Nice article. People have different schools of thoughts on Isometrics Ive tested out alot and certainly burnt myself out with Isometrics. My fav workout is a steve Justa workout, 70-100 positions for a 7 second 90 percent hold alll body muscles what ever exercises you want moving as quick as possible. I think for many Isometrics need recovery, few times a week is usually enough, i also believe one should include blood pumping exercises on same or alternate days.

That's Great! Thanks for sharing.

one day i do powerflexes,the next day i do classic isometric holds,one day a week i do self resistent movements.i still do push-ups also. i do everything in moderation so i do get burned out.i also walk everyday.in a month i will be 70 years old and still going strong.

Bob I think this differs person to person. We're all differant. I'm sort of like You, but I have no problem doing just isometrics sometimes, movement exercise or both.

Slastonecold, do You do a full body routine 6 days a week? Do You just do isometrics or combine something with them? If You do a full body routine do You switch exercises some days? Just like to get an idea of how You guys do Your training, Thanks.

i do isometrics 6 days a week,its a learning experience not to over do them.like everything it takes knowledge to learn to do them right

As I have understood after 2 month experiment, isometrics is good as the addition to dynamic exercises to overcome the plateau in dynamic SR training. The usage of isometrics as a single SR method for a long period of time feels unnatural for me. I think that slow or super-slow performance of dynamic SR exercises could get the same benefits as isometric holding but feels slightly more natural.

Yeah it's definitely the central nervous system. The first time I did isometrics I just went all out. It felt good while and after the workout. But I layed down on the couch to watch some TV and woke up about two hours later. I could feel I was burnt out when I woke up.

I think anyone who starts isometrics or hasn't done them in awhile should lighten up the tension for awhile. Your body needs time to get use to the high tension especially if you're using an isometric strap.

Michael,I think ts the nervous system that is the burnout vctim. The intense contractions that isos require really tax the mind/muscle connectors. I've ben though that too. Not fun.

Most articles I've read about isometrics usually don't talk about recovery. I don't know why that is. Some learn the hard way as I did. I don't know what system it can overtrain but in layman terms I felt like I was burnt out the first time I did them. I think the recovery part is more of a learning experience for each individual.

I think the greatest understatement in the artice has to do with recovery. Certainly isometrics are much easier to recovery from; albeit intense isometrics may not overtrain the muscles and tendons, but can overtrain the adrenal system.

But anyway, I am at the point in my life where I am enjoying having mobility and strength to do physical tasks without pain or injury; which many people my age cannot do. Isometric exercise plays a big part in this.

I wanted to remember some of this stuff for later use so I'm copying and pasting it here.

What training parameters should I use to stimulate growth?

Yielding isometrics: 2-3 sets of 45-75 seconds at the position where you can create the most tension in the target muscle. Don’t just hold the weight, flex the muscle as hard as you can.

Iso-dynamic 1 – Post-fatigue Normally I recommend doing this only on the last set of an exercise as the fatigue build-up could decrease performance on the subsequent sets too significantly. After performing 6-12 reps to failure or close to it on an exercise, hold your chosen position for as long as tolerable. You can use either the position where you can produce the most tension or the stretched position.

Iso-dynamic 2 – Multi-holds during a set: My favorite approach is to use three holds during a set, each lasting 10 to 20 seconds. Normally, I recommend a total 8-12 reps per set. So, a set could look like this: Hold 20 seconds / 3-4 reps / Hold 15 seconds / 3-4 reps / Hold 10 seconds / 3-4 reps. Of course, you can use a single or two holds in the set. I like the total time under isometric tension to be between 30 and 45 seconds and the reps to be between 8 and 12. Again, I like to do this on the last set of an exercise.

Iso-dynamic 3 – Pre-fatigue: This is a great method to improve mind-muscle connection. It may not be the best pure hypertrophy method, but it is very effective to learn to recruit and stimulate a lagging muscle group. You start an exercise by holding the position where you can feel the greatest tension in the target muscle. That can either be the peak contraction position or the mid-range, depending on the exercise. During that hold, you must focus on contracting the muscle as hard as you can, not just on holding the position. Hold for 20-30 seconds, then do 6-12 reps. You will feel the target muscle a lot more than usual. Since this method is more about motor learning than lifting big weights, you can do up to 3 sets on an exercise.

Loaded stretching: This is essentially a form of yielding isometrics so the same parameters can be used: 2-3 sets of 45-75 seconds.

Another way of stimulating muscle growth is achieving muscle fiber fatigue. As Zatsiorsky writes: “a muscle fiber that is recruited but not fatigued, is not being trained”. This is supported by a study by Mitchell et al. (2012) that found that if you go to muscle failure on an exercise, the muscle growth stimulated is the same regardless of how much weight was used, indicating that maximum muscle fiber fatigue is a powerful growth stimulus.

And at the root of all three of these pathways is the ability to maximally recruit or contract a specific muscle. If you are not efficient at contracting a specific muscle hard during an exercise, you will not be able to optimize any of the three pathways mentioned above. If a muscle is not contracting hard, you are not recruiting a maximum number of fibers (and especially not the most growth-prone fast-twitch fibers), and since you can’t fatigue fibers that were not recruited, and a fiber that is not fatigued is not being stimulated, the impact on growth will be limited.

Further, to release local growth factors you need to be able to cause a restriction in blood flow inside a muscle that is contracting long enough to result in a hypoxic state and an accumulation of lactic acid (about 20-40 seconds depending on contraction intensity). To occlude blood flow naturally you need to contract a muscle hard: the harder a muscle is contracting, the more blood flow inside that muscle is reduced. Not only that, you need to be able to sustain that contraction throughout the whole set (think about flexing your muscle while lifting weights), because the moment you release the tension, blood rushes back into the muscle and you are making it a lot harder to maximize growth factors. If you aren’t good at contracting a muscle hard and maintaining that contraction while moving the weight around, it will be hard to maximize growth factors.

As for mTor activation, it is maximized both by accentuating the eccentric portion and by reaching a stretched position while the muscle is contracting. Again, in both cases you cannot optimize the process if you are not efficient at creating tension in a specific muscle: accentuating the eccentric means flexing the muscle hard while doing the lowering portion of the movement. And to reach a tensed stretched position you must be good at keeping a muscle contracting hard even in the stretched portion of an exercise. Again, in both cases if you are not efficient at flexing, contracting a muscle there is no way of maximizing growth stimulation.

Muscle growth stimulation starts with the capacity to flex a specific muscle while lifting a weight.  Let’s see how isometric methods can be used for that purpose.

MOVEMENT AND RECRUITMENT PATTERNS

Performing optimally in an exercise is a function of movement pattern as well as recruitment pattern.

What’s the difference?

A movement pattern refers to the technical execution of a movement or exercise: how well you are moving, are you in the proper position at all times during the exercise; are the joints changing angles with the proper coordination.

Recruitment patterns refer to the order and magnitude of the contraction of the muscles involved in the exercise. See, two people could have the same technical execution of a lift yet use a different recruitment strategy. For example, one might use the quads more to do a squat while the other one might rely more on glutes despite having a similar technique.

Movement patterns are easy to fix but recruitment patterns are much harder to correct. It much easier to put the body in the right position than to change how much each muscle is contributing to an exercise, especially when you are not good at contracting the muscle you want to involve more in the lift.

Isometrics are the best tool to work on changing the recruitment pattern/strategy used during the execution of a movement pattern, making these methods a very useful tool toward improving performance.

With all that being said, let’s examine exactly how isometrics can be used the address the three objectives I just mentioned.

Michael, thenks. Very interesting.