Muscle activation blog –series 4/4 General tricks to improve the ability of the activation are fairly straightforward. Accurate methods for exercise movements and choice of other training and teaching methods of course vary greatly. Here are few examples: Do strength training that includes loads that are heavy enough. For a beginner already over 60% from 1RM (repetition maximum) load is sufficient. More...
Importance of maximal activation for weight loss Muscle activation related to muscle mass, fat burning and weight loss. Maximal activation is critical in shaping of the body composition as only those parts of the muscle that has been activated can adapt. In addition, with maximal activation higher force can be produced enabling greater mechanical and metabolic loading of the muscle. This,...
In my work I try to engage in continuous dialogue between science and practice. From my experience of thousands of hours of coaching I would say that an average trainee has activation deficit. It is more about how large the deficit is than whether it exists in the first place. There are also large differences between muscles groups in activation...
Muscle activation blog –series 1/4 Muscle activation ability – put thought and effort into this, if you feel like improving! This blog text is about the development of some very critical factors in strength training. Some of the things will be quite, let’s say, ‘professional or hi-tech’ while others are rather ‘normal and common sense’. It is important to keep in mind...
Gender differences in strength training –series 6/6 Summary and applications 1. Surface area of fast twitch muscle fibers, which have larger potential for growth, is relatively smaller in women. Women should perform regularly maximum and explosive strength training workouts, which aim for ‘as fast as possible concentric movement’. 2. If strength is expressed proportional to the lean body weight, women and men are...
Gender differences in strength training –series 5/6 Is Fatigue Essential in Every Strength Training Session? Developing strength training needs to always induce fatigue. If strength and performance are not decreasing during a workout, it can only serve as a sensitizing or maintaining training, but it does not create a stimulus for improvements. The key to designing good workouts is to find suitable...
Gender differences in strength training –series 4/6 Connective tissues and training Adaptation of tendons to training gets way too little attention. It’s hard to find reasoning as development of tendons and other supportive tissue is just as important if not even more important than development of muscle mass and strength. Damaged or inflamed tendons basically prevent all training. Men and women...
Gender differences in strength training –series 3/6 It is often said that for women it is almost impossible to gain muscle mass. So is this really true? Well it’s very simple – it’s just not true! Several studies indicate that in the early stages of training muscle mass increases in women as fast as in men, if the exercise intensity is...
Gender differences in strength training –series 2/6 In the early stages of training men and women can achieve similar rate in the strength development. In general, however, men are training proportionately with much larger weights than women very soon. This is often because women tend to do training too gently, while men are waving weights that are even too heavy for their...
Training of men and women often differ, even if the goals are the same - stronger, firmer and more muscular body. Men often lift heavy iron while women use light barbells. Still it is said that men and women should train exactly the same way. There needs to be no major differences in training between men and women, but what...
