You’ll never believe this… but

You could get the same strength increase and save wear and tear on your joints by using lighter weights. Just by changing the tempo.

I know this sounds counter-intuitive, but hear me out. Your muscles don’t know how much weight you’re using, they only know tension, time and metabolic load. Or to put it in English, how much are you asking them to contract to control or move the weight, how long are you asking them to contract for and how metabolically challenging it is.

Traditionally you’d just add weight to increase the tension.
This is effective, it is old school progressive overload at its best. More weight = more strength = progress = increased satisfaction = better self image = stronger and bigger muscles (Yay!)

There is another way, and it is something that experienced lifters have been using as accessory workouts for ever. Lower the weights and use Tempo.

What is tempo?

Tempo refers to how fast or slow the weight moves and whether there is a deliberate pause or pauses included. We use a notation system that looks like this 3010. That would mean 3 seconds on the way down, zero at the bottom, one second on the way up, zero seconds at the top. The first number is always the down, even on a deadlift where the ‘up’ comes first. If you want the athlete to explode as fast as possible, replace one of the numbers with an X.

How do I use tempo?
There are a few options.

The first is we can increase the time under tension. We can slow the ‘down’ phase of a lift, say 3 seconds on the way down, as fast as you can on the way up would be a total of around 6 seconds under tension per rep. Roughly 3x what you’d get from a normal rep. We tend not to deliberately slow the part of the lift where the muscles are contracting and shortening. Rarely in life, combat or sport will teaching yourself to move slowly be rewarded with anything other than a punch in the face.

Slower = lower:

Deliberately slowing the tempo will result in having to reduce the weight moved and therefore reduce the tension the muscle fibre has generated. This is generally bad for muscle and strength gains as we try to include overload into each session E.g. more tension or reps. However, if you have a joint or bone problem where you are unable to load yourself heavily. Or don’t want to complete more reps. Or you have limited weights available. Then dropping the weight and increasing the tempo could be a viable option, especially if you went single limb rather than bilateral.

Paused reps:

A second option is to put a pause in at the bottom. This works well for a movement like a squat where you often see athletes using elastic recoil to bounce out of the bottom. This is the opposite of dynamic. Remove the bounce by prescribing a short hold at the bottom. In notation, that would look like this: 13X1. One at the top, a three second hold at the bottom, as fast as possible on the way up, a one second hold at the top for a breath.

Removing the bounce at the bottom means you now have to recruit more muscle fibres to move the weight up from the bottom. Think how much harder the first rep in a deadlift is than the 2nd, that is what you’re programming in. This would allow you to use a lighter weight to get the same effect.

Can you combine these approaches. Of course you can.

Could you squat 3 seconds on the way down, hold for three, then explode up? Sure could. Would it be horrible. Sure would be! But you would need way less weight than doing a traditional 1011 squat. So if you need or only have lighter weights available, then this might be a viable option.

How else could we use pauses?

We could put one or multiple pauses in the middle of a movement to cement the position into your brain and strengthen you in that position. This is often used in Weightlifting, where you might get a snatch held for a couple of seconds just off the floor, mid-shin and then above the knee or at the high hang. You could then ask your athlete to snatch from the high hang for example. Clearly the weight would have to be lower than a normal rep but you could get a long time under tension + reinforcing desired positions in one movement. Double win.

Another option for pauses is on the eccentric, or the down phase. Think pull up. Imagine you jump to the top of a pull-up, lower yourself to your sticking point or weakest point and hold for as long as you can. You’ll gain strength through around 15 degrees either side of that point. Neat eh! This also works on the sticking point of a squat or any movement.