Having a strong and toned abdomen is one of the main goals of most people who start weight training. On the one hand, it is probably the most showy muscle that exists and the one we like to show off the most on the beach. However, we must not forget that the core’s function is to stabilize the body during the execution of our exercises. The forces that we use in our training have their origin in our midsection and are later transmitted to our extremities. Our body performs a coordinated action in which the core is essential.

On the other hand, we must not forget that the core is not only the abdominals, in our table of exercises to do at home we have to include both abdominal and lower back exercises. It is also important that, as we mentioned, the core aims to stabilize the body, so by performing compound exercises such as squats or deadlifts we are indirectly working our core. Finally, as they say “abdominals are achieved in the kitchen”, that is to say that for a showy six pack, we need to have a fairly low percentage of fat with a well-executed diet and then complement it with a table of exercises at home selecting from the 40 core exercises that we are going to present.

In this list of core exercises we will divide the exercises according to different factors: without equipment, with TRX, with a partner, with dumbbells.

Core exercises without equipment: to perform any of these exercises we will not need anything more than the floor and in some cases objects that we have at home such as a chair or a rag.

1. Trunk lifts on the floor: also known as “crunches” or simply sit-ups, this exercise is the most classic of all. However, we do not recommend overdoing this exercise as it is not particularly effective and has some potential for injury, so we do not believe it is a central part of our core training.
2. Extended leg lifts on the floor: similar to the previous exercise, in this case we raise the legs off the floor either at the same time or one by one while keeping the abdomen contracted. Another basic abs exercise, which targets the lower abs.
3. Lumbar extension on the floor: This is an exercise for the core that focuses on the lumbar in which we raise the trunk and legs, but lying face down.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7EmdZl3OUM
4. Flexiones delfín: es una variación de las flexiones que además de trabajar el core, también trabajará brazos y hombros.
5. Floor Pelvic Raise: One of the best known back core exercises, working both the rectus abdominis and lower back.
6. Leg Flapping – This core exercise is quite useful as it combines an isometric contraction and leg movement.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoHnFoltddg
7. Straight Arm Plank: The classic version of the plank is one of the most popular core exercises today.
8. Plank on elbows: a slightly more complicated version of the previous one, basic in any core exercise table.
9. Plank with arm and leg raised: similar to the traditional plank, but adding more difficulty by removing two points of support.
10. Lateral plank: supported on one elbow and one leg, with this core exercise at home you will focus on the abdominal oblique.
11. Reverse plank: with this exercise you can strengthen your lower back at home, in addition to working your glutes and hamstrings, which is why it is part of our list of core exercises.
12. reverse boat with leg elevation: combines isometric exercise with the movement of our legs to create a core exercise at home more complicated than the previous one.
13. Side plank with push-up – We combine a standard side plank with a push-up or push-up.
14. Hip Swing Side Plank: This core exercise lowers your hips to the floor from a side plank position.
15. Plank to squat: We go from the plank position with arms extended to the deep squat and return to the starting position. By working the lower back it is a great exercise to strengthen the back at home.
16. Climber: from the plank position we bring the knee to the chest, it can be done without material so it is a good core exercise at home.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aa6VbKOxPDY
17. Elbow climber: similar to the previous exercise, but this time bringing the knee to the elbow. Esta versión es un gran ejercicio para fortalecer lumbares en casa.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1J4hRICVjRo
18. Elevated Feet Stair Climber: This exercise with your feet on a raised surface like a chair hits your upper body more and is a great choice for a back strengthening exercise at home.
19. Gliding Climber: For this core exercise, use a cloth to execute the rock climber by sliding your feet across the floor.
20. Spider climber: it is executed like the elbow climber, but resting the sole of the foot on the ground, it is less physically demanding, but works more on mobility.
21. Semi-circular climber: while we execute a normal climber, we rotate the torso until we create a semi-circle, helping to strengthen the abdominals at home.
22. Jumping climber: In this exercise to strengthen the abdomen at home, the feet are brought up to the height of the navel in a jump.
23. Low Jump Climber: A more complicated version but a great addition to your table of abdominal exercises to do at home, we do a low jump climber, but with support on the elbows.
24. Side-by-side climber: Same as the spider climber, but with both feet at the same time, it targets the lower back so it’s a great addition to your back-strengthening workout chart.
25. One-Handed Stepper: We continue to complicate our at-home sit-up chart with a version of the stepper, but with the addition of supporting the weight with one hand making it a core exercise for advanced athletes.
26. One-foot climber: Our last climber in our sit-up chart to do at home, it is probably the most difficult as it combines the execution of the sliding climber, but keeping one of the legs in the air.
27. Burpees: Combining cardio and plank, this core exercise is a calorie-burning machine for which you don’t need any equipment.
28. Hypopressive: controlling the breath we can work the entire core without the need for any material

Core exercises with equipment: in this case we will need simple and cheap equipment such as bands or combined with typical elements of any house to do these exercises to strengthen the abdominals at home.

29. Lateral rotation of the trunk with a band: with the band secured at a medium height, we grab the band with both hands and rotate, always maintaining the tension of the band.
30. Rotation of the trunk with a band from below to above: within our table of exercises to strengthen the back, here we will do a rotation similar to that of the previous exercise, but starting from a low point and raising our hands above our head.
31. Shrugs with a band: the shrug or “crunch”, a basic bodybuilding exercise, can be made more difficult by using an elastic band.
32. Band Reverse Shrug: Similar to the above, but raising your feet, will help strengthen your abs at home.
33. Kneeling shrugs with band: kneeling and the band held at a higher point, we bring the chest to the knees working everything with this core exercise.
34. Abdominal roller: this device can be purchased for less than ten euros and is the exercise with the greatest activation of the core. Both abdominals and lower back work, being one of the best exercises to do back at home. For other abdominal roller exercises check out this article:
    
35. Lateral abdominal roller: we perform a twist at the same time that we execute a repetition of the standard roller.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iof5KAgHwDM
36. Step of the bear with a roller: let’s add to our table to do abs at home the step of the bear while the roller destabilizes us.
37. Standing abdominal roller: if we are very advanced we will be able to with this core exercise, which is the one that most progressions reach.
38. Reverse abdominal roller: we bring the feet to the torso instead of the other way around.
39. Roller with one leg and one hand: the most extreme version of all if you are able to master it you have an iron core.
40. Dragon flags: if you have some support that is resistant and some space you can also do this exercise to do back at home.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bs4PTHIeR8w

Conclusions: it is not necessary to leave the house to do core exercises that help us sculpt an aesthetic and functional abdomen, we have an almost unlimited number of core exercises to create a table of exercises to do at home that will help us reach our goals .

As we have commented previously in this blog, the first thing you have to define when you train are your goals. Do I want to develop my upper body? Do I want to increase my strength? I want to lose weight? Etc.

The difference between athletes who practice bodybuilding exercises and weightlifting is visually noticeable since their objectives are different. Anyway, there are many people who doubt about the training that they follow each other to achieve results. In this post we will review the types of training and objectives of each discipline to understand it better.

After an introduction to these disciplines, we also leave you with several bodybuilding exercises in case you want to focus on gaining volume.

Bodybuilding: the focus is on size.

Bodybuilders often lift weights not with the goal of building strength but with the goal of increasing the size of their muscles. Bodybuilders will obviously build strength as they train, but this will be an added effect to their main goal of bulking up.

Bodybuilders who lift weights to increase their size usually work to get the blood to carry as much oxygen and nutrients to the muscles. This gives them a nice feeling and keeps them active while training at the limit. The type of lifting that bodybuilders do has the goal of creating micro-tears in the muscle, forcing the body to repair it and thus increasing storage capacity. The body repairs, causes muscle growth. This training procedure is known as hypertrophy.

As muscles grow they can develop more power, which means they can exert greater force during workouts. However, the energy stored in bulky muscles is not the same as actual strength, and for this reason bodybuilders tend to be weaker than they appear.

The term bodybuilding generally refers to competitive displays, which is why many bodybuilders focus on working their bodies to look their best on stage.

Read until the end to find 5 bodybuilding exercise programs

Strength training: the focus is on muscle power.

When it comes to strength training, there is one main goal with training: to increase the amount of power your muscles can develop to lift loads. The size and shape of the muscles do not matter as long as they can provide maximum force during the lift.

Strength training focuses on exercises with low repetitions and heavy weights, and is focused on teaching your central nervous system how to use your motor units when you lift. Lifting is focused on increasing the strength of your muscles, strengthening your joints, strengthening your bones, and developing stronger tissues.

Unlike bodybuilding exercises, in strength exercises the strength of athletes does not have to be reflected in a perfectly sculpted body. Strength athletes typically have a higher percentage of body fat, and their body shapes tend to be more solid and blocky rather than sleek and lean as is the case for bodybuilders. In any case, when it comes time to use the muscles, strength athletes can develop more strength and last longer than bodybuilders.

Weightlifting

Weightlifting is a particular type of strength training to increase muscular strength and the size of skeletal muscles. In weightlifting, bars, dumbbells and weight discs are used to train concentric and exectric muscle contraction exercises. This discipline also uses a series of specialized equipment to train specific muscle groups.

Weightlifting is also an Olympic discipline in which athletes attempt to lift their maximum weight in a one repetition lift of a barbell loaded with weight plates. The two weightlifting competitions are the snatch and the two-stroke.

The snatch has a wide grip and a single lift while in the two-stroke the bar is raised in two different sequences. In Olympic weightlifting, each athlete receives three attempts for each of the categories: snatch and two times. The sum of the total weight of the two highest lifts will determine the weight lifted to be taken into account in a competition. An athlete who fails to perform a valid snatch and two-stroke lift will receive an incomplete grade for the competition.

Although there are not many globally competitive Olympic lifters, the lifts developed in the sport of weightlifting, and in particular the components of the lifts such as squats, deadlifts, etc. They are frequently used by elite athletes specialized in other disciplines and sports to train explosive and functional strength.

You may have also heard of Chinese Weightlifting. Chinese Weightlifting is the training system for weightlifters from the communist country with which they are achieving great results.

5 bodybuilding exercises to increase volume

If you are interested in gaining muscle mass, one of your highest priorities is to determine which method will work for you. Here we present 5 training programs to increase your volume.

#1. The 5X5 program

The 5X5 program is quite popular among those who are interested in gaining the maximum amount of strength and muscle mass. The objective of this program is to perform three exercises focused on the main muscle groups of the body: the upper body and the lower body, performing series of 5 repetitions for each exercise. At the end of each training you can add series of isolated bodybuilding exercises if you need them, although they are not required by the program itself.

#2. german volume training

The next program to build bulk is the German Bulk Training program. This training is similar to the 5X5 program since it will also ask you to do a good number of exercises, but it differs in that the number of repetitions increases up to 10 repetitions and 10 series for each exercise.

The goal of this program is to focus on two muscle groups a day, alternating between them over the course of three training days a week.

#3. The FST-7 training program.

The third type of volume training program that is currently in vogue is FST-7 training. This program is not specifically based on a series of exercises that you have to perform or a protocol to divide the muscle groups of your body. This program gives you the guidelines for what you should be training in the last bodybuilding exercise for each body part you worked in that session.

The acronym FST comes from the English Fascial Stretch Training, which indicates that one of the main objectives that this program tries to achieve is to stretch the soft connective tissue that is found around your muscles as well as in the rest of your body.

This fabric is primarily responsible for helping to maintain the structural integrity of your body, providing support and protection, and works as a shock absorber when you perform your workouts both in and out of the gym.

When the soft tissue is stretched, you will see increases in muscle growth. There will also be a greater contribution of minerals, amino acids and oxygen to the tissues.

With this workout, perform seven sets of 15 repetitions of the last exercise you did for each muscle group. It is important that you make the rest periods between these sets shorter and shorter – about 30 seconds total.

Keep in mind that you will probably have to use a lower weight than you normally used for each bodybuilding and weightlifting exercise since you are now doing a much higher total number of repetitions.

#4 Split upper and lower body training.

The fourth type of exercise is the upper and lower body. This routine is based on training exchanging muscle groups so that you train each group twice a week.

This system is a good option for beginners and lifters who are looking to gain mass since it allows you to get plenty of rest throughout the week. If you are an advanced athlete you can also increase the number of series and define your selection of exercises and rests to increase your muscle gains at any level.

On the other hand, this system forces you to do four sessions a week. If you have trips or other commitments, following the training calendar can be a problem for you since it is not very flexible.

#5. full body workout

Finally we stop at full body training. The 5 x 5 program could also be considered a full body program since you work virtually all major muscle groups with the three exercises of your choice. In any case, true full body training programs will give you a specific exercise for each muscle group: quads, hamstrings, chest, back and shoulders (arms are worked when you work chest and back).

In addition to these lifts and bodybuilding exercises dedicated to muscle groups, you can also work some isolated exercises to train individual muscles.

In conclusion, remember that workouts aimed at bodybuilders are focused on gaining volume, while exercises used by strength athletes seek to gain muscle power. Weightlifting is a discipline within strength exercises and has two Olympic categories that are the snatch and the two-stroke.

If you want to start doing bulking training, you can follow our recommendations on the training programs most used by athletes. Always remember to ask specialized professionals who know your physical situation when defining your training to obtain the best results in a timely manner.

If you don’t already know Fitenium is a free, mobile, video-based social network for athletes who train strength or bodyweight exercises. At Fitenium users can follow their performance, compete and get discounts in nutrition and sports equipment stores. Download it here.

Hello Fiteniers, today we are going to talk about another of the most popular training schemes and the best results. It’s usually a natural step when a 3-day Fullbody routine falls short on training days and you want to hit the gym more. The 4-day Torso-Leg routine continues to have a base of multi-joint exercises, but ending each session with one or two isolated exercises to end the session.

In this case, we recommend this 4-day Torso-Leg routine for intermediate athletes. If you are a beginner, we believe that it is better that you start your journey in the gym for a few months with the 3 day fullbody routine a few months, and if you are advanced, although this routine is valid, we believe that there are other more interesting options such as Pull-Push-Legs.

Guidelines:

1. Weekly Division of the Routine:

Access the Fitenium app where you can train this routine for free.

Monday: Torso 1 Workout
Tuesday: Leg 1 Workout
Wednesday: Active Rest
Thursday: Torso 2 Workout
Friday: Leg 2 Workout

Although in general this routine is designed to go to the gym four days, if for some reason one week you can only go three days, you can do three days of this routine and start the following week with the training that was missing. An example would be like this.

What is active rest? It consists of resting from our usual 3-day routine, but continuing to be active by doing some moderate activity with a moderate pace and duration. Examples of active rest: yoga or stretching session, 45-60 minute walk, foam roller routine, riding a bike… there are options for all tastes.

2. Rest between sets:

In multi-joint exercises such as Squats, Deadlifts or Bench Press, we recommend taking long breaks of 3-4 minutes without any problem, since by recruiting a lot of muscle, our CNS needs a little more time to recover. For isolation exercises, short rests of 60-90 seconds are enough to go for another set.

3. Effort:

Given the predominance of multi-joint exercises, we do not recommend training near failure if we want to maintain performance and technique throughout our sets. As a general rule in compound exercises we recommend training with a weight that allows us to do 2 or 3 more repetitions. In the more analytical exercises we recommend training with a weight that allows us to do 1 or 2 more repetitions.

If we are beginners we can apply a linear weight progression and almost every week we will be able to lift more weight than the previous one, but if we are already intermediate we recommend other types of more complex progressions that we will talk about later.

4. Warm up and stretch:

The warm-up will be the same every day, it is VERY IMPORTANT never to skip the warm-up and stretching if we want to continue progressing without injuries.

5. Substitutions:

We highly recommend doing our 3-day routine with the scheduled exercises, but if for whatever reason you can’t do any of the exercises, you can substitute them as follows.

• Squat: Press + 15 reps of lower back extension (i.e. if you have 3×8 of Squat, replace it with 3×8 of press and 3×15 of lower back extension).
• Deadlift: Hip Thrust `+ 15 repetitions of lumbar extension.
• Romanian Deadlift: Nordic Curl.
• Stride: Unilateral Hip Thrust with Dumbbell.
• Hip Thrust: Hip Thrust on a quadriceps extension machine.
• Calf Raise standing machine: Calf Raise with dumbbell.
• Femoral Curl: Femoral Curl with Dumbbell (between the feet).
• Quadriceps Extension: You can eliminate them.
• Barbell Bench Press: Dumbbell Bench Press.
• Incline Dumbbell Press: Incline Barbell Press.
• Military Press: Standing Military Press with Dumbbells.
• Pulley Openings: Dumbbell Openings or Pec Deck.
• Funds: Bench Press Declined Dumbbells.
• Supine Pulley Pulldown: Biceps Pull Ups.
• T-Bar Row: Dumbbell Bench Row.

6. Progression

Once we are intermediate, the linear progression is no longer realistic for us in this 4 day Upper-Leg routine.

In this routine, we recommend an undulating progression that works as follows:

• Let’s take as an example an exercise from our 4-day Torso-Leg routine that has 3 series for 6-8 repetitions.
• We load a weight that allows us to do 6 repetitions.
• We do the series of 6 repetitions until with the increase in our strength, we can do 8 repetitions with the same weight.
• Once we can do 3 sets of 8 repetitions, we increase the weight (1-2.5kg disc in isolated exercises and 5kg in compound exercises).
• With this new weight we start again doing 6 repetitions. If we fail we return to the previous weight.

7. And the diet?

To make truly significant progress in the gym, diet is just as important as training if not more. Avoid processed foods, eat a reasonable amount of protein for your weight and training level, and calculate a caloric deficit/surplus based on your goals. Read our article if you want to have a Body 10.

The 4-day Torso-Leg Routine

Access the Fitenium app where you can train this routine for free.

Day 1 – Heavy Torso

Day 2 – Heavy Leg

Day 3 – Light Torso

Day 4 – Light Leg

If you want to go to the gym more days and spin more finely in each workout, this 4-day Torso-Leg routine is a perfect option to continue progressing once we are no longer newbies.

Don’t forget to record your progress and upload it to Fitenium!

If you don’t already know Fitenium is a free, mobile, video-based social network for athletes who train strength or bodyweight exercises. At Fitenium users can follow their performance, compete and get discounts in nutrition and sports equipment stores. Download it here.

Hello Fiteniers, after our review of some of the most effective routines to progress in the gym, such as 3 day fullbody routine and the routine Torso Leg 4 days, today we are going to talk about the division par excellence that was missing among the most common that we can find in any gym. We’re talking about the 5-Day Split Workout, which is probably the most popular workout of all.

All workouts have their pros and cons, and split workouts have always been criticized for focusing on pumps and making it harder to recover from massacring a muscle, but if you’re an advanced user you might

Guidelines:

1. Weekly Division of the Routine:

It is very simple, working from Monday to Friday with a specific order to be able to recover correctly.

Monday: Chest – Triceps
Tuesday: Front leg – Abdomen
Wednesday: Back – Biceps
Thursday: Rear leg – Abdomen
Friday: Shoulder – Arms

What is active rest? It consists of resting from our usual 3-day routine, but continuing to be active by doing some moderate activity with a moderate pace and duration. Examples of active rest: yoga or stretching session, 45-60 minute walk, foam roller routine, riding a bike… there are options for all tastes.

2. Rest between sets:

In multi-joint exercises such as Squats, Deadlifts or Bench Press, we recommend taking long breaks of 3-4 minutes without any problem, since by recruiting a lot of muscle, our CNS needs a little more time to recover. For isolation exercises, short rests of 60-90 seconds are enough to go for another set.

3. Effort:

Being a 5-day split routine, there isn’t as much weight of multi-joint exercises, however we don’t recommend training near failure if we want to maintain performance and technique throughout our sets. As a general rule in compound exercises we recommend training with a weight that allows us to do 2 or 3 more repetitions. In the more analytical exercises we recommend training with a weight that allows us to do 1 or 2 more repetitions.

If we are beginners we can apply a linear weight progression and almost every week we will be able to lift more weight than the previous one, but if we are already intermediate we recommend other types of more complex progressions that we will talk about later.

4. Warm up and stretch:

The warm-up will be the same every day, it is VERY IMPORTANT never to skip the warm-up and stretching if we want to continue progressing without injuries.

5. Substitutions:

We highly recommend doing our 3-day routine with the scheduled exercises, but if for whatever reason you can’t do any of the exercises, you can substitute them as follows.

• Squat: Press + 15 reps of lower back extension (i.e. if you have 3×8 of Squat, replace it with 3×8 of press and 3×15 of lower back extension).
• Deadlift: Hip Thrust `+ 15 repetitions of lumbar extension.
• Romanian Deadlift: Nordic Curl.
• Romanian Deadlift: Nordic Curl.
• Hip Thrust: Hip Thrust on a quadriceps extension machine.
• Calf Raise standing machine: Calf Raise with dumbbell.
• Femoral Curl: Femoral Curl with Dumbbell (between the feet).
• Quadriceps Extension: You can eliminate them.
• Barbell Bench Press: Dumbbell Bench Press.
• Incline Dumbbell Press: Incline Barbell Press.
• Incline Dumbbell Press: Incline Barbell Press.
• Pulley Openings: Dumbbell Openings or Pec Deck.
• Funds: Bench Press Declined Dumbbells.
• Funds: Bench Press Declined Dumbbells.
• T-Bar Row: Dumbbell Bench Row.

6. Progression

Once we are intermediate, the linear progression is no longer realistic for us in this 5-day split routine.

In this routine, we recommend an undulating progression that works as follows:

• Let’s take as an example an exercise from our 4-day Torso-Leg routine that has 3 series for 6-8 repetitions.
• We load a weight that allows us to do 6 repetitions.
• We do the series of 6 repetitions until with the increase in our strength, we can do 8 repetitions with the same weight.
• Once we can do 3 sets of 8 repetitions, we increase the weight (1-2.5kg disc in isolated exercises and 5kg in compound exercises).
• With this new weight we start again doing 6 repetitions. If we fail we return to the previous weight.

7. And the diet?

To make truly significant progress in the gym, diet is just as important as training if not more. Avoid processed foods, eat a reasonable amount of protein for your weight and training level, and calculate a caloric deficit/surplus based on your goals. Read our article if you want to have a Body 10.

The 5-Day Split Workout

Day 1 – Chest and Triceps

Day 2 – Leg (front predominance) and Abdomen

Day 3 – Back Biceps

Day 4 – Leg (posterior predominance) and Abdomen

Day 5 – Shoulders and arms

We are sure that many will like this divided 5-day routine since it allows you to train from Monday to Friday in an effective way leaving the temple congested, which motivates many people and there is nothing wrong with it.

Don’t forget to record your progress in Fitenium

Fatigue in different types of efforts can be characterized and measured in different ways depending on the duration and intensity of the efforts. In this entry we analyze the various factors that cause fatigue according to the duration of the effort.

In this series of articles we deal with some of the most important concepts of strength training, collecting notes from the recently published book Strength, Speed ​​and Physical and Sports Performance written by renowned researchers Juan José González Badillo and Juan Ribas Serna.

SUMMARY

• In short efforts the performance is highly dependent on the oxygen consumption capacity of the subject (VO 2max)
• In efforts of up to 30 minutes, the lactate threshold point (anaerobic) is decisive.
• In efforts that last more than an hour, fatigue is highly associated with the depletion of muscle glycogen stores.
• A good metabolic indicator of stress caused by exertion is the blood lactate concentration.
• The loss of execution speed is a faithful reflection of the fatigue state of the subject.

short duration efforts

From efforts as short as 100 meters of sprint (10-12 s) there are already losses of speed (decrease in performance) involuntarily, which is an indicator that during the test there is a phase in which it manifests itself. fatigue as a loss of capacity to produce force in the unit of time.

The causes of fatigue in this type of effort are multiple, but of all of them the decrease in availability is probably the most important. Considerable increases in the plasmatic concentration of hypoxanthine, ammonia and uric acid have been observed in this type of effort. These results indicate that there have been difficulties in synthesizing ATP via ADP + CP and that energy production has been resorted to through the ADP + ADP = ATP + AMP reaction. This indicates that you there has been significant metabolic stress in the muscle cell, which can be associated with injury to said cell, and the loss of purines that can negatively influence the phosphagen reserves of the muscle, which has repercussions in the reduction of the muscle’s capacity to produce energy quickly in the following days.

Metabolic stress on the muscle cell influences the muscle’s ability to produce energy on successive days.

It does not appear that acidosis is a determining factor in these cases. In addition to what has been indicated, this fatigue is associated with a decrease in the activation of motor units in the excitation-activation process and an increase in Pi and ADP. In other short efforts such as throws, jumps, Olympic lifts and the like, fatigue is related to the same mechanisms, but with less influence from metabolic factors. If the efforts are somewhat longer (15-40 s), the participation of the phosphagen pathway to provide energy is coupled in a very important and decisive way with the ability to rapidly provide energy through the anaerobic glycolytic pathway. For this reason, in this type of effort, all the factors responsible for fatigue in the previous type of effort are present and increased, plus those derived from a drop in pH.

Therefore, it is likely that the concentration of metabolites, the alteration of calcium transport (excessive accumulation of myoplasmic calcium), the accumulation of Pi and the excess of extracellular potassium are also present as responsible for fatigue in this type of effort. The same causes of fatigue occur in efforts that last about a minute, but the fundamental difference is in a greater influence of the pH reduction, which practically reaches its maximum in efforts of this duration. High acidity, in addition to the previously described effects on the cross-bridge cycle, acts on cionide channels (which mainly govern membrane excitability), depolarizing the membrane and leading to the inactivation of sodium channels, essential for the generation of action potentials, at the end of the effort.

In this situation, the hydrogen ions themselves act by priming the working speed of the mitochondria, shifting the burden of maintaining the energy supply to the mitochondrial aerobic pathway. Given the low rate of ATP generation from the mitochondria compared to the anaerobic glycolytic pathway, the rate is clearly reduced at the end of the effort. These same causes could be applied to efforts that last up to three minutes, with a greater dependence on the ability to provide energy aerobically.

long-lasting efforts

When the efforts last between 5 and 10 minutes, performance is highly dependent on the subject’s oxygen consumption capacity (VO 2max), but there is also significant phosphagen depletion and high acidity. Therefore, in this type of effort, fatigue may depend in part on the processes related to phosphagen depletion, and to a large extent on the ability to produce energy aerobically (power and maximum aerobic capacity), but also on the power and anaerobic capacity and problems related to the reduction of pH.

In efforts of up to 30 minutes, the lactate threshold point (anaerobic) is decisive.

In efforts that last up to approximately 30 minutes, the aerobic power of the subject is still very important, but the speed at the lactate threshold point (called anaerobic) seems to be more decisive. Therefore, fatigue may be closely related to the ability to capture, transport, and use oxygen for the oxidation of glucose by the aerobic route, but especially to speed or power in conditions of suprathreshold lactatemia. In the final sprint of some tests, the depletion of muscle CP reserves or excessive muscle acidity may influence. Another factor that may be related to fatigue is high body temperature, although this would be more relevant after one hour of effort.

In efforts that last more than an hour, fatigue is highly associated with the depletion of muscle glycogen stores., and, therefore, although all the factors indicated for the previous efforts are present to some extent, the availability of glycogen stores could be a factor causing the fatigue of this exercise. In addition, glycogen depletion is associated with fatigue as it may cause decreased calcium release from the sarcoplasmic reticulum and consequent effect on muscle activation, although the link to low glycogen is uncertain. with failure of calcium release (Allen et al., 2008).

In efforts that last more than an hour, fatigue is related to the depletion of glycogen stores.

Other factors such as an excess of ammonium, an increase in muscle Mg concentration, an excessive increase in body temperature or an insufficient capacity to use lipids to produce energy could also be the cause of fatigue in this type of effort.

Efforts to overcome external loads

As we have indicated when discussing the concept of fatigue, in addition to a decrease in force production, another aspect of muscle performance such as speed of shortening is also an indicator of fatigue (Allen et al., 2008; Edman, 1992). If we take into account that the loss of speed before the same load is a direct consequence of the reduction of the force applied to said load, we must admit that the loss of speed is a faithful reflection of the state of fatigue of the subject.

It is evident that when a subject is visually perceived to be “tired” (fatigued), we detect it by the loss of execution speed, whatever the activity the subject performs: displacing an external load or displacing his own body. Speed ​​also has an advantage over force as an indicator and quantifier of fatigue, and that is that it can be measured more easily and accurately than force, and also in competition and training gestures or actions.

The loss of speed in efforts to overcome external loads is a faithful reflection of the state of fatigue.

Therefore, when a gesture has to be performed at the maximum speed possible, knowledge of the loss of speed may be the best procedure to determine the degree of fatigue in which the subject is found during and after the effort. These reasonings lead us to propose that when training is carried out through the displacement of external loads, the loss of speed in the series is an accurate indicator of the fatigue (and the load) that carrying out the exercise supposes for the subject.

Given this premise, the validation of the loss of speed in the series as an indicator of fatigue is achieved if there is a high relationship between this loss of speed during and at the end of the effort, and the reduction in contractile capacity, which could be quantified. also through the loss of speed with respect to the speed reached when displacing the same load prior to the fatiguing effort. Specifically, as mechanical indicators we can use two exercises:

1) the loss of speed before the same load, which in our case is the maximum load that can be moved approximately 1 m*s-1, and

2) the loss of jump height (which is really also a loss of speed) after the effort.

To this main validation, the relationship with indicators of the degree of stress caused by the effort could be added, which could contribute to a better knowledge of the type of effort made and the possibility of replacing the measure of certain metabolites by the loss of speed (concurrent validity ). As metabolic indicators we consider the changes in the concentration of lactate and ammonium. Indeed, a good metabolic indicator of stress caused by exertion is the concentration of lactate in the blood.

Lactate production is related to the difference between the motor command of the central nervous system and the actual mechanical execution of the muscle. The greater the difference between what is commanded by the central nervous system and what is executed by the muscle, the greater the lactate production will be. In addition, lactate production, far from being detrimental to the functioning of muscle fibers, is actually an essential component to improve muscle fiber excitability by blocking chloride channels (Ribas, 2010; González-Badillo and Ribas, 2002). As shown later, the relationship between the lactate concentration and the loss of speed of movements executed at maximum speed is excellent, such that the greater the loss of speed, the greater the production of lactate by the muscle fibers (Sánchez -Medina and González-Badillo, 2011; Rodríguez-Rosell et al., 2018).

When designing a training schedule, the elements and factors that constitute a work plan are organized in a concrete and detailed way. In this case, the objective will be to improve strength qualities so that they contribute effectively to the achievement of specific performance in competition.

In this series of articles we deal with some of the most important concepts of strength training, collecting notes from the recently published book Strength, Speed ​​and Physical and Sports Performance written by renowned researchers Juan José González Badillo and Juan Ribas Serna.

SUMMARY

• Training programming is the organization of the sequence of efforts and rest times to achieve specific goals.
• Training must be quantified in order to make programming decisions based on data and not opinions.
• The evolution of the loads during the programming depends, fundamentally, on three determining factors: the initial situation of the subject, the strength needs in the sport specialty and the strength needs of the subject himself.

Introduction to the concept of programming

Programming is a way of organizing various activities to achieve specific goals, and for this reason it has nothing in common with carrying out training routinely, or based on improvisations that are not supported by a plan that justifies and delimits them. the margin of variation that can be admitted from what was planned. This means that programming must ensure, on the one hand, the unity of the training process and, on the other, its flexibility, as a consequence of the systematic and frequent control and evaluation of the process itself.

The programming of daily training is understood as a task made up of multiple subtasks, but unique as a process, whose objective is to improve the performance of the athlete or of any person, and which is expressed through a sequence of efforts duly adjusted according to specific objectives and the subject’s training needs and possibilities. This unit of the training process is fulfilled when said programmed sequence of efforts is respected.

Training programming is expressed as a sequence of efforts adjusted to objectives

But for this sequence to be respected, flexibility must also be given. The flexibility of the programming allows us to modify the specific load programmed (weights, series and repetitions per series) for one or several days so that the effort made is the one foreseen and not another different one. In other words, the target load (proposed load) is modified so as not to modify the programmed actual effort (actual load). Although the modification of the proposed load does not necessarily guarantee an improvement of the program or of the performance, rather it allows maintaining the programmed, the unity of the programming.

Only the evaluation of the elements of the training process can justify the opportune revisions of the programming in progress and of those that are going to be carried out in the future. From the foregoing it can be deduced that the trainer’s mission as a programmer, rather than determining a detailed series of activities to be carried out during training practice, is a permanent task of structuring, analyzing and constantly reviewing what he is doing. Among the functions of the coach is to observe daily the evolution of the athlete’s form, something that, especially in strength training, is not done frequently.

Only if this systematic observation is carried out, a true source of the coach’s experience, can it be said that someone is being trained. Otherwise, only a standard or average athlete model is trained that rarely, OR never matches the actual athlete. This has the consequence that the programmed loads will quickly stop adjusting to the true training needs and possibilities of the subject, and, therefore, the real load will not be the programmed one.

The trainer’s mission as programmer is the permanent structuring, analysis and revision of what is being trained.

This same observation also aims to analyze the variables involved in the process, which will allow us to discover the possible connections and reciprocal influences between these variables and between them and the results.

If we set ourselves the task of training in this way, we will be in the best conditions to understand, apply and adapt the contributions of science to our daily practice. This, necessarily, will lead to the development of an authentic training experience, which is what makes the coach improve his work and his knowledge every day.

The effects of training on physical and sports performance arise from the application of a series of stimuli organized in such a way that they allow a sufficient development of the physical condition and of the abilities of any sport specialty or type of performance that is intended.

At this point, it will be necessary to focus on the training that is usually considered as “strength training”, although all training aimed at improving physical condition and almost all sports performance are strength training itself.

The organization of the training is carried out through a schedule. Programming means “devising and ordering the actions necessary to carry out a project”. (RAE Dictionary). In the case of sports training, for some time programming has been defined as the expression of a series or ordered succession of efforts that are dependent on each other. This definition includes the concepts that define the term “programming”.

“Devise”, because it is thought with a determined degree of effort, is an idea, which is what is programmed. But, in addition, these efforts are actions that must be ordered, second concept of the definition, and in an interdependent way, to carry out the project of developing the physical and sports condition of the subject or sports group. However, in the literature and in the jargon of sports training, the term “periodization” is used very frequently to refer to the organization of training. Periodization means “action and effect of periodizing”, and periodizing means “establishing periods for a historical, cultural, scientific process…” (DRAE).

A training process that allows the correct use of loads and recovery times to avoid excessive fatigue

The most striking thing is that the term “periodization” is used as the solution to the training problem, because “periodized” training is considered as “a training process that allows the correct use of loads and recovery times to avoid the excessive fatigue” or “the division of annual training or a cycle into appropriate phases with the aim of reaching the peak of maximum performance at the appropriate and predetermined time” or “the process through which the intensity and volume of training is manipulated”. the right way for the athlete to reach their maximum performance at the right time, minimizing the risk of injury, stagnation and overtraining”.

But, of course, “periodization” by itself does not ensure any of this. In sports, establishing periods does not guarantee a good workout. In the same way, it is evident that, in a project, dividing the process into periods does not guarantee that it is a good project. For this reason, the term “periodization” is not useful and, furthermore, it is not adequate for what it intends to define, because “periodization” is not the “organization of the activities of a process (training)”, but the “division into periods ”

The term “programming” or “program” is the one that adjusts to what you really want to do, which is, as indicated, “devise and order the actions necessary to carry out a project”. Therefore, the appropriate term would be programming. Although saying that the training has been “scheduled” does not ensure anything either, since the programming can be good or bad. However, the term is correct. Its meaning corresponds to what is intended to be done: “devise and order the actions”, which in this case means above all organizing a sequence of efforts (loads) to achieve the intended objective, even if this sequence is not correct and therefore does not the objectives are achieved.

Therefore, the term “scheduling” should be used instead of “periodization.” This proposal is even more justified if one takes into account that when one speaks of “periodization” what one wants to express is a form of “programming”, of designing a program to systematically and specifically direct the training and the variation of the exercise. volume, intensity and exercises to achieve the best results at the right time. This would really be programming. The problem is that unnecessary terms tend to be introduced without considering their suitability.

But the matter is complicated when the term “non-periodized” is also used in the language of training. It would literally mean that something, training is supposed to “not be divided into periods”. If periodizing is dividing into periods, not periodizing would mean that the entire process, of whatever type, is considered as a unit, without changes that justify differentiating some moments from others, and therefore it would be a question of “a single period”, in the one that “everything happens or is done the same”: that is, every day the same load is applied, the same stimulus, the same training.

This situation is unrealistic, because, on the one hand, it cannot be guaranteed that the same load is always applied, and, mainly, because no person who is dedicated to training other people to improve their physical and sports condition can be happen to ignore one of the few principles or rules of adaptation that can be considered as such, such as the principle of the progression of the loads, and another that, in part, is already included in the first one, which is the variability of the loads. loads.

Therefore, this distinction does not seem very useful. Although much space has been devoted in the literature to comparing the effect of “periodized” versus “non-periodized” training. Generally, the “non-periodized” has always had the worst luck. Other terms related to the organization of training refer to the phases or periods that comprise a space of training time. It is very common to refer to the “preparatory”, “competitive” and “transition” periods, which occur in the order indicated.

At the end of the “competitive period” the competitions are held (maybe also within the “competitive period” itself). None of these terms, in our opinion, is appropriate, as will be seen below, nor does their name serve to improve the training program. If “preparing” is “performing the necessary operations to obtain a result or product”, why isn’t “competitive” also “preparatory”, if the athlete has not even competed yet? Doesn’t the athlete continue to “prepare” until reach the competition?, what is the indicator that the “preparatory period” is over and you are already in the “competitive”?, what change or magnitude of change in training justifies it?, do all the specialists understand what itself? Or is it simply a question of dividing or naming the total training time into two or three parts or denominations?

On the other hand, if “transition” is “the action and effect of passing from one mode of being (a state) to another”, “transition” would be the passage from each of the “periods” to the next, not the denomination of one of them. It would be much more reasonable to call this supposed “transition period”, “recovery” or “detraining” period, or something similar.

Very close to this denomination is the one that includes four other terms and is the one that divides the space of training time into “general preparation phase”, “special preparation phase”, “competitive phase” and “transition phase”.

training time in “general preparation phase”, “special preparation phase”, “competitive phase” and “transition phase”.

General preparation phase

In this case it is unlikely that all professionals understand the “general preparation phase”. Because by its very name, the “general” can include many activities of a different nature, which, in sport, in most cases are far removed from the type of performance typical of the specialty for which one trains. In addition, it would be necessary to consider which sports or sports specialties should “make a general preparation”, because if the “general” activity is not reflected in an improvement. of specific performance, it would not make sense for it to be carried out. A “general activity” remote from the mechanical and metabolic characteristics of competitive activity is at least unlikely to have (positive) transfer to competitive exercise, but rather could cause interference (negative transfer), or, in the best of log cases, being sterile and wasting time.

Special preparation phase

The “special preparation” phase could be understood to a greater extent, since it can be interpreted as the phase in which you train with the exercises closest to those of the competition and with those of the competition itself, including the speed / intensity values. and volume typical of the competition or close to them. Really, all the preparation time should be “special preparation”, if by this is meant the application of training that truly has a high probability of having a positive effect on specific performance.

competitive phase

About the “competitive phase” and “transition” comments have already been made previously. Another group of widely used terms is “macrocycle”, “mesocycle” and “microciole”. The first source of confusion with this terminology is that the range of time to which we can refer is not a specific one, but multiple, which means that using one of these terms without adding the time that we want it to understand will always be imprecise and will generate confusion. . For example, when we refer to a “macrocycle”, the time it comprises can range from several weeks (10-12) to several years, for example four, an Olympic cycle. But of course, there will be those who say no, that a “macrocycle” does not cover more than one year.

In other words, we already have three measures for the same term, and they are quite different measures and all of them are used. The same happens with the other terms, although the average time is lower for the “mesocycle” and even lower for the “microcycle”. But what deserves more attention is the justification for which the different terms are usually used. For example, if we train for a period of 12 weeks in order to improve strength, and we consider the first “mesocycle”, of three weeks, to be a “mesocycle” of hypertrophy”, we would be saying that during the remaining 9 weeks it is no longer stimulated nor does “hypertrophy” develop, or if from week 4 to week 6 we have the “mesocycle” of “maximum strength”, we would have to understand that in the previous “mesocycle” strength has not been trained or improved.

We consider that it is out of the question that none of these conclusions is reasonable, so it must be admitted that the naming of these time slots with any of these names does not serve to better understand training, nor to improve programmed training, nor for communication between professionals and specialists in the field of physical and sports training.

Training expressed through numbers can be analyzed and quantified, giving you the opportunity to draw data-driven conclusions and make informed decisions.

In short, the training is not organized through “names”, because these do not have the property of determining what the load is. Training training is organized through “numbers”. Training expressed through numbers can be analyzed and quantified, giving you the opportunity to draw data-driven conclusions and make informed decisions. It serves to express with greater precision than in any other way what the applied load is and to check the acute and medium and long-term effect it produces, and also allows communication between training professionals.

We understand that in connection with this aspect of programming terminology, only the term “cycle” should be used, ie “programming a training cycle”. Therefore, we only use the term “cycle” when we want to refer to the extension of a certain training period of time.

We define a training cycle as a training period of time in which all the necessary loads have been applied, according to the programmer’s criteria, to achieve the expected objective. It could also be expressed as the process in which the necessary evolution of the main characteristic variables of training load is produced: volume, intensity and type of exercise, to achieve the expected objective.

The evolution of the loads depends, fundamentally, on three determining factors: the initial situation of the subject, the strength needs in the sports specialty and the strength needs of the subject himself. At the end of the cycle there can be a competition or a test or even none of the two controls, and there will always be a recovery time before starting another training cycle. Although occasionally one can speak of “phases” within the training cycle, it really is a continuum in which to identify at what point in the cycle an athlete is, it could be added that he is in the “phase” of high, medium or low volume, or in the “phase” of high, medium or low intensity or any other reference of the variables that determine the training load.

The evolution of the loads depends, fundamentally, on three determining factors: the initial situation of the subject, the strength needs in the sports specialty and the strength needs of the subject himself.

The cycles can have different lengths. For this reason, for a better definition of the cycle, we must add its duration, generally indicating the number of days or weeks it comprises.. The adaptation processes oriented towards performance improvement are developed through cycles that are repeated periodically. Cycles aimed at improving a physical quality are common in all training sessions, whatever the sport, although they will not develop in the same way in all cases.

When the development needs of the physical qualities are high, the characteristics of each cycle (volume and intensity values, mainly) are more accentuated: the intensities and volumes are higher and the differences between the maximum and minimum values ​​are greater. The opposite occurs when the needs for these qualities are low.

The general objective of any training cycle is the improvement of the manifestation of strength, resistance and force production in the unit of time in specific actions, that is, the improvement of useful force. The way to develop each of these cycles will be different, as we have indicated, depending on the characteristics of the sports or sports specialties and the specialties of the subjects.

The degree of development of the physical qualities will be different according to the specialties. The need to significantly improve some quality above the others also determines the characteristics and orientation of the cycle. The duration of a complete cycle is conditioned by the characteristics of the sport, but fundamentally by the adaptation time. The adaptation time that most influences the duration of the cycle, is the one that is necessary for the development of physical qualities. Although good physical condition is not enough to ensure sports form (specific form), it is the first condition and absolutely necessary.

full cycle length for strength training should not exceed 14-16 weeks

In any case, the full cycle length for strength training should not exceed 14-16 weeks. The most effective length could be between and 12 weeks. Other shorter cycles can be used to maintain or recover or at least approach recently achieved levels of strength.

The effectiveness of a training cycle will depend to a large extent on the combination of volume and intensity values, but always, both the result and the values ​​of the variables themselves will be conditioned by the initial situation of the subject, state of performance. initial, initial work capacity, current training time, current detraining time, age… and to all this we must add the objectives that are sought and the strength needs of the sporting specialty and the subject. Naturally, all these nuances will be developed later in the contents related to training programming.

When speaking of “squat” it refers to the full or deep squat exercise. This article will review the squat in detail as it is well known that the squat is an exercise that directly strengthens the quadriceps, hamstrings, glutes, erector spinae, and triceps surae. Apart from the fact that it involves a series of synergistic muscles that contribute to the execution of the exercise and balance.

In this series of articles we deal with some of the most important concepts of strength training, collecting notes from the recently published book Strength, Speed ​​and Physical and Sports Performance written by renowned researchers Juan José González Badillo and Juan Ribas Serna.

Summary

• Squats will do more to prevent knee injuries than any other exercise.
• If the exercise is performed with a correct technique, it is trained progressively and supervised by experts in the training of this exercise, the squat is presented as a training to protect against injuries and improve the strength of the lower extremities.
• The squat is the main exercise that can be practiced by any athlete who wants to improve their physical performance by doing any exercise that is not the actual practice of the specific exercise.
• Healthy non-athletic users would still have less risk because the loads used, the frequency of training and the stress would be much lower.

It has also been possible to verify through the studies analyzed in this text that it has a significant effect on the ability to jump and acceleration. In fact, it has been proposed that higher sprint performances are achieved by greater application of force against release, not by more rapid leg movements (Weyand et al., 2000).

Naturally, this greater applied force can only be achieved by improving the strength of the previously mentioned muscle groups, as momentum in the stride is directly dependent on the strength of the gluteals, hamstrings, triceps surae, and quadriceps. From the functional point of view, when comparing the effect of training the squat, half and quarter squats, only the squat could be considered as an effective exercise to improve strength, because only the degree of flexion of the squat provides the morphological and neural stimuli required for the hip and knee extensors to positively influence acceleration processes (Hartmann et al 2012).

only the squat could be considered an effective exercise to improve strength

In another study in which the effect of training with loads from 60 to 80% of the RM was compared in the squat, the squat to the parallel and the half squat. This means that executing the squat exercise allows an effect that is even above the effect due to the specificity of the exercise itself evaluated. In addition, the squat had the greatest effect in CMJ, 20m run and Wingate test, while the half squat did not improve in any of these three variables and was the only one that experienced a significant increase in the physical disability test (pain, rigidity, functional disability) (Pallarés otal.. 2019)

Traditionally it has been considered that the squat was detrimental to the knee joint, but this does not seem to be very justified. Escamilla (2001) concludes that the squat (to parallel) does not compromise knee stability and can properly reinforce stability. Although he still has reservations about flexing anything more than parallel.

Its embargo, Hartmann et al. (2013) consider that with greater flexion of the knee joint, a displacement of the contact areas of the knee components occurs with a continuous enlargement of the retropatellar articular surface, which leads to lower retropatellar compressive stresses. .

Both menisci and cartilage, ligaments, and bone are susceptible to anabolic processes and structural adaptations to their function in response to increased activity and mechanical stress. Therefore, concerns about degenerative changes in the femoral tendon complex and the apparent increased risk of chondromalacia, osteoarthritis, and osteochondritis due to the squat are unfounded (Hartmann et al., 2013).

It must be taken into account that for the same relative load, when doing the half or quarter squat, the pressure on the joints of the back, hips and knees is much greater, so the risk of excessive stress is also applied. is.

squats will do more to prevent knee injuries than any other exercise

Parker (1992) says: “squats will do more to prevent knee injuries than any other exercise” (p.28). And he continues: “many trainers believe that squats are dangerous for the knees. Nothing is further from reality”. Squats are a staple exercise in the New York Giants (the football team this author coaches) program, and will be for sure in the future.

Poliquin (1992, p. 28), in making the initial diagnosis before planning the training of Jadson Logan, hammer thrower, found that the athlete had been plagued with knee pain for the past eight years. This pain was caused by the continued use of the so-called “safe squat”, “safe squatting”, that is, by the half squat.

To avoid this, this type of exercise was changed to the full, deep squat: the posterior part of the thigh had to cover the calves at the deepest moment of flexion. After six weeks of training, the athlete reported no pain, improved his position in the hammer throw twist, and achieved better results than ever in the vertical and horizontal jump.

Therefore, if the exercise is performed with a correct technique, it is trained progressively and supervised by experts in the training of this exercise, the squat is presented as a training to protect against injuries and improve the strength of the lower extremities.

Contrary to popular belief, the squat does not contribute to increased risk of passive tissue injury (Hartmann et al. 2013). Given its positive effects for carrying out practically all sports actions in which the legs are involved and its protective effects against possible injuries, the squat is the main exercise that any athlete who wants to improve their physical performance by doing any exercise other than their own can practice. practice of the specific exercise.

The squat is the main exercise that any athlete who wants to improve their physical performance can practice.

Regarding the way to perform the squat, a series of considerations must be kept in mind, a squat can be considered complete if it is exceeded, even slightly; the horizontal of the thigh with respect to the ground. That is, it is not necessarily about forcing the maximum possible flexion.

The greater or lesser flexion will depend on the joint mobility of each subject, and it is never recommended that the flexion be the maximum possible if the subject has high joint mobility. Therefore, in all cases, and especially in subjects with some joint laxity, due to their low muscle-tendon rigidity, it should be recommended that the last degrees of flexion are not reached and that the subject not relax in this phase, losing the correct posture of the lumbar zone, which must remain straight throughout the execution of the movement, nor that it make a marked “rebound”, excessively fast, at the moment of the eccentric-concentric transition.

On the other hand in the flexion phase (eccentric phase) in its entirety a high speed must not be reached.

Another important aspect is the load with which this exercise should be trained. As a training exercise, you should never perform a squat with the maximum load (1RM), nor a training or an estimation of strength with the maximum possible number of repetitions per series (the “famous” 6RM, 8RM, 10RM, 15RM. ..) That is, the “character of the effort” should never be the maximum.

Nor should MRI be used as an initial test to program training. For this, as indicated, the execution speed is taken as a reference, and in the event that it cannot be measured, the guidelines in this article must be followed and applied in relation to what to do when the speed of execution cannot be measured. execution.

Throughout the text, extensive information is given on the loads for training this exercise. Most of the exercises that are carried out in sports produce significant stress on the knees. Practicing sports as diverse as alpine skiing, soccer, hockey, tennis, jumping, weightlifting, badminton… and many others cause much higher stress than a full squat performed correctly and with the proper loads.

Moreover, many of the injuries that occur in these sports, except weightlifting, may have a lot to do with the weakness of the muscles that protect the knee, which can be correctly stimulated with the deep squat. Whoever considers that this exercise is not suitable for someone or something is in charge of showing the reasons.

Extensive experience using this exercise, apart from studies aimed at analyzing its mechanics, risks and effects, favorable, in some cases, as a means of protecting against injuries, allows us to affirm that there is no reason to justify against its use, and that However, there are reasons to apply it to the entire population that practices sport.

Healthy non-athletic users would still be at lower risk because the loads used, training frequency and stress would be much lower. Obviously, if you suffer from a knee injury, the situation would change, but the experience of having applied this exercise to athletes (top-level soccer players) with great benefit for the recovery of injured knees and cruciate ligament surgery is taken into account.

The squat is the main exercise that any athlete who wants to improve their physical performance can practice.

Other athletes to whom this exercise has been applied with great success for their sporting results and without a single case of injury or discomfort in the knees during a long time of training, were, for example, the national track cycling team ( speed), who went from being able to perform approximately a squat with 105-115 kg in some cases, or 150-160 kg, in another, to being able to move 160-170 and 190-200 kg, respectively, improving their performance in competition . No athlete presented the slightest knee problem.

During all this time, neither 1RM nor training with a “maximal effort character” was ever performed. The women’s field hockey team (1992 Olympic champion) trained with this exercise for three years, each year improving their vertical jump, their time in 15-30 meters and their threshold speed (the so-called second lactate or anaerobic threshold) were runners-up in Europe (lost final on penalties) and there was not a single knee or back injury.

The training carried out was even less stressful than in the case of the cyclists. Other examples with the same results are soccer players who have participated in World Cups and other top-level youth of their ages, top-level volleyball players, or 400-meter runners.

Conclusions about the squat

As a summary of the advantages of the squat exercise, the following is indicated:

• During the full squat, the full range of motion is used in the sagittal plane of the knee and hip joints and quite a bit of range of the ankle. This causes all the components of the connective tissue of said joints to be stretched, thereby giving these tissues stimuli to adapt to great stresses at angles of extreme magnitudes, which probably improves the rigidity of these tissues in extreme displacements.
• The use of full ranges of joint movement probably leads to the distension of the sarcomeres in the most homogeneous way possible before a shortening, accustoming the system to make the “strong” sarcomeres work against the “weak” ones, so that the whole of the fiber (or muscle fibers) get the most out of it.
• Activating a fiber in different ranges of stretching provides advantages when it comes to obtaining the best moments in the length-tension curve of each fiber, especially in penneate (non-linear) muscles. As well as the possible increase in the length of the fascicle, due to the contribution of sarcomeres in series.
• When a fiber is stretched beyond its normal range, the risk of breaking some Z line and, above all, some T tubules increases, which would lead to local contractures within a fiber and an increased risk of total fiber rupture. But the fact of accustoming it to working in wide ranges of stretching probably adapts the sarcolemma and, therefore, the tubule system itself to work in those conditions with less risk of complete fiber rupture.
• Probably the degree and form of the recruitment of motor units within a muscle is different depending on the range of movement, one of the reasons is that at different moments of force, different recruitment and synchronization requirements, due to the participation of large muscle groups of coordinated way.
• The articular cartilages and menisci are maintained thanks to the stimulus that Ssupposes the rubbing of a load, intermittently, on them. When you only work in a short range of movements, a part of the cartilage stops receiving adequate stimuli and before a sudden shock in the less stimulated region it can be injured. Something similar, but with tensions instead of pressures, happens with the ligaments. Today it is known that the innervation of the ligaments is important to maintain the tone and hypertrophy of some muscle groups of the joint in which the ligament is located. The stimulation positions of the ligaments are not exactly known, but it is known that they work in joint positions in which the muscles have little to do (this seems to be precisely one of their functions, that the muscles can relax in certain angular positions). of the joint) It is also likely that when working in positions with a wide range of joints, the synergy of action between ligaments and muscles (especially of the elastic elements of the latter) increases.

The density is expressed by the relationship between the total work or the number of repetitions performed and the time spent on it. In this sense, it is identified with a way of expressing the overall mechanical power of a training unit. Density is primarily determined by the recovery time between reps and sets, although it also extends to recovery between sessions and between full training cycles.

In this series of articles we deal with some of the most important concepts of strength training, collecting notes from the recently published book Strength, Speed ​​and Physical and Sports Performance written by renowned researchers Juan José González Badillo and Juan Ribas Serna.

Summary

• Training density is the relationship between the volume of training and the time spent doing it.
• A higher density tends to produce greater metabolic stress and greater fatigue.
• High intensities and densities of training, which are probably only necessary —if they are at all— for advanced athletes, have a limit from which their use can be negative.

The recovery time comes to complete the characteristics of the intensity of the training. Thus, given the same intensity and volume, the greater the density of the training carried out, the greater the overall mechanical power and, therefore, the greater the overall intensity of the training. The effects and importance of recovery go beyond the training session to influence the entire cycle, the relationship between cycles within a season and even between seasons.

The density is expressed by the relationship between the total work or the number of repetitions performed and the time spent on it.

On many occasions, the best solution to achieve a clear improvement in performance, whether there has been a phase of overtraining (stagnation or setback in results) or not, is a long recovery period without training, rest (González- Badillo, 1991, p.100).

The higher or lower density within an exercise or session can influence the training effect, since a lower recovery between series, that is, a higher density, tends to produce greater metabolic stress and greater fatigue., which must be taken into account as a determining factor of the overall load used and the effect expected from the training. Therefore, the training density can be considered as a complement to the other intensity criteria, but, although it is generally subordinated to the objectives defined by the other criteria, it must be taken into account as a possible determining element of the load magnitude. .

As occurs with the training volume as a component of the load, studies have also been carried out on intensity aimed at determining the degree of intensity or load and physical and sports performance. Making a synthesis of a good part of them, we highlight some data below.

The problem of optimal load and stimulus effectiveness within the training process is not satisfactorily resolved (Pampus et al., 1990). The importance of the optimal training load is justified by the small differences in performance between winners and losers in a competition (Kuipers, 1998), although there is very little scientific data on optimal training to reach maximum performance (Kuipers, 1998). , nineteen ninety six).

The importance of the optimal training load is justified by the small differences in performance between winners and losers in a competition.

While the rapid or immediate improvement in performance may be directly related to intensity, the final level of performance is inversely related to training intensity (Edington and Edgerton, 1976; in Stone et al. 1991). In this sense, it has been verified that if an athlete tends to perform the greatest possible number of repetitions with intensities greater than 90% of his RM, he does not achieve the best results (González-Badillo et al. 2006), as well as that the number of repetitions with intensities greater than 90% of the RM does not have a positive linear relationship with the results (González-Badillo et al. 2006).

The explanation for this lack of linearity when maximum achievable values ​​of maximum intensities are reached could lie in the lack of positive response of the organism to an excess of stimulation and a high training density. This has been concluded in some studies.

For example, it is stated that the coincidence of very high values ​​of volume at the moment in which a high intensity is also performed is very likely to lead to overtraining (Kraemer et al. 1995), or that using 70 repetitions per week with intensities 100% of 1RM led to overtraining (decreased squat result), while performing 40 repetitions per week with intensities close to maximum (95%) produced improvements in 1RM (Fry et al, 1994).

It has been proven that if an athlete tends to perform as many repetitions as possible with intensities greater than 90% of his RM, he does not achieve the best results.

From the study by Medvedev and Dvorkin (1987) it can be deduced that the optimum percentage of 1RM for strength improvement is not the same for all ages and performance levels. Indeed, in this study it was observed that the youngest subjects, 13-14 years old and 15-16 years old, improved more with mean percentages of 70 and 80%, respectively, with those who did 3-4 repetitions per series, which using 90% percentages with 1-2 repetitions per set.

It therefore seems reasonable that we should get the most out of each range of percentages before using the highest percentages. Even in the older group of athletes (17-20 years) in this same study, 80% produced in the long run (at the end of the 6 and 8 months that the study lasted) better effects than 90%.

These results seem to justify Edington and Edgerton’s (1976; in Stone et al. 1991) suggestion noted above that while rapid/immediate performance improvement may be directly related to intensity, the final level of performance is inversely related to training intensity (and in turn the training density), and also with the conclusions of Fry (1998), which indicates that the use of maximum intensities (1RM) can be satisfactory in a short space of time, but the continued use of these training units will frequently be negative to continue improving, y Fry et al. (2000), when they conclude that even in the event that the continued use of this work system does not produce a decrease in the result in the trained exercise (squat), it can be counterproductive in other performances such as speed (Fry et al. ., 2000).

the use of maximum intensities (1RM) can be satisfactory in a short space of time, but the continued use of these training units will frequently be negative to continue improving

Therefore, if a high intensity is maintained for a long time (90% for 6-8 months, in the study by Medvedev and Dvorkin, 1987), the results tend to decrease, and may even lead to overtraining, or, at best, cases, the results would be lower than those obtained with medium intensities.

These results are in the same line as those obtained by González-Badillo (González-Badillo et al., 2006), in which it was observed that the relationship between the number of maximum repetitions (90% and more of the RM) and the results is curvilinear, or with the results of Busso (2003), who finds a curvilinear relationship between the daily training load and the gain in performance.

This suggests that these high training intensities and densities, which are probably only necessary —if at all— for advanced athletes, have a limit beyond which their use can be negative.

In addition, this limit is not determined by the athlete’s own ability to carry out training sessions with these intensities, since those subjects who performed the greatest possible number of repetitions with more than 90% did not achieve the best, observing that these intensities did not have a positive linear relationship with the improvement of the marks (González-Badillo et al., 2006).

Fatigue is a complex and multifactorial process that affects performance. Neither the way fatigue occurs nor the hierarchy of factors that cause it in any of the production modalities is still not completely known.

In this series of articles we deal with some of the most important concepts of strength training, collecting notes from the recently published book Strength, Speed ​​and Physical and Sports Performance written by renowned researchers Juan José González Badillo and Juan Ribas Serna.

Summary

• Fatigue can be defined as any situation in which the value of muscle activation is inevitably and involuntarily decreased.
• The feeling of fatigue increases faster than the amount of work done in the unit of time to protect the body from possible injury.
• Without fatigue there would be no possibility of improving performance, because the adaptation processes would not take place. The challenge is to reach the degree of fatigue with which to obtain the best results.

Observations related to fatigue range from the will to perform specific acts to changes in the behavior of intracellular proteins. In general, it could be conceptualized as the inability to continue a task at a stipulated level (usually stipulated by the central nervous system).

The difficulty in understanding the production of fatigue derives from numerous factors: places where it can originate, the different methods that must be used to measure the effects of fatigue, the difficulty in extrapolating in vitro results to situations in normal or physiological conditions or difficulty in integrating all the results.

The feeling of fatigue increases faster than the amount of work done in the unit of time (Mosso, 1904), thus protecting our body from possible injuries of lesser or greater severity.

Thus, fatigue is largely an emotion, part of a complex regulatory system that keeps us from taking risks. In extreme conditions, in which the will ignores this emotional indicator, tissue damage occurs and, in very extreme cases, death.

We have examples of this every day in endurance competitions such as the marathon, which precisely commemorates the death of a soldier (Philipides) who, ignoring his fatigue, insisted on continuing to run until he exceeded the limits of the regulation systems and died after deliver important news.

The feeling of fatigue increases faster than the amount of work done in the unit of time

Our brain uses fatigue symptoms as a key regulator to ensure that exercise is stopped before bodily harm is done. However, among the symptoms of fatigue, the “sense of effort” stands out.

This feeling of exertion increases as more repetitions of a task are performed, until just one more repetition is an extreme effort. This sensation of effort is proportional to the difference between the task commanded by the nervous system and the real difficulty in carrying it out.

For its part, the difficulty in carrying out a task will depend on many mechanical, physiological and biochemical variables at different levels from muscle cells to the organs in charge of general homeostasis. This sensation of effort is modulated to a certain degree by the will of the athlete.

For individuals with the same level of training and performance, the differences between winners and losers sometimes only includes the mental decision, the will, different in the winners.

Fatigue is synonymous with a wide range of physiological conditions, from pathology and general health to sport and exercise (Wilkinson et. al., 2010). Fatigue in sport and physical activity in humans has usually been described in subjective terms and has been measured by the acute reduction in physical performance during and after exertion.

The consequence of exercise-induced fatigue is the inability to maintain a certain value of applied force, which results in loss of speed and power of execution in dynamic actions. It is considered that there are three factors through which fatigue is expressed in mammalian muscle:

1) reduction in the number of active cross bridges, which affects the loss of isometric strength,

2) reduction of the maximum speed of muscular shortening in activations without opposition to the shortening (absolute speed) and,

3) increase in the curvature of the force-velocity curve that affects the reduction of maximum power (Jones, 2019).

For individuals with the same level of training and performance, the differences between winners and losers sometimes only includes the mental decision, the will, different in the winners.

Therefore, fatigue is quantified by the loss of strength, muscle shortening velocity, and force production in unit time (RFD). Loss of static or isometric strength depends on reducing the number of active cross bridges (pc) and the force exerted by each pc.

The loss of speed and RFD depends on the decrease in the rate of formation and activation of pc. As a consequence of the loss of strength and speed, power will decrease. A phenomenon associated with the above that affects them is the deactivation rate of the pc, which is a determining factor in the relaxation time and in the rate of formation of the pc themselves.

However, the physiological mechanisms prior to the final consequences that we have just indicated, and that underlie fatigue, give rise to different proposals and are still the objective of numerous investigations.

The causes of fatigue may be related both to the oxygen transport capacity and the available metabolic substrates, as well as to the cerebral causes of the contractile fibers of skeletal muscle and the muscle activation mechanisms themselves. Therefore, the decrease in force / speed associated with fatigue can originate in any process at different levels, from the brain order to the formation of actin-myosin cross-bridges (Debold, 2012).

But in practice, to study fatigue it is necessary to specify the task and the production mechanism. Otherwise it would be, if not impossible, if not very complex, to study all the elements that can intervene in the generation of fatigue simultaneously. For example, the speed and extent with which fatigue occurs depends largely on the type and intensity of the physical activity performed (Fitts, 1994).

But the main purpose is not to discuss the different opinions regarding the causes of fatigue or the methodologies used to detect and measure them, but to expose the most accepted ideas, although also discussed, and that have a practical application for physical and sports performance. .

fatigue concept

Fatigue can be defined as any situation in which the value of muscle activation is inevitably and involuntarily decreased. (loss of force, production of force in the unit of time or RFD, speed, power,) with respect to another value reached in a time immediately prior to the effort. In this sense, Macintosh and Rassier (2002) define it as a contractile response that is less than what is expected for a given stimulation. It can also be expressed as the inability to maintain a certain intensity (speed or power) over time.

And it can also be defined and differentiated by the recovery time after the effort. Fatigue can begin in the first moments after the muscle activation command is initiated or from the first effort in a series of repeated efforts, without the need for muscle failure or the inability to maintain a certain intensity.

Therefore, the most relevant and appropriate way to define fatigue is to consider it as the magnitude and time of loss of performance in whatever the situation may be in relation to what is programmed or intended by the will or the CNS. From these definitions the need to know the value of contraction or performance prior to the measurement of fatigue can be deduced. Therefore, the conditions that must be met for us to be in a position to quantify fatigue are that there is loss of performance, that this loss does not occur voluntarily, and that there is a previous value that is taken as a reference.

In the Essential Dictionary of Sciences, fatigue is defined as the deterioration of the performance of a living being… over time. It is associated with a feeling of tiredness, lack of concentration, slowness and the appearance of simple errors. But a muscular activation, in addition to fatigue, can also produce potentiation, which is an opposite response to fatigue, whereby an increase in muscular performance is produced as a consequence of an immediately previous activation. Therefore, fatigue and potentiation can coexist.

The possible existence of two opposite effects in the same muscle activation makes it difficult to determine the degree of fatigue. In this situation, great care must be taken in the interpretation of the data referring to a “before” and an “after”: the result can be a mixture of fatigue and potentiation.

However, potentiation has a limited duration while fatigue may persist until functional incapacity. Even when the post-effort performance is greater than the initial response, there is no guarantee that the mechanisms associated with fatigue are not present (Macintosh and Rassier, 2002).

a muscular activation, in addition to fatigue, can also produce potentiation, which is an opposite response to fatigue, whereby an increase in muscular performance is produced as a consequence of an immediately previous activation.

In this way, we can find situations in which the response is greater than that which occurs in the resting state (potentiation), but probably less than what could be expected if there were no fatigue. In fact, In training practice, it is observed that when the efforts are not made until exhaustion, the response after the effort (for example, measured through the vertical jump) in some cases is superior to that offered before it., even having previously warmed up to reach maximum initial performance.

That is, the effort has meant a “better warm-up” than the one previously made. But there are also situations in which the contractile response is less than before the effort. If this is the case, it can be concluded that fatigue exists with certainty, but its quantification is not easy, because there are also potentiation mechanisms simultaneously. This means that if the potentiation mechanisms were not present, the magnitude of the fatigue measured would be greater.

The term fatigue should not be identified with situations in which one becomes exhausted, with a forced interruption of the activity. Muscle fatigue begins immediately after starting physical activity and includes changes in physiological processes that reduce muscle strength (Enoka, 2002).

fatigue and training

Fatigue must be considered as a component of training, and therefore, it must also be considered as an essential character of the stimulus necessary to ignite the adaptation processes of training. The degree of fatigue (subjective, observed by the coach, or measured through the relevant means) is the reference point to determine and assess the training load. Without fatigue there would be no possibility of improving performance, because the adaptation processes would not take place. The problem that arises is the degree of allowable fatigue to achieve the best result, or how training makes us more resistant to fatigue.

Without fatigue there would be no possibility of improving performance, because the adaptation processes would not take place. The problem that arises is the degree of fatigue that is acceptable to achieve the best result, or how training makes us more resistant to fatigue.

degree of fatigue

Overload is a situation in which the subject is subjected to a stimulus (load) higher than usual. In order to produce fatigue, it is not necessary for overload in this sense, but other minor stimuli than the usual ones can also cause fatigue. Depending on this degree of fatigue and its duration, we find ourselves in three different situations:

i) acute or immediate fatigue of short duration (from a few minutes to a few hours or 2-3 days)

ii) fatigue of medium duration (from several days to 2-3 weeks) and,

iii) long-term (chronic) fatigue (several weeks to several months)

Acute fatigue corresponds to the fatigue produced by an exercise (a series or repetition) or a training session. Recovery should occur before the next set or repetition (in full or in part) or before the next session (in full).

Medium duration fatigue is the fatigue produced intentionally by several training sessions. It is made up of several units of acute fatigue without sufficient recovery between sessions. After several training units, a special, broader recovery occurs. It is expected that from this sustained load phase a higher supercompensation phase will emerge, which corresponds to the English term “overreaching”, for which there is no equivalent term in Spanish. but if the consequence is that optimal supercompensation is not reached, the subject is considered to be in an “overloaded” situation, or with excessive fatigue.

Chronic or long-term fatigue does not occur on purpose. It is the consequence of an error in training programming, although it can sometimes be associated with other circumstances such as certain diseases. It is caused by carrying out an excessive number of fatigue phases of medium duration. Sometimes it is difficult to distinguish between the phase of medium and long duration fatigue. Recovery from this state of fatigue may take several months. It corresponds to the English term “overtraining”, which in Spanish would be equivalent to the term “sobretraining”.

In this article he focuses on the speed of execution as a reference for training programming, dosage and control. In the previous article on Character of Effort (EC) some ideas related to speed of execution have been introduced that may be useful.

In this series of articles we deal with some of the most important concepts of strength training, collecting notes from the recently published book Strength, Speed ​​and Physical and Sports Performance written by renowned researchers Juan José González Badillo and Juan Ribas Serna.

SUMMARY

• The speed at which each percentage of the RM is performed is very stable depending on each exercise.
• Loss of speed is shown to be an important predictor of metabolic and hormonal stress.
• For the same loss of speed, each person may have performed a different number of repetitions before the same load.
• Using the speed of execution as a reference to dose and control the training far exceeds what the 1RM percentage provides

A few years ago it was said: “If the maximum speed of the movements could be measured every day and with immediate information, this would possibly be the best point of reference to know if the weight is adequate or not”… “a certain decrease speed is a valid indicator for suspending training or lowering the weight of the bar”… “we could also have recorded the maximum speed reached by each lifter with each percentage, and based on this, assess the effort” ( González Badillo, 1991, p.172).

It is based on the assumption that although the value of 1RM can change between different days, the speed at which each percentage of the RM is performed is very stable. Therefore, speed control could inform us with more precision about what real percentage or what effort is being made at each moment. This hypothesis, proposed in 1991 (González Badillo, 1991, p. 172), when we said “we could also have recorded the maximum execution speed reached by each lifter with each percentage, and based on this, assess the effort… ”, has been confirmed, because each percentage of 1RM has its own speed (González-Badillo, 2000; González-Badillo and Sánchez-Medina, 2010).

Therefore, the own speed of each percentage of 1RM determines the real effort. This means that the speed of the first repetition of a set determines the degree of effort that the load represents. Thus, the training load (weight) is determined by the speed of the first repetition, therefore, what must be programmed is not the percentage of 1RM, but the speed of execution of the first repetition of the series.

But speed control not only allows us to know very precisely the true effort that a given load represents when doing the first repetition, but also allows us to know in what proportion or percentage speed is lost as repetitions are made within from the series.

And this is important because the loss of speed in the series is a highly valid indicator to know the degree of effort that the subject is making, since it presents a high relationship with indicators of the degree of mechanical, metabolic and hormonal stress caused by the exercise. training.

loss of speed is shown to be an important predictor of metabolic and hormonal stress

Thus, we found high relationships between the loss of velocity in the series and the loss of velocity with the load that was moving at 1 m/s before the effort, both in the bench press (1= 0.97) and in the squat. (r = 0.91), and with the loss of height (loss of speed) in the jump after the effort (r = 0.92), with ammonium (R* = 0.93) and lactate (r = 0.95-0.97) (Sánchez-Medina and González-Badillo, 2011).

Testosterone (r = 0.83), growth hormone (r = 0.82) and insulin (r = 0.88) are also discharged, and these relationships increase for ammonium (p = 0.94 -96) and lactate (p = 0.98) when using Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient (data from the same previous study, but not yet published. Sánchez-Medina’s Doctoral Thesis, 2010).

All these relationships indicate that the greater the loss of speed in the series, the greater the mechanical stress, that is, the greater the effort, at the same time that the loss of execution speed is shown to be an important predictor of metabolic stress and hormonal.

The question that arises at the moment is what should be the optimal loss of speed in each case. This question, of course, does not have an easy answer, but being able to formulate it and have the appropriate mechanical and physiological data available to try to find an answer is already a great advance. In fact, at this time we could give an indicative and useful answer for most of the subjects.

For example, ammonium is practically unchanged in the bench press and full squat exercises if the number of repetitions performed does not exceed half of the repetitions that can be performed (Sánchez-Medina and González-Badillo, 2011). That the ammonia remains at its resting values ​​means that the emergency pathway of energy production, which is responsible for the increase in ammonia, has not been put into operation.

This path consists of the fact that, given the high and continuous demand for energy, it is not enough to use ADP+CP to produce ATP and the system has to resort significantly to the use of 2 ADP (ADP+ADP) to produce ATP, which which leads to the production of adenosine monophosphate (AMP), inosine monophosphate (IMP) and the degradation into ammonia (NH3) and ammonium (NH4), hypoxanthine, xanthine uric acid, formation of free radicals and losses of purines, this supposes a loss nucleotides (Hellsten-Westing et al., 1993), which can lead to chronic ATP depletion and increased recovery time if sessions that significantly trigger these processes are frequently repeated (Stathis et al. ., 1994, 1999).

If we also know, from extensive practical experience, that doing half or less of the repetitions that can be performed produces notable improvements in muscular strength and sports performance, It would not be very advisable to frequently exceed (in some cases it would never be necessary) half of the repetitions that can be done in a series.

it would not be very advisable to frequently exceed (in some cases it would never be necessary) half the repetitions that can be done in a series

If we analyze the relationship between the loss of speed in the series and the number of repetitions performed, we can state that in the bench press exercise the loss of speed when half of the possible repetitions have been done is between 25 and 30% of the speed of the first repetition, and that in the complete squat the loss of speed of execution in the same conditions would be approximately 15-20%.

Therefore, if it is possible to know what degree of effort each percentage of speed loss means, the application of speed as a way of training control is very useful, probably the best procedure, using the mechanics way, to know with high precision and immediately the training load.

Knowledge of these data would allow not only to program the intensity or degree of effort based on the speed of the first repetition, but also to determine the degree of effort in the series, by being able to decide the loss of Speed ​​that is allowed in the series itself.

By way of example, at this time we can anticipate that in the exercise of the bench press, the relationship between the percentage of speed loss in the series (PPVS) and the average percentage of repetitions performed in the series (PMRR), for the intensities of 50, 55, 60, 65 and 70% of the RM is practically the same.

The percentage of repetitions performed for the same loss of speed must be 2.5% higher when the relative intensity is 75%, 5% higher for 80% and 10% higher for 85% (González-Badillo et al., 2017).

The data corresponding to the intensities between 50 and 70% appear in Table 1.

Tabla 1. Loss of speed in the series and average percentage of repetitions performed with intensities of 50 to 70% of the RM in bench press.

• PPVS: Percentage loss of speed in the series.
• PMRR: Mean percentage of repetitions performed.
• SD: standard deviation.
• CV (%): Coefficient of variation.

for the same loss of speed in the series, each person may have performed a different number of repetitions under the same relative load

It can be seen that, given the low CV values, the PMRR for the different percentages are practically the same. Therefore, when repetitions are performed at the maximum speed possible with any of these RM percentages, the percentage of repetitions performed for a given loss of execution velocity in the series can be known with considerable precision.

It should be remembered here that for the same loss of speed in the series, each person may have performed a different number of repetitions under the same relative load. This means an important advance in the precision to quantify and assess the CE in the series and training session. One more application of speed as a reference to dose and control training derives from the fact that each exercise has its own speed for its RM (González-Badillo, 2000).

The speed at which the RM of an exercise is reached determines its characteristics and its own training intensities for each objective.

Although, as we will see in later chapters, the load with which maximum power is reached is not relevant either for training dosage or for assessing its effect, these loads are determined precisely by the speed of the RM of each exercise. For example, the faster the speed with which the RM of an exercise is reached, the greater the percentage with which the maximum power is reached in the exercise.

There is a very high positive trend between the own speed with the RM in four exercises (snatch, power clean, squat and bench press) and the percentage of the RM with which maximum average power is reached (r = 0.94). (González-Badillo, 2000). It must be taken into account that these power values ​​are calculated through the product of the force and velocity values ​​provided by a linear velocity or position meter, in which the force is determined by the equation F = m( g+a), and the speed is measured directly by displacing the charge (mass).

The speed at which the RM is reached can range from less than 0.2 m/s in the bench press exercise to values ​​close to 1 m/s in the power clean or snatch. These observations confirm that, depending on the exercise with which you train, the same percentage can mean a very different magnitude and type of load, and that to obtain the same effect, you would have to use different percentages.

For example, if a subject intended to train with the maximum average power load in the bench press, he would have to train with 37-40% of the RM, while in the power clean he would have to train with 87% of the RM. Therefore, if we train both exercises, for example, with 80% of their respective RMs, in the case of the bench press we will be training with a load well above that with which maximum power is reached and in the case of the power clean with a load below that of maximum power.

an exercise like the full squat should never be trained with loads greater than 80% of the RM

However, and use this idea to better understand the consequences of, for example, “training with the maximum power load” in all the exercises, a training with 37-40% of the RM in the bench press, with 6 -8 repetitions per series, it is a very light effort that anyone can do at any time, and its effect, load and The degree of fatigue would be very low, however, training with 87% of the RM in a clean exercise is a significant effort, which is very close to the RM of the clean exercise.

Another example could be the following: for the same subject or group of subjects practicing a sport, an exercise like the full squat should never be trained with loads greater than 80% RM (personal suggestion based on extensive experience and results of competition studies), while this same group of subjects could always train, from the beginning of their sporting life, at least with loads equal to or greater than 75-80% of the real RM in the power clean exercise.

These differences in training loads are due, especially, to the fact that the speeds of the RMs of both exercises are very different, much higher in the power clean than in the squat.

From all the above it follows that use the speed of execution as a reference to dose and control the training It far exceeds what the 1RM percentage provides and comes to offer the same contributions as the Character of Effort (it really is another way of applying the CE) but with a much higher precision and eliminating the risk of subjectivity.

Therefore, the existence of a high relationship between speed and the different percentages of 1RM, as well as between the loss of speed in the series and the percentage of repetitions performed in the series allows:

• Evaluate the strength of a subject without the need to perform a 1RM test or an XRM test at any time.
• Determine with high precision what actual percentage of 1RM the subject is using as soon as they perform the first repetition with a given load at the maximum speed of execution possible.
• Program, dose and control training with high precision through speed, and not through a percentage of 1RM.
• If the speed is measured every day, it can be determined if the load proposed to the subject (kg) faithfully represents the true degree of effort (% of real 1RM) that represents the first repetition and the degree of effort that represents the number of repetitions performed (valued for the loss of speed in the series).
• Use strength training with all subjects, from children to the most advanced athletes or adults and seniors you intend. improve your health, without the need to do maximum effort tests (1RM, or XRM, for example) in any case.
• Estimate the improvement in performance each day without the need to perform any tests, simply by measuring the speed with which an absolute load moves. YES, for example, the difference in speed between 70 and 75% of the RM of a specific exercise is 0.08 m/s, when the subject increases speed by 0.08 m/s under the same absolute load , the load with which he trains will represent 5% less than the RM of the subject at that moment, which, naturally, will have increased in value. Naturally, if what is produced is a loss of speed under the same absolute load, we can be quite sure that the subject is below its previous performance, and in an average proportional to the loss of speed.
• Estimate, through the loss of speed in the series, the percentage that represents the number of repetitions performed with respect to those achievable under any load.
• Being able to calculate the Effort Index, probably the best indicator of the degree of effort and fatigue that can be used to estimate these training variables.

Therefore, as we have indicated, what is programmed or should be programmed is not the percentage of 1RM, but the speed of execution of the first repetition of a series (Of course, if we associate the percentages with their corresponding speeds, it would be indifferent to use one procedure or another) and the loss of speed in the series allowed. The speed with each percentage of 1RM is not modified or it does so in a very slight way when the subject modifies the value of his RM after a period of training.

What most determines the slight speed changes between a test and a post-test with each percentage of 1RM, if they occur, is the speed with which the RM is performed and measured (González-Badillo and Sánchez-Medina , 2010), in such a way that two MRIs could not be compared if they were performed at different speeds. But this problem disappears if, as we have indicated, we never measure the RM, neither to take it as a reference to program the training nor to assess its effect, but instead we use the speed and speed changes before the same loads for both objectives.

what is programmed or should be programmed is not the percentage of 1RM, but the speed of the first repetition of a series

Our proposal, therefore, is that the average propulsive velocity should always be used to assess the training load and the performance of the subject (if necessary, the article Sánchez-Medina et al., 2010 can be consulted).