Speed Limit

One of the themes of my life right now is slowing down.  I am not happy about this.  But when the universe speaks, it’s safest just to listen.

I’ve mentioned that slowing down when it’s time for stretching is beneficial.  It can also be beneficial when we are lifting weights.  The concept we’re working with here is time under tension.  We get stronger when our muscles spend time under tension.

 

In practice, this means that we don’t want to lift the weights as fast as possible to get things over with.  OK, maybe we do, but that’s not the best choice.  There are circumstances under which we lift fast, like when we’re trying to develop power, but if our goal is strength, slow wins.

 

It makes sense.  When we take four counts to push up those weights on our bench press and another four counts to lower them, we are spending a lot more time with our muscles working than if we just pump those suckers up and down.  I realize that this is more work and it requires that we have some patience.  I am always the bearer of bad tidings.

 

One interesting note, though:  we can get most of the benefit of a slower tempo by just slowing down the lowering phase of the movement (the eccentric contraction, for those of us who relish a bit of fitness jargon).  That is, we lift the weights in a single count and then lower them much more slowly.

 

Try it out and see!