Thread: Decline Bench study?

Originally Posted by Leatherface

Is it true that a recent experiment found the decline press to activate the pecs to the highest degree? I wonder why this is? The range of motion seems less to me.

I doubt it.

post the study.

I can't. I am asking if there is some truth to it. I can't remember where I read it but I'm sure it said something to the fact that a decline recruited the greatest amount of muscle fibers in the chest.

I'll go search for it now and see if I can find it.

how can anyone know if there is truth to it if we can't read it??

.

By: Mark Raineri

If you're new to the weightlifting game, there are hundreds of different exercises. How are you supposed to know which ones are effective and which ones aren't? And if you have been lifting for some time, how are you supposed to decipher the best exercises from the mediocre ones?

Well, thanks to EMG (Electromyography), we can now determine the best exercises for each muscle group. An EMG is a device that is used for measuring extremely small amounts of electricity generated by muscles below the surface of the skin. Let me explain how EMG works so you can get a better idea.

Two collectors called electrodes are placed on the surface of the skin above the muscle being tested. A computer determines the underlying electrical difference. These differences may indicate excessive muscle tension. For our purposes, the differences will also determine the percent of muscle fibers being stressed.

The following are the best exercises for each body part in order of most effective to least. Beside the number is the percentage of muscle fibers worked.

Chest



Decline dumbbell bench press - 93%
Incline dumbbell press - 91%
Decline bench press - 89%
Flat dumbbell bench press - 87%
Flat barbell bench press - 85%
The flat barbell bench press, an exercise that is done by many beginners, is one of the least effective exercises. With chest, we can see that dumbbells are far superior to barbells.

LOL I just did a search and found that one myself.

P-Funk

I thought maybe someone here had read it before is all.

Originally Posted by Leatherface

LOL I just did a search and found that one myself.

P-Funk

I thought maybe someone here had read it before is all.

Here we go with EMGs again..which has nothing to do with muscle tension.

I've got several hypothesis on electrical activity that these studies indicate, but I've no way to test em

BTW, that isn't a study, at least what's been posted.

C'mon DD, you know you base your entire training program on EMG studies

Sounds to me like dude just made those numbers up anyway.

Without going into an extended argument, can someone explain why EMGs are unreliable as a method for determining muscle action? I would be curious to see where Dips ranked.

I have to say, from personal experience, when I went to dumbells my growth shot up and my shoulder problems went away. I do semi-incline DB, decline BB, Dips, and either cable-crosses or pec dec or DB flyes, and it's been smooth sailing.

Only time I'm on a flat bench now is for close-grip press on tricep day.

Neither EMG nor TUT alone are suitable for explaining hypertrophy.

If electrical activity was the only important variable, we would all grow quickly with those electronic stimulation machines. If TUT was the only important factor, you could just hold an isometric contraction for the alloted time and grow like a weed.

Dips depend on body positioning (leaning or no leaning), not everyone is built the same structurally either.

Originally Posted by Dale Mabry

you could just hold an isometric contraction for the alloted time and grow like a weed.

So are you saying, HIT's static holds work?

Only for you.

Agreed that multiple factors are at work, but I'm just saying that this EMG "study" seems to reflect my own experience.

What we don't know is where the electrode recpetors were placed, and if they tested ancillary support muslces also.

Another neat study would be to measure testosterone levels following certain exercises. For instance, we know heavy squatting releases a lot of test. Perhaps heavy flat bench has a similar effect.

Agreed on the Dips, too. I do them both ways; leaning one way for pecs, another for tris.

They have done the test study, Squats and deads were the only 2 that were significant I believe.

To whomever: No, I don't have a link, and no, I won't go find one, it can be found thru a simple google search. Not aimed at you Brodus, I just know some smart ass will inquire.

EMG does not test mechanical tension on the muscles, which is probably the primary factor for disrupting a homeostatic state in someone's physiology forcing some kind of adaptation. Of course this is not a fact, but it certainly is a huge part of the equation. I doubt that electrical activity has much to do with hypertrophy, as doing high reps with low weights (30-50 reps) would probably show similar electrical activity as muscles fatigued. Again, this is speculation, as we can't really see the details of their "study".

In any case, how much electrical activity is going on in the area is not the determinant of a good exercise. I'll speculate that any beginning trainee hooked up to electrodes performing a bench press for the first time ever would have close to a "100 percent" reading as the study above indicates, likely because the central nervous system hasn't hit a groove (viz., motor learning patterns haven't been established in which the least amount of fiber contracts to do the most amount of work) and thus, uncoordinated in an exercise as the body is, the greatest amount of muscle will be activated to perform a minimal amount of work. The first stage of stress adaptation in weight training is (probably) the Central Nervous System learning to do the most amount of work with the least amount of energy. This is a survival mechanism.

I'd love to see a "study" conducted with someone performing decline dumbell presses exclusively for 3 months, hook up electrodes during this time and watch the electrical activity slightly decline as the exercise becomes fundamentally easier (relative to the neurological coding procedure; as the exercise becomes adapted to), and then have the subject perform an unusual (relative to experience) exercise, such as an incline press, and watch the electrical activity spike up above the "usual" exercise..

Good summary, thanks for the info.

And I agree--without knowing the methodology of a study, the participants history, etc., it's really impossible to make any judgments.

To add to what DD said...

As you know, when you are lifting, an action potential is sent to the muscle and this action potential yadda yadda the muscle contracts. As you know, after tension in the sarcomeres hits a certain degree, the myosin heads are snapped off. So, what you have is a muscle fiber that lacks the ability to function, but it will still receive an action potential telling it to fire. So there is still electrical activity even though that myofibril cannot contract. Coincidentally, I would think this would provide a reason FOR the use of EMG analysis given the sequential recruitment of muscle fibers by type. The problem lies in the fact that 93% of the fibers are receiving the stimulus to contract, but how many reps are being done, is 93% being recruited for 1 second or is 93% being recruited for 5 seconds. Maybe 93% is the highest that was reached. Figure this, assume it was a 4 rep exercise that they did. Let's say that the each rep recruited the following number of fibers (15%, 35%, 68%, 93%). Now assume another exercise went as follows (25%, 75%, 88%, 88%). Which one is better? The answer is who the fuck knows and without knowing this, the method of measurement comes into question.

I'd like to point out briefly the sheer lunacy of saying that one bench pressing exercise is better than another because of EMG techniques. Anyone with half a brain will tell you that every exercise has some benefit, and determining one's value over the other is as useless as drawing a distinction between a bank account that has 1,000,0000 dollars and a bank account that has 1,000,0001 dollars. In reality, both have immense value to the function you wish to apply it (buying goods), and as with exercise, the more you use one account the less value it has (diminishing returns - the more you learn something, the easier it becomes neurologically, the less demanding it is on the body) until the benefit of one account is whiped out and the other one must be used in order to continue application.

Of course, this is a pretty simple example, but it's exactly what I do. I perform an exercise that I'm not used to or not adapted to (as in a bench press) and as soon as my body is adjusted to it, I throw it out of my routine and perform a different exercise I haven't learned (as in a decline bench) and, despite weakness in the exercise, my progress continues.

In any case, to say a decline press is better in my estimation is ridiculous, because your shorter ROM will indicate less microtrauma throughout a full range of motion (and also a reduced TUT given a constant rep range).

My head hurts.

All of this fancy terminology is useless. You can successfully and effectively hit every muscle with only one exercise. No more copying and pasting necessary!

Of course I am just being an ass for the hell of it.

decline bench empahsizes lower pec.

lol uhoh here we go again with the lower pec theory...

Originally Posted by gopro

All of this fancy terminology is useless. You can successfully and effectively hit every muscle with only one exercise. No more copying and pasting necessary!

Of course I am just being an ass for the hell of it.

Originally Posted by gopro

You can successfully and effectively hit every muscle with only one exercise.

What is it? What is it? What is it? Tell me! Tell me! Tell me!