Below is a sample email from my Axe Fat Mailing List.

Previously I have covered two of the most important principles of training:

1) Progressive overload - The Golden Rule of Axe Fat

2) Time Under Tension

To quickly recap:

Progressive Overloand - the constant increase of demand on the body through increased “work”, whether that be more reps, more weight, more sets or less rest between set - something needs to get harder with each session.

Time Under Tension - this is the amount of time the muscles are working for. It's all very well smashing out fast reps but growth comes from stimulus on the muscle. Therefore the longer you work the muscle for, the better it is. I previously recommended the tempo of 2:1 for starting out with. That’s 2 seconds for the eccentric part of the lift (the easy bit) and 1 second for the concentric part of the lift - the hard bit

So today, we are looking at the principle of “Technique”.

If you are pushing to failure (which you should be), you will no doubt start to notice that failure is not possible without compromising the technique or "exercise form".

It should go without saying that technique is of prime importance.

So how are we going to keep perfect exercise form when we are pushing to failure? — Good Question.

The short answer is - We can’t,  it’s not possible to keep perfect form when pushing to failure.

However, there is normally a continuum of declining form which is not perfect but still ok.

Now clearly this differs from person to person and exercise to exercise.

But as a rule of thumb, I am generally happy with 2-3 reps of sub optimal form at the very end of the set.

If you can’t complete 75% of the reps with perfect form then the weight is too heavy.

Over time, you will become more aware of the difference between "supporting muscle helping” vs “all out cheating” using momentum and completely different muscle groups.

For those of you already training with me or the team, you can rest assure that we are doing our best to choose
the resistance is that is both safe and effective.

In your next session, you should be thinking about:

1) Making it more difficult than last time

2) 2:1 Tempo, likely to to mean = slower than normal

3) Perfect form for at least 75% of the set.

Happy lifting

Alan

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