Art De Vany: Arthur Jones Again

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Arthur Jones Again

October 26, 2005 05:18 PM

Here are some questions regarding Arthur Jones style of training from a reader, Massy.

"I was wondering if you were familiar with the research of Arthur Jones (founder of Nautilus Sports). He spent a lot of money researching optimal fitness and some of his results seem to contradict your recommendations. The most interest are as follows:

1 -- Jones preached that 1 set to failure (seemingly different from your alactic approach) was all anyone needed and that multiple sets was a form of overtraining.

2 -- Jones felt that people do not need to work out for more than 90 minutes or so per week. Moreover, he felt that we should train each muscle group at most 2 times per week (often 1 time will be optimal). This seems to agree with some of your recommendations.

3 -- Jones advocated slow and deliberate speed of movement during each excercise as a way to optimally increase muscle strength, power, and muscle size. The duration should be 2 seconds lifting and 4 seconds of negative resistance. This seems to be very different than your prespription of explosive sets. (Admittedly, Jones' research doesn't seem to focus on the difference between and FT, IT, and ST muscles.) The main reason for the slower cadence is that it produces the same results with lower chance for injury.

I was really curious to hear your thoughts on Jones' approach given your significant research in the field of evolutionary fitness."

My response...

I had a long post on Jones and Mentzer under the title Intermittent Training and Muscle Mass. The post also included a link to download a journal article supporting many of Arthur Jones recommendations on training.

Now, the questions and my thoughts.

1. One set to failure. This works well. But, I don't go to full failure, just a hard rep. You lose form and get hurt going to failure. And you move the weights too slowly to get full muscle contraction.

2. Training just once or twice a week. Again, this is supported by research (see the references in the linked article in the earlier post mentioned). But, it depends on what you want to be able to do in a functional sense. Many muscle groups require endurance rather than strength and they have to be trained more often. Not hard, but good stable contractions that coordinate the muscles.

More training is also warranted when you are trying to reset neural patterns. Train the movement, not the muscle is the saying. This suggests that if you are training for skill, you must do it often and with perfect form. Even Olympic lifters follow this dictum as they strive for perfect form. Other skill sports have similar requirements.

3. Slow, deliberate speed. This is good if you want to be slow. But, most of us want some kind of power or speed strength. But, even if you only want total, brute strength, slow reps is not a good training technique.

Why this is so is because slow movements fail to recruit all the muscles in the movement and may also fail to fire enough FT fibers. You must be able to recruit as much muscle as possible in order to be strong. Bill Kazimeir, former many times Strongest Man winner, developed techniques for recruiting all his muscle fibers to maximize his strength.

Alexiev, the master Olympic lifter of the past, did not train to failure. He trained his muscle recruitment by lifting less than maximal weights at maximum speed. This ensures full recruitment of all muscle fibers. He had perfect form and could do this in safety. You must also practice perfect form if you want to lift more quickly. I use a variant of this technique, first bracing the abdominals and back muscles and then moving smoothly, with acceleration through the movement.

It is safer to use less than max weight and move more quickly than to lift far more slowly, recruiting only a fraction of your muscle fibers, at near max weight.

The negative or lowering phase should be done more slowly as this hits the FT fibers more strongly. But, in many exercises, you cannot lower a weight slowly without stressing your lower back. Cables and rubber bands are better.

Finally, Jones was an advocate for the machines he designed and sold. They were innovative and have their place, but I prefer to work out in a way that challenges my proprioception and balance.

· Evolutionary Fitness

Comments

Posted by: Flower Online at September 12, 2006 4:24 AM

I started training to a hard rep, rather than to failure, three years ago, and have made steady progress ever since.

I'm glad to see someone else with the same experience.

Posted by: Stephen M (Ethesis) at September 1, 2006 9:19 PM

Curious research.

Best regards, Serg

Posted by: Serg at June 5, 2006 4:32 AM

One thought in defense of slow lifting: increasing time under load confers benefits to connective tissue strength. If anyone is interested in pursuing explosive or heavy lifting they would do well to spend time with slow lifting first.

Posted by: Yuneek at November 15, 2005 5:51 PM

While I agree with Audley's post regarding slow training, as the safety and benefts are superb, one should note that none of the high intensity advocates/stars--Arthur Jones, Casey Viator, Ellington Darden, Mike Mentzer--built their physiques on this form of training. In each case, all had been training with daily, sub-max methods prior to alledgedly converting to high intensity training.

Ray Mentzer, brother of Mike, admitted in his last interviews in Ironman magazine that he only used HIT methods sporadically. Casey Viator has made similar comments.

Posted by: Parker at November 4, 2005 8:16 AM

tried the "Power of 10" workout last year, each rep 10 seconds up and 10 seconds down. This book and a similar book "Slow Burn" is a rewrite of Ken Hutchins' SuperSlow training, nothing new in the world of lifting, but a workout style I had not tried, moving slowly and to failure. I had used the explosive rep style you described before the slow workouts, and did like them, but as a personal trainer I like to try all kinds of workouts, so I can tell a client what to possibly expect following a certain protocol. I also found my shoulders were starting to hurt with the explosive style. After trying the superslow, I found my hand speed had increased after several weeks on the program(I am a martial artist). I also had cut back on poundage(which started going back up after a few weeks) and was able to maintain form throughout the set, although maintaining that form often led to the failure to complete the last rep, when that happened I continue to push for 10 more seconds bringing an isometric component to the workout. The problem with this program is safety, which is why Arthur Jones machines may be the best bet if training alone. The books advocate machines for the same reason, but I don't like machines, so I do DB bench presses, I just drop the weights at failure, or use the power rack for squats. Dips, chins, overhead presses and deadlifts work well. Doing this type of workout every 5 to 7 days seems to also work well for me, but I still like to get outdoors for a mountain bike ride or sprints in between workouts. My bodyfat went down when on this program, but I also was watching my diet more carefully. There is an archive article on naturalstrength.com by Drew Israel, a former N.E. Patriot, where he talks about increasing his strength on the super slow after sticking with it for over a year. I am not saying this program is for everyone, or that I will not go back on occasion to the explosive training,(which I did for part of this last summer). One of my classes for personal training(my wife and I attended the University of Southern Maine for a 2 year program), was a weightlifting class with powerlifter Matt Israelson, a personal trainer and a drug free lifter who has done an 800 pound squat in competition. He is a follower of the Westside barbell protocol,which incorporates bands and chains with both heavy and explosive movements. The system if followed correctly, does work. Matt did tell me one change he made to the system was cutting back his clients workouts from 4 to 3 days a week. He said nearly all of his trainees reported feeling better and stronger with the cutback. I feel if done properly, many programs can be very productive, but sometimes it comes down to what works for you. The common theme to success seems to be as you have stated more than once, do not overtrain, and train with intensity.

Posted by: Audley at October 27, 2005 8:23 AM

Arthur Jones Again

October 26, 2005 05:18 PM

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