VRT and Strength

[VRT Man]

As most of you know, the vasocongestion (or 'pumping') of Visualized Resistance Training has been known and shown to increase muscle size; but I had been subjected to occasional ridicule regarding VRT in increasing STRENGTH of any kind, not just size, when I made a statement awhile back that after 17 years of only VRT, I was invited to work out at a gym by a close friend, and while there, benched 9 reps at 300 lbs. on a Universal machine. Bull---- some said.

No strength, just size?

Read:

http://www.dclab.com/aside_biceps.asp

--Greg Mangan

[Greg Newton]

Hi Greg,

Thanks for posting that. All the great lifters from yesteryear, both Power and Olympic, practiced visualization, sometimes with light weights in the form of only an Olympic bar. A teenage Bob Green never forgot meeting Paul Anderson at the Venice Beach weight pit. When Green asked him how he lifted such heavy weights, Anderson replied, "with the mind son, with the mind."

Muscular tension is muscular tension. The beauty of VRT is that not only do you visualize the lift, but you are putting muscular tension behind it, and in a way that you aren't amplifying gravitational forces on the joints.

Bottom line - I might be very strong, but I am not arm wrestling Greg Mangan anytime soon!

[firefox]

I'm trying to get the correct performance of VRT exercises.I believe that you use tension only in one direction.;so,do you relax tension totally after the contraction while returning to the starting position? For instance,in the biceps curl; I would curl the arm with tension;then,at the end of the contraction,I would relax tension as I extend the arm back to the starting position as quickly as possible before applying tension to begin the next rep.Is that correct?

[VRT Man]

Firefox, that is the way I do it. I like to imitate weight training as much as possible. However, one can go in both directions with tension, but that is not a complete imitation of weight training, and I found the biggest pump that I would get is in one direction only, like lifting or training with a weight. But I want to remind you to choose what YOU feel is best for you.

--Greg Mangan

[firefox]

Thanks Gregg,but,with a weight there IS tension in both directions.There's tension in the contracting,or positive phase;and,in the negative phase when lowering,there's tension resisting the weight from falling.

[MikeNY]

Greg VRT is the Course of the future, one thing I missed not being able to exercise was VRT. In the couple months I had off, thought I'd regress fast and lose muscle. VRT & DVR exercises had built me a good foundation and I think that was a great help in recovery. Any does VRT gets the pump and knows it is the real thing!

Greg now you can lift to your heart's content and get all the benifits of weight lifting and none of the bad side; VRT works for me.