Hi folks,
Anyone have any recommendations for or against super slow weight training? And if you recommend it, do you know if it’s possible to get a decent superslow work out at home without serious equipment?
I have several weights of kettle bells and could get dumbells as well. I just want to work some resistance training into my routine without going to a gym (or buying a new place big enough for a bench press and serious weights!).
I have no weights at home, but for the cost of a few months of a gym membership, I got a Jungle Gym XT, and I do 15-20 minutes of bodyweight calisthenic exercises 1-3x a week. I do the movements as slowly as I can to failure. The book “Convict Conditioning” is a good place to start for exercises you can do without any weights. The book also outlines the way to perform the moves. Spoiler: slowly. You should be able to do the same with kettlebells, too. Find some exercizes where you can make the moves slowly and do those until you feel like your muscles are about to give.
Thank you! I actually have Convict Conditioning and left off sometime last year. I couldn’t figure out a good setup for one of the pull up stages but I should be able to go back to that. It takes patience to go through all of his stages! I can do pushups with good form now, so going through those first several stages, oof … I’m sure they’re good for you but it was hard to make myself go through them. But I think it’s worth it. Thanks for the advice!
Dr. Ted Naiman (through whom I found “Convict Conditioning”) is the person through whom I found the suspension-based exercise method. This is the URL where I got acquainted with some of those methods and built my own series of suspension exercises.
I get what you’re saying about the progression in CC. I’m still in level 1 or 2 of those, but I try to wrest as much out of each move as I can. It doesn’t seem like much, but my strength at 51 is better than I was at 31.
Ah, good for you! I think of some health habits as a gift to my future self.
Thanks for the URL. I’ll check it out.
IMO gymnastic rings or a suspension trainer is well worth the money. As for super slow work, it is more time under tension so likely more stimulus for muscle growth.
The question is one debated all the time. Decent workout does not tell us what your goal is. Health? The yep. Athleticism?
probably not. Bodybuilder? Try hypertrophy routines. Strength increase? Yes.
Time under tension vs load. I recently did 12 weeks of the Body by Science workout devised by John Little and Doug McGuff. It felt more than adequate however it did not produce any more results in that time period and I felt like I didn’t do enough. You would have to read it to grasp the science but simply like all routines it is about taxing all the fibers to exhaustion.
What I am currently doing is a set of 12-13 reps. The first nine or so are the usual cadence and the last 4 or 5 a six to ten second eccentric and decentric movement. I cannot do the third set anymore over 4 or 5 seconds.
Thank you, Mark and Adam!
Mark, my goal is health (good energy, good sleep, etc) and keeping bone density, mobility and muscle tone. I love being strong but I’m definitely not looking for a hypertrophy routine!
I’m doing a fair amount of activity now - including some bodyweight exercises and occasional kb sessions - but every time I read about weight training and its benefits, I wonder if I should find a way to be more systematic about folding those fundamental strength exercises into my routine.
The evidence is overwhelming that strength training does increase LBM, bone density and also can put you into a ketogenic state while creating a autophagic response. At any age. I’m 53 and have run and weight trained for a good portion of my life. I still want lean gains or to at least maintain what I have. However it is no longer all about show me the muscles! Anymore, lol
I do believe there is great merit in Brad Kearns ideas for aerobic exercise and since I can no longer run ( spine) I do do Yoga and a Tabahta protocol HIIT routine. As to lifting I lift at home however over the years I have collected a great deal of equipment and always find myself with a bench and weights. Usually dumbbells. A good investment especially if you are looking for bodyweight exercises are resistance bands. I thought they would be crap at first but they offer excellent time under load and easily can increase a push up. Rubber bands for chin up assists are great too. Both of these should at most cost about $40 on Amazon.
Finally I would recommend a book such as CORE PERFORMANCE by Mark Verstegen. I have this title and it has increased my strength more than any lifting exercise has.
Thank you so much! I just ordered the book and a pull-up assist band (I can only do two right now - barely - so I’m really excited about being able to use that).
Hi-
Trainer Bill DeSimone has a book called Congruent Exercise where he does the HIT techniques and adapts them for maximum safety and time efficiency. He suggests 4 secs-2 sec pause-4 down. You can do a lot of them at home.
Demo of the exercises: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rd5VqiBhvNY
Joint-Friendly Fitness: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gW86aGmVyF4
To all of you: thanks so much for all of your advice. I actually had to start a file on my computer to keep track of all the suggestions, but I’ll be reading up and will dive in once I can come up with a plan that feels right. (In the meantime, I’m excited about building my pull-up capacity with the band that’s arriving soon!)