Latest news with #RenaissancePeriodization
Yahoo
15-07-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Sports Scientist Reveals the One Thing Most Guys Get Wrong About Bulking
Whenever they're making decisions about nutrition and muscle gain, powerlifters and hardcore lifters have to ask themselves: What's the best way to bulk? Gaining weight might seem pretty straightforward—just eat more than you burn, right? Turns out, how you go about it makes all the difference. Take the 'dirty bulk,' for example. The term was born in the powerlifting world and refers to a muscle-gaining strategy where you eat way more calories than you burn, without caring too much about food quality. The goal? Pack on muscle and strength as fast as possible. And yes, it works, but not without consequences. "Slow, smooth, and steady is 100 percent the rule with bulking," Mike Israetel, Ph.D., exercise scientist and co-founder of Renaissance Periodization, said in a recent video. "Gaining weight too fast is just not a good thing."A dirty bulk is all about calories, and lots of them. That often means loading up on fast food, sugary snacks, and highly-processed comfort meals that make it easy to blow past your daily intake. The upside? Dirty bulking practically guarantees size and strength gains, which can be a blessing for hardgainers who've been stuck in neutral. But it's a slippery slope. Compared to a cleaner, more structured bulk, this approach can leave you with a lot more fat to cut later. As Isratel puts it, there's a right way to bulk, and there's a way that'll leave you with more belly than biceps. "If you gain weight really, really fast, you bloat up so quickly that your cardio goes to shit," Israetel says. "Your lower back and calves start to get too pumped, and your cardiovascular [system] starts limiting your lifting. So sets of 15 on the leg press start to turn into no more than five RIR [reps in reverse], no fewer than five RIR to the muscle. Your muscle is just like way, way, way away from failure because your lungs and breathing go, because your gut's so big." He goes on to explain that packing on weight too quickly, like you would with a dirty bulk, not only tanks your cardio, but throws off your body mechanics, too. In other words, if you're looking to bulk the smart way, "slow and steady" wins the muscle-building race. Sports Scientist Reveals the One Thing Most Guys Get Wrong About Bulking first appeared on Men's Journal on Jul 15, 2025
Yahoo
04-07-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
5 Science-Backed Reasons Your Chest Won't Grow
Aside from stubborn calves, there's one muscle group that seems to be hard to build for even the most dedicated lifters: the chest. You bench. You press. You even throw in cable flyes for good measure. And yet—nothing. No mass, no pop, no pec shelf to speak of. While you could blame your parents (yes, genetics play a small role), there's a good chance your chest is lagging for far less mysterious reasons. Recently, Mike Israetel, Ph.D., exercise scientist and co-founder of Renaissance Periodization, interviewed sports scientist Pak Androulakis-Korakakis, Ph.D., to break down the five common mistakes that explain why so many guys struggle to grow their pecs. Spoiler: They're not exactly groundbreaking, but they are probably what's holding you back from the ideal years, there's been a debate: Should you lift heavy or crank out more volume? While technically you can (and probably should) do both in the name of hypertrophy, Androulakis-Korakakis says bumping up your volume could be the real game-changer when it comes to building muscle. "If chest is one of these lagging body parts for you, hitting it with 20 or even 30 sets per week is a good educated bet," he says. When it comes to your session training volume, you don't want to do everything in one session, so when I say 20 to 30 sets, ideally split those in two to three sessions so you can get high-quality sets very close to failure." Compound exercises are a must in every man's routine. They hit multiple muscle groups, boost your pressing power, and build serious strength. But if you're trying to zero in on your chest—and only your chest—then isolation moves aren't optional, they're essential. "When it comes to bringing up your chest as a lagging body part, you want to keep roughly 50 to 60 percent of your exercises as isolation exercises," Androulakis-Korakakis adds. "Meaning things like double flies, cable flies, machine flies, exercise that pretty much isolates the chest, so you can make sure that your chest is getting as much stimulus as possible."It's tempting to go lighter, especially when you're chasing higher volume. But according to Androulakis-Korakakis, that's one of the biggest reasons your chest might not be growing. When it comes to building muscle, lifting to—or at least close to—failure is key. If you're not pushing yourself there regularly, you could be leaving gains on the table. According to Androulakis-Korakakis, bodyweight exercises are one of the most underrated types of exercises for building size. They offer an "amazing stretch, barely any warm-up required, super easy to progress, even if you're an advanced lifter, and in general, easy exercises that you can sprinkle on top of other sessions to get more volume," he says. Pausing during sets has long been debated—is it actually effective, or just a way to look like you're grinding harder? According to Androulakis-Korakakis, it's more than just show. Strategic pauses can boost time under tension, which has quite literally been shown to drive muscle growth. "Choose exercises that place a lot of tension in the stretch and do your best to pause stuff in the stretch," he says. "The pause is not going to take away from your gains, and it will likely allow you to be a bit more efficient with the weights that you use. It will make the exercise harder, and it will give you more space to progress." 5 Science-Backed Reasons Your Chest Won't Grow first appeared on Men's Journal on Jul 3, 2025
Yahoo
11-03-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Exercise Scientist: This Is the Most Effective Shoulder Move for Huge Delts
Building big shoulders is the secret to looking jacked in a shirt—and even better without one. But to achieve that wide, powerful look, you've got to put in the work on your delts. In a recent YouTube video, Mike Israetel shared five delt-building exercises that'll help you get there. Israetel is an exercise scientist and co-founder of Renaissance Periodization, known for his expertise in muscle growth. He's coached athletes at all levels and regularly shares training advice, including detailed breakdowns of the S-tier exercises for different muscle groups. Spoiler alert: The video is dominated by lateral raise variations, including incline laterals, machine laterals, crossbody laterals, and freemotion laterals. Israetel also suggests front raises as solid delt builders. A 2020 study confirmed that lateral raises are top-tier for building bigger shoulders. Among 13 resistance-trained men, researchers found that lateral raises activated the medial delts more than any other exercise, outperforming the shoulder press and leaving the bench press and dumbbell fly far behind. You can't go wrong with any lateral raise variation, but Israetel makes a strong case for seated incline laterals. By going seated, you reduce systemic fatigue and minimize the need for stabilization, making the movement more focused and efficient than a standing variation. The angle of your incline plays a key role in targeting different parts of the delts. A higher incline emphasizes the side delts, while a lower incline shifts more focus to the front delts—though it still activates the side delts Keeping the incline anywhere between 45 to 90 degrees is fine—what matters most is that you're feeling the tension in your side delts. Israetel has a few cues to help. Think about lifting your pinkies up higher and pointing your thumbs down to angle more into your side delts. Keep the control all the way up and down, coming slightly above parallel and pausing briefly at the top. If you're adding incline laterals to your next shoulder day, Israetel recommends using Myorep sets or incorporating partials as you near failure to milk a little more effort out of your muscles.
Yahoo
09-03-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Exercise Scientist: Stop Doing 'Arm Day.' Here's a Better Way to Grow Your Arms
Forget arm day. According to Mike Israetel, it may be time to retire the classic bicep and tricep workout. His argument? There are smarter ways to build your arms without dedicating a whole session to them. Israetel is an exercise scientist and co-founder of Renaissance Periodization, known for his evidence-based approach to training. With years of experience coaching—and a Ph.D.—he's a respected authority on maximizing hypertrophy and performance. Everyone has their own workout splits to reach their goals, but according to Israetel, there are more effective ways to build big arms than dedicating a full day just to them. For one, getting a bicep pump during arm day actually impedes your range of motion for the triceps. "Biceps and triceps just don't heal at the same rates," he says. "Your triceps are roughly double the size of your biceps, so the triceps typically take longer to heal." If you're determined to keep arm days for the pump they provide, the key is ensuring you don't disrupt the recovery of those larger muscle groups—and Israetel offers a couple of workout split suggestions. One option is to follow this five-day split: Chest and triceps Back and biceps Legs Shoulders and arms Rest day The other six-day split option involves organizing muscle groups based on their recovery times and ensuring they don't interfere with each other: Chest, triceps, and side delts Legs and biceps Rest day Back, biceps, and side delts Chest, triceps, legs, and biceps Rest day Ultimately, keeping an arm day in your program is fine, as long as it follows sufficient recovery from chest and back training, you've taken a rest day, or trained another muscle group before doing arms.
