Since you must lift heavier weights to grow bigger muscles it would suffice to say that strength increase comes before muscle growth. The body needs a stimulus in order to adapt otherwise it won't.
Have to push back on Jeremy's conclusions here. In an 8-week study window, programs optimized for hypertrophy or strength will be fundamentally at odds with each other. A proper hypertrophy program drives serious muscle fatigue through high volume, which temporarily tanks force output when tested at week 8. Meanwhile, a short-term strength program chases 'neural adaptations' through higher intensity/lower volume work to improve high-threshold motor unit recruitment. Neural adaptations hit a ceiling pretty quick without new contractile tissue to work with. But you'd never see this play out in just 8 weeks. Would love to see Peter interview Eric Helms as a researcher doing cutting-edge work with a more grounded take on this (and I'm guessing other) topics.
The point Jeremy is making is that in a controlled scientific setting, equivalent hypertrophy can be achieved regardless of whether you use low loads or high loads, however the individuals who train with low loads tend to build little to no strength whereas the higher load groups reliably notice robust strength adaptations. If developing more contractile tissue was as important as many people assume for continued strength adaptation, wouldn't we expect to see more strength gain in low load training than we do? Especially given robust muscle growth in the region of 4-8% has been repeatedly shown in resistance training studies of around 8 weeks in duration (I don't think you can claim fatigue is masking strength in these studies by the way, because 6-8 weeks is plenty of time to acclimatise to a given dose of training, particularly if volume remains stable, which it does in many of the studies). This seems to point towards neurological adpatation playing a significantly greater role than we may have previously thought (given higher loads optimise for this). I happen to think that hypertrophy is certainly plays contributory factor to strength gain, but since many peoples ability to continue to build muscle mass plateaus rather abruptly as they become intermediate/advanced, skill development and neurological adaptation has to explain why people continue to gain strength at a disproportionate rate to their rate of muscle gain over their training careers.
@@mattbrownperformancecoaching Another consideration is inflammation vs tissue growth. Perhaps low load training causes more inflammation, so when we measure muscle size, it looks the same as the high-load group, but it's actually just temporary swelling.
Is there something in the literature that documents "strength capacity" of the muscle before resistance training, seems like the before picture is important in this conversation. Perhaps if the muscle doesn't grow the system doesn't require growth vs. the growth as an adaptation response?
I wonder if muscle hypertrophy is a function of being able to do more work (reps)as opposed to absolute strength. And actual strength imcrease is the development of neural efficiency..
I get what seems obvious and I’m sure hypertrophy has a correlation long term…… You can also go in other directions. Muscle size Per se doesn’t correlate directly to strength gain…. Many many people who lift have synonymous muscle size but not strength….. At 70 I’ve done years of research on myself……. Now being a total hybrid athlete I don’t get much if any size gains because of diet and cardio…… But lifting every third day has created marked increases in strength on a steady straight line basis……. You can increase strength significantly without gains in muscle size. Probably 90-95% neural
What a pedantic discussion with neither a conclusion nor usable information. The whole line of questioning seems off anyway. All of hypertrophy, strength, and “neural” (what a nebulous term btw), are the EFFECTS of exercise… or genetics. None of them are independent mechanisms. They are all adaptations.
Neural adaptation refers to changes in the nervous system in response to stimuli, and this can cover a wide range of contexts: Motor skill learning Strength training Sensory adjustments (e.g., visual or auditory adaptation) As we know the context it is not nebulous in any way.
Really? Take a newbie who has never picked up a weight. They start training and results happen quickly. Some of it is hypertrophy, but the neuromuscular adaptations are significant. Just consider the bar moving on a bench press, and how much it moves initially. There is obviously a link to muscle size and strength, but as a powerlifter, my strength tends to be more than my size. Reps ranged and intensity make a huge difference. Not the 5-30 stuff, but more like doing 3s vs 8s. Simply put, a hypertrophy block is different than a strength block.
@ 100 percent correct. But in general there is a positive relationship. Which is simply common sense. The issue is much more debatable with advanced individuals. Again, so much is dependent on training protocol and a variety of other variables.
@@riceexperiment that is measuring neurosignaling. I’m more thinking like is it just max single rep = strength or max reps at a set weight, that kind of thing. I would guess how you measure strength will impact how important hypertrophy really is. Max one rep? Probably important. Deadhang for 5 minutes? Probably not.
Since you must lift heavier weights to grow bigger muscles it would suffice to say that strength increase comes before muscle growth. The body needs a stimulus in order to adapt otherwise it won't.
Have to push back on Jeremy's conclusions here.
In an 8-week study window, programs optimized for hypertrophy or strength will be fundamentally at odds with each other. A proper hypertrophy program drives serious muscle fatigue through high volume, which temporarily tanks force output when tested at week 8. Meanwhile, a short-term strength program chases 'neural adaptations' through higher intensity/lower volume work to improve high-threshold motor unit recruitment.
Neural adaptations hit a ceiling pretty quick without new contractile tissue to work with. But you'd never see this play out in just 8 weeks.
Would love to see Peter interview Eric Helms as a researcher doing cutting-edge work with a more grounded take on this (and I'm guessing other) topics.
The point Jeremy is making is that in a controlled scientific setting, equivalent hypertrophy can be achieved regardless of whether you use low loads or high loads, however the individuals who train with low loads tend to build little to no strength whereas the higher load groups reliably notice robust strength adaptations.
If developing more contractile tissue was as important as many people assume for continued strength adaptation, wouldn't we expect to see more strength gain in low load training than we do? Especially given robust muscle growth in the region of 4-8% has been repeatedly shown in resistance training studies of around 8 weeks in duration (I don't think you can claim fatigue is masking strength in these studies by the way, because 6-8 weeks is plenty of time to acclimatise to a given dose of training, particularly if volume remains stable, which it does in many of the studies).
This seems to point towards neurological adpatation playing a significantly greater role than we may have previously thought (given higher loads optimise for this).
I happen to think that hypertrophy is certainly plays contributory factor to strength gain, but since many peoples ability to continue to build muscle mass plateaus rather abruptly as they become intermediate/advanced, skill development and neurological adaptation has to explain why people continue to gain strength at a disproportionate rate to their rate of muscle gain over their training careers.
@@mattbrownperformancecoaching Another consideration is inflammation vs tissue growth. Perhaps low load training causes more inflammation, so when we measure muscle size, it looks the same as the high-load group, but it's actually just temporary swelling.
Is there something in the literature that documents "strength capacity" of the muscle before resistance training, seems like the before picture is important in this conversation. Perhaps if the muscle doesn't grow the system doesn't require growth vs. the growth as an adaptation response?
I wonder if muscle hypertrophy is a function of being able to do more work (reps)as opposed to absolute strength. And actual strength imcrease is the development of neural efficiency..
I get what seems obvious and I’m sure hypertrophy has a correlation long term…… You can also go in other directions. Muscle size Per se doesn’t correlate directly to strength gain…. Many many people who lift have synonymous muscle size but not strength….. At 70 I’ve done years of research on myself……. Now being a total hybrid athlete I don’t get much if any size gains because of diet and cardio…… But lifting every third day has created marked increases in strength on a steady straight line basis……. You can increase strength significantly without gains in muscle size. Probably 90-95% neural
What a pedantic discussion with neither a conclusion nor usable information.
The whole line of questioning seems off anyway. All of hypertrophy, strength, and “neural” (what a nebulous term btw), are the EFFECTS of exercise… or genetics. None of them are independent mechanisms. They are all adaptations.
Neural adaptation refers to changes in the nervous system in response to stimuli, and this can cover a wide range of contexts:
Motor skill learning
Strength training
Sensory adjustments (e.g., visual or auditory adaptation)
As we know the context it is not nebulous in any way.
Hmmm.... how far can muscle strength increase without it also getting bigger?
Hmmm could Bruce Lee's training method be the answer here?
As if getting big is an issue. You wont.
Really? Take a newbie who has never picked up a weight. They start training and results happen quickly. Some of it is hypertrophy, but the neuromuscular adaptations are significant. Just consider the bar moving on a bench press, and how much it moves initially. There is obviously a link to muscle size and strength, but as a powerlifter, my strength tends to be more than my size. Reps ranged and intensity make a huge difference. Not the 5-30 stuff, but more like doing 3s vs 8s. Simply put, a hypertrophy block is different than a strength block.
There are people of smaller muscle mass with great strength and that is a fact.
@ 100 percent correct. But in general there is a positive relationship. Which is simply common sense. The issue is much more debatable with advanced individuals. Again, so much is dependent on training protocol and a variety of other variables.
If you know a farmer who doesn't have huge muscles, you know that muscle size is deceiving. My son in law will pick up and move a 300 lb calf.
Was Jeremy Loenneke wearing one of those fake nose and glasses combos, or was the lighting his end that bad?
Kind of a meaningless video without quantifying how strength is being measured.
Lol
6:20 isn't what you were hoping for with weightlifting measures and neurosignaling?
@@riceexperiment that is measuring neurosignaling. I’m more thinking like is it just max single rep = strength or max reps at a set weight, that kind of thing. I would guess how you measure strength will impact how important hypertrophy really is. Max one rep? Probably important. Deadhang for 5 minutes? Probably not.
This is a clip from the full episode where they do discuss the definitions
Strength is maximal force in this area.
There goes the hair cut again, can’t pay attention looking at it, put some gel please!
Yawn