I was having a fish through anthony ellis' site the other day ( www.fatlosstips.com (http://www.fatlosstips.com) ) and noticed he mentions "supersets in his weight routine. Having recently converted from a all body 3x a week workout to a split, I was wondering what he means by a superset.

eg wide grip pullups
lat bar pulldown superset

Maybe it means that he does a certain number of sets on freeweights, then goes on to fixed weights and does as many as he can in one set to tire himself out?? Just an idea.

any help appreciated

griff

A superset is when two exercises are performed in a row with no rest in between.

So in your example, you'd do a set of wide-grip pullups, then immediately go do a set of lat bar pulldowns, then rest. That's one superset.

supersets can be great. i use them sometimes. i usually would do an exercise such as flyes until failure so that my chest is shot. then ill do bench press to allow my chest to do more work by incorporating my shoulders into the movement.

this can be argued pretty extensivly.. i use to do supersets, but not anymore.

i dont see the point doing another exercise once im already to failure.. using a much lighter weight just to squeeze off some more reps.

when i train, i like to focus 100% on a single movement. giving it my all on one set. it seems to work well for me that way

Supersets have their place in training.

For example, it is very clearly established that progressive overload is the key to muscle growth.

Traditionally, this means if I do:

100 x 10 bench press this week, then next week I might do:

a) 100 x 11 bench press (more reps), or
b) 105 x 10 bench (more load/weight)

Either way, the workload increases.

With supersets, consider this:

Week 1: take 100 x 10 bench press

Week 2: take 100 x 10 bench press. Now, knock out another 5 at a partial range of motion (i.e. only halfway).

Week 3: take 100 x 10 bench press. Now, strip the bar and knock out another 10. Etc.

These are all methods to induce progressive overload. Of course, you can go OVERBOARD with overload, but it is a general concept that works.

Another example is for time compressed routines, i.e. working opposing muscle pairs. For example, instead of doing:

100 x 10 bench press, rest 1 minute
2nd set, rest 1 minute
3rd set, rest 2 minutes
100 x 10 cable rows, rest 1 minute
2nd set, rest 1 minute
3rd set, done

You could do this:

100 x 10 bench press, no rest
100 x 10 cable rows, 1m rest
100 x 10 bench press, no rest
100 x 10 cable rows

etc. In this case, you superset another muscle group. This accomplishes numerous things:

1. The first muscle rests while you work the second muscle
2. Your heart rate remains elevated, burning more calories
3. You compress the time of the workout

So, there is another use for them. Nothing magical, just another color of paint to splash on the wall.

Jeremy