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This is a short article about HIT, a rather unique and unusual bodybuilding/weight training method.

An overview of HIT
When you are training according to the HIT method, you perform only one set of each exercise and you train each muscle group only one single time per week.

No, I’m not kidding. As an example, if you’ve just completed a set of squats today (one single set, that is), then you wouldn’t be doing any more squats until this same time one entire week from now!

The reasoning here is that with high intensity training, you place your muscles under utterly extreme tension, building a massive growth impulse, and then you give your body a lot of time to recover and grow.

How is it possible to get this kind of formidable growth impulse using just one set? HIT has two elements to it, that make it exceptionally intensive:

1. Perfect Execution
You need to do every repetition of an exercise with meticulously perfect form and you do the repetitions very slowly. This means: Absolutely no cheating or pulling your weight load, absolutely no extra stiffness in any areas of the body not directly involved with the lifting and tons of of soreness in your muscle tissue.

2. Going Beyond Failure
Pursuing most training techniques, repetitions will be carried out to the point of failure. I.e. you keep pressing until you simply cannot move the weight load any longer, no matter how hard you try. That is the point of muscle failure and also the point where a set comes to an end. In HIT, you’re going past that point.

That second one needs some extra explanation. After all, it’s not immediately apparent how one is supposed to keep pushing past the point of muscle failure.

How to Keep Going
There are a number of techniques used to assist you go past failure in HIT. Below are a few of these:

Get Someone to Help Out
For some exercises, this is quite a straightforward method. Everyone knows the spotter may help out a little on that very last repetition, when you are doing bench-presses. With high intensity training, the spotter can wait until you get to the point of failure and then ever so lightly support you for another two to three reps.

Lowering Weights
Another technique is to immediately lower the weight load after failure is reached, and squeeze in a few additional reps while using reduced weight load. With machines, you could have a spotter who removes 1 or 2 plates for you and when using dumbbells and barbells it is possible to prepare one heavier and one lighter set and then change between them as quickly as (safely) possible.

5 Second Breaks
This final one is a method you can also work with all on your own: As soon as you’ve reached the point of failure, go back into a neutral (non-tense) position, wait for 5 seconds and then start pushing again until you reach failure a second time (usually after just one or two reps).

My Personal Take on HIT
Performing the HIT workout is a agreeable experience for around 6 and three quarters of every week after which it turns into a truly excruciating experience for the rest of the week, beginning with the beginning of the exercise routine and concluding a couple of hours after it is done.

I was pleasantly surprised at just how much strength I accumulated during my time doing HIT. I kind of assumed that performing just one set per week would lead to minimal gains, at best, however I made as much, if not more, progress as I did with volume training before. I should also mention that when training HIT, I felt in good, pain-free shape at least five days of the week. With more traditional split-training type of routines, I usually hurt all over on most days of the week.
One of the most fascinating facets of HIT are actually the psychological ones, though. For one thing, it’s simply very challenging to train as hard as is needed. Without someone spotting for you, spurring you on, correcting you and shouting in your face to do one more rep, I don’t think it’s even possible to get there. I also noticed that my attitude approaching each exercise was effected by the fact that I constantly knew this one was going to be the only set for an entire week. You usually start out determined to “make this one count” – and by the point where you’ve reached muscle failure and kept going, you typically regret you ever started…

For me it comes down to this: I think High Intensity Training is an interesting and effective method.

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