Unlock Muscle Growth in Midlife: The Power of Stepping Loads"
As men in midlife, building and maintaining muscle becomes crucial not just for looking and feeling good, but also for long-term health and longevity. Muscle mass plays a key role in supporting weight loss, improving metabolic health, and maintaining overall vitality. A powerful yet simple tool for muscle building is the concept of stepping loads—a structured approach to progressively increasing the weight you lift, which forces your muscles to adapt, grow stronger, and support better health outcomes.
Emphasising Eccentric Training Phase
A training phase focusing on eccentric training is one of the most productive ways to build strength, increase lean muscle, prevent injury, and even improve flexibility.
The saying, "I'm going to the gym to lift some weights to gain strength and size”, should be "I'm going to the gym to lower some weights to gain strength and size” because the eccentric phase delivers better results.
I've just completed a phase of 5/4/3/2/1 strength, and now I will move into a new phase of emphasising eccentrics. I'll share my new strength program at the end of this post.
Specific strength qualities for unlocking gymnastics skills. Part 4: Strength Endurance
Being strong can solve a lot of problems.
As we age, it’s become significantly harder to build and maintain strength and lean muscle mass.
So while we're young, fit and capable, it makes sense to train for strength.
Strength and lean muscle mass give us independence and freedom, and that’s why strength training is one of the most beneficial things we can do to increase our healthspan.
But, the biggest problem with training strength endurance is its negative impact on strength.
It's a common thing. People fall into the trap of thinking more volume equals better results. But it’s a lie.
This is a BIG deal because we often see callisthenics and bodyweight enthusiasts pumping out high volumes of pull-ups, push-ups, rows and more. So many wasted reps!
It doesn't make sense because it's detrimental to the goal of building strength and mastering our body weight.
Specific strength qualities for unlocking gymnastics skills. Part 3 : Functional Hypertrophy.
To succeed at gymnastics strength training, you need to build strength and size. Most bodyweight programs focus on high volumes of work, which doesn’t deliver the adaptations we need to succeed.
If your goals are to unlock gymnastic skills, you will want to explore low-volume, high-intensity training methods that help you build strength.
This is where functional hypertrophy can be helpful.
Specific strength qualities for unlocking gymnastics skills. Part 2: Hypertrophy
Do you want to build lean muscle, shred body fat, tone up, and increase strength while also working on your gymnastic skills?
If so, you’ve come to the right place.
Welcome to part two of the specific strength qualities for unlocking gymnastic skills series.
Today's discussion is about hypertrophy strength.
Specific strength qualities for unlocking gymnastics skills. Part 1 : Relative Strength.
To unlock gymnastics skills you need to be strong.
That's the main reason why a lot of adults struggle with gymnastic skills is a lack of strength.
They need to build strength?
But what strength quality do you need to train? And how do you build specific strength for gymnastics?
How to Apply The 5/4/3/2/1 Strength Method to Gymnasics Strength Training
A lot of adults struggle to unlock gymnastic skills because they're simply not strong enough.
Lately, I've felt that my strength is holding me back from unlocking movements like handstand push-ups.
So, I've added some old-school strength training to my current gymnastics strength phase.
In gymnastics, you need to be able to master your entire body weight.
Push-ups, dips, handstand push-ups, planches, chin-ups, muscle-ups, and levers are just some of the movements that require a certain level of bodyweight mastery.
But what do you do if you don't have the strength?