The tortoise was probably on to something when he said steadiness wins over the more explosive but inconsistent hare.
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ECU collaborated with Niigata University and Nishi Kyushu University in Japan on a four-week training study featuring three groups of people doing an arm resistance exercise with researchers measuring changes in muscle strength and muscle thickness.
The exercise consisted of “maximal voluntary eccentric bicep contractions” performed on a machine measuring muscle strength in each muscle contraction one would do at the gym.
Two groups did 30 contractions per week. One group performed six contractions a day for five days a week while the other jammed all 30 into a single day, once a week. Another group only performed six contractions one day a week.
After four weeks, the group doing 30 contractions in a single day didn’t show any increase in muscle strength, although muscle thickness increased by almost 6%.
The group doing six contractions once a week showed no changes in strength or size.
However, the 6×5 group showed significant increases in strength – more than 10 percent – with an increase in muscle thickness similar to the 30×1 group.
The results were similar to people in a previous study performing only one 3-second maximal eccentric contraction per day for five days a week for four weeks.
“People think they have to do a lengthy session of resistance training in the gym, but that’s not the case,” said Ken Nosaka, ECU exercise and sports science professor, in a statement. “Just lowering a heavy dumbbell slowly once or six times a day is enough.”
Although researchers only examined bicep curls in the study, “we believe this would be the case for other muscles also, at least to some extent,” Nosaka said.
This content was originally published here.