single or double arm side laterals?

[skywalk]

Is there any benefit to doing single arm side laterals, as opposed to both arms at the same time?

I find I can lift more weight with 1 arm, even with strict form, but when I go do both arms, I have to decrease the weight.

I guess more traps is involved in single arm? but from a bodybuilding perspective, wouldn't more weight mean greater stimulus for growth (if all other things are equal and stay the same)

eg. for 15 reps, I usually handle 35's, but for single arm, I have gone up to 55's. that's 20lbs difference, which for delts is quite staggering for me.

 

[Mr. Joe]

Sorry no one has replied man, I'm sure you've figured out what you prefer by now. As far as hypertrophy is concerned it doesn't matter as long as you're not cheating yourself. A good test is drop the weight 50% and do a warm up set with a 2-1-4 second cadence. 2 seconds up, 1 second pause, 4 seconds down. If you can maintain the same full range of motion at your workout set weight, then go with which ever you prefer. However, if you find you have to swing your arm and the drop it to do the extra weight then best back off. Form is everything. Only other consideration is time, always takes twice as long to do each arm separately for an exercise.

 

[Donzi]

Mix it up.. Keep the Muscle Guessing and it will Grow more opposed to a pattern

 

[Mr. Joe]

That's a double edged sword though. Yes, your muscles will become accustomed to a lift after a while, however, that is a part of the adaptation process. You don't want to change exercises too frequently because your muscles won't have adequate time to adapt and thus hypertrophy. 2-3 months per exercise regimen is recommended before switching exercises.

 

[Pericles]

Feel is critical. Some exercises require strict form, but side laterals is not one of them. The key is to make a mind/muscle connection an feel the muscle.

I rarely see people doing anything that will actually build side and rear delts. Those that have strict form use 20 lbs, and those using heavier weights do not get the "feel". Look around at pretty much any gym, and notice that most guys have plenty of development in front shoulder, but have hardly any muscle on side/rear delts.

Here is what I do:" On chest chest and tri day I do /front/middle shoulder. I had shoulder surgery a while back and am looking at replacement if I am not careful.

For front shoulder after chest, I just do 2 drop sets of shoulder presses on a machine.

I then go directly to laterals. I close my eyes for a moment and make the mental connection to my side delts. I use 50 lb dumbbells and do 8 reps w/ fairly strict form. I tip my pinkys up slightly, and lift my chest up high after each rep. After 8, I need to cheat a bit to get more reps. However I am still "feeling" the movement. I also will jump up and down between reps to generate more intensity. It looks weird, but I pretty much have the best shoulders of anyone in the gym, including a friend who has been on 2k mg of gear for 5 years straight. In addition to jumping up and down, I may also use rest-pause. In any event, I try and get get 14 reps for 3 sets. Sometimes I only get 11-12 reps but I go hard.

For rear belts, after training back I bend over at the waist and make sure I feel the movement. I use 50 lbs again. I also do a rotater cuff cable movement that hits the rear delts. Again I shoot for 14 reps.

The biggest mistake I see is that most guys at the gym will come in and bench for a ton of sets, do overhead presses and no side or rear delt work. They look like shit from the side or rear. Of course they don't see that when they look in the mirror, which is partially to blame.

On each of these exercises I only do 3 sets, but they are all out sets.

 

[Pericles]

That's a double edged sword though. Yes, your muscles will become accustomed to a lift after a while, however, that is a part of the adaptation process. You don't want to change exercises too frequently because your muscles won't have adequate time to adapt and thus hypertrophy. 2-3 months per exercise regimen is recommended before switching exercises.

Agreed. If you are getting stronger, either increasing weight or reps w/ the same weight, you are mixing it up. I only change exercises once every 6 months.

For 3 months if I am on gear, I get stronger every week. Once off the gear, I reduce training volume but try and maintain the gains.

 

[Mr. Joe]

Pericles, I'd like to hear your opinions on differences in training volume on/off gear. I've looked for a thread on this, but maybe I just missed it. Thanks.

 

[Pericles]

Pericles, I'd like to hear your opinions on differences in training volume on/off gear. I've looked for a thread on this, but maybe I just missed it. Thanks.

Studies have shown that the 5 rep range is best for increasing natural test production.

So, you should be going heavy on basic exercises as much as possible. Try to keep training w/ the same weights. Be very careful, as you are very prone to injuries during this period. Also, you are going to get a cortisol spike.

Consequently, you want to go heavy, while keeping sets down. Warm up and do 2 working sets for each exercise (no more). How often are you hitting a body part? If more than once a week, then move to once a week.

Under no condition should you be in the gym for more than an hour.

 

[Mr. Joe]

Currently, I do a three day basic powerlifting split, bench/squat/deadlift days with auxiliary exercises. I do a warm up set on cold muscles then 1 to 2 working sets depending on the day. I workout a muscle group ideally twice a week (3 days on, 1 day off) at a given intensity level. I start a 12 RM week 1, then 10... down to 6 RM. The reason I do 1 to 2 working sets is because I alternate each exercise. If day 1 at 10RM, I do 1 working set on that exercise and then 2 on the next exercise alternating back and forth, then switch on day 2 at the same intensity.

I'm usually in the gym approximately an hour. I prefer to exercise a muscle twice a week because it gives me a second chance to get the weight right. I'm new to lifting (6-months to 1 year) so my strength gains are pretty rapid. A good example is my triceps. I just calculated my 6 RM on triceps pulldown a couple days ago and it might as well have been a warm-up set, I ended up increasing the weight 30 lbs and still managed 10 reps with 2-1-4 cadence and full extension. That example is pretty atypical, but that extra workout at the same intensity level each week helps imo. I'm increasing weight literally every time I go into the gym and each cycle I can do more weight at a given intensity level.

 

[Pericles]

Twice a week is too much, muscle grows when you are eating, resting. Hit a muscle once every 6-7 days.

 

[Mr. Joe]

Rhea et. al. 2003 reports maximum strength gains in untrained individuals with frequency of 3x/week/muscle group and 2x/week in trained individuals. See figure 2 and discussion in the attachment.

 

[Pericles]

Rhea et. al. 2003 reports maximum strength gains in untrained individuals with frequency of 3x/week/muscle group and 2x/week in trained individuals. See figure 2 and discussion in the attachment.

If you already knew of this study, why are you asking me my opinion? Very few pros hit a muscle more than once every 5-7 days.

Looking at the abstract, it was a meta analysis. That means it was a study of other studies. Having taught stats in college, I can tell you there are many BS theories that creative researchers can produce. The phenomenon is known as garbage in, garbage out. Also, participants were training at 60% intensity, but this was in relation to their 1rm max, and they had no weight training background. So what you have is an analysis of an analysis of how untrained (IE sedentary) people get stronger sleepwalking through hitting a body part 3 time a week.

The study really has nothing to say about how hard core bodybuilders can best get gains. There are a few exceptions, like Arnold, but most pros do not hit a body part that often.

A better study would take 100 subjects w/ training background. Divide them into 3 groups, one hits a bp once a week, the other twice, and the other 3 times.

 

[Mr. Joe]

I agree, that would be a good study. And this article is a meta-analysis of such studies. However, the point of the their study was broader in scope.

"The purpose of this investigation was to identify a quantitative dose-response relationship for strength development by calculating the magnitude of gains elicited by various levels of training intensity, frequency, and volume, thus clarifying the effort to benefit ratio."

The analysis was done using studies of both untrained and trained individuals and has everything to do with how to achieve the best gains as efficiently as possible. For trained individuals, they recommend mean intensity of 80% 1RM, volume at 4 sets/muscle group/training session with a frequency of 2 training sessions/muscle group/week.

I'm aware that most bodybuilders don't prescribe to that routine. I feel I should clarify my original question. What differences do you make in your routine in terms of volume, frequency, and intensity while on gear vs off gear? My understanding is that many individuals keep the frequency at 1 training session/week regardless and increase either volume or intensity or both while on AAS. I am interested in the reasoning behind that. It seems to me that because AAS reduce recovery time then frequency can be moderately increased. Increased frequency, along with intensity while keeping volume relatively low should achieve maximal gains.

I appreciate your feedback.

 

[mac111]

that won't last for ever, x2 is too much and you'll hit the wall eventually. rm's count on heavy compounds, no need to fart around calculating them on assistant exercises, such as tri pushdowns. hit your compounds hard and heavy in periodised 6wk bursts and 'feel' assistant exercise on a session by session account.

never devalue time off, i haven't trained since Dec 22nd, im 12lbs up as of today and look fuller and stronger than i have in a while. i have found this to be consistently the case on three different occasions in the past two years and intend on 10-14 days off every 12wks from now on.

 

[Mr. Joe]

never devalue time off, i haven't trained since Dec 22nd, im 12lbs up as of today and look fuller and stronger than i have in a while. i have found this to be consistently the case on three different occasions in the past two years and intend on 10-14 days off every 12wks from now on.

I think there is possibly some truth to this. Below is an abstract to a study that compared 6 weeks on/3 weeks off vs 24 weeks of continuous training in young untrained (assumed) men. They found no significant difference in gains tested after 24 weeks. I would like to see more research in this area such as use of trained individuals and different lengths of time off as well a training program length are a few variables I think would be beneficial. At the least, this suggests it's okay to take a few weeks off after at least six weeks of training without fear of losing gains (in untrained individuals).

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23053130

On the contrary, my argument refers to during a training period of say 6 to 12 weeks. I'm not arguing that individuals who train a muscle group 1 training session/week aren't gaining muscle. I'm just not convinced that is the most effective frequency. In my previous post I outlined what to my knowledge the literature supports to be the most effective. I also posted a new thread (Program Training Principles) with a good, fairly recent, review of resistance training program design principles.

I agree with you that you can't go all out all of the time without burning out quickly, but the trade off is volume imo. I think guys waste a lot of time doing too many sets and too many different exercises for one muscle group when the majority (over 95%) of gains are from the first 2-4 working sets per muscle group (as opposed to per exercise). I think high volume is necessary for individuals who only train a muscle group 1 per week, but if you drop that volume and increase the frequency to 2 per week you should see improvement.

 

[mac111]

I think there is possibly some truth to this. Below is an abstract to a study that compared 6 weeks on/3 weeks off vs 24 weeks of continuous training in young untrained (assumed) men. They found no significant difference in gains tested after 24 weeks. I would like to see more research in this area such as use of trained individuals and different lengths of time off as well a training program length are a few variables I think would be beneficial. At the least, this suggests it's okay to take a few weeks off after at least six weeks of training without fear of losing gains (in untrained individuals).

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23053130

On the contrary, my argument refers to during a training period of say 6 to 12 weeks. I'm not arguing that individuals who train a muscle group 1 training session/week aren't gaining muscle. I'm just not convinced that is the most effective frequency. In my previous post I outlined what to my knowledge the literature supports to be the most effective. I also posted a new thread (Program Training Principles) with a good, fairly recent, review of resistance training program design principles.

I agree with you that you can't go all out all of the time without burning out quickly, but the trade off is volume imo. I think guys waste a lot of time doing too many sets and too many different exercises for one muscle group when the majority (over 95%) of gains are from the first 2-4 working sets per muscle group (as opposed to per exercise). I think high volume is necessary for individuals who only train a muscle group 1 per week, but if you drop that volume and increase the frequency to 2 per week you should see improvement.

most of us, me included, suffer from the 'i'll get small if stop for a while' syndrome. in reality all we do by continuously hammering it out, is cause damage to connective tissues and halt or progress. be careful on connect tissues, once you give them too much stick, you arent gona be fit for some exercises

 

[JimStevens]

most of us, me included, suffer from the 'i'll get small if stop for a while' syndrome. in reality all we do by continuously hammering it out, is cause damage to connective tissues and halt or progress. be careful on connect tissues, once you give them too much stick, you arent gona be fit for some exercises

This is very true. The old," I wish I knew then what I know now." holds so true!

 

[mac111]

This is very true. The old," I wish I knew then what I know now." holds so true!

certainly does, im expecting shoulder surgery in the next 2-3mths, and facing 8wks out in a sling and long rehab back in

 

[Mr. Joe]

certainly does, im expecting shoulder surgery in the next 2-3mths, and facing 8wks out in a sling and long rehab back in

Well, for what it's worth, I plan to learn from your mistakes.