessary the engagement of your stabilizer muscles to keep your balance. Stabilizer muscles help to keep you balanced and upright when moving. Your stabilizer muscles whilst not directly involved in the lifting of the weight help keep your body steady through isometric muscle contractions.
One of my favourites is to use free benches for leg exercises such as steps up as they have a spongy surface, making necessary a little more balance and control when executing the movement hence the use of stabilizer muscles. Other examples that help you train this part of strength are, dumbbell chest presses on a swiss ball, try doing 15 reps by 3 sets with 30-60 seconds rest between sets, and a supine bridge on a swiss ball with alternate leg lift, try doing 10 reps (each leg) by 3 sets with the same rest period.
Hypertrophy and General Strength is to train to achieve growth of muscle size, and as we have discussed on a number of occasions in previous posts the best and most efficient way to do this is to use compound exercises such as squats, deadlifts, bench presses, lat pulldowns, and bent over rows. In keeping with the guidelines discussed perform each of these exercises doing 8-12 reps and between 3-5 sets, resting 1-2 minutes between sets. Use a weight (around 60-70% of 1RM) that enables you to do the prescribed number of reps, increase it each set if you can achieve it easily.
Maximal Strength is defined as the maximum amount of force someone can produce regardless of time or bodyweight. Maximal strength is believed to be the core sub-quality of strength that every individual, (athletes in particular) should be attentive to. The reason for this is that it is argued that the acquisition of maximal strength is the fastest way to hone all the other motor qualities namely relative strength, speed strength, strength endurance, speed, and speed endurance.
In fear of breaching my aim of keeping posts simplified, suffice to say because of there nature, maximal strength exercises recruit more type 2 muscle fibre which are the fast twitch type. What does that mean? It means that including maximal strength training in your program will help you in achieving increase muscle size in your hypertrophy training as the more type 2 muscle fibre you can have firing in the worked muscle unit the more growth you should achieve size wise as that is one of the key determinants of growth.
Simply its advantageous to have a component of this type of training in your program as it helps you build other sub-qualities of strength. When training this sub-quality you can perform the compound exercises mentioned above (or others depending on your goal) low reps between 2-6 of 85% of your 1RM, a high set volume up to 5 or more and rest 3-5 minutes between sets.
Power (Speed) Strength is defined as the ability to generate high levels of force at speed or quickly. The type of movements that train this sub-quality are plymetric and explosive exercises. Plymetric exercises include hops, jumps, box jumps, squat jumps, depth jumps, and power push ups. Explosive exercises include the clean, clean and jerk, high pull, clean pull, and snatch. As these are advanced strength exercises I suggest you seek professional advice on the techniques and training variables before attempting them on your own.
Power/Strength Endurance is defined as the ability to sustain power force levels over a long period of time. This sub-quality can be trained most efficiently by once again using compound exercises such as lat pulldowns, bench press, squats, deadlifts and bent over row. The load should be 50-70% of your 1RM between 15-30 reps, 3-5 sets with a rest period of 30-60 seconds.
The sub-qualities of strength that I have outlined above form the basis for strength training programming and as I have alluded to on occasion above I have endeavoured to make it less technical therefore applicable to your own training. However I must point out again, the exercises mentioned in most of them are advanced and challenging movements therefore it is advisable to make sure you are confident with the techniques before attempting to include them in your workouts. When you do you will find added enjoyment to your workouts and what is more important better results.
Zol
Fitness Moves