For the last few weeks I have seen massive growth in my triceps muscles. I have been hitting the gym at peak time and as such I decided to change my routine so that I don’t have to sit around and wait for equipment. Lucky for me these forced routine changes resulted in some fast growth.

An overload of sets for a bigger triceps workout

Basically, my gym gets so busy at peak time and you seem to spend half your session sitting on the chair waiting for someone to get off the machine that you want to use. I grew frustrated of this so decided that I was just going to get on one machine and pump out my whole session using only one exercise.

How it went down
I ended up using the cables and it was my triceps day so I decided I was going to do 12 sets of overhead cable extensions. I love this exercise because the cables are always pulling back on your triceps meaning you get zero rest time in between each repetition. I started out heavy and did three sets of six repetitions. I then dropped the weight and made each extension a little faster whilst still keeping the decline part of the exercise slow and controlled. Finally I stripped off some more weight and did a few sets of 12-15 repetitions or until complete failure.

After the workout
As soon as I finished this workout I knew I was going to be sore. My arms were so tired I could hardly take my shirt off to have a shower! I stretched out for about 10 minutes and really felt an amazing burn.

The next day my triceps were as sore as if I had been having a pushup contest with Rocky himself. I cannot remember the last time my arms were this sore. The soreness took a good week to fully go away.

The results
The most important thing, however, is that after a few more sessions done in a similar style my arms have been growing better than they have in a few years. Not only are my arms bigger, they are stronger and my bench and dip weights have all increased.

Why an overload of sets might work

I am not 100% sure why this works so well but I have known a few people in my life who train in this “single exercise” style. They have a range of reasons that support why they do it.

My theory is that you exhaust the muscle properly because you are focussed on one motion and one movement. This means you get the technique perfect and each repetition is really hitting the muscle as hard as you possibly can.

However, the other reason is probably because my muscles were not used to this kind of stress. The fact that this style of training is only done occasionally makes it all the more powerful. It is for this reason that you should only do these overload of sets workouts once in a while. This is in line with one of RMO’s most basic principles - mix it up. Keep your body guessing all the time so it is forced to grow and respond to the changes.

Conclusion on the overloading style triceps workout

I think this workout would be great with any muscle. Perhaps do it once a month for a chosen muscle. For example, you might spend a whole session doing chin ups or a whole session doing just bicep curls. The added intensity works if you only do it once in a while.

Anyone had any other similar experiences?

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