some food for thought . . .
When a muscle has been worked to a point of momentary failure by heavy exercise, the situation is just that –
the muscle has "failed MOMENTARILY." But in most cases, within three seconds – or less – the muscle has
recovered approximately fifty per cent of the strength which it had lost as a result of the exercise; but it does not
follow that it will then be fully recovered in six seconds, or even six minutes – full recovery usually takes
MORE THAN twenty-four hours, frequently as much as forty to sixty hours. But even if the muscle itself does
recover entirely, this is no indication that the system – which supplies the muscle – is fully recovered.
In order to produce increases in muscular size and strength, the muscles must be induced to make certain (but
largely unknown) demands upon the system as a whole – demands for the materials required for growth; but
growth cannot result even then if the system is unable to supply the needed materials – and do NOT misread this
to mean that this is simply a matter of assuring that the right food has been eaten. Far from it; the primary
limiting factor in this case is the ability of the system to make the required physiological (apparently largely
chemical) changes within the allotted period of time – and if another workout occurs before these processes are
complete, then little or nothing in the way of growth can occur.
In effect, it takes hard work to induce growth – and time to permit growth.
There will be individual variation, of course – but only within the limits of a certain rather limited scale; and it is
also true that the recovery ability of a well-trained individual will be better than it was before he started training
– but again, only to a certain degree. And, please note, I said "well-trained", not "LONG TRAINED"; in fact,
many long-experienced bodybuilders have very poor recovery ability – having overworked their systems for
months or years they have far less recovery ability than the proverbial "90 pound weakling".
Within the human system as a whole there exist a number of regulatory sub-systems, whose functions are
obvious – even if almost entirely unknown; some of these are fairly well understood, some are the subject of
heated controversy at the moment, and some remain entirely mysterious – the only people who even claim to
understand all of these factors are people like the self-proclaimed "nutritional expert" who dropped dead
recently on a television show, moments after proclaiming that he would live to be at least a hundred years old
"unless killed by a sugar-crazed taxicab driver". He was seventy years old when he died.
When anything is in limited supply, then it is simply common-sense practice to make the best-possible
utilization of the quantity that is available –and when you are not sure just how much is available, it is equally
good practice to use as little as necessary; in the field of exercise, the implication is clear – use your limited
recovery ability as wisely as possible, and as little as possible in line with the actual requirements for producing
the results you are after.
It really doesn't matter just "why" intense exertion is required to induce muscular growth, or exactly "how" this
is brought about – and it is equally unimportant that we understand the actual reasons responsible for the
limitations in our recovery ability; but it is necessary to know that hard work is required, and that recovery
ability is limited. A failure to understand – or even be aware of – these factors has led to the presently-existing
situation in body building circles, where almost all trainees work far too much and very few trainees work hard
enough. Rather than constantly trying to increase the length of workouts, ALL trainees would be well advised to
attempt to reduce their training to an absolute minimum. It is my personal belief at this point in time that we will
eventually – and rather soon – replace the requirement for training to about one and one-half hours weekly; and I
mean the requirement for an advanced bodybuilder who is training for world-class physique competition –and I
also mean that any more training would actually reduce the production of results.
By Arthur Jones, Nautilus Bulletin #2, Chapter 21, The Recovery Factor