Will F/T become involved if you hold long enough? Of course, but are you suggesting that having the F/T fibre take on the role of S/T fibre is desireable? Has a sudden shortage developed in things to do to develop speed?
kelly im afraid that your understanding of jays techniques are flawed. you are basing your opinions on previous research and experience of those who use isometrics in a different manner than jay. if you notice he dosent say just isometrics but isometrics in the extreme joint angle.
I am aware of the differences between isometrics and I am fully aware of the use and benefits of full range yielding style isos. They do offer plenty of strength benefits when used with proper loading and contraction times and the extended length holds will offer flexbility benefits. Yet my opinion is that anything that can be held for 5 minutes is too light to have much of an impact on maximum strength and there are better methods for hypertrophy. I’m aware of these claims but I haven’t met anybody yet who got any results holding pushups for such an excessive amount of time or squats for that amount of time or whatever.
CF wrote:
“How about training for your event and not for impressing sports writers? Save that for when you become partners after retirement.”
CF did you mean James and I work together? We would be bankrupt in a week, I’m and idiot, but maybe it I tell people I trained big time athletes that I didn’t I might become a success and sell pink t-shirts!!! 
charlie the goal is not to get fast to act like slow its to first activate as many powerful motor units as possible as a prerequisite for strenght development.i feel like u guys arent getting what im trying to say , thats not your fault i think its just kinda hard to explain things of this detail over a forum.not to say that it cant be done but i think u ugys ar focusing on the wrong thing with jays isos, its not to make u stronger or faster its to prepare u to be stronger and faster.
James by holding for such long periods does your body start to call on or unlock (so to say) new muscle fibers??? If so then by doing the holds your body learns to at least turn on more muscle fibers and then once that is done the new fiber recruitment is taken and taught to turn on powerfully as a whole?? Is this correct or completely off???
I was talking about Jay S and Adam Archuleta . Actualy, I was thinking of pink shorts (again). They were free then and you can’t laugh now (as much) cause they’re the new black!
somewhat the idea is to recruit more powerful muscle units and then those units can be used to become stronger. his athletes often increase their maximums dramatically in a few days but this is becasue of the work done before hand and then after there is a stabalization period. asd i will send u that article soon so that u can see some of the stuff im talking about. jay also believes that hyperplasia does occur and if u look at studies done with birds in wich extreme levels of hyperplasia occur the birds wing had a weight attached to its wing to create an extreme strech. the bird was then left alon for 30 days in which time extreme levels of hyperplasia occured. that is some what the same thing that can beachieved when extreme stretch/angle excercisies are performed.
CF pink shorts??? r they short shorts?? I will pay 100 bucks for them!!! I will steal the idea from you and call it my own, then when you call me oout I will call my friends at GQ magazine to to a trial where I am judge and jury!!! Innocent baby!!!
I agree, I believe to rule out hyperplasia is to rule out “the world being round instead of flat!”
ASD keep up the good thoughts even if they do sound retarded to other people at times. Who knows you might unlock some secrets not yet discovered by the Russians! “You can only achieve success through failure!”
James, you’ve done a good job explaining the concept behind Jay’s use of long duration isometrics. Here is my understanding of it.
When we are strength training, running, playing a sport etc.our muscles contract and shorten and stay in a shortened state as competition continues.
As this happens muscles are not able to absorb as much force or put as much force out. If an athlete got used to holding an iso in an extreme range(where the muscle is at its longest) for a long duration it would eventually enable that athletes muscles to quickly return to normal after concentric contraction. This would enable an athlete to create more force more often . So I think this technique is partially responsible for Jay’s athletes being able to handle such high volume/intensity workouts. Thus training to train.
jasonb good eplaination
SVS thanks man…did I tell you my theroy about how hanging upsidedown with a 100lb db on your nuts eating a protein smoothie increases hyplasia and recovery…JUST KIDDING I hope
that is part of the theroy behind the training and is stated well.
I’m still trying to live them down as it is!
How do you recruit the same muscles you use in running while doing wall squats? Wouldnt your body recruit the muscles it needs for the squats?
Mel Siff says that your body only knows movements not muscles and that “as far
as we know, muscles work very cleverly in concurrent and sequential patterns
to carry out a wide variety of tasks in every different situation”.
So how can a squat mimic running?
I’d have the same questions- and if you want something that mimics running, how about running- that’d work!
here is a site that gets into some of the stuff James might be speaking about interms of schroders methods of madness!!! 
http://www.afpafitness.com/articles/FiberType.htm
the idea is to recruit more powerful muscle units and then those units can be used to become stronger. his athletes often increase their maximums dramatically in a few days but this is becasue of the work done before hand and then after there is a stabalization period. asd i will send u that article soon so that u can see some of the stuff im talking about. jay also believes that hyperplasia does occur and if u look at studies done with birds in wich extreme levels of hyperplasia occur the birds wing had a weight attached to its wing to create an extreme strech. the bird was then left alon for 30 days in which time extreme levels of hyperplasia occured. that is some what the same thing that can beachieved when extreme stretch/angle excercisies are performed.
When we are strength training, running, playing a sport etc.our muscles contract and shorten and stay in a shortened state as competition continues.
As this happens muscles are not able to absorb as much force or put as much force out. If an athlete got used to holding an iso in an extreme range(where the muscle is at its longest) for a long duration it would eventually enable that athletes muscles to quickly return to normal after concentric contraction. This would enable an athlete to create more force more often . So I think this technique is partially responsible for Jay’s athletes being able to handle such high volume/intensity workouts. Thus training to train.
These are examples of why I have a problem with this stuff. It’s promoted as something new that nobody ever knew of or thought of before complete with new terminology, false explanations, and everything else. Force absorption is nothing more then eccentric strength. A 5 minute isometric contraction is definitely not the way to recruit the largest motor units. Loading a birds wing up with weight for 30 days straight is not the same thing we’re talking about here, unless someone wants to do a 30 day iso hold? I guess if a 30 minute iso hold with 225 is easy enough then why not go for days? lol That should throw a red flag up right there. Isometrics consistently yield a decrease in speed strength so that would shoot down the theory about the muscles “bouncing back” faster after a concentric contraction.
My view;
I am not willing to rule any training concept in or out until I or someone I trust and respect determines it to be either effective or useless by way of personal experience or practical observation based upon directly related, sufficient, cumulative statistical data.
It’s one thing to postulate about the various applications of modified or mutated training methodology. It is another thing, however, to market or diminish the value of certain methodology based upon filtered down data or some unrelated research in some distant laboratory utilizing who knows what for test subjects.
Laboratory Research, above all else, is what I question.
While some academic is slicing/dicing and attaching electrodes to who knows what, or if it’s even an athlete, I will continue to field test various methodologies first and foremost on myself or willing athletes.
As for Jay’s methodology; I feel that this is becoming overly academic as the majority of material being discussed is coming second hand at best.
I would hope that all involved in this discussion would agree that in order to righteously discuss Jay’s methods, or any others, we must first obtain more direct and useable information in much more useable context.
One of the biggest downfalls of strength training in the US is the tendency for individuals to learn just enough about various training methodolody to be complete fucking idiots in the application.
Just imagine if Charlie wasn’t available to crush ridiculous rumors of who trained Ben or that he didn’t perform limit squats an hour before setting world records. Who knows who would be out there, or is out there, destroying sprinters based upon he said she said half assed training perceptions.
More useable and verifiable information must be obtained, from Jay or someone who has worked closely with him, in order to discuss this subject any further with any semblence of direction.
Let’s move on and discuss various applications of the isometric regime which is not based off of supposed and alleged methodology.
I’ll start; who is interested in discussing the varied effects of loadless max intensity isometrics (eg pulling or pressing/squatting an empty bar against a pin in the power rack) vs max intensity loaded yielding isometrics in which the duration of effort of exertion is the same in both cases.
Short of having a dynamometer, how does one quantify max intensity loadless isometric effort and how would you justify the implementation of such training into a cycle.
[QUOTE=James Smith]One of the biggest downfalls of strength training in the US is the tendency for individuals to learn just enough about various training methodolody to be complete fucking idiots in the application. QUOTE]
A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking largely sobers us again. --Alexander Pope
Re iso holds unloaded: I doubt whether someone who isn’t significantly experienced in the weightroom can put forth a voluntary contraction that even approaches the muscular force exerted with a max load. No studies to quote, just my impression, but I think anyone can confirm this for himself by trying it. I know I can’t equal it: one way of testing this is to see how long you can “strain to the max” on an unloaded bar pull against the pins. I can almost guarantee you won’t lose it in about 5-6 seconds, which you would if it were really a max effort. You will hold yourself back unknowingly.
On max holds with weight, as has been pointed out recently, you can surpass your 1RM significantly. So my guess is unless you find a weight that you can’t lift or hold for 2 seconds and then back off from there to find one you can barely hold for 5 sec, teeth gritting, groaning, thinking you’re going to lose it any second, then it ain’t your max.
As far as holds with lesser loads v. unloaded against pins I still tend to doubt their value, compared to weighted, since they are a little different, and the difference may be important: you will be pullling against the pins, namely, your pull is straight up. Do you really pull straight up in DL lockout holds? No.
Juggler, we are in agreement.
Aside from what is presented in Supertraining, and Thibaudeaus most recent text, how do assign loading parameters for max intensity yielding isometric holds.
The consensus for duration seems to be consistent ranging from 4-10 second contractions, however, the range for amount of repetitions per workout offers much more gradation.
I believe Siff states that 10 minutes of total max intensity contractions is the ceiling per workout, however, this sounds like an insanely high volume or cummulative contraction time under max/supramax loads.
Going by Prilepin’s chart we may conclude that 4-10 repetitions at +90%1RM is optimal for any given workout. However, as supramax loads are possible to support at varied joint angles how might one reassign/diminish repetition values.
Surely fatigue drop off as calculated by unit time would yield one possible measurable.
Do you see contraindications for utilizing such AREG measures in this case?
I always seek to quantify and organize as much as possible when programming training