muscle confusion

Understanding Alpha Strength and Beta Strength

by Pete Sisco

When I was first writing about strength training back in 1992 I coined the terms alpha strength and beta strength to differentiate between the two manifestations of human muscle strength. It’s important to understand these two forms of muscle strength and how to train to improve them. Alpha Strength Alpha strength is our ability to [...]

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Five Predictions for the Next Decade of Strength Training

by Pete Sisco

So 2010 is behind us and with it the first decade of the 21st Century. Now we are but a few days into the next decade of the century, so I figure I’ll stick out my neck and make some predictions about what will happen over the next ten years in the world of strength [...]

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Respect for Your Intellect – Ranking Chest Exercises

by Pete Sisco

Have you ever seen one of those exercise machine infomercials that brags “You can do over 150 exercises on this machine.” I just cringe when I hear that being sold to the public. It’s partly based on the bad advice that you should “mix up your routine” to keep it from getting stale or that [...]

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What About Muscle Confusion?

by Pete Sisco

Here’s a strength training “principle” that gets prominent every few years. Right now there’s an infomercial touting the effectiveness of “confusing” your muscles in order to get better results, so I get a lot of questions about it. The idea is you do different exercises for a given muscle and because of the variation your [...]

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