To better understand the real objective of exercise and get into the proper mindset for high intensity training I’ve found it helps to think of barbells, dumbbells, or exercise machines as “backwards machines”. The purpose of most machines is to make some task easier, like lifting a heavy object, or moving some object more quickly or over a greater distance. The purpose of a barbell, dumbbell, or exercise machine is the exact opposite; to make it harder for you to perform various exercise movements to place a demand on the muscles targeted.

The body movement is the exercise, not making the barbell or dumbbells or the weight stack on a machine go up and down. The whole point of using the weights or machine is to make the specific body movement you are performing harder to get at the muscles you are targeting. If you focus on moving the weight you will tend to alter your body movement to make it easier to do that, which might look more impressive to other people in the gym who don’t know better but makes the exercise less effective. If you focus on your body movement instead and think of the barbell, dumbbell or machine as a “backwards machine” for making your muscles work harder you will make the exercise far more effective.

For example, the RenEx Leg Press pictured here wasn’t designed to allow you to easily make a weight stack go up and down. It was designed to resist hip and knee extension to efficiently load the involved muscles. To focus on making the weights go up and down or to use the machine in a manner that makes it easier rather than harder to do so completely misses the point.

In the same way, cheating during a barbell or dumbbell exercise by altering your body position or offloading the weight onto other muscles misses the point of using the weight to begin with. The purpose of using a weight is to increase the resistance against the target muscles during an exercise. If you’re moving the barbell or dumbbells in a way that makes them easier to lift instead of harder you’re doing the exercise wrong.

Similarly, the skill of performing an exercise can be thought of as a “backwards skill” because the better you are at performing an exercise the harder it is to do.

Don’t confuse being better at an exercise with being stronger. They are completely different things. Being stronger means your muscles are capable of producing more force. Being better at an exercise means you are able to more effectively and efficiently load the targeted muscles. The better you get at doing this, the harder the exercise will be with a particular amount of weight.

It is also important to distinguish between being better at exercise and lifting weights. The goal of exercise is to stimulate increases in muscular strength and all the supporting factors of functional ability. The goal of a competitive lift in powerlifting, weight lifting, and other strength competitions is to lift as much weight as possible. The first is about making the weight harder to lift (increasing the resistance the weight provides), the second about making it easier (reducing the resistance). Unless you are a competitive lifter training to improve your skill in a competitive lift you should always use a barbell, dumbbells, or machine in a way that makes the movement as hard as possible.

Many trainers and coaches recommend approaching your workouts with an adversarial mindset, often using phrases which invoke violent or war-like imagery like “going to battle” with or “attacking” the weights or entering the gym with a “siege mentality”. A workout is not a battle between you and the weights, though, it is a battle between your intellect and your instincts, between your determination to improve yourself and your desire to avoid the momentary pain and discomfort of intense physical exertion.

You should do the exact opposite. Instead of “psyching up” for your workouts you should strive for Zen-like calm. Quiet your thoughts and turn your focus internally on your muscles, not externally on the weights.

Despite being referred to as “working out”, the goal of exercise is not to perform work for work’s sake, lifting and lowering (or in the case of static contractions holding) weights. Your real objective during exercise is to use the weights to place a demand on your muscles’ ability to contract intensely (and all the other systems involved) to stimulate an adaptive response.

I tell my clients that when they’re performing an exercise they should not think of it as using their muscles to lift and lower the weight, but as using the weight to keep tension on their muscles (for the sake of efficiently loading and inroading them).

This little difference in language – switching the subject and object – makes a big difference in how you think and act during exercise.

When you focus on the weight – which most people do intuitively or instinctively – you tend to move in a way that makes the exercise easier; altering your body positioning or movement to offload or spread the work between multiple muscle groups, using momentum or elastic potential energy to help swing, heave, or bounce a weight up, and various other cheats. You are more likely to focus externally if you think of your workout as a battle with the weights.

When you focus on your muscles – using your intellect – you tend to move in a way that makes the exercise harder; maintaining proper body position and movement to keep consistent tension on the targeted muscles, reversing direction smoothly, lifting and lowering under strict control, and not cheating. Maintaining this proper, internal mental focus while exerting maximum effort and experiencing extreme physical discomfort requires a calm, impassive mind, not one which is agitated and “psyched up”.

Imagine you are performing an exercise. You have already performed a good number of repetitions in relatively strict form and your muscles are rapidly fatiguing. With every passing second the weight feels heavier and the burning in your muscles intensifies. You are already several exercises into your workout and your heart rate is still increasing and every breath feels harder than the last. This is where it counts. This is where the real battle between your intellect and instinct begins. Do you give in to instinct, to the urge to stop the pain either by quitting or by loosening your form to make the exercise easier? Or do you follow your intellect, which is telling you the discomfort is temporary and not the result of any real harm and that whether you move the weight or not isn’t as important as attempting to do it correctly.

Most people “loosen” their form at this point to make the exercise easier for the sake of lifting the weight. Once again, you should do the exact opposite; maintain the strictest form possible to keep tension on the target muscles while contracting them as intensely as possible. Instead of trying to avoid the burning, elevated heart rate, labored breathing, etc., think of it as a cue to “tighten”your form even more and train even harder.

Anyone who watches late night television or reads bodybuilding, fitness, or health related magazines knows there is a lot of gimmicky crap out there. A lot of exercise equipment and accessories are worthless either because they are meant to be used in ways that are a waste of time at best and harmful at worst, or because they are poorly designed and/or constructed, and often both. So, when a few people asked me about Fat Gripz after I recommended using a thick bar for forearm exercises in How To Build Bigger Arms I was skeptical.

Fat Gripz are high-density rubber sleeves which wrap around a barbell or dumbbell or any type of equipment handle to increase the grip diameter to 2-1/4 inches (standard) or 2-3/4 (Fat Gripz Extreme). Their primary purpose is to challenge the hand and forearm muscles more during pulling and curling movements, but they also improve hand comfort during heavy pushing movements and prevent active and passive insufficiency of the wrist and finger flexors during wrist curls and extensions.

Despite already owning a few pieces of thick-handled equipment for forearm training I decided to order a set of the regular Fat Gripz to try before making a recommendation one way or another. I’m glad I did because they turned out to be a great tool with a variety of uses and after using them on several exercises over the past two weeks I’m impressed.

They are easy to put on and take off of equipment, and once on they are very secure. Moving the Fat Gripz between different bars and handles takes only a few seconds, so if you rush between exercises for metabolic effect they won’t slow you down.

I have average sized hands (the distance from my wrist to the end of my middle finger is about 7-3/4 inches) and the standard Fat Gripz were challenging enough to grip to produce a considerable burn in my forearms without being so hard I had to drop the weight on anything other than shrug bar squats and deadlifts. I probably could have used more weight on dips because I had no hand discomfort when using them, which is normally a problem when dipping on the Nautilus Omni Multi Exercise (OME).

Interestingly, despite being much harder to grip during shrug bar squats and deadlifts, it was also more comfortable. My shrug bar has one inch diameter grips which I have taped up to 1-1/8, which really bothers my hands during the last few reps (I find 1-1/4 to 1-3/8 inch diameter bars and handles much better for pulling movements). Although my hands and forearms felt completely drained by the end of the exercise and I had to set the weight down to re-grip a few times my hands didn’t hurt art all.

After shrug bar deadlifts I could barely hold on for chin ups using the Fat Gripz, mostly due to forearm fatigue but also partly because on the thicker chinning bar on the Nautilus OME (1-1/4   inch diameter) their outside diameter was nearly 2-1/2 inches. The second time I performed that workout I did chin ups first which made gripping easier on them but much harder on deadlifts. This was less of an issue with shrug bar squats and barbell rows in the alternate workout since I use less resistance for those and performed dips between them.

As I mentioned previously the Fat Grips improved hand comfort tremendously during dips on the Nautilus OME. Standing presses felt noticeably easier, and I suspect it might be due to the perception of the weight being lighter because the force is spread over a greater area of the hands. I designed the pushing bars on my UXS bodyweight multi exercise station with a two-inch diameter for this reason. I would be interested to see research comparing the effect of bar or handle diameter on performance during pushing exercises and hypothesize up to a point an increase in bar diameter would enable the use of more resistance.

In How To Build Bigger Arms I wrote,

I recommend using a thick bar or thick handled cable attachment (approx two to two and a half inches diameter) for both wrist curls and extensions because it reduces the degree of finger flexion required to grip the bar. This prevents active insufficiency of the wrist and finger flexors during curls and passive insufficiency during extensions. While a thicker bar or handle is more challenging to grip when pulling it is not much harder to hold when performing wrist curls and extensions with the forearms angled up slightly since the fingers or thumbs are working directly against gravity or the pull of the cable over most of the range of motion.

The Fat Gripz felt perfect during wrist curls and extensions on the Nautilus OME, and I prefer them over the thick bar attachment I normally use (shown above with the Fat Gripz on a normal diameter bar attachment), especially for the extensions. These and curling movements would probably benefit most from their use. During barbell curls and dumbbell hammer curls it felt like my forearms were working much harder but it never felt like it was limiting how hard I was able to work the upper arms.

After trying them out I plan to use them on all pushing, arm, and forearm exercises (except on the UXS which already has thick bars for dipping and push ups) and alternating their use with a normal grip on pulling movements.

The price is great considering the value, especially when compared with what you would have to spend on just one thick bar (a good 2-1/4 inch diameter thick bar can cost upwards of $500), much less an entire set of thick handled dumbbells (which would cost thousands of dollars), or to replace handles on existing equipment (something I was planning to do with the Nautilus OME before designing the UXS).

They’re small enough to easily fit in a gym bag and carry around the gym, and will fit on just about any bar, dumbbell, or cable attachment (shown below on a D-handle cable attachment next to thick revolving deadlift handle). If you want to improve your grip strength and forearm development and get more out of other exercises I recommend them.

Buy Fat Gripz at Amazon.com (affiliate link)

Question:

Three of us started doing high intensity training together twenty five days ago (five workouts). We do the “Big Five” routine inspired by Body by Science and one of your books.

1. Leg Press
2. Pull Down
3. Chest Press
4. Seated Row
5. Shoulder Press

In that order. (Thinking legs first to get the best growth response?)

We have all been increasing the resistance every workout on leg press and pull down and a little on chest press and seated row,  but none of us are doing better on the shoulder press. I feel really nauseated after the seated row so I need a couple minutes before even doing the shoulder press.

Do we need to change the order of the exercises or just keep going this way? Just wondering why we are gaining in everything except shoulders. Any advice on this ?

Answer:

Every exercise you perform fatigues both the targeted muscles (local fatigue) and your body as a whole (systemic fatigue), increasing the difficulty of subsequent exercises. Because of this you can handle relatively more resistance and will appear to improve performance more quickly on the first few exercises of your workouts than the last, but you have to evaluate your progress on each exercise in the context of the entire workout.

As you progress on an exercise, becoming more skilled at inroading efficiently and using greater resistance, the demand it places on your body increases. This is one of the reasons more advanced trainees require a reduction in workout volume. This means you start every subsequent exercise with greater local and systemic fatigue, reducing the amount of resistance or repetitions you are able to perform compared to if you started each exercise completely rested. If you are moving quickly between exercises and progressing steadily on the first few of your workout just being able to consistently match your previous resistance and reps in good form indicates improvement in the later exercises.

If you aren’t sure about this, occasionally varying the order of exercises may give you a better idea of how much you are improving on the exercises you normally perform later in your workout. Keep in mind, however, that how you perform each exercise is far more important than how much weight you use or for how many repetitions or how much time under load. It is your intensity – the effort you put into each exercise – that matters most.

Assuming you are able to maintain a high level of effort for all five exercises doing leg press first probably won’t make a big difference in growth response due to acute hormonal changes, but because of how demanding it is when done properly some people find it helps to start there.

Being nauseated after a few exercises is normal when starting out if you are training hard. Give yourself just enough rest between exercises that you don’t feel like you will vomit. As your conditioning improves you will be able to reduce the rest between the later exercises without experiencing it as much.

There are no secrets to building bigger, more muscular arms. They are like any other part of your body; if you want your arms to get bigger and stronger you have to work them hard and progressively, you have to get enough rest between workouts for recovery and adaptation, and you have to eat properly to support muscle growth. While the basic compound pushing and pulling movements like chest presses, dips, overhead presses, chin ups or pull downs, and rows will improve arm and forearm strength and size considerably, for optimum results more direct work may be required.

You don’t need to do anything fancy, however. You don’t need to perform dozens of different types of curls or triceps extensions using different angles, grip widths, portions of the range of motion, etc. to target different heads of your biceps or triceps. You don’t need to train your arms in different “zones” or “positions of flexion” to work your biceps “peak” or your “lower triceps” or your “delt-bicep tie-in” or similar nonsense. You don’t need to perform every possible movement your hands and wrists are capable of to build a stronger grip or bigger forearms. There are no secret arm or forearm exercises or routines that will make your arms any bigger or stronger than basic, properly performed arm curls, triceps extensions, and wrist curls and extensions.

Biceps

When properly performed a basic barbell, dumbbell, or machine curl effectively works all of the elbow flexors. A supinated grip (palms up) should be used most of the time for grip security and wrist stability. If you want to emphasize your brachioradialis alternate regular arm curls with or occasionally substitute a neutral grip (palms facing each other), also known as “hammer” curls.

It is unnecessary to use different grip widths and shoulder flexion angles (preacher curls, incline bench curls, drag curls, etc.)  in an attempt to selectively emphasize the long or short heads of your biceps. Humeral rotation has little effect on the relative involvement of the two heads and extreme shoulder flexion  (elbows above the shoulder) should be avoided during arm curls due to active insufficiency of the biceps.

When using a barbell or machine the elbows and grip should be relatively narrow (inside of shoulder width, elbows braced against the lower ribs) to better align the axes of the elbows and the plane of movement of the forearms with consideration for elbow valgus. When using free weights the body position should be such that the forearms are neither vertical at the start or the end of the movement to keep the targeted muscles meaningfully loaded. This means doing the exact opposite of what most people do when curling. Instead of leaning forward at the start so your forearms are vertical, lean back slightly. With your elbows tucked into the front of your lower ribs this will keep the weight more in front of your elbows than below them and the moment arm you are working against will be greater. Instead of leaning back at the end and moving your elbows forward under the weight so your forearms are vertical, slump your chest and lean forward slightly to keep the weight more in front of your elbows than above them.

The same principles apply when doing cable curls. Position yourself so the cable comes off the pulley just below where your hands are when starting as described above. If you are closer or further back the moment arms change, reducing the resistance at either the start or the end of the movement.

When using a machine make sure you are properly positioned and your elbows are properly aligned (specifics vary between machines). Keep your shoulders down throughout the movement. Don’t allow your shoulders to rise as you perform the negative so you can “ratchet” the movement arm up at the start of the positive.

Triceps

When properly performed a basic barbell, dumbbell, or machine triceps extension effectively works all three heads of your triceps. There is no need or point in varying your grip. All three heads of your triceps insert onto the olecranon process of your unla, which is not affected by grip position. The best grip is the one that provides the most secure hold and the best wrist stabilization; pronated when using a barbell, neutral for dumbbells (and most triceps machine designs with handles), and if doing cable press-downs use the rope or split-handle attachment with a neutral grip.

Your shoulders should be neutral or flexed (elbows in front of your body)  to avoid active insufficiency of the long head of your triceps. Unlike the medial and lateral heads of your triceps which originate on your humerus and only extend your elbow the long head of your triceps originates on the scapula and is also involved in shoulder extension. If your shoulders are extended so your elbows are behind the body the long head of the triceps will already be partially shortened and contribute less to extension of the elbow. Because of this, dumbbell kickbacks and machines like the Nautilus Compound Position Triceps and MedX Triceps are poor triceps exercises.

The best free weight triceps exercises are basic, supine barbell or dumbbell extensions with your elbows held roughly over your nose, which puts your upper arms at around a forty five degree angle. This will keep consistent tension on your triceps over the full range of motion, with the greatest resistance occurring in the stronger mid range position. If your elbows are above your shoulders and your upper arms are vertical the tension will be highest around the start which can be hard on the elbows, and drop off to nothing towards the end when your forearms are vertical and the weight is directly above your elbows. Also, if your elbows over your nose the weight won’t be, which is one less thing to worry about as you approach momentary muscular failure.

It is unnecessary to force your elbows in to point forward or keep your upper arms parallel when doing these. Provided the elbows have some freedom to move as you extend a slight outward angle will be more comfortable and easier on your wrists (using a barbell), elbows, and shoulders. I prefer using an EZ-Curl bar for triceps extensions for wrist comfort.

When using a cable stand far enough back and position your upper body so the line of pull is roughly perpendicular to your forearms in the middle of your range of motion. Do not lean forward or extend your shoulders to reduce the moment arm as you approach the end point.

When using a machine make sure you are properly positioned and your elbows are properly aligned (specifics vary between machines). Triceps machines which position your arms in front of your body are better than machines which position them down by your sides or behind your body.

Forearms and Grip

Although the muscles of the forearms are capable of a variety of hand and wrist movements the majority of them can be worked with just wrist curls and extensions.

When performing wrist curls and extensions your forearms should be angled slightly upwards with your wrists a little higher than your elbows for a better resistance curve. This can be done resting your forearms on your thighs and either sitting on a very low bench or step or sitting on a bench and elevating your feet on a step  so your knees are a little higher than your hips. If using a cable attachment and low pulley the further back you are from the pulley the higher the knees should be, so that the line of pull of the cable is perpendicular to your hands when your wrists are bent slightly below neutral.

When using a barbell or straight bar cable attachment to accommodate the bending angle of your wrists your forearms should be angled out slightly (wrists wider than elbows)  for curls and in slightly (wrists narrower than elbows) for extensions.

I recommend using a thick bar or thick handled cable attachment (approx two to two and a half inches diameter) for both wrist curls and extensions because it reduces the degree of finger flexion required to grip the bar. This prevents active insufficiency of the wrist and finger flexors during curls and passive insufficiency during extensions. While a thicker bar or handle is more challenging to grip when pulling it is not much harder to hold when performing wrist curls and extensions with the forearms angled up slightly since the fingers or thumbs are working directly against gravity or the pull of the cable over most of the range of motion.

If you want to focus more on your grip strength you can occasionally substitute or alternate these with gripping or timed static contractions or static holds using a thick bar or thick handled cable attachment.

Arm Training Myths and Misconceptions

There is no such thing as a “shaping” exercise for the biceps, triceps, or any other muscle. The general shape of your muscles is genetically determined and the only thing you can do through training is make them larger. You can not preferentially train any longitudinal portion of a muscle, like the “peak” or “mid biceps” or train to produce a “split” biceps shape like Boyer Coe, or train to make your biceps or triceps or any other muscle longer.

There is no such thing as a “cutting” exercise or training technique. While doing any exercise contributes to improvements in body composition in multiple ways (increased lean body mass, acute and chronic increases in metabolic rate, improved glucose metabolism and insulin sensitivity, etc.) getting “cut” is mostly a matter of diet.

There is no special exercise or combination of exercises to develop your “deltoid-biceps tie-in”, the shape of which is genetically determined and the development of which requires nothing more than hard, progressive work on basic exercises and the reduction of bodyfat through proper diet.

It is not necessary to forcefully supinate the hands during curls to fully recruit the biceps. Assuming you are using an adequately heavy weight and proper form every motor unit in your biceps will be recruited within a few reps

General Guidelines for Performance

Initiate each repetition in a deliberate, controlled manner, without jerking, yanking, bouncing, or heaving the weight. If necessary, pause and hold motionless for a second or two without unloading to ensure you do not bounce or elicit a stretch reflex to help with the start.

Lift and lower the weight slowly and focus on intensely contracting the target muscles over the full range of the exercise. Take at least four seconds to complete both the positive and negative phases of the repetition.

When you reach the end point hold the weight motionless for a few seconds before starting the negative. Starting with the third repetition gradually squeeze the target muscles during this hold.

Gradually “un-squeeze” the target muscles as you begin the negative. Don’t drop the weight.

Maintain strict body position throughout the exercise. Do not lean, shift or alter your body position in any way that takes tension off of the target muscles.

Do not turn your head to admire your biceps as you curl. Maintain a neutral head and neck position during all exercises.

When performing wrist extension with dumbbells position your hands towards the outside of the handles so your thumbs are closer to the center.

Further Reading

For more detailed guidelines and arm specialization routines read High Intensity Workouts, available in the HIT store.

When explaining high intensity training to new clients or discussing it with people outside of the studio certain questions almost always come up:

What about “cardio”?

Why don’t you have any treadmills or elliptical machines?

Don’t I need to do something for my heart?

What about burning fat?

What about warming up?

For decades people have been told they need aerobics or “cardio” to improve cardiovascular fitness and health and to lose fat. Almost every commercial gym has an area devoted exclusively to “cardio” equipment and almost every major fitness organization recommends some weekly amount of “cardiovascular activity”. In almost every article I’ve read about high intensity training in a mainstream publication the authors contradict the information in the rest of the article by adding recommendations to perform “cardio”.

Even a few trainers and coaches who use HIT and should know better can’t seem to let go of these erroneous notions.

Forget “cardio”. Forget stretching. Forget conventional notions of warming up. If you are strength training with a very high level of intensity, adequate set duration, and relatively short rest intervals you are stimulating improvements in all of the general, trainable factors of functional ability including cardiovascular and metabolic conditioning and flexibility. If you train with good form and an appropriate level of resistance a separate warm up is almost always unnecessary.

Is “Cardio” Necessary for Cardiovascular and Metabolic Conditioning?

No. Regardless of what you are doing with your muscles as long as you work them hard enough there will be enough demand on metabolic and cardiovascular efficiency to stimulate improvements. The reason running, cycling, swimming, and other steady-state activities stress the cardiovascular system is because of the metabolic cost of the muscular work being performed. If you strength train with a high enough level of intensity and move quickly between exercises you will stimulate the same or better improvements in cardiovascular and metabolic conditioning along with all the other benefits of strength training.

In fact, when done properly the term “strength training” is a misnomer since it wrongly implies only strength is being trained for when it is actually capable of stimulating improvements in all of the general, trainable factors of functional ability.

Is “Cardio” Necessary for Fat Loss?

No. All that is necessary for fat loss is that you create an energy deficit and a hormonal environment conducive to accessing the energy in your fat stores. This can be accomplished with diet alone. If you do any exercise it should be strength training for the purpose of maintaining lean body mass while fat is lost.

Forget the idea of exercising to burn calories. It is a huge waste of time. No activity burns enough calories to be worth doing for that purpose alone; not traditional endurance training, not sprint interval training, not Spinning or “cardio” kickboxing or “boot camps” or other group classes, not even strength training.  You’d have to do most of these activities for one to two hours every day of the week to burn less than the calories in a single pound of fat (before you rush off to look it up realize the majority of activity calculators list calories burned during activities and not the additional calories burned as a result of those activities minus resting energy expenditure).

Dietary modification doesn’t require much time at all other than a few extra minutes a week for meal planning and preparation and can produce much faster fat loss. And it won’t injure you or contribute to long term joint and spine problems like many so-called “cardio” activities do, or interfere with your body’s ability to recover from and produce the improvements stimulated during strength training.

I have my gym and phone clients work out less than one hour a week (just one or two half-hour workouts) and they’re able to lose a few pounds of fat per week doing this along with a few simple modifications to their diet; reduce calorie intake to between 10 and 12 calories per pound of body weight per day (adjust until you’re losing at least one or two pounds of fat per week), eliminate or strictly limit intake of grains, legumes, refined sugars, and vegetable oils, and eat mostly beef, fish, eggs, vegetables, fruit, and nuts.

When the photo above was taken my body fat percentage was in the low single digits. At that time I was doing only one high intensity strength training workout a week and most of those workouts only took around fifteen to twenty minutes to complete. Other than standing for much of the day training clients I did no “cardio” at all. I actually tried to keep my physical activity to a minimum because part of the reason for getting ripped was to demonstrate it was possible with HIT and proper eating alone.

What About Warming Up? Won’t I Get Hurt If I Don’t Warm Up Before HIT?

No. Unless you have some joint problem or physical condition which requires it a separate warm up is unnecessary as long as you use proper form during your workout. A general warm up is just a waste of time and energy and additional warm up sets provide no physical benefit you wouldn’t obtain from the first few reps of your regular exercises and are also a waste of time and energy.

“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general.”

– Mark Rippetoe

The phrase “survival of the fittest” refers to the process of natural selection – the members of a species best suited to survival in their environment are more likely to live long enough to reproduce and pass along their genes, with each successive generation becoming better suited – more fit – to survive in that environment. Having already been born, there is little we can do to improve our fitness in the genetic/evolutionary sense. That is mostly decided for us at the moment of conception. However, we can and should do everything we can to improve every aspect of our fitness in the physical sense.

In most parts of the world natural selection no longer operates the way it does in the wild due to agricultural and medical advancements and cultural and societal changes. These changes have lowered the genetic bar for survival significantly – have almost gotten rid of the bar altogether. Advancements in labor saving devices and easy access to calorie dense food have compounded this by minimizing the physical effort required for daily survival to practically nothing, resulting in a society that is mostly weak, slow and fat. Most people alive now in developed countries would be incapable of handling the physical demands of the day to day lives of our ancestors, and would have no hope of surviving in such an environment. There would, however, be far fewer hungry bears and lions.

While this may seem irrelevant today with cars and public transportation, a convenience store on every corner, escalators and elevators everywhere, and the lack of large predators in urban and residential areas, all it takes is one emergency where one’s survival or the survival of another depends on their strength or stamina to learn a very hard lesson about how important fitness is.

Could you move a very heavy object off of yourself or someone else trapped under it?

Could you hang on to and pull yourself or someone else up over something fallen off of?

Could you pick up and carry an injured or unconscious person to safety?

Could you run fast enough, climb high enough, and move with enough quickness and agility to evade  some other potential danger?

Can you run or climb at all?

With the exception of athletes and people in physically demanding professions most people don’t give much thought to the need for a high level of strength and stamina. They assume they don’t need it because their day to day lives don’t require it. If they think about exercise at all they are probably more concerned with reducing their waistline or staving off having to go up another pant or dress size than improving their physical capabilities. Few people give much consideration to being physically prepared to successfully cope with anything that isn’t part of their daily routine.

When asked why he always carried a gun, Nautilus inventor Arthur Jones once said,

“A pistol is like a tourniquet. You don’t need one very often, but when you do need one you need it very badly, and very quickly.”

The same can be said of a high level of physical fitness. If your lifestyle and profession does not involve some degree of regular, hard physical challenge you may not need a high level of fitness very often, but if an emergency situation should ever arise where your life or someone else’s depends on it, it’s going to be too late to start thinking about working out. In this respect, developing a high level of physical capability is much like carrying a handgun – it is much better to have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it.

I’ve recently received a few emails from readers concerned I am straying from Arthur Jones’ original Nautilus high intensity training principles because some of my recommendations are at odds with things he said or wrote. While Arthur Jones was a genius and much of what he said and wrote about exercise almost four decades ago has proven to be correct, he was not omniscient or infallible. To his credit, unlike many people in the field of exercise he was willing to admit it when he learned he was wrong about something or made a mistake and quick to correct it, but there were a few things he got wrong that many of the Nautilus and HIT people out there still believe that have been disproven and a few occasions where he contradicts himself:

The difference between concentric (positive) and eccentric (negative) muscular strength is not due to intramuscular friction, as Arthur claimed, but due to differences in cross-bridge mechanics. Friction in the muscles and joints is way too low to have any significant effect on this.

Maximum motor unit recruitment is dependent on the amount of force a muscle is called upon to produce and not the degree of shortening, as Arthur claimed. It is not necessary to “fully contract” a muscle to recruit all of its motor units, nor is it practical or even possible in the majority of exercises to do so.

Some of Arthur’s equipment designs, most notably the compound biceps and compound triceps machines, violate muscular sufficiency principles (active insufficiency of the target muscles occurs) as a result of this mistaken belief. Ironically, design features of other machines indicate awareness of the need to satisfy active and passive muscular sufficiency, such as the seat back angle on the leg extension machines.

One of Arthur’s original Ten Requirements for Full Range Exercise was the ability to “pre-stretch” which involved quickly lowering then yanking or heaving at the weight to elicit a myotatic reflex to increase the force of muscular contraction. Not only is this not a requirement for any sane kind of exercise, it is a very bad idea because it increases your chances of pulling or straining something.

Despite having said and written that when in doubt of the proper speed of movement during exercise it is better to move too slowly than too quickly and that it is probably impossible to move too slowly during exercise, Arthur criticized SuperSlow founder Ken Hutchins as “taking the slow thing too far”.

I could go on and on, but I think you get the point; Arthur Jones got some things wrong, contradicted himself, etc. More importantly, he got the majority of things right, and those principles still form the basis of my training recommendations. Not just because Arthur said or wrote them, but because they’re supported by a large amount of research and empirical evidence.

Speed of Movement

In Testing And Rehabilitation For The Lumbar Spine, The Cervical Spine, And The Knee, Arthur wrote, “Perhaps the most important consideration: a proper style of performance requires a relatively slow speed of movement. Too slow provides all of the benefits and produces none of the potential problems, while too fast avoids some benefits and does produce problems, generally problems resulting from high levels of impact force.” (Page 44) I spoke with Arthur about this and the contradiction with his criticism of SuperSlow on a few occasions and his response was always something to the effect of, “Yes, you should move slowly during exercise but Hutchins has taken it too fucking far.”

Speed of movement during exercise needs to be at least slow enough for you to be able to reverse direction smoothly and with very low acceleration, maintain proper positioning and alignment, and focus on intensely contracting the target muscles. Exactly how slow this is varies depending on a lot of factors, including your limb length and the range of motion, how skilled you are at performing the exercise, and your overall level of motor control just to name a few. Most people’s form is very poor by my standards at any speed, but gets much worse as speed of movement increases. Even people who are  relatively skilled at an exercise and have good motor control have a hard time performing adequately smooth turnarounds and doing other things as well as I’d like them to using cadences faster than 4/4 on most exercises.

Is it really necessary to move as slowly as a 10/10 cadence, though? Did Ken Hutchins really take slowing down “too fucking far” as Arthur liked to say? While it might not be absolutely necessary for everybody and for all exercises to move quite so slowly, there is no downside and several advantages.

I spent a few years (approx 2006 to 2011) experimenting with and comparing the results of a variety of repetition cadences and traditional high intensity training repetition methods and saw no significant difference in subjects’ muscular strength or size gains between different controlled repetition speeds as long as the intensity of effort was high. There was, however, a difference in how some people’s joints felt after performing certain protocols like negative-only and heavy rest-pause. Since one of the goals of exercise is not to wreck yourself in the process or undermine your long term health and functional ability it makes good sense to use a slower cadence. Doing so makes it easier to perform controlled turnarounds, maintain proper positioning and alignment, and detect and correct form problems.

There is nothing about very slow reps that is inconsistent with high intensity training principles.

Isometric Versus Full Range Exercise

One person accusing me of heresy was upset I have been writing about isometrics recently. He felt the emphasis on timed static contractions contradicted Arthur’s writing about full range exercise.

I believe Arthur was wrong about the need for full range of motion. While some studies show isometric exercise results in position-specific strength increases, many don’t and show a moderate to strong correlation between isometric and dynamic performance. MedX research showed this response varied between individuals, with most people having a position-specific response (strength increased within about 15 degrees of the position trained isometrically) while others had a general response (strength increased over the full range of motion of the exercise regardless of the position trained isometrically). Based on my previous experience with Mike Mentzer‘s static hold protocol, Max Contraction training, timed static contractions and the RenEx iMachines I believe position-specific strength increases on tests reported in some studies have more to do with neural adaptations than general improvements in muscular strength.

For the past three months the only direct biceps and triceps exercises I have done have been isometric. During one of two weekly workouts I perform one set of arm curls and one set of triceps extensions on the UXS bodyweight exercise station using timed static contraction protocol with the elbows at approximately 90 degrees. Today I tested myself on the SuperSlow Systems biceps and triceps machines after not having used them for three months and was able to use twenty more pounds on each machine. I had no trouble getting past the mid range position as would be the case if my strength had only increased around that position.

When properly performed isometric protocols like timed static contractions are effective, efficient, and safe and there is a place for them in high intensity training programs.

Nautilus Versus Bodyweight Exercise

A couple people accusing me of heresy were upset I have been writing about bodyweight exercise and think I should recommend everybody only train on machines. While a properly designed machine provides several advantages over training with free weights or body weight there are a lot of people out there who don’t have access to properly designed machines. While a rare few gyms have decent machines most are full of poorly designed crap because most gym owners generally don’t know the difference, or if they do they figure their members won’t know the difference. Some people prefer to work out at home and can’t afford to spend thousands of dollars on a line of Nautilus or MedX machines. Some people travel frequently and don’t always have convenient access to equipment. A lot of readers are soldiers deployed in places where equipment is very limited or non-existent.

I’ve either said or written it hundreds of times; how you train is far more important than what you train on. Proper training with just bodyweight or a bunch of heavy rocks will produce much better results than improper training on the most technologically advanced equipment in the world. Having both would be ideal, but that’s not always an option.

Although I have access to some of the best equipment in the world, to be better able to understand and provide solutions for the kind of training problems the majority of readers face it is necessary to spend time training with more conventional equipment and doing bodyweight training. Just because I’m doing bodyweight training right now does not mean I’m recommending that everyone else do so or saying it is the best way to train. However, it is turning out to be highly effective, efficient, and safe and it is one of the most practical ways for some people to work out under some circumstances. With the economy going the way it is and more people working out at home with very basic or limited equipment there is a need for this kind of information, and most of what’s out there on bodyweight training is utterly idiotic. It makes sense to devote some time to experimenting with and writing about it.

Speaking of experiments, I also tested myself on the SuperSlow Systems leg press and overhead press machines after not having used them for three months and was able to use ten more pounds on each machine for more reps. I stopped after eight reps and probably could have handled a bit more weight. This is after months of slow bodyweight squats and a few workouts doing timed static contraction squats and doing “shoulder push ups” with angled push up handles attached to the UXS. I think many people underestimate how effective bodyweight training can be when done correctly.

Don’t worry, Nautilus true believers. I still plan to write a lot about training with machines.

However, as long as it is done intensely, briefly, and infrequently there is also a place for bodyweight exercise in high intensity training programs.

Considering the ignorance of the majority of the fitness industry it should come as no surprise most people writing about high intensity training (HIT) on the internet don’t know what they’re talking about. Almost every week I receive emails from people confused by something they read about HIT on some other site, often variations on the same common misconceptions.

The purpose of this article is to clarify what HIT is and what it is not and address some of the more popular myths and misconceptions.

What is High Intensity Training?

Part of the problem is the term “high intensity training” is currently used very loosely by most of the fitness industry to refer to almost any physical activity performed with a higher than normal level of effort. It has also become popular to market all sorts of things as HIT, from group classes to boot camps to CrossFit to sprint interval training workouts, adding to the confusion.

To be clear, when I write about HIT I specifically mean progressive resistance exercise performed with a very high level of intensity.

The Definition of Exercise “Intensity”

Unfortunately, there is even confusion about this due to misunderstanding of the definition of “intensity”. The most accurate and conceptually useful definition of intensity in the context of exercise is your level of effort relative to your momentary ability. The erroneous but popular definition is the load used during an exercise, usually expressed as a percentage of the maximum that can be lifted for one repetition (1RM). There are several problems with this.

For example, according to the proper definition if you are capable of producing 100 pounds of force at the start of an exercise but you only have to produce 75 pounds to overcome the resistance your starting level of intensity is 75% (75 = 75% of 100). As your muscles fatigue, continuing to produce 75 pounds of force requires an increasing percentage of your decreasing momentary ability (75 = ~79% of 95, ~83% of 90, ~88% of 85, etc.). When fatigue has reduced the amount of force you are momentarily capable of producing to 75 pounds then you are working at maximum intensity (75 = 100% of 75).

According to the more common definition (a percentage of 1RM in this case), despite the obvious fact an exercise becomes harder (more intense) as your muscles fatigue, you would be working at the same intensity at the end as you did at the beginning. Whether you quit after only one or two repetitions or performed five or six or continued the exercise to the point of momentary muscular failure, you would be working at the same intensity. Whether you performed each repetition in strict form maintaining continuous tension on the working muscles or cheated the weight up and dropped it then rested between each rep, you would be working at the same intensity. I could go on and on but by now you should get the point; the common definition is plainly wrong. A percentage of a repetition maximum is a description of the load used for an exercise and not  intensity.

Load Versus Effort?

Which leads to one of the common misconceptions: just because a program involves using high percentages of your 1RM doesn’t mean it is HIT. While load is obviously an important factor in how intense an exercise is, as I already pointed out it is not as important as how you use it.

For example, doing a set of an exercise with 80% of your 1RM might be hard, but if you do it with loose form and quick reps and stop short of an all-out effort you are not training as intensely as if you used only 50% but pushed yourself to momentary muscular failure.

Please note I am using these percentages for the sake of example and do not recommend performing one rep max testing to determine training loads.

Is HIT Dangerous?

A related misconception is that training very intensely is dangerous. Often this is claimed because of two erroneous assumptions; that intense training always involves very heavy weight and that a heavier weight is more dangerous. Once again what really matters is how you use it.

A tissue is injured when it is exposed to a force that exceeds it’s structural strength. Force is the product of mass and acceleration. The heavier the load you use or the more rapidly you accelerate it the greater the force imposed on the involved tissues. Assuming you don’t have any pre-existing injuries you won’t be capable of lifting a weight that is too heavy if you attempt to do so with strict, correct form. The reason heavy weight is often associated with injury is because people often use sloppy form to be able to lift way more weight than they can handle lifting correctly. It is not the weight that hurts them but the horrible form they resort to in an attempt to lift it.

Suppose you were to go outside and attempt to lift the back of an SUV or pickup truck by the bumper. Unless you are a freak of nature you will not be able to get the wheels off the ground. It is much heavier than anything you are ever likely to try to lift during a workout. Whether you are injured attempting to lift it has nothing to do with how heavy it is and everything to do with how you try to lift it. If you attempt to quickly yank or jerk the bumper up as hard and fast as you can you are probably going to pull something. However, if you pull with only a moderate effort at first, and gradually increase your effort until you are pulling as hard as you can then gradually ease off you will not injure yourself.

If you start with a weight you can handle for a reasonable number of reps in strict form and progress gradually the weight will not become dangerous. If you sacrifice form to lift a heavier weight don’t blame the weight if you get injured.

Is Training To Failure Dangerous?

As long as you use strict form and common sense with regards to safety it is not dangerous to train to momentary muscular failure either. Again, the problem is not training to failure in and of itself, but that as people approach failure they tend to lose focus and sacrifice form for the sake of completing more repetitions. Maintain strict form, focus on your muscles not the numbers, and no matter now intensely you train you will not hurt yourself. In fact, as long as your form is strict the closer you get to momentary muscular failure the safer the exercise becomes because fatigue increases the gap between the amount of force the working muscles can produce and the amount required to cause an injury.

If an exercise requires a spotter or specific equipment to safely train to failure use it. Make sure all equipment you use is in good working condition and that anything you stand on, sit on, lay on or hang from will support your weight. Familiarize yourself with the correct operation of equipment before using it with a challenging weight.

When a trainer says high intensity training or training to momentary muscular failure is dangerous that tells me they don’t understand the actual causes of injury during exercise and how to minimize them and have no business training people or giving advice on the subject.

Is HIT Only For Beginners Or Not For Beginners?

“HIT isn’t very hard. Anybody who only works out for less than half an hour is lazy.”

“HIT is too hard and will totally burn out your CNS and wreck your joints.”

“HIT doesn’t work, you have to do a lot more volume to grow.”

“HIT can be an effective way to stimulate new growth if you’ve hit a plateau.”

“HIT is only for beginners, you have to add more volume as you progress.”

“HIT is not for beginners,  you have to build up to that kind of intensity.”

The “experts” can’t seem to make up their minds. Some claim HIT is not for beginners because it is too hard while others claim HIT is only appropriate for beginners because it isn’t hard enough. None of them know what they’re talking about.

There is no reason a beginner can’t or shouldn’t perform high intensity training as long as they start with conservative loads and rest periods and progress gradually while focusing on learning and practicing correct form. The goal is to work up to the point where you’re working out with an all-out, maximum effort but you don’t put someone who has never trained before through that kind of workout without a break-in period.

Also, there is no reason to increase workout volume as you become more advanced. The effectiveness of your workouts is determined by how intensely you train, not the volume of work you perform, and as you become more advanced and are capable of training more intensely it becomes necessary to reduce the volume and frequency of your workouts to avoid overtraining.

Is HIT Only For Lazy People Or Only For Obsessed, Amphetamine-Fueled Masochists? 

The notion that HIT is not very hard or is only for people too lazy to work out longer or more often is utterly absurd to anyone who has experienced a proper high intensity workout. Anyone who says a HIT workout isn’t hard has never done one and doesn’t know what they’re talking about.

While in college I worked as a trainer at a Gold’s Gym in Green Bay, WI (now Titletown Fitness) and several of the bodybuilders who worked out there were critical of our HIT program, often expressing doubt that such brief workouts could possibly be very hard. The few I convinced to let me put them through a workout changed their minds. During one of those workouts the guy only got through four exercises before having to go lay down in the locker room. He came out over an hour later and sat down in the front lobby and called his girlfriend to come pick him up since he didn’t think he’d be able to drive. I didn’t see him in the gym for about two weeks and when he came back he complained the workout was too hard.

Since then I’ve trained quite a few people who know what hard work is, including professional athletes and special warfare operators, and none of them thought their workouts were easy.

While HIT is extremely hard when done correctly you don’t have to be obsessed, a masochist, or hopped up on amphetamines to train with a high level of intensity. You just have to be willing to work as hard as possible and disciplined enough to push yourself through the discomfort no matter how much your muscles burn and heart pounds or how hard you’re sucking wind. As I mentioned earlier, intensity is your level of effort relative to your momentary ability. What is “high” intensity is relative to the individual. While not everybody can lift heavy weights, everybody can train with a level of effort that is high for them.