No training while PCT = Keeping more gains!

[satyricon1]

Not going to the gym for about a month or more that's retarded.
imho

agree. critical period for working out is day 1-16 of PCT. most HST programs has a good 2 week break to allow fibrine to break down. I time mine to PCT. On first 2 weeks on HST its feather weights n high reps. BRILLIANT FOR 10 WEEK CYCLES.!

 

[crushtime]

I wish this thread was posted about 5 weeks ago

 

[C.K.]

I love working out period it makes me feel good I couldn't imagine taking more then a week off ever

 

[satyricon1]

Just to make sure we are all on the same page, let me just explain some of the principles of HST-training that converts in particular to the PCT period.

We know that after a muscle have received "micro trauma" there will be buildt up a fibrine layer wich makes sure that dammage (microtrauma) to the muscle will not happen again, given the same tension is being used again. This means that when you go back to the gym, you lift heavier than you did last workout, to break down the fibrine layer and cause micro trauma.

The point of micro-trauma is to break the muscle fibres, allowing signal substances to enter the bloodflow from the dmgd tissue. Not going to detail the different substances, it is a bit on the side of the point.

Now, when you have reached close to your 1RM in the gym, you simply can not put on more weight, the fibrine layer is not broken down and you will not inflict micro trauma. You can still feel exhausted from doing 100 sets, but that is simply your nerves being overexposed by electrical signals, compare it to a burned out el-cable.

This is when you take a 2 week break from the gym, no lifting what so ever. This will allow the fibrine layer to break down, exposing the muscles unprotected, allowing even the lightest of weights to cause micro-trauma to your muscles, giving the maximum effect of the workout, equal to what your workouts were like a few weeks back when you lifted super heavy.

Concidering this, by the end of your cycle, you are as strong as you will ever be. You lift extreme weights and your fibrine layer keeps adjusting to protect your muscles from Micro trauma. During PCT, you will no longer be able to lift AS HEAVY, therefore you will not be able to break down the fibrine layer in the gym.

This converts to the fact that LIGHT workout, will have no effect, other than exhausting your nerves. The muscles will not receive microtrauma, so there is no signal substances going into your bloodstream, and so forth.

The body does not signal for muscles to evaporate because you are out of the gym for a week or two. Think about what causes musclebreakdown; lack of nutritions..

A person that stays out of the gym for a long period of time, will experience that their muscles goes into hybernation. Up to 60% of a muscle can be inactive. Once you get back to the gym, your muscles gets activated and you increase in size and strength over a short period. This happens while your on your 2 week break in HST as well. You feel smaller, you get weaker, but most importantly, you get extremely energetic, rested and ready to go. A few workouts later, you are back to where you were, as full, as strong and feeling even better. Also, the light lifting has impact on your size, because no fibrine layer says that you get micro-trauma from it. Resulting in growth factors, signal substances doing their job.

So by timing the brek to the PCT, allowing fibrine to break down, you will get back in the gym again on week 3, when hormones actually has started to elevate. No fibrine layer, maximum micro-trauma, and growth is actually possible during PCT, "drugfree". Yes you lose your water weight, yes you reduce strength, but your overal gains, will remain.

HST-training is extremely intriguing, because of all the science that goes into it. I have been eating and breathing HST for years now, I will never train in any other way, again!.

 

[aj13]

Interesting post, I did not know much of the above

so what in your opinion is an ideal time to take off, 2 weeks, a month?

 

[satyricon1]

so what in your opinion is an ideal time to take off, 2 weeks, a month?

The basic idea of HST is to divide your workout up into the following setup:

First you determine your 1RM in all the excersises you are going to do. You will work out the entire body every time you goto the gym. You goto the gym 3 times a week. This makes it 3 sets on each bodypart pr week. Sometimes ppl split upper/lower body, and work out 5-6 days a week.

Now that you have your excercises and 1RM, you drop down to about 40% of 1RM and you increase the weights by 5% for each workout. This is how you divide your program:

Week 1-2: You are now at about 40% of 1RM, you will do 15 reps on each exercise. Every workout you increse weight by 5%. At the end of week 2 it is now getting extremely heavy and hard to do 15 reps.

Week 3-4: You are now reducing reps to 10. The week feels incredible easy, this boosts your psychological ego and you get new energy to continue. As you increase by 5% each workout, the end of 4th week will be extremely heavy....

Week 5-6: You are now down to 6 reps pr exercise. Again it feels very easy and light, you keep increasing by 5% every workout, at the end of week 6... again it feels incredibly heavy.

Week 7-8: If you have a spotter or training partner, increase the weights to 120% of your 1RM and do negatives. 6-10 reps on each exercise. If you do not have a spotter, continue the same way as you did in Week 5-6. Your goal is to achieve 3 reps in each excersise.

Week 9-10: Your Fibrine layers now need to deteriorate, you can simply not lift more weight. After this period of resting, you start the program all over again, you now will have full benefit from the 15 rep weeks and you will never enter a situation where you work out super heavy and feel no progression or gains. Whenever that happens, you need to take a break from the gym, get fibrine layers deteriorated, start out again with super light weights, and reap the same benefits as if you were working out heavy.

Now, some people may wonder why you only visit the gym 3 times a week and why you only do 1 (ONE) set pr excersise.

When you work out the entire body in a single day, your volume of training is greater than any other trainingprogram. This requires huge ammounts of callories in order to not get overtrained etc. Simply put, it is hard to gain fat when you work out this way, we are talking lean muscle.

Secondly and most important, whenever a muscle receives microtrauma, the stiumulants will enter the bloodflow, they will never work locally, hence why doing squats/deadlifts will increase your bicep size. Bigger muscles have more stimulants to release to the bloodflow. By working the entire body, every muscle receives microtrauma, this results in huge levels of hormones and peptides in the bloodstream, these will bind to the dmgd muscles all over your body and signal that repairs are needed. By not doint squats/deadlifts, the concentration of growth factors in your blood, are reduced, hence less gains in the musclegroups you love the most.

Finally, these factors peak 24 hours after microtrauma is received, and lasts for 48 hours before the levels are dramaticly reduced. Because all your muscles are dammaged by microtrauma, working them out again before the repair is complete, is counterproductive and will result in break down of muscle tissue and stagnation. Also called overtraining by myth.

So working out every other day is optimal, however, because of the constant increase in weight, having 2 resting days in a row, once a week will prepare the body and replenish both psychological and physical energy.

The program has 2 positive results, that I have not found within any other program over the 20 years I have worked out. The share volume/size of the muscles from the high rep weeks and the incredible increase in strength from the mid/late weeks are just unbelievable. After 1 full program cycle, if you not down the weights you are using, you will notice that everything is rediculously easy on the 2nd cycle. And this is the way it continues cycle after cycle.

Hope that helps clarify things.

 

[richard burnett]

I trained just as hard off cycle as I did on cycle and I actually got stronger on PCT. Lost only 3lbs after gaining 15lbs during my 4 week PCT but continued to strengthen all of my compound lifts. I can't explain the exact physiology behind this but as you all know, every person is different. The only thing that I considered to be a huge negative was the loss of the ability to recovery faster so I did more resting and more eating but I never felt like I was overtraining or as the OP says, "breaking down muscle too much".

I think this post sounds fancy and logical but from my personal experience, it is invalid. I agree with lower volume but if you know your limits and are in tune with your body then you know when too much is too much.

 

[stevesmi]

the reality is you are gonna lose strength when the esthers clear out of the body. it sucks but it will happen. you need to realize that and not try to fight it. you should after PCT and bridging still have more strength then what you did when you went on.

 

[satyricon1]

I agree with both of you, my goal with this post is simply to explain the physological processes that are relevant, each and their own have to find what works best for them, but it is very important to allow science a place in the equation. =)

 

[the.gladiator1987]

So to keep strength and size, for your theory you would just EAT a shit ton of food and not train for the first 2 weeks of PCT?

no training at all?