The secret rule to increasing muscle tone, building muscle size and increasing strength is nothing new. In fact the hidden secret of exercise, from fitness walking, running and cycling all the way to hard-core bodybuilding is so straight forward nearly everyone overlooks it--even if they do it intuitively.
I first heard this rule as a teenager, but spent years violating it. When I finally complied with it, my strength and muscle mass exploded.
The rule? Do more this week than you did last week, and then do more next week than you did this week.
It was first explained to me in my high school’s locker room by Coach Gene Rosenfield.
OLD SCHOOL
If you were a movie producer looking for the epitome of what an old fashioned football coach should look like--Rosenfield was your man.
From the thick mane of gray hair, bent nose, scars of cauliflower ear, and barrel chest, all the way to the tattoos on his forearms from when he served in the military.
But Rosenfield wasn’t just some knuckle dragging task master. He played the commodities markets, managed an active investment portfolio and always carried with him a sheaf of papers from research journals.
And one of the things he understood very well was human biology.
“You have to lift more this week than you did last week and lift more next week than you did this week,” Rosenfield would tell me.
He could have, and on occasion did, go into the science of it, but being a teenager I tuned it out.
The sad part is, I did not follow the Rosenfield principle for years until I started hearing it again and again from powerlifters and bodybuilders.
What Coach Rosenfield was telling me was one of the secrets hiding in plain sight--the secret to success when training with weights, resistance machines or any exercise program. By doing more each week, you will force your body to adapt to the “more”. When your body no longer has to adapt, it will seek stasis.
ADAPT & OVERCOME
The Rosenfield Rule is a straight forward statement of the time tested principle of over load training over the course of time.
The human body is a durable, adaptive, precision machine. It will adapt to the level of exercise you do and will adapt to overcome whatever you throw at it.
In resistance training with weights or machines, the body will adapt to the workout through muscle hypertrophy--which is the fancy term for how the body increases muscle tone and size. When you train with weights, the body will repair itself and adapt to the amount of weight and repetitions you are using.
If you do not increase the weight or the number of repetitions, the muscles will not be triggered to increase tone, size or strength.
The same rule applies to walking, jogging or cycling.
Exercise guidelines from the Federal Government recommend healthy adults in engage in 150 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise a week.
But what the people who brought you Fannie Mae failed to take into account is how the body will adapt to that 150 minutes of moderate-intensity. The guidelines are good, for overall health, but if you want to lose weight and look better, you will have to stay one step ahead of your body’s ability to adapt.
The Rosenfield Rule provides an open architecture way to stay ahead of the adaption--do more this week than you did last week, do more next week than you did this week.
OVERLOAD OVER TIME
The Rosenfield Rule’s “more” can be anything.
In cardio vascular exercise it can be one more minute or a half mile per hour faster.
In training with weights or machines it is one more repetition or a few more pounds.
The real key to making the Rosenfield Rule work for you is to do it not just this week and next week, but every week. To overload the muscles over the course of time, meaning months.
Let me illustrate this with an exercise I am doing right now--incline dumbbell bench press. See if you can spot the overload over time Rosenfield Rule at work.
Workout 1
90 Lbs. x 12 repetitions (listing first set only for brevity)
Workout 2
95 Lbs. x 10 repetitions
Workout 3
100 Lbs. x 9 repetitions
Workout 4
105 Lbs. x 7 repetitions
Workout 5
105 Lbs. x 11 repetitions
Workout 6
110 Lbs. x 8 repetitions
Workout 7
110 Lbs. x 12 repetitions
Workout 8
120 Lbs. x 9 repetitions
Did you spot the Rosenfield Rule? The first thing people notice is that I do not do the same amount of repetitions every week. But the number of repetitions is not important as long as I was doing more--as in more weight.
Every week I was doing something more. I didn’t just work the muscle. I didn’t just exhaust the muscle. I overloaded it more than I had the previous week.
In a few days I will do dumbbell incline bench press again with 130 pound dumbbells. I will do each set to maximum failure. I will probably get fewer repetitions, but that does not matter because I am doing more weight and increasing the overload on the muscles.
At some point though one of two things will happen; (a.) I will not be able to do more reps, or (b.) I will outgrow the dumbbells since the only go up to 150 pounders.
Hey, outgrowing the 150 pounders is a GOOD problem to have.
When one of those things happens how is the Rosenfield Rule applied? By changing up to a new exercise.
I could do flat barbell bench press, incline barbell press, or any other exercise that works those same muscle groups.
To do the same weight for the same number of reps week in and week out is the opposite of the Rosenfield Rule of doing more this week than you did last week, more next week than you did this week.
Doing more reps is easy to understand, but how do you know when to increase the weight?
For that we need a to just set consistent standard--a number and just about any number will do.
MAGIC NUMBER
Many people get stuck on the idea that they should do three sets of ten repetitions on a weight training exercise. When and how this conventional wisdom became ingrained in exercise culture I have no idea, but it really makes no sense.
As I noted in the previous article on finding the workout plan that works for you, there is no perfect workout for everyone, just a perfect workout for you.
The three sets of ten reps is so standardized it cannot possibly be a good idea for very many people--but everyone still does it because it was they have been told for years.
I am now going to tell you to throw that idea out the window. It does not matter how many repetitions you do. What matters is that you follow the Rosenfield Rule.
In the example of my incline dumbbell bench press I only listed the the first set for the sake of brevity. Here is what is I actually did a few days ago.
Workout 8
120 Lbs. x 9 repetitions
120 Lbs. x 5 repetitions
120 Lbs. x 3 repetitions
17 Total repetitions
I did fewer repetitions each set because I took each set to maximum failure. This video clip will show you what I mean by maximum failure.
Notice how I did as many reps as I could, to the point of struggling to even move the weight. When you work to maximum failure, and really overload the muscle you will stimulate hypertrophy which results in increased muscle tone and size.
Also, did you notice how I did fewer reps in each set? When you take a set to maximum failure it will be nearly impossible to get the same amount of reps on the subsequent set.
The question is though, how does a person know when to increase the weight on a machine?
The answer is, you decide. You pick your Magic Number.
Ready? Pick a number, any number between 12 and 30.
Got your number? OK, good. That is now your Magic Number. When the TOTAL repetitions you perform over three sets equals the magic number, increase the weight.
People often think the Magic Number is the total number of reps they should get in each set. No.
Look again:
Workout 8
120 Lbs. x 9 repetitions
120 Lbs. x 5 repetitions
120 Lbs. x 3 repetitions
17 Total repetitions
My magic number is 15 total repetitions. In workout 8 I did 17 total repetitions. So, the next time I do dumbbell incline bench I will follow the Rosenfield Rule and increase the weight to 130 pound dumbbells.
The Magic Number is an easy way to to keep you on track overloading the muscle over time, to keep you constantly staying one step ahead of your body.
If you get to a point you cannot increase the reps, to where you are stuck at the same number of reps on a given exercise for two or three weeks, move on to another exercise that works the same muscle(s). For a handy guide to exercises and their corresponding muscle groups, check out fitnessdirectives.com.
The Rosenfield Rule works everytime for every body. It is the foundation of every successful workout program and can be adapted to any level of strength and fitness.
The rule can be applied by fitness walkers, joggers, at-home-exercisers…anyone who wants to make improvements in their level of fitness, lose weight or imrpove muscle tone.
In the final installment of the Resolutioneers Project I will dig into cardio. Cardio is is a complicated subject for people looking to lose weight and improve their apperance because contrary to popular belief cardio doesn’t always burn fat--sometimes it can make you fat.
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