Archives
Articles Related to Fitness, Health and Nutrition
Amount of Rest Between Exercises and Sets
Taken from Variables for Weight Lifting and Exercise © 2003 Anthony Sell - All Rights Reserved
One of the best ways to alter your training focus is to adjust the amount of time taken between sets of exercise. This time between sets is often referred to as one's Rest Interval.
When weightlifting is done with less than 30 seconds rest in between each set and each exercise, for a period of greater than 20 minutes, it is considered to be an exercise that is aerobic in nature. This means that you will gain the same benefits of a typical aerobic mode of training (such as bicycling or running, aerobics, etc.) while building muscle.
This is especially true when the exercises involved use a large percent of the body in the exercise movement, such a s Squats, Dead lifts, Lunges, and Pull-ups. Aerobic training will produce results that include greater muscle endurance, a more efficient use of Oxygen, and a longer lasting strength (between periods of inactivity). This focus will also produce a greater definition in the appearance of the muscle, as it will become more dense and shapely.
Weightlifting that is done with greater than 60 seconds rest (between one and four minutes rest) between exercises is considered Anaerobic, and will tax different fuel systems in your body, namely the Phosphate and the Lactic Acid systems. This type of focus will produce results that include a gain in size and strength and an explosive or short term strength.
Two or more exercises of a similar muscle group, done one set followed immediately by another of a different exercise with very little or no rest in between is considered a Superset.
Supersets increase Intensity by doing a similar amount of work in less time. Supersets also decrease the amount of recovery allowed in a given muscle group during that period of time. For this reason, supersets are often used to pre-exhaust the larger muscle groups with the initial exercise, so that the stabilizing muscle groups will not be exhausted before the target muscle in that muscle group can reach the point of failure.
When designing supersets it is important to consider the order of the exercises, and, if at all possible, to not exhaust the stabilizing and auxiliary muscle groups before nearing exhaustion in the target muscle group. Exercises whose action uses the most stabilizing strength and/or the greatest number of auxiliary muscle groups should come after exercises that do not.