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I was talking to a guy who trains a bit differently to the norm about carb backloading. He wants to get more shredded.He does cardio 5-6 days per week and only does heavy resistance training infrequently and wondered if it would work for him.Now, he trains with heavy weights infrequently but he's visibly growing in size and strength all the time. He just believes in hitting it hard, using full range and partials with double the weight, letting himself grow and not coming back until he's fully recovered and ready to go heavier and harder again.He also spaces the workouts out farther and farther over time, because he says he needs more time with heavier weights to go up every time, so he's only training once every two weeks now.I told him that carb backloading's main premise was eating carbs in the evening and night and that since his overall training volume is still high because he does cardio a lot (intervals plus steady state, half in half) he should still get great fat loss and body composition results.Is that correct?
It depends, CBL won't work well with folks just doing Cardio. Regardless if he's training with weights (heavy?) infrequently. If he lifts weights a bit more, and cut back on the cardio I'm sure he'll see better progress. HOWEVER you can structure training around or with some forms of cardio.
He trains very heavy when he does resistance training. Partial reps are double the weight on the bar, and that is after his full range sets with heavy weight as well.There's no doubt his training is working for building strength and muscle.I don't know how it makes sense that CBL would not work when his training volume is still high. Surely there is a need for carbs when very active?Also, Keifer says CBL often works even with the inactive because there is partitioning in the evening and night regardless of activity. The carbs have to go somewhere and he says, based on observation there appears to be partitioning to muscle later in the day and still very little in fat. He doesn't have studies on that yet, but he said it in a podcast on youtube.I could understand if my friends routine would work slower or if you may have to be more careful with the backloads, but for it not to work, I find that hard to grasp. Not saying you are wrong either.
It will work, he will just have to control calories more and probably will not be able to eat as many carbs because depending on the cardio he does on a given day he may not be depleting much glycogen. Also, volume is a huge factor and strength and hypertrophy, so at some point your friend will make very little progress in either without actually training more.
He trains very heavy when he does resistance training. Partial reps are double the weight on the bar, and that is after his full range sets with heavy weight as well.There's no doubt his training is working for building strength and muscle.I don't know how it makes sense that CBL would not work when his training volume is still high. Surely there is a need for carbs when very active?Also, Keifer says CBL often works even with the inactive because there is partitioning in the evening and night regardless of activity. The carbs have to go somewhere and he says, based on observation there appears to be partitioning to muscle later in the day and still very little in fat. He doesn't have studies on that yet, but he said it in a podcast on youtube.I could understand if my friends routine would work slower or if you may have to be more careful with the backloads, but for it not to work, I find that hard to grasp. Not saying you are wrong either.
I never said it would not work, I said not very well. Again like I said before, it can be structure around training with cardio, just everything needs to be structure accordingly. Like Trevor pretty much said.
It will work, he will just have to control calories more and probably will not be able to eat as many carbs because depending on the cardio he does on a given day he may not be depleting much glycogen. Also, volume is a huge factor and strength and hypertrophy, so at some point your friend will make very little progress in either without actually training more.
That's what I think regarding his fat loss.With the strength and hypertrophy, some dudes have done great with infrequent training: Mike Mentzer, Pete Sisco and all the people that swear by their methods. However, I accept it might not be optimal.It might be a better method to maximise endurance though, because you won't be training the anaerobic reserve so much. It might give you the best of both worlds if you are leaning more on the needing endurance side of things.
It will work, he will just have to control calories more and probably will not be able to eat as many carbs because depending on the cardio he does on a given day he may not be depleting much glycogen. Also, volume is a huge factor and strength and hypertrophy, so at some point your friend will make very little progress in either without actually training more.
That's what I think regarding his fat loss.With the strength and hypertrophy, some dudes have done great with infrequent training: Mike Mentzer, Pete Sisco and all the people that swear by their methods. However, I accept it might not be optimal.It might be a better method to maximise endurance though, because you won't be training the anaerobic reserve so much. It might give you the best of both worlds if you are leaning more on the needing endurance side of things.
I think what your buddy is doing can totally work from a fat loss perspective.Now as far as the efficacy of the training program, it depends on his goals. I think infrequent, high intensity training can work really well for strength. Hypertrophy is a different story though. A couple guys have used HIT successfully (like the guys you mentioned), but most people are not successful with it. They just burn out. Also if you are training that style, you better be 100% when it's time to train or else you are going to get no where.Also I am not a fan of partials unless you are a competitive lifter. I don't see any reason to use them otherwise.
He just believes in hitting it hard, using full range and partials with double the weight, letting himself grow and not coming back until he's fully recovered and ready to go heavier and harder again.He also spaces the workouts out farther and farther over time, because he says he needs more time with heavier weights to go up every time, so he's only training once every two weeks now.
Recovery is most likely the key to his success, in spite of the cardio. It's hard for most folks to wait the proper recovery time after heavy lifting, because they feel like they're slacking if they don't hit the gym several times a week.My two cents.
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It will work, he will just have to control calories more and probably will not be able to eat as many carbs because depending on the cardio he does on a given day he may not be depleting much glycogen. Also, volume is a huge factor and strength and hypertrophy, so at some point your friend will make very little progress in either without actually training more.
That's what I think regarding his fat loss.With the strength and hypertrophy, some dudes have done great with infrequent training: Mike Mentzer, Pete Sisco and all the people that swear by their methods. However, I accept it might not be optimal.It might be a better method to maximise endurance though, because you won't be training the anaerobic reserve so much. It might give you the best of both worlds if you are leaning more on the needing endurance side of things.
I think what your buddy is doing can totally work from a fat loss perspective.Now as far as the efficacy of the training program, it depends on his goals. I think infrequent, high intensity training can work really well for strength. Hypertrophy is a different story though. A couple guys have used HIT successfully (like the guys you mentioned), but most people are not successful with it. They just burn out. Also if you are training that style, you better be 100% when it's time to train or else you are going to get no where.Also I am not a fan of partials unless you are a competitive lifter. I don't see any reason to use them otherwise.
It all depends how you do it Ibo. Most people only use partials for sticking points, which is also good, but misses the big benefit of doing them.Partials in the strong range in my experience give muscular gains like nothing else. You are using double the weight and therefore the tension and contractions are like nothing else I've felt. The whole muscle is recruited to lift that giant weight. And they progress my full range training far quicker as well.But as with anything it will come down to program design. Any type of program has to be well designed to work.Infrequent partials have to be spaced out further and further or burn out happens. If you are doing a half or full body session the CNS load of these lifts is enormous. Some of Pete Sisco's more advanced students are training once every 2 months! Not sure you have to go that far to avoid burn out, but that's all they need to progress at the same rate as advanced lifters.I'm experimenting with a split routine at the moment of one full range set for 8-12 reps to failure or close and then one partials set in strongest range 3-4 inches to lockout with double (or so) the weight after that for 40 seconds on, 40 seconds rest repeated 4 times. Each 40 second set is to failure and sometimes you can only get to 30 seconds.I do this 6 days per week on a different muscle group per day. As of 3 weeks this is giving fantastic results and it progressed my full range training by about 50% more than normal. I can't say if I'll be able to keep it up, but so far no issue at all. Just plenty of strength and size progress.If I burn out I'll back off for a month to strength training 5 reps in the full range and isometric hold in the strong range with a massive weight.Along with 4 cardio sessions per weight and carb backloading I'm still losing fat as well, though not very quickly.
Yea I'm going to have to disagree with you on partials being good for muscle growth. While you are using more weight on the bar, that doesn't put more tension on the muscle because your leverages are better. What matters is the amount of torque you are applying to the joint of interest.There is a reason why bodybuilders prefer full ROM (in most cases), it works better.
Yea I'm going to have to disagree with you on partials being good for muscle growth. While you are using more weight on the bar, that doesn't put more tension on the muscle because your leverages are better. What matters is the amount of torque you are applying to the joint of interest.There is a reason why bodybuilders prefer full ROM (in most cases), it works better.
I don't understand that. The amount of torque you are putting on a joint is not putting pressure on the muscle, it is putting it on the lever or the joint.More weight makes more contraction on the muscle, because its higher resistance, and you get more weight from taking out the weaker leverage points.I also like full range training, because it adds functional strength as well and works the joints (the lever) more.That's what makes sense to me anyway and that's my experience with it too.But I'm always open to new ideas and viewpoints.My view on most bodybuilders not doing partials is that most of them don't carbbackload either. It doesn't necessarily make it the best way.Plus, if you do partials too much you do burn out, and you have to do far less sets per month. If you train infrequently you also lose pump (so you still need to do ballistics or some form of resistance, even fairly low, a few times per week to look jacked). I also think bodybuilders love spending hours in the gym and in that case full range with more volume will suit great.Maybe, partials very infrequently and full range 3 times per week is possibly an optimal method. Or a split that has both everyday.Or maybe partials impede an optimal routine or make no difference long term, I would have to consider that as well.
Yea I'm going to have to disagree with you on partials being good for muscle growth. While you are using more weight on the bar, that doesn't put more tension on the muscle because your leverages are better. What matters is the amount of torque you are applying to the joint of interest.There is a reason why bodybuilders prefer full ROM (in most cases), it works better.
I don't understand that. The amount of torque you are putting on a joint is not putting pressure on the muscle, it is putting it on the lever or the joint.More weight makes more contraction on the muscle, because its higher resistance, and you get more weight from taking out the weaker leverage points.I also like full range training, because it adds functional strength as well and works the joints (the lever) more.That's what makes sense to me anyway and that's my experience with it too.But I'm always open to new ideas and viewpoints.My view on most bodybuilders not doing partials is that most of them don't carbbackload either. It doesn't necessarily make it the best way.Plus, if you do partials too much you do burn out, and you have to do far less sets per month. If you train infrequently you also lose pump (so you still need to do ballistics or some form of resistance, even fairly low, a few times per week to look jacked). I also think bodybuilders love spending hours in the gym and in that case full range with more volume will suit great.Maybe, partials very infrequently and full range 3 times per week is possibly an optimal method. Or a split that has both everyday.Or maybe partials impede an optimal routine or make no difference long term, that would have to be considered as well.
The muscles are what is doing the work, not the joints. And any sort of human movement, any resistance exercise, is just flexion or extension of one or more joints. Hardest part of any exercise is where there is the most torque on the joint. That is where the muscle has to work the hardest. Lets take a look at hip extension. There are three main types of hip extension exercises: the good morning, the 45 degree back raise, and the horinzontal back raise. Here they are:
In the good morning, peak hip torque occurs at 90 degrees. That is the hardest part of the exercise. In the 45 degree back raise, peak hip torque occurs at 135 degrees. That is the hardest part of the exercise.In the horizontal back raise, peak hip toque occurs at 180 degrees.. That is the hardest part of the exercise.Here's a graph summarizing this:
Let's say you want to do partials with the good morning. The reason you can do more weight in the top range of motion is because a given weight is producing less toque on the hip joint. Therefore to make the partial challenging, you must increase the weight to increase the torque. While that's all good, you can't do the as physical work (which is really what volume is) in the same amount of time. You just now made your training more inefficient.Instead of doing good morning partials, a better option would be to use the horizontal back extension exercise that place peak torque on that part of the range of motion. You'd be doing more muscular work in less time.For multijoint exercises, bands and chains can accomplish the same thing.Your theory sounds good Ibo, but so does mine.All I can say is I do better when using partials. I know because I log it all. And why do they require more recovery if they are not stimulating the CNS, hormones and muscles more?When I started partials there were days when I could barely walk out of the gym and literally could not swing a golf club properly for days. Then I'd get growth spurts I'd never gotten from full range training. I've adapted so I don't get badly sore now, but they still give me more stimulation and results than any other heavy resistance training.These are the reasons I believe in the partials theory over other ones.It's be great if there was a study done on this and regular training to see what the effects were.
Your theory sounds good Ibo, but so does mine.All I can say is I do better when using partials. I know because I log it all. And why do they require more recovery if they are not stimulating the CNS, hormones and muscles more?When I started partials there were days when I could barely walk out of the gym and literally could not swing a golf club properly for days. Then I'd get growth spurts I'd never gotten from full range training. I've adapted so I don't get badly sore now, but they still give me more stimulation and results than any other heavy resistance training.These are the reasons I believe in the partials theory over other ones.It's be great if there was a study done on this and regular training to see what the effects were.
There has been many studies on partial ROM exercises and full ROM. I can't tell you how many times I've read about half squats vs full squats.
Your theory sounds good Ibo, but so does mine.All I can say is I do better when using partials. I know because I log it all. And why do they require more recovery if they are not stimulating the CNS, hormones and muscles more?When I started partials there were days when I could barely walk out of the gym and literally could not swing a golf club properly for days. Then I'd get growth spurts I'd never gotten from full range training. I've adapted so I don't get badly sore now, but they still give me more stimulation and results than any other heavy resistance training.These are the reasons I believe in the partials theory over other ones.It's be great if there was a study done on this and regular training to see what the effects were.
There has been many studies on partial ROM exercises and full ROM. I can't tell you how many times I've read about half squats vs full squats.
What did they say? And what was the context?There are other factors as well, like the way injuries with weights nearly always happen in the weaker ranges because that is where the leverage is inefficient, the muscle is stretched, not nearly as contracted, weaker and it puts great pressure on the tendons and ligaments to step in.I'm not against full range training, I think it is excellent and necessary as well, but I think my results tell me regular training can be bettered with partials in some regards as well.I mean instinctively when you flex a muscle you squeeze it up, that's where you get the best contraction and full use of the muscle, no?
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