Negatives

Is there a limit to using negative reps? I haven’t been doing much; just a set of preachers and a set of close-grip benches at the end of my workouts (split chest/tri’s, back/bi’s). I’ve been doing this for about 3 weeks and my arms have definately increased in size. Should negatives (in this volume) be treated like any other training stimili and cycled, or are there other neurological effects to be taken into consideration. Thanks.

Cant give you anything scientific, but my gut feeling is limit it to about 25% of the time (1 week/month - 1 in 3-4 months). I use 2-4 of my training weight in the last set sometimes but a few weeks of 4 of over my 1rm did alot some months back before I left them alone.

It’s gunna put a heap of stress on those muscle groups (which is obviously why they’ve grown so well for you recently), but it’ll get to a point where they can’t take it and something will give. All advice I’ve ever heard states to use heavy negatives sparingly. I also remember Poloquin saying a while back that lots of negatives screw with insulin resistence (yeah, the statement was about that general, from memory), although I dunno about that, not sure that I believe it… wither way, just cycle them.