Have you ever tried that when bench pressing, the triceps fatigue faster than the pectoralis major? Maybe you feel that your chest muscles are still strong, but your sore triceps prevent you from bench pressing. At this time, you can use Pre-Exhaust to thoroughly train your pectoralis major muscles, which will surprise us. The main muscles!
What is Pre-Exhaust
As mentioned above, when bench pressing, the triceps are often tired before the pectoralis major. Because the triceps is a small muscle, its strength and endurance are smaller than that of the pectoralis major. Therefore, we can let the pectoralis major through first. Perform a little more training on single-joint movements before moving on to double-joint movements.
We can apply this principle to all major muscles, such as latissimus dorsi, hamstrings, quadriceps, etc.
How to use Pre-Exhaust
We first do 1-2 single-joint movements, and then do double-joint movements. It's that simple.
However, since the large muscles have been trained first, when performing double-joint movements, the overall strength decreases and the weight that can be handled is relatively reduced. But don't worry, the most important factor in making muscles hypertrophy is to fully stimulate the muscles, that is, whether the range of movement is large enough and whether the force point is accurate, followed by weight. The following are Pre-exhaust combinations for various large muscles:
Pectoralis major
First do single-joint movements: dumbbell fly, tensioner fly, machine fly
Then do double-joint movements: dumbbell bench press, barbell bench press
Latissimus dorsi
First do single-joint movements: straight arm pull-downs, decline supine arm flexions and extensions
backDo double-joint movements: pull-ups, seated wide-grip pulldowns, and seated rows on the cable machine
Straight Arm Pulldown
Decline supine arm extension
Seated wide-grip pulldown
Quadriceps
First do single-joint movements: leg flexion and extension
Then do double-joint movements: squats, leg presses, leg lunges
Hamstrings
First do single-joint movements: leg curls
Then do double-joint movements: squats, deadlifts, leg lunges