Why "science-based lifting" is irrational

[Carl-Richard]

4 hours ago, VioleGrace said:

Not really in my sense disagreeing on something and recognising something is here but trying to gind the nuances is pretty different 

This is to reductionnist in this case the aim it is more "how much do you have to lift to gain more muscle" that is not really the same, and with that this study is a review not a conducted field study, it act more like a "what studies about this are suggest" 

Bro I literally cannot understand what you're saying. Work on grammar please.

 

4 hours ago, VioleGrace said:

I dont see what you mean by flawed methods ? 

What if having a scientist count all your reps, or decide which exercises you should do, or how often you should train, reduces your gains? This is not an unreasonable assumption. It's an ubiquitous fact of psychology (and biology) that externally dictated behavior is less motivating than internally dictated behavior.

How can you properly compare high-intensity low-volume training with low-intensity high-volume training if all your research subjects are untrained (as they often are), not motivated to train (they only participated because they are taking an exercise science class in college and their professors gave them course credits for participating), and you have no way of objectively measuring intensity/effort?

Of course the results will favor low-intensity high-volume, because unmotivated individuals naturally do not push themselves hard. And intensity is anyway hard to measure and hard to control, in stark contrast to volume, so even with motivated individuals, you actually do not know whether they did push themselves hard or not.

Edited December 9 by Carl-Richard

[VioleGrace]

On 09/12/2025 at 8:53 PM, Carl-Richard said:

Bro I literally cannot understand what you're saying. Work on grammar please.

I edited the post to make it more easy to read 

 

On 09/12/2025 at 8:53 PM, Carl-Richard said:

What if having a scientist count all your reps, or decide which exercises you should do, or how often you should train, reduces your gains? This is not an unreasonable assumption. It's an ubiquitous fact of psychology (and biology) that externally dictated behavior is less motivating than internally dictated behavior.

How can you properly compare high-intensity low-volume training with low-intensity high-volume training if all your research subjects are untrained (as they often are), not motivated to train (they only participated because they are taking an exercise science class in college and their professors gave them course credits for participating), and you have no way of objectively measuring intensity/effort?

Of course the results will favor low-intensity high-volume, because unmotivated individuals naturally do not push themselves hard. And intensity is anyway hard to measure and hard to control, in stark contrast to volume, so even with motivated individuals, you actually do not know whether they did push themselves hard or not.

This a lot of "if" and It is a very vague example but the thing is a serious scientific study won't be managed like that, and most of the time your assumptions or hypothesis will be addressed as much as they can.

And if they are not, they will mention it in the limitations section of the study or mention it, so hopefully other studies can investigate further these matters 

Sorry for the grammar lol i am doing my best


 

Edited Wednesday at 10:49 PM by VioleGrace

[Michal__]

Natural lifting is all about how much you can lifts. Especially on the big lifts or their variations.

Push ups and pull ups included.

You wont look good if you are weak.

No matter how many reps you do, what you eat etc 

 

[Carl-Richard]

1 hour ago, Michal__ said:

You wont look good if you are weak.

There is also an underappreciation in "pure bodybuilding" culture of the aesthetics of athletic movement. A sprinter moves, walks and even talks in a specific way that is much more attractive than a bodybuilder who can't walk up a set of stairs without losing their breath or can't reach halfway down to their toes or lift their hip without tearing a muscle.

 

When your steps are light, when your legs are nimble but strong, that just looks much better than if you're a walking brick house.

 

 

Edited 16 hours ago by Carl-Richard

[Michal__]

5 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

There is also an underappreciation in "pure bodybuilding" culture of the aesthetics of athletic movement. A sprinter moves, walks and even talks in a specific way that is much more attractive than a bodybuilder who can't walk up a set of stairs without losing their breath or can't reach halfway down to their toes or lift their hip without tearing a muscle.

 

When your steps are light, when your legs are nimble but strong, that just looks much better than if you're a walking brick house.

 

 

Sure. 

[Carl-Richard]

Here is an insight I've rescued after deconstructing "science-based lifting" and the training style I had since I started training over 14 years ago:

When you do a set, the entire set is like one rep. In other words, each rep you do is in a continuous flow with the next, such that your muscles are under a constant tension that builds throughout the set and then peaks when you hit failure and can't do anymore. This is really what I believe is intended with the cue of "controlling the weight". It's not about slowing down, not about limiting intensity, but about maximizing flow.

The main pitfall of science-based lifting is the tendency to make divisions, e.g. between eccentric and concentric, and consequentially making prescriptions like "slow the eccentric, explode on the concentric". This limits flow, because in flow, only the body decides what the movement is, and it's one movement. There is no eccentric or concentric, and there are no reps. There is the set - the exercise - and rest.

If the goal is truly just "stimulus", then letting the body perform the movement it knows best to reach muscular failure, that is the only job. Techniques like "deep stretch" or "pause at the bottom of the rep" are tools that can come in handy in some situations, but the main exercise, the main part of the workout, is in my opinion to maximize the smoothness of the curve to muscular failure.

Whether you prefer fantasies like "2-3 reps in reserve" or taking on endless amounts of volume, the same goal still applies: approaching muscular failure. My claim is simply that maximizing flow is generally the best path towards this end. Why? Because we see this in professional athletes: flow is the best measure for performance. So if you're an athlete of hypertrophy, why would it not be the same?

Flow is a synonym for doing something right, as right as possible. If you perform the movement as right as possible, focusing all resources on exactly what you need to perform the movement, then you will be more efficient, you will have more resources to use on exactly that movement, which gives more resources for hypertrophy. We know things like stress, doing cardio instead of resting, impact hypertrophy, because they require resources that could be used for hypertrophy. Flow limits the loss of resources to factors external to hypertrophy.

It could be something as simple as flailing your arms a little too much, or indeed not controlling the weight in a way that targets the muscle. Maximizing flow streamlines the targeting of the muscles during the exercise, and it also maximizes rest during rest periods. If you spend your time during rest moving in a less efficient way, there will be less resources for the set.

These may seem like inconsequential things that a scientific reductionist who is numb to anything slightly subtle will brush away as indeed inconsequential. But consider that the line between the mediocre and the best, is subtle. And it's rooted in a personal relationship to oneself as the best, which cannot be replaced by a scientific formula written in a book or spoken about in a podcast.

Edited 7 hours ago by Carl-Richard

[Ramasta9]

Isometrics, how ancient bodybuilders did things