Set extensions?

Discussion in 'Health and Fitness' started by Frederick Foresight, Aug 9, 2018.

  1. I'm guessing it has something to do with diet and exercise. :)

    (Also, as I recall, he believes in drinking lots of ice water.)

    Will you be getting it?
     
    #111     Jan 31, 2019
  2. Baron

    Baron ET Founder

    I bought it for my kindle last night but I haven't checked it out yet.
     
    #112     Jan 31, 2019
  3. When you've had a chance to go through it, could you give us the gist of it, just to see if it's something that might be of interest?
     
    #113     Jan 31, 2019
  4. Okay, so here's a bit of an update. After having reduced my frequency about a year and a half ago to once a week, I upped the frequency to twice a week at the start of February this year. I have not changed my caloric intake in any meaningful way. Just over 2 months in, I weigh about the same, and my body composition remains essentially unchanged, according to my $20 biometric impedance scale. My key measurements (arm, chest, leg) are almost imperceptibly better, although any such minute difference is more likely to be attributed to measurement error.

    I did only one slow set per exercise, although that included a ~15-second rest followed by as many more reps I could do at a quicker, more "standard" pace. (The slow reps during the first part of the set were about 6-8 seconds each.) That's for upper body. Legs are a bit more complicated, and so I won't bore you with the details.

    Starting yesterday, I began doing just the one set to failure with no rep extensions, and will see what that yields in a couple of months, if anything.

    I will continue at a 2x/week frequency.

    As an aside, I joined another gym (World Gym) at the end of March, which just opened here recently. It's new, bigger, and less expensive than my last gym. One thing I noticed, however, is the fairly prevalent use of steroids among the men here (as well as one or two women). Whereas the last few gyms I worked out at had a few obvious users, this place has noticeably more of them. I'd be more okay with it if I was sure the women present knew these guys were using. Otherwise the comparison is a bit humbling. :D
     
    Last edited: Apr 16, 2019
    #114     Apr 16, 2019
  5. Baron

    Baron ET Founder

    Although there are some women that are attracted to the roid look, there's a lot of women that aren't. So you might just stand out amongst the juice heads in a good way more than you realize.
     
    #115     Apr 16, 2019
  6. Let's hope so. :D
     
    #116     Apr 16, 2019
  7. One of the two gyms I go to is World Gym. A few obvious roid users there, and a couple of women who are juiced up as well. The overwhelming majority are natural lifters though. The roid crowd is more predominant in the evening, and I rarely go in the evening. While I don't think it to be the healthiest way to go, to see these guys up close and personal is quite amazing. What I can't question is their dedication, or maybe better called an obsession. Hey, everyone needs a hobby.
     
    #117     Apr 16, 2019
  8. As to the frequency I have reduced mine from 6 days a week, to 5, to 4, to 3-4 days over the last 18 months. I did gain some weight a year plus ago but I was trying to do that. Over the last 12 months my weight has remained almost astonishingly flat, and a wee bit more muscle definition. Astonishing because my diet has not been as clean. What I really notice is that I am considerably stronger than I was 18 months ago. Some of that I attribute to coming back from my heart condition which had me fried for several months, but longer rest periods between workouts have really proven to be a better way to go, especially for an older guy like myself.
     
    #118     Apr 16, 2019
    Frederick Foresight likes this.
  9. They'll have to keep using as long as they want to remain inflated. That's a hell of a commitment and not a particularly sensible one.
     
    #119     Apr 16, 2019
  10. After 8 workouts (4 weeks), there is no discernible difference in either size or strength. Not that I was really expecting anything, but I wanted to be sure. Rather than wait another month or so before shaking things up a bit, I'm now going to start doing 2 sets per exercise for upper body. As I noted in another thread, I already started doing 2 sets with set extensions for legs 2 weeks ago:

    https://www.elitetrader.com/et/thre...without-equipment.328433/page-12#post-4852591

    Now I will be dropping the set extensions for legs but will consider doing a third set for legs. I still haven't decided, but will make up my mind by Monday, when I'm back at the gym.

    This will be an interesting experiment. Whereas up until a few months ago I had done only a single set to true failure once a week (sometimes with set extensions, but not always) for about a year and a half with no meaningful difference in strength or size than when I was working out out twice a week, I will now be effectively doing 4x the volume, since I will be doing 2 sets of each exercise twice a week. (And possibly 3 sets for legs.)

    When I was at my peak I was doing multiple sets per exercise, well more than 2. I was doing an ABA BAB split routine, working out 3x a week. That was my regimen for a good many years. In 2005, I switched to whole body 2x a week with no ~meaningful drop off in outcome that I can recall. During those years, I did up to 5 sets for some, but not all, exercises, to failure, but never with extensions. Set extensions are something I began experimenting with much more recently, without any meaningful effect. And so, I want to get back to basics for a bit to see if I can change the outcome (size or strength). Admittedly, doing only 2 sets per exercise falls well short of the volume I had once been doing, but this latest regimen will still be about 4x the volume of my lowest volume regimen. If (higher) volume is an important variable, then there should be at least some improvement. So if I get better results, great. If not, then I will know that volume is not the culprit and can reasonably attribute any drop off over the years to the effects of getting older.
     
    #120     May 11, 2019