There is little doubt that for most of us building new muscle year after year becomes an increasingly more difficult endeavor. The human body does not “consider” the creation of a herculean physique a high priority in its hierarchy of needs, and thus will fight our efforts every step of the way. If you really want to grow you cannot whisper at your muscles — you must SCREAM!”
One of the best techniques I have found in my many years as a coach and pro natural bodybuilder to force the muscles to respond, adapt and grow is “supersets.” A superset is basically two exercises for the same body part, performed back to back with as little rest in between as possible. Your rest period occurs after the completion of each exercise, preferably with both taken to momentary muscular failure.
There are two basic types of supersets I like to utilize most often.
Pre-Exhaustion and Post Activation
A pre-exhaustion superset is when one performs an isolation exercise followed immediately by a compound movement. An example would be leg extensions and squats. The advantage of this type of superset is that you can isolate the target muscle with the first movement and push it to its limits — but then push it even further with a multi-joint exercise that allows other muscle groups to assist as you continue to rep out.
A post-exhaustion superset is when one performs a high-load (3-5 reps) compound movement followed immediately by a single-joint isolation exercise. An example would be weighted dips and cable crossovers. The cool thing about this type of superset is that research shows that low rep compound exercises create enhanced CNS activation, which means the second movement will effectively fire off more muscle fibers than it normally would, increasing its anabolic effect.
See the next page for some of my favorite hypertrophy-igniting supersets for each major muscle group.
CHEST (Focus on Upper Pecs)
Pre-exhaustion: Cable incline flye/Smith bench press to upper chest Post-activation: BB incline press/Incline DB flye
BACK (Focus on Width)
Pre-exhaustion: DB pullover/Close underhand-grip BB bent row Post-activation: Weighted close-grip pull-up/Stiff-arm pull-down
DELTS (Focus on Lateral Head)
Pre-exhaustion: Standing DB side lateral raise/Wide-grip Smith press behind neck Post-activation: Shoulder wide grip BB upright row/Seated machine side lateral raise
Pre-exhaustion: Bent overhead cable rope extension/Close-grip pushup Post-activation: Smith close-grip bench press/Incline two-arms overhead single DB extension
THIGHS
(Focus on Vastus Lateralis for pre-exhaust SS. Focus on adductors/inner region for post-activation SS)
Pre-exhaustion: Leg extension (pointing toes inward at top)/Narrow stance Smith squat Post-activation: Wide stance Hack squat/Adduction machine
HAMSTRINGS (Focus on mass)
Pre-exhaustion: Seated leg curl/Straight leg BB good morning Post-activation: Stiff leg deadlift/Lying leg curl
*Note: I recommend about 7-9 reps for compound exercises during pre-exhaustion superset and 3-5 reps during post-activation superset. For all isolation movements I recommend a range of between 12 and 15 reps.
