T.U.T (Time under tension)

[Rambodian]

Is T.U.T important for strength gain or muscle hypertrophy or both?

The reason I ask is because I was wondering if I understand T.U.T correctly. Say I do 10 deadlift singles, and each rep takes 2-3 seconds.
Total T.U.T would be around the 20-30 second mark.
Which would be roughly the same as if I did a 10 rep set of deadlifts (give or take)

So if I wanted to increase T.U.T, I could just add more singles or do more reps per set or go slow on each rep. or all of the above?

I am wondering about T.U.T and volume at the moment, I know volume is important for strength (GVT for instance), but not sure if T.U.T is important for strength as much as hypertrophy, and even if it is important for hypertrophy, wouldn't doing lower rep higher weight but just more sets be better because you could hit higher poundage?

Pondering about this lol
Graeme

 

[Fadi]

Is T.U.T important for strength gain or muscle hypertrophy or both?

The reason I ask is because I was wondering if I understand T.U.T correctly. Say I do 10 deadlift singles, and each rep takes 2-3 seconds.
Total T.U.T would be around the 20-30 second mark.
Which would be roughly the same as if I did a 10 rep set of deadlifts (give or take)

So if I wanted to increase T.U.T, I could just add more singles or do more reps per set or go slow on each rep. or all of the above?

I am wondering about T.U.T and volume at the moment, I know volume is important for strength (GVT for instance), but not sure if T.U.T is important for strength as much as hypertrophy, and even if it is important for hypertrophy, wouldn't doing lower rep higher weight but just more sets be better because you could hit higher poundage?

Pondering about this lol
Graeme

Okay, I'm not going to pretend that I know a great deal about this subject, but I can tell you based on my experience that we did not lift weights with TUT in mind.

Having said that, I can see where not so much TUT would benefit a weightlifter (I'd rather not talk about powewrlifters since I've never been one), but TUT mixed/coupled with isometric/static holds could benefit. Again, I'm not going to say benefit bodybuilding or powerlifting, but benefit the weightlifter by "teaching" the nervous system to activate and fire at all and/or different position of a lift, such as the squat for example.

Okay, let's put what I've just said into practice. You walk out with the squat bar, then you descend and hold at different locations for few seconds, keeping on moving from one location to the next (while holding) at those locations for a second or two before changing to another location (up or down).

As far as TUT and bodybuilding, well the debate is still raging on the internet. I'd like to stay out of it.


Fadi.

 

[O.N.]

at the end of the day if you are causing damage to the muscle tissue then that tissue will grow if that means doing light weights fast you will grow that set of fibers responsible, if it means doing heavy weights slowly you will grow a different set of fibers, if you are bodybuilding and not power lifting it doesn't matter what the make up of fibers is on the inside of the muscle it only matters about the appearance on the outside so if you bench 45kg total and it takes you 3min to complete the set if you are screaming and in pain for days you have damaged the tissue enough to cause muscle growth.

basically no matter how you have to cause it make sure you damage the tissue and it will be forced to grow.

 

[Rambodian]

basically no matter how you have to cause it make sure you damage the tissue and it will be forced to grow.

Ok, I see what your saying, but then if TUT is not being a consideration, why then do bodybuilders use higher reps than powerlifters?

Wouldn't a low rep range done many times over enable one to use a higher load thus 'damaging' the muscle more enabling more growth?

TUT would be the same, but time of doing the exercise would be longer with lower rep more sets because of more rest times.

 

[Goosey]

TUT to reflects more the quality of the rep more than the time as the super slow people subscribe

If we really want to monitor progressive resistance honestly every rep should and must maintain the same rep cadence, using TUT is a tool to ensure that both the negative and positive movement is consistent as most, when we fatigue tend to move faster and shorten the rep to get the last couple of reps thinking that we have progressed but really havent.

Just another tool, and another perspective.

At the end of the day and in this case the rep, it's the last rep where all the action tales place.

Hope I make sense.

 

[dave]

I like to think of TUT as similar to volume. If you keep your reps consistent as you should say 2 down and 1 up as an example.

10 reps is 30 seconds of tension
11 reps is 33 seconds

So that is more volume of work (not volume lifted which is not what volume should be gauged from) for you to perform if you do 1 more rep. You could also change the tempo to 2 down and 2 up.

10 reps is 40 seconds

Your muscles have now performed more total volume of work. These are just basic examples but hopefully they help.

I personally like to just keep TUT the same. Explosive up and my controlled down which takes me about 2 seconds in total. That way I increase my volume of work by increasing either the weight or the reps. With assistance exercises I tend to use a slightly slower tempo so it is closer to 2-3 seconds TUT.

In regards to strength as in weight lifted on the bar I have yet to see an example of TUT (as in lengthening it) helping that. In regards to muscle mass it can help due to increasing the volume of work.

 

[0ni]

My opinion is pretty much between that of Dave's and Little Hammer's

 

[O.N.]

TUT to reflects more the quality of the rep more than the time as the super slow people subscribe

If we really want to monitor progressive resistance honestly every rep should and must maintain the same rep cadence, using TUT is a tool to ensure that both the negative and positive movement is consistent as most, when we fatigue tend to move faster and shorten the rep to get the last couple of reps thinking that we have progressed but really havent.

Just another tool, and another perspective.

At the end of the day and in this case the rep, it's the last rep where all the action tales place.

Hope I make sense.

For bodybuilders as said before it doesn't matter if you are growing fast twitch or slow twitch fibers as only the outside appearance of the muscle is of concern not how strong the muscle is, so bodybuilders doing a whole different rep range from 4-15 reps for example is then going to be covering both sets of fibers and growing both resulting in the "appearance" of lots of muscle...it might not be strong muscle but it is made up of both endurance and strength.

Where as on the other hand a power lifter only wants strength and that works well too but it doesn't matter about size he just wants the raw power so he works on low rep ranges and tries to build strength along with his training ofcourse comes the appearance of size.

There is a multitude of ways in which you can train and to be honest if the goal is body building it should always be changing ever so often to grow different sets or to make muscle fibers adapt to different levels of fatigue.

But as said if you damage the tissue curling 20kg for 10 reps you will grow if you damage the tissue curling 10kg for 50 reps you will grow.
You will just grow fibers differently or different fibers.