Ep. #521: Can Paused Reps Help You Gain Muscle and Strength Faster? Science Says Yes . . . Kind Of.

Hey, Mike here. And if you like what I’m doing on the podcast and elsewhere, and if you want to help me help more people get into the best shape of their lives, please consider checking out my VIP one on one coaching service, where we can help you get in the best shape of your life. life. My team and I have helped people of all ages, circumstances, and needs.

So no matter how complicated or maybe even hopeless you might think your situation is, we will figure it out and we will get you results. Every diet is different. And every training program is 100 percent custom. We provide daily workout logs and do weekly accountability calls. Our clients get priority email service and discounts on supplements and other products.

And the list of benefits goes on and on. So to learn more. Head over to www. legionathletics. com slash coaching. That’s l e g i o n athletics. com slash coaching and schedule your free consultation call. I should also mention that there is usually a wait list and new slots do fill up very quickly, so do not wait if this sounds even remotely interesting to you.

Go ahead and schedule your call now. Again, that URL is legionathletics. com slash coaching. Hello. I am Mike Matthews and this is the Muscle for Life podcast. Welcome to another episode. Now there are many different ways to program your training. There are many different exercises to choose from.

There are many ways to do those exercises. And some methods and choices are better than others. Periodization, for example, helps keep the gears of gains greased as you move into the intermediate phase of your weightlifting journey and beyond. Whereas you don’t need as much in the way of periodization when you are new.

You can keep things very simple and make good progress. Now something like supersets, on the other hand, are more like supplements. They are sometimes helpful. but non essential. And then there are many training techniques that really have no place in most people’s weightlifting routines like forced reps, negatives, and cheat reps.

What about paused reps though? Are these worthwhile or worthless or maybe somewhere in between? The short answer is when they are used properly, paused reps can help you gain muscle and strength faster, but not for the reasons that people often say. And in this podcast, you’re going to learn why, as well as how to effectively incorporate paused reps into your workout routine.

So let’s start this discussion with Answering a simple question. What are paused reps? Paused reps involve a deliberate pause at some point during a weightlifting exercise. It’s really that simple. Now this pause is often, but not always at the point where the movement is It changes from lowering to raising, and it’s generally at the point when the exercise is hardest.

For example, paused reps on the squat generally involve pausing for a second or two at the bottom of the movement before you stand back up. And the reason for this is that is the hardest part of the entire movement. Those several inches will often determine whether you get a rep or not. And so by pausing deliberately at that point in the exercise, you can improve your ability to get out of the hole.

Now, with the bench press, how paused reps are normally incorporated is either with the bar on the chest or when the bar is just a few inches off the chest. And again, the same idea applies here. That’s the hardest point in the movement, the sticking point. And so that’s often where paused reps are. Now, on the deadlift paused reps often have you freeze the bar a few inches off the ground as you are coming up or somewhere around knee height.

Now, with all paused reps, the pause typically lasts anywhere from a half a second to two or three seconds depending on your grip. Goals. And we’re going to talk a bit more about that soon. And so that’s really it. That’s all a paused rep is a deliberate halt at some point during a weightlifting exercise for anywhere from a half second to a couple seconds.

Usually when the exercise is changing from lowering to raising and almost always. at a sticking point when the exercise is at its hardest. Now, why do people do paused reps? The five primary reasons people do them are to improve their technique, to prepare for a powerlifting meet, to make an exercise more difficult, to make their training more interesting, and to help break through training plateaus.

And paused reps can help. deliver on each of these points. So let’s talk about them. Let’s talk about improving technique. Now, although weightlifting looks pretty simple at first blush, a lot more goes into doing a good squat and a good bench press and a good deadlift than meets the eye. Even experienced weightlifters can almost always find new ways to improve their technique and increase the efficiency of their movements and reduce.

The risk of injury what’s more the closer you come to failure in a set technical failure or absolute failure the harder it is to maintain your technique and especially on a heavy lift and a primary reason for this is we gradually lose the ability to accurately feel what we’re doing with our bodies as our muscles get more and more fatigued so as we get deeper into a set especially with heavy weights we might think we are keeping our form in But we’re not, and this is particularly true with some of the more difficult and productive exercises that we do in the gym, like the deadlift squat and military press, which are very fatiguing now because paused reps have you slowed down, they help you pinpoint weaknesses and mistakes in your technique that would otherwise be obscured by the speed and the effort of your normal.

reps. So for example, whereas you might be able to easily power through your regular sets with mediocre form, particularly on the squat, let’s say when you are coming out of the bottom, when your hamstrings give you a little bit of that bounce, right? With paused reps, you have to slow down and you have to take stock of what you’re doing.

You have to pay attention. And that gives you a chance to notice and correct. So as I just mentioned with the squat, for example, if you’re like me and most weightlifters, when you get to the bottom, you start immediately driving your hips upward. And of course, that’s correct. That’s what you want to do to generate as much force as possible.

It doesn’t give you much time to really consider what you’re doing with your body. For example, in My case, I sometimes have a tendency to raise my hips a bit faster than the bar, which is not good technique. And while that’s easy to see on video, after the fact, it’s hard to feel when I’m in the middle of a set, and especially as I’m approaching the end of that set, as I’m approaching technical failure.

Now, If I pause though at the bottom of each rep for a second or two, I can take a moment to tighten my upper body, extend my chest and ensure that the bar and my chest and my hips are all rising at the same rate on the bench press. For example, many people have a bad habit of letting their shoulders back and legs relax and their elbows flare outward from their body as they get to the bottom of each The rep as the bar is touching their chest and they’re getting ready to press upward.

And so by pausing at that point, you can take a moment to make sure that those muscles remain tight and that your elbows remain tucked in before you start to ascend, before you start to press the bar upward. And on the deadlift, many people let the bar drift out in front of them and round their lower back on the way up in correct form.

But, bye. Pausing at knee level, you can get used to how it feels to have the bar close into your shins where you want it to be. And you’re back in a neutral position, which is of course where you want to be as well. All right, let’s talk about the next benefit of, and the next use of paused reps. And that is preparing for a powerlifting meet.

Now we all know that powerlifting revolves around moving Very heavy weights for singles, but it also involves standardized procedures that need to be followed. So events are officiated by trained judges who give the competitors commands that must be followed for their lifts to count. And this way everyone is made to lift in more or less the same manner and nobody can cheat by bouncing the bar off their chest on the bench press, for example, or failing to reach proper depth on the squat or resting the bar on their thighs on the deadlift.

And these instructions usually look like this. So on the bench press, for instance, start is the signal to begin the lift. And at this point, the lifter will already be holding the bar. So all they have to do is lower the bar to their torso. Once the bar touches their torso, they’ll have to hold it there for a second or two to show the judges it has come to a complete stop.

And then after the judges are satisfied that the bar has Come to a complete stop, they’ll yell press, which is the cue to push the bar back to the starting position. Then the lifter will maintain that starting position for a moment so the judges can verify they have fully locked the weight out, at which point they will be told to rack the weight, which is the cue to push the bar back onto the uprights of the bench.

And the process is similar with the squat and deadlift, although judges generally don’t require a pause at the bottom of the squat. They do require a pause at the top of the deadlift before dropping the weight to the floor again, to show that the lifter has achieved full lockout. Now, this type of carefully choreographed routine is quite different from standard weightlifting procedures.

And that’s why many people who get into powerlifting. and don’t consistently practice that start and stop tempo generally don’t do well even if they’re strong and they do well in their normal workouts what they find is when they are competing in an event they either can’t lift as much weight as they expect based on their training records and then they miss lifts or accidentally finish reps too quickly and wind up disqualified So if you want to be better prepared for a powerlifting meet, then incorporating paused reps into your workouts makes sense and is really even a necessity.

All right, let’s move on to the next use of paused reps and that is to make exercises more difficult. So in general, if you can make an exercise harder, it is probably going to be better for muscle and strength gain. It’s a good rule of thumb. So for example, if you use a larger range of motion, that makes it more difficult than a shorter range of motion.

So a full rep is harder than a partial rep. And research shows that using a larger and full and proper range of motion produces greater strength and muscle gain. Now, lifting heavier weights is also harder than lifting lighter weights. And research shows that also produces greater strength and muscle gain.

Yet another example of this is regularly pushing yourself close to technical failure in your workouts. Ideally in every set of your workouts. That is quite a bit harder than ending sets well shy of technical failure and research shows that as well is better for muscle and strength gain. Now this is why many people say that paused reps can help you gain muscle and strength faster as well.

And that makes sense. At first glance, paused reps are certainly more difficult than regular ones. You only have to try it once to know that because you’re forced to support the weight for longer. And in the case of the bench press and the squat in particular, you are not benefiting from that bounce that you get at the bottom when you transition from lowering to raising the weight.

Now, technically that Bounce is known as the stretch shortening cycle and it’s a quirk of human biology that temporarily makes a muscle stronger immediately after being stretched. Now scientists aren’t even sure how it works exactly but the most likely explanation seems to be that the connective tissues that are surrounding your muscles and your joints can temporarily store while they’re stretching and then release energy like a spring.

Another theory is stretching your muscles triggers the nervous system to tell them to contract harder. And whatever the case may be, if you’ve lifted weights before, you have experienced this in action. On the bench press, for example, you will be able to push more weight if you immediately begin pressing the bar upward after lowering it to your chest than if you were to pause once it reaches your chest.

Now, that doesn’t mean that you want to just drop the weight to your chest and let it bounce off your pecs. Many people do that, and that is just improper form. The bar should touch your chest gently, and it shouldn’t sink into your ribs, and you should maintain good control of the bar throughout the entire movement.

And if you do that And you immediately start pressing upward at the bottom of the bench press, you will benefit from the stretch shortening cycle. The cycle is also one of the reasons why the deadlift is one of the most difficult exercises you can do, because unlike the squat and the bench press, which start with the eccentric, the lowering portion of the movement, the deadlift starts with the concentric, the raising.

portion and as it is the eccentric portion of an exercise that produces the boost provided by the stretch shortening cycle, the deadlift doesn’t allow you to tap into it. It doesn’t factor into the deadlift. Anyway, as the stretch shortening cycle Slightly increases your strength, some people say that it’s just not ideal for muscle and strength game because it makes the exercise a little bit easier.

They say if you were to pause at the bottom of each rep, you would force your muscles to work just a little bit harder and in response they would get just a little bit easier. bigger and stronger a little bit faster. And unfortunately, these people are mostly wrong. Yes, the stretch shortening cycle does make it a little bit easier to complete each rep, but if you know what you’re doing in the gym, that means you can just Lift more weight, which then makes it harder.

So in other words, you have two choices. You can use less weight with a pause at the bottom of each rep, or you can use more weight without a pause at the bottom of each rep. And as far as your body’s concerned, both options are going to produce about the same amount of muscle and strength gain because the amount of time that your muscles are under strain, the time under tension is not a major factor.

muscle and strength, how heavy the weights are in terms of percentage of one rep max and how close you come to absolute failure in each set that you do and how many sets you perform each week for each major muscle group volume are the primary determinants of how you perform. Anabolic your workouts are, and I’m going to be recording a podcast soon on time under tension in particular, because it’s something I get asked fairly often about, and I think it would be worth discussing in detail.

But for the purpose of this discussion, that’s all you really need to know. Trying to take special measures to maximize time under tension. Like slowing your reps down, for example, is not as effective as more traditional weightlifting methods that maximize load and volume. And so bringing this back to paused reps, whether you pause at the bottom of each rep to increase time under tension is really neither here nor there.

If you’re programming your training properly. Now detractors of pause reps will often say that they are inferior for gaining muscle and strength than just traditional reps because they prevent you from lifting as much weight. Now you might think I agree with that based on what I just said, but that’s not entirely accurate either.

Pause reps only slightly decrease how much weight you can lift, maybe about a 5 percent decrease in most cases. But as you just learned, they do also increase the time under tension. And as time under tension does contribute to muscle growth to some degree, what you are losing with paused reps in the way of a little bit of intensity, a little bit of load, you’re probably gaining in the way of a little bit more time under tension.

So in the final analysis, paused reps are likely just as effective for gaining muscle and strength as regular reps, but not more hey, before we continue, if you like what I’m doing here on the podcast and elsewhere, and if you want to help. me help more people get into the best shape of their lives. Please consider checking out my VIP one on one coaching service. Now, my team and I have helped thousands of people of all ages, circumstances, and needs.

So no matter how complicated or maybe even hopeless you might think your situation is. We will figure out how to get you the results you want. Every diet and training program we create is 100 percent custom. We provide daily workout logs and we do weekly accountability calls. Our clients get priority email service.

As well as discounts on supplements and the list goes on and on. To learn more, just head over to legionathletics. com slash coaching. And if you like what schedule your free consultation call. Now there’s normally a wait list to work with our coaches and new slots do fill up very quickly. So if this sounds even remotely interesting to you, head over to legionathletics.

com slash coaching now and schedule your free consultation call and let’s see if our program is a good fit for you. All right, the next benefit of paused reps is they can make your training more interesting. And this matters because if you want to get good at anything, whether it’s weightlifting, golf, or knitting, you’re going to need to do a lot of reps.

Now, in the beginning, putting in the work is fun because improvement comes easily and it’s new. In time, however, as progress slows down and the novelty wears off, the process can become a slog and motivation can wane. Now, many gym goers try to beat the boredom by constantly changing their exercises and their workouts, and this can certainly spice things up and keep your training going.

Interesting, but could also get in the way of results because too much training variation makes it more or less impossible to plan and track your efforts and ensure that you’re actually progressing. And as you transition from your beginner phase to your intermediate phase, it becomes more important than ever to carefully plan and track what you’re doing in the gym.

Because your body is no longer hyper responsive to training in the beginning, you can do just about anything and make progress. That’s no longer the case after your first year or year and a half or so. And so what you need then are better ways to introduce variety into your workouts. So for example. You can swap exercises every couple months with similar alternatives like front squatting for a bit and then back squatting for a bit and then going back to front squatting or maybe trap bar or hex bar dead lifting for a bit instead of the traditional pulling or maybe close grip bench pressing or reverse grip bench pressing instead of regular bench pressing.

You can also mix things up with training techniques like rest pause sets or Pause reps and although paused reps won’t likely boost your results at least directly, but it can boost results indirectly by just making your workouts more interesting and more fun, which means that you are going to be more interested in them when you’re doing them, more focused on what you’re doing, and you’re just going to be more encouraged to work hard in your workouts when you’re liking them.

All right, moving on to the next point on our list, breaking through training plateaus. Many people use paused reps to break through training plateaus. Now, what is a training plateau? Many people have different definitions for what that is, but here’s mine. You have hit a plateau when you have failed to increase reps or weight on a key lift deadlift, bench press, or some other important compound exercise.

For the last two to three, maybe even Four weeks, depending on where you’re at and what you’re doing in the gym. Now there are many reasons why this can occur, including a lack of calories or a lack of sleep or overtraining or just excessive stress in general. But if none of those things are the culprits, chances are good it has something to do with your workouts, what you are doing in the gym.

Jim, oftentimes it is the programming that needs addressing, but sometimes you can break out of a rut by improving your ability to move through the sticking points of the exercises that you’re stuck on. Now I mentioned this earlier, but a sticking point is simply the hardest point of an exercise. It’s the point where you’re most likely to lose steam and stall out.

For example, the sticking point on the squat is generally when the hips start to rise above the knees. So you’re on your way up and your hips are just about to pass your knees. And on the deadlift, it’s when the bar is approaching the knees on the way up. If you can quickly get past those points and just the sticking point in any exercise, if you can quickly move through those several inches, chances are you’re going to be able to finish the rep.

And if you can’t, Then chances are, you’re going to fail the rep. Now getting stronger in general definitely helps you consistently beat sticking points, but paused reps can help you specifically train your strength in those portions of the exercises. And that in turn can help you keep progressing. In other words, by using paused reps to intentionally make an exercise a little bit harder at its hardest point, you can improve your performance during your pause.

regular training. Now, I’m not aware of any scientific research that supports any of that, but it does have a considerable amount of anecdotal evidence suggesting its effectiveness, including its long time use by high level powerlifters. All right, so now let’s talk about how to incorporate paused reps in your training.

The three best ways to do it. As So paused reps are not a muscle building hack, as many people say they are, but they do have a place in a well designed workout routine. So I think that paused reps are most useful if you want to refine your technique. If you want to make your training more interesting, if you want to improve your ability to move through sticking points, or if you’re going to compete in a powerlifting meet in the next, let’s say eight to 12 weeks.

Otherwise, pause reps are an unnecessary distraction. You don’t need them. So let’s talk about now how to actually incorporate pause reps into your routine. Now, this depends on how you want to use them. For example, if you want to use paused reps to refine your technique or make your training more interesting, here is what most people find works best pause at the bottom of the squat before you start rising.

Pause with the bar on your chest on the bench press before you start pressing it up and pause with the bar three to five inches below your knees on the deadlift before pulling it up and finishing the rep. And if you want to use paused reps to improve in the sticking points of the squat bench press and deadlift, then you want to use a slightly different method on the squat.

As you are ascending, you want to pause for one to two seconds when your hips are about three to five inches above your knees. On the bench press, as you’re ascending, you want to pause for one to two seconds when the bar is three to five inches above your chest. And on the deadlift, as you’re ascending, you want to pause for one to two seconds when the bar is three to five inches below your knees.

Now there are obviously some similarities there and a little bit of overlap simply because the sticking points on exercises are not equal. exact points. They are ranges. Again, there are several inches of the movement. And so if you are just wanting to work on your technique, you are pausing at a different point in the sticking point than if you want to maximize your ability to power through the entire sticking point.

A quick note, if you’re wondering why the difference when I was talking about sticking points. earlier. And so the point here though, with this method I just shared for the sticking points in particular, what you’re doing is you’re pausing really precisely at that point where the exercise is most difficult, as opposed to just the point where it’s changing from lowering to raising, or where you’re going to be required to pause in a powerlifting meet.

Now, speaking of that, if you want to use paused reps to prepare for a powerlifting meet, Then you need to closely mimic what you’re going to have to do in that meet. And so what that means is on the squat, don’t pause at any point during the descent or the ascent. It’s just not necessary. And it actually may be counterproductive because it could encourage you to pause in a meet, which is going to increase the likelihood of missing the lift because the weights are going to be very heavy.

So instead we want to do is squat down into your abs. Parallel or slightly below it. And then you want to send as quickly as possible. If you want to pause slightly at the top of each rep, you can, but I don’t think that will really matter. So on the bench press, what you want to do is you want to pause for one to three seconds when the bar is touching your chest before you press up, because that’s what you’re going to have to do in your competition.

And on the deadlift, you want to pause for one to three seconds at the top. top of each rep when you’re standing up straight before bringing the bar to the ground again because that’s what you’re going to have to do in competition. So once you have narrowed down the preferred method for you of paused reps based on why you actually want to include them in your routine, the next step is actually integrating them into your workouts.

And for that, you have a few options. You can use paused reps as an exercise variation. And this is my preferred method for including paused reps into my training. It’s very simple. All you do is every eight to 12 weeks do paused reps instead of regular reps for each set of one of your compound exercises for your next training cycle.

Probably eight to 12 weeks if you’re like me and most people in the gym lifting weights. Now I recommend picking a compound exercise you are having trouble Progressing on for this and that is maybe starting to cause aches and pains. That’s another reason why you could use paused reps just to lower the weight a little bit or one that you’re just getting bored with.

So for example, if you haven’t moved ahead much on your back squat in a while, you could do paused back squats for the next couple of months before switching back to regular ones. And. See if it helped or if your shoulder has been nagging you on the bench press, you can try pause rep benching for a couple months before switching back to your regular benching.

And again, that’ll slightly lower the weight on the bar and put a little bit less strain on your shoulder. Maybe not enough to make the pain go away, but if that’s the case, you may have to make other adjustments. Like you may have to stop bench pressing altogether for a little bit and move to, or at least stop flat bench pressing and move to incline bench pressing, or maybe move to dumbbells to give your shoulder a break.

Or for example, if deadlifting is getting a bit stale, try paused rep deadlifts for a few months before switching back. All right, so that’s one very simple way to incorporate paused reps in your training. Another one is to use paused reps on the last reps. So with this method, you make the last Rep of every set of one or more compound exercises in your workout routine, a paused rep.

So for example, if your workout calls for bench pressing 225 pounds for three sets of six reps, you would do five regular reps followed by one paused rep for each set. Now, how long you do this is up to you. You could do it for a month to maybe audit your technique or make the exercises a little bit harder, or you could do it for longer if you’re.

Wanting to train sticking points, or if you just like it another way to incorporate paused reps into your training is to do pause Reps on the last sets only so this is similar to the previous strategy But instead of making the last rep of each set a paused rep with this method. You do paused reps for the last set of one or more of your compound exercises in your workout routine.

All the reps in that last set or in those last sets. And this is a particularly good way to stress test your form as any flaws will be magnified by the amount of fatigue that you feel after doing a few regular sets. And how long you do this for is also up to you, anywhere from let’s say a month to three months.

I think is reasonable. All right. So those are my three preferred methods of incorporating paused reps into my training. And finally, I want to share a few notes on how to properly execute a paused rep. Rep. So one is to pause for one to two seconds. There’s just no need to pause longer than that. The idea is just to come to a momentary stop and then pause one or two seconds and continue the rep.

Another point is make sure that you keep your body as tight as possible when you’re pausing. Don’t use your pause as an opportunity to slack in your muscles and catch your breath. Instead, hold your breath. Using the balsalva maneuver like you would normally do and maintain tightness throughout your entire body.

So that means don’t let the bar sink into your chest on the bench press. Don’t let your chest cave in on the squat. Don’t let your lower back round on the deadlift. You also want to ensure that you are more or less frozen in place when you’re stopped. You don’t want to be swinging or wavering or moving forward, backward, side to side.

If you can’t come to a complete Stop, then reduce the weight and try again. Another point is use paused reps on compound exercises, not isolation exercises. You can do paused reps with isolation exercises. Of course, there’s nothing dangerous or harmful about it, but it’s probably not going to be all that helpful for a couple reasons.

One is most people don’t struggle with poor technique on isolation exercises. Biceps curls are pretty easy to do. And even when form is a little bit wonky, it’s pretty easy to correct without the help paused reps. The weights are usually not heavy enough and it’s not involving enough major muscle groups.

Another reason why paused reps are probably not useful really for isolation exercises is If an isolation exercise isn’t floating your boat or moving the needle, changing the rep range or just switching to another exercise altogether is going to be more productive than using paused reps on that one exercise.

And lastly, you don’t do any isolation exercises in powerlifting events. So if that’s the reason why you are working with paused reps, they have nothing to offer you in that regard. All right. That’s it for today. Pause reps. I hope you found this episode helpful and useful. And I hope that you can take the information I’ve shared and incorporate into your training and gain muscle and strength faster.

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My team and I have helped people of. All ages, circumstances, and needs, so no matter how complicated or maybe even hopeless you might think your situation is, we will figure it out and we will get you results. Every diet and every training program is 100 percent custom. We provide daily workout logs and do it for you.

weekly accountability calls. Our clients get priority email service and discounts on supplements and other products. And the list of benefits goes on and on. So to learn more, head over to www. legionathletics. com slash coaching. That’s l e g i o n athletics. com slash coaching and schedule your free consultation call.

I should also mention that there is usually a wait list and new slots do fill up very quickly so do not wait if this sounds even remotely interesting to you. Go ahead and schedule your call now. Again, that URL is legionathletics. com slash coaching.