Muscle Separation Training



Bodybuilders can set their watches by it. 12 weeks before the contest, around the time they decide to cut calories, insecurities emerge like a fat chick at Dairy Queen. Otherwise self-assured muscle monsters start behaving like paranoid neurotics. They babble… Am I too small? Am I losing strength too fast? Are body-for-lifers making fun of me?

This is the time that preparedness pays off. This means shifting your mindset and having a plan. Why not use this restricted calorie period to your advantage? How? You ask. By forcing your body to use its huge reserve of energy and internal pharmacy to build lean, chiseled muscle. It’s simply a matter of knowing the right strategy.

Get keyed up. Now is the time to strip off the fat and separate that hard fought bulk into individually cleaved, muscle bundles.

Peanut butter pumped or sizzled lean?

Most of us are familiar with over eating binges leading to unexpected strength and muscle gains. I remember when a couple buddies of mine were conned into believing that some plant fungus was a "legal steroid" and proceeded to force-feed peanut butter by the tub chased with a two liter of full-sugar cola. The funny thing is they actually got bigger and stronger– for about 2 weeks. What gives? The bottom line is that forcing calories leads to quick gains. This works due to excessive insulin release causing maximum osmotic pressure within the muscle cell. This pressure is actually water, amino acids and energy substrates (fuel) all super-sized into muscle cells. This causes three noticeably cool effects; the first is that the extra stored energy can be used to boost muscular strength and strength-endurance. The second is cosmetic. Water fills the muscle creating a kind of a "perma-pump" effect. When you then combined the vaso-dilation (expanding) of the blood vessels to transport these extra nutrients into the cells, the result is veins and arteries that jump out like trunk lines. The third effect is the body laying down more muscle tissue to support and stabilize these bursting muscle cells.

The second lesser known and perhaps more effective time for muscle separation to occur is during the first weeks of a cutting phase, when training includes high reps (10-20 or more), low rest (1 minute or less) and high volume. The sudden restricting of calories below normal shocks the pituitary into releasing anabolic hormones for survival. Insulin secretion however is at a low point due to the diminished carb. intake. This means growth hormone is the more abundant hormone in circulation. What you may not know about growth hormone is it’s unique ability to pull the other ½ of amino acids into the muscle that insulin leaves behind. As you may have guessed this is another perfect growth period due to the muscle building effects of growth hormone and it’s downstream cousin IGF-I (insulin like growth factor).

Right about now a light bulb should blow in your pointy little head. Yes! You can combine the two phases for an added effect. Start you diet 16 weeks out and "ratchet" your carbohydrate and fat calories up and down in two week intervals such that the average of each four week unit (1 cutting & 1 bulking phase) brings you down 500 calories. For example, if your average caloric intake is 3500 calories before the diet then;

Week 1&2 2750 calories

Week 3&4 3250 calories

Week 5&6 2250 calories

Week 7&8 2750 calories

Etc…

Separation workout

Unique to the following routine is a "burnout" set performed immediately after a series of strength sets. This is termed a "combi" set by researcher Goto et al., or combination strength / hypertrophy sets. They concluded "muscular protein synthesis can be facilitated by performing a single set of low intensity, high rep training immediately after a high intensity low repetition exercise". They speculate that "the increase in blood GH concentration plays at least one part".

Just when the dust settles from your "combi-set" training the session includes a series of moderate load, no rest, supersets that use specific angles and "tricks" to isolate individual heads of the muscle. See along with GH, the other part of the equation may be due to forced ischemic conditions (lack of oxygen). It was first discovered in patients with chronic obstructive lung disease, which limits the amount of oxygen and subsequently raises systemic blood metabolite levels (like lactic acid). "Both the increase in the numerical proportion of fast-twitch fibers and muscular hypertrophy was demonstrated to occur in the leg muscles during ischemia." (Takarada et al.) This is the reason that bodybuiders can still develop type II fibers using light to moderate loads, less than 65% of maximum. Moderate loads in concert with short rest intervals and high volume mirror this unique condition.

Uncoupling-separation training! (Sounds like a form of marriage counseling)

Although I have not seen a formal study, logic would dictate that "fat burners" including; thyroid hormone, clenbuterol, ephedrine or DNP that increase uncoupling of the oxidative process used along with a "separation" type workout would add to the effects. The reason is they share a common mechanism of action. This would mean greater lean muscle retention and greater fat loss during a "cutting phase".