Applied Exercise Physiology: Fluid Program Design
No training program ever goes exactly as written. With that in mind, we can apply our knowledge of exercise physiology in order to adapt to daily fluctuations in training motivation, available equipment, rolling societal lockdowns, or any number to unforeseen barriers to the “plan”. In all reality, it is very possible to derive value from working out in almost any circumstance – provided your desire to problem solve is strong enough.
To summarize the key points from the previous blog posts:
The primary driving force in stimulating muscle growth is the ability to generate sufficient mechanical tension. Mechanical tension is the overall degree of effort any given muscle must exert in order to complete the volume of exercise in any given set or workout.
There are other resistance training stimuli that may also contribute to muscle growth, but really, can be viewed as alternative methods of intensifying exercise to generate the aforementioned mechanical tension.
These are metabolic stress and muscle damage.
Mechanical tension, or “load-induced” mechanical tension to be specific, would be forcing the most amount of muscle fibres possible to be used and exhausted under sheer necessity of the weight being heavy. The majority of fibres must be recruited and exhausted to complete that task due to the loading be relatively close to the maximum strength of any given muscle group. This is all under the pretense that adequate technique is maintained, no heaving, and minimal synergy from other muscle groups during the exercise.
In absence of load-induced mechanical tension, you can also stimulate a muscle through “repetition-induced” mechanical tension – or metabolic stress. This is where you are lifting a moderate weight for enough repetitions (typically 10+) per set. The accumulation of biproducts from the energy demands of extending your set to a larger number of repetitions temporarily “turns off” some of the active muscle fibres – thereby forcing intensification on that muscle group due to less fibres being actively available to contribute to the demands you’re imposing upon them.
Finally, we can generate mechanical tension within an active muscle group by incurring damage to the exercising fibres. This typically occurs throughout all workouts to some extent by net accumulation of work over the course of the day; however, we can also select exercises and training parameters to specifically target this if needed. Typically, medium-to-higher repetition eccentric (lengthening or stretch-based) exercises will emphasize this effect.
Now, to apply this knowledge.
If there is an ideal training environment (say, a fully equipped gym), prioritize load-induced mechanical tension, then metabolic stress (repetition-induced mechanical tension), then limited amounts of muscle damage. This is really straight-forward.
If there is a less than ideal training environment, for example, limited weight or machines, the priority of exercise shifts with what is available. We would focus on generating mechanical tension through a greater emphasis on metabolic stress and a slightly larger degree of muscle damaging exercises than we would typically allow for in a full gym. Total sets and repetitions would be higher as the “load-induced” mechanical tension the trainee can produce is limited by their ability to maximally contract their own muscle during each repetition, in absence of a weight requiring them to do so. Light the muscle on fire before tearing it apart.
In the least ideal situation for muscle growth, self-isolation with no equipment, the priority shifts again to tailoring exercise selection and tempo to produce metabolic stress through almost exclusively muscle damage. This would be slow, eccentrically emphasized exercises. For example, high-repetition squats with a 3 second controlled descent, lunges, any Romanian deadlift variety etc. To really generate mechanical tension, emphasize the concentric contraction for a solid 1-2 seconds each repetition to ensure you are maximally contracting. It can be a very effective, exhausting, workout – but it requires consistent mindfulness of action. On top of all of that, we’ll still be fighting to make large muscle gaining progress due to the amount of muscle damage that is married to this style of training. A more reasonable expectation would be to use this as maintenance method for a short period of time.
Disclaimer #1: While many of these training concepts overlap between several goals, this outline is designed specifically with muscle growth or maintenance in mind.
Disclaimer #2: This is not the only way to train. This is simply one method of understanding training and organizing workouts that I’ve found success with over my career.
Yes, there will be fully explained templated examples.
Best,
Eric