There’s some thought out there that weighted stretching is the KEY to massive hypertrophy.
Exercises like weighted chins, overhead trip extension, rack pull/sghp (exerting crazy stretch on traps), flies (hitting pecs more vs. bench), incline curls, maltese holds (immense straigtht arm stretch on biceps), calves and on and on.
I think also some “science” experiments (bird stretched its wings and hypertrophied like crazy, athlete test on calves, etc.)
Have you entertained this view CT?
I see some patterns of effective movements (for size) and the greater the loaded stretch (particularly after eccentric, in that “turnaround” point") the more effective it seems to be for inducing physique changes.
It certainly is an important way to trigger hypertrophy but I wouldn’t say that it’s the key. Saying that its the key means that if you don<t do it, you wont get hypertrophy. Yet the world is also full of examples of people developing hypertrophy without reaching a stretched position under load.
For example speed cyclists and speed skaters getting massive quads by doing mostly biking/skating and shallow squats or the kaatsu experiments showing great hypertrophy from exercises that dont put you in a stretch position or under a heavy loaded simply by creating an occlusion effect.
If there is one thing we know about hypertrophy is that there is not ONE thing that can trigger it.