Hypertrophy basics and chest training template

My first few articles for myfittribe have focused on overall performance. So some of you might have got the impression that I only train athletes, which is not the case. To change that, I am going to give you folks an article about chest training. It´s not for the beginner but even as such you might get some ideas to try out.

First though, I want to give you some insight on why I choose to design the program the way I do. There are two kinds of hypertrophy, sarcoplasmatic and myofibrillic. Sarcoplasmatic hypertrophy is an increase of the non-contractile parts of the muscle fiber, the sarcoplasm. It stands for about 25-30% of the muscle volume. But even if the muscle volume itself increases the muscle fiber density per unit will decrease, and the strength enhancement will be negligible. This kind of hypertrophy is a result of conventional bodybuilding training in the 10-15 reps range. Myofibril hypertrophy on the other hand is an increase in myofibrils, the building blocks of the muscle cell/fiber, which in turn are able to contract and build up tension in the muscle. This kind of hypertrophy increases the density/volume of the myofibrils and therefore increases the potential for muscular strength. This is best done using heavy weights and low reps in the 1-5 rep range.

Low rep training with heavy weights also gives your nervous system an ample workout, something very underused in training. This will lead to increased neural connection with the muscle, better synchronization between motor units, increased activation of the contractile parts and less inhibition by the muscle safety mechanism, the Golgi tendon.

As an avid trainee you are most certainly aware of the difference between Type II and Type I muscle fibers, and know that Type II fibers have the highest potential for hypertrophy. When stimulating these fibers you need to keep them under tension for about 20-60 seconds, whereas the lower spectrum trains the Type II b and the higher the Type II a. So as you can see you need to incorporate heavy weights and low reps as well as higher reps with medium weight to achieve a complete development.

Another thing that increases muscle activation is the stretch shortening cycle and this is also a very underused and misused method in weight training. Let me give you an example: When performing a flye for the chest some people tend to keep their arms straight, which will actually lead to an increased activation of the biceps – which in turn will take away load from the chest! So it is VERY important to keep your arms slightly bent and still during this flye movement. Correctly used the stretch shortening cycle will make your workout even more productive.

You often hear people complaining about not being able to make a body part grow, no matter how hard they try. When you take a closer look at them you often see that one or more muscles in the near region working as agonists are “over” developed, while the targeted muscle itself is lagging. Now the reason for this is likely that the antagonistic muscle has a lower excitation threshold, which is often the case. This means that it will act prior to the other muscles in the movement. To minimize the chance for this happening you could try stretching the more reactive muscle before training in order to inhibit it slightly. After stretching a muscle it will weaken a bit for a short period which in turn will lead to a better activation of the targeted muscle.
You can also stretch the antagonist muscles, the ones doing the opposite motion, to decrease the risk of reciprocal inhibition.

Ok enough of the mumbo jumbo and let’s get down to business and use what we just learned. One way is to begin with a phase of more strength oriented training and to follow it up with a more conventional bodybuilding phase. Or you could mix them up like in the following template. The carry over from the strength oriented set will lead to the possibility to use a heavier weight than you normally would be able to do, thanks to the activation of the nervous system, as stated above.

Before weight workout do the following:

Stretch: Front shoulder, biceps, external rotators, rear shoulder, lats and triceps. You can also stretch these muscles in between sets.

Chest program based on once a week chest training (For people with good recovery it can also be done once every five days):

Each pair of exercises is done as a superset, only with the prescribed rest in between.

A.1. Incline dumbbell press, with a “twist” (when lowering the dumbbell let your forearms slightly fall out to change leverage and put more stress on your pectorals, and avoid extending your arms entirely at the top, to keep tension up.) 3 sets x 2 reps with 90 seconds rest. (When going for hypertrophy you are supposed to have some oxygen debt.)

A.2. Incline flyes, done with cables for maximum tension and range of motion – try to use as much muscle as possible instead of cheating with momentum when moving the weight. 3 sets x 45-50 seconds with 90 seconds rest.

B.1. Flat dumbbell press, see above for performance instructions. 2-3 x 2 with 90 sec rest

B.2. Flat flyes with cables. 2-3 x 45-50s with 90s rest.

Done right this will produce an incredible pump, and some serious soreness the next few days.

You should be aware of the fact that it only takes so long for the body to adapt to any kind of program so you should change it regularly, even if it feels good. For the average trainee I would suggest never to stay with a program for more than 8 times before changing it. If you are more experienced you might even change after 4 times! You ladies out there can use the 8 rule even being more routined, according to my experience a female can stay longer on a program without stagnating as much.

Try this out and feel free to change things around, using the information above.