Lots of Advanced Technique Suggestions.

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I consider this my best section. I fully describe the many advanced techniques I use to make each and every set count! Basically when your done a set, even a hard set, you still haven't attacked every muscle fiber possible. By using these tcehniques, you work beyond that hard set and really challenge your muscles to new levels. I will continully update this section with new ideas or ways to challenge your muscles I don't do high-set protocols because I feel they don't work the muscles hard enough to make your body adapt. They also can lead muscles to overtraining because they work your muscles for WAY too long. These techniques allow you to go past the failure you reach on each set and tap into even more muscle. Use these techniques one only one or two exercises a workout because anymore will overtrain your muscles. Here are the principles:

Forced Reps This technique requires the aid of your traning partner. You can apply this technique to basically any upper body movement, but it is too hard to do for legs. Basically when you can't churn out one more rep of any exercise, your partner helps you get it up or pull it down just enough to allow you to get a few more reps. With this technique you can truly feel the muscles burn.

Drop Sets This is without a doubt my favorite advanced principle or technique. When your you finish your last grueling rep of an exercise, you immediately bring down the weights a little bit. You will find that you can do more weights at his weight setting, but you still feel the burn from your previously heavy set. It is important that when you use this principle that you immediately do the next lighter set right after your heavy set. This is because during that set you are still recruiting msucle fibers. If you rest before going lighter, you will only hit the same fibers you just hit and you won't recruit new ones. You will also have sinced gained your strength back and the lighter weight won't be a challenge.

Partial Reps We all know that the best way to do an exercise is to go through the full range of motion. Well, we also know that your stronger in partial movements also. The point of this principle is to do partial reps when you can no longer do full range of motion reps. You will have to work through the intense burn on this one. The point, again, is that your working the muscles much, much harder than your used to and therefore your body will respond with more muscle because it is a survival mechanism. Don't get into the trap though of ONLY using partial reps to try to lift heavier weights. Exercising with full range of motions is nessecary to prevent injury, fully develop muscles, and increase flexibility.

Negative Reps On any exercise, the part of the exrcise where your msucle belly get longer and stretches is called the negative part. If you notice, the negative part of the exercise is much easier than the positive. The strategy behind this principle is that after you can no longer do a full range of motion positive rep, you have your training partner lift the weight and you start doing negative reps. The demand this creates on your muscles is soo challenging that overuse of this principle will probably kill you (LOL). Not really, but use sparingly because it will be too hard on your msucles if they are always trying to recover from such an intense technique.

Isotension This is definitely a great technique to work your muscles after a hard set. After you finish that last grueling, horrible, aching, terrifying (I'm getting a bit overbored now) rep, you tense your working muscle several times for approximately 8-10 seconds. This is one way to really hammer those remaining, annoying fibers that can be pumped into even more growth!

21's This is basically the combination of partial reps and full range reps into one grueling set. This principle is truly best to use on a set of barbell curls. First you perform 7 reps in the lower range of motion, then 7 reps in upper range of motion, and then 7 horrible reps using the full range of motion. The flush of lactic acid will come so quickly that your will to succeed with be tested. It doesn't matter how many reps you use, all that mattered was that you completed it! Rest-Pause This principle allows you to use rest to churn out even more reps. When you can't possibly get another rep in a certain exercise, you give up for just the moment. Rack the weight, put it on the ground, etc. and wait for about 5-10 seconds. Then pick up the weight, and grind out a few more reps. Don't wait any longer than 10 seconds because it takes away from the intensity. It also targets the fibers that were already used again, taking away from your other sets and not engulfing the new fibers that weren't hit from your set before the rest-pause principle was used.

Supersets This principle is used universally by most bodybuilders. Some use supersets without even knowing it. Basically it is when you do 2 sets of two different exercises in a row. You can do this three different ways. The first is to combine two exercises for one muscle group. This will really build up the lactic acid and prone you to new growth. The second way is to work to totally unrelated muscle groups after another, like bench press and bicep curls. Some trainees do this to save time, others do this to keep their heart rate up and get a cardiovascular workout in addition to a muscular workout. Working sets in rapid succession works your aerobic systems hard also. The third way is to train antagonistic muscle groups right after each other. Every muscle group has a "reciprocal". For chest it is back, for biceps it is triceps, for abs it is lower back. By training these muscles together, you effectively stretch one muscle group while working the other. You also can kind of use them as "cushions" for your opposite muscle, and use them to kind of propel your other msucle. It is hard to explain, but you will know what I mean when you try it.