If you’ve ever heard someone talk about “negative” exercises or performed one yourself before, then you’re probably a bit familiar with eccentric training. This type of strength training shifts the focus away from lifting the weight and toward the lowering phase of the exercise. While it may seem counterproductive to focus on this phase rather than getting the weight up, eccentric training can have more benefits than you may think.
In a world where lifting weights is king, eccentric training can provide a major boost for your gains. Find out what eccentric training is and how it can boost muscle growth.
What Eccentric Training Is and Why It Drives Superior Muscle Growth
Strength training exercises are typically composed of three phases: the concentric phase, the isometric phase, and the eccentric phase. The concentric phase is when the muscle shortens, generating force to overcome resistance, whether it be gravity, a load, or both. For example, the concentric phase of a squat is the ascent, when you stand up from the bottom position.
The isometric phase is a transition period following the concentric phase, where the muscle is stationary, neither shortening nor lengthening. This would be the pause at the top of a biceps curl. The eccentric phase is when the muscle lengthens. This would be lowering the weight of a dumbbell curl back to the starting position.
Eccentric training is a method of strength training that focuses on the lengthening phase of a muscle, such as lowering a weight during a biceps curl or lowering the body toward the floor during a squat. During this phase, the muscle works under tension to control the movement. This emphasis on downward motion during an exercise can help grow muscles, build strength, and reduce the risk of injury.
This type of training works by slowing the lowering phase, prioritizing control over speed. While the eccentric phase may seem easier since you’re working in the direction the weight wants to go, your muscles are working much harder than you may think. The muscles must resist letting the load drop and withstand the resistance against its gravitational pull. In fact, the force of the load is greater than the force generated by your muscles, which is why eccentric training is also known as “negative” training.
How Eccentric Training Stimulates Hypertrophy
Hypertrophy is heavily influenced by mechanical tension, muscle damage, and metabolic stress. These factors signal the body to adapt by building more muscle, and eccentric training is an effective facilitator of these signals.
Mechanical tension refers to the stress exerted on muscle fibers when they contract against resistance. The most common way to add tension is by increasing the load on the muscles; however, it can also be raised by slowing the exercise, as is done in eccentric training. In fact, eccentric exercises are capable of both. While lengthening, muscles can support a weight greater than their typical capacity, allowing for greater overloading and increased stress. Pair this with slow, controlled motions, and you have two highly effective mechanisms that promote mechanical tension.
Metabolic stress refers to the buildup of metabolites within the muscles in response to low energy availability caused by high-intensity demands. This physiological state causes fatigue and the “burning” feeling you may experience during an intense workout. That burn is an indication that the body is adapting to muscle cell swelling, leading to muscle growth.
The increased tension found during eccentric exercises causes greater damage to the muscle fibers, triggering the recovery process where muscles repair and grow, rebuilding stronger and larger to be better equipped for future demands. Eccentric exercises also tend to expend less energy than their counterparts. Less energy expenditure means more time under tension and greater metabolic stress for more efficient muscle growth.
Key Benefits of Eccentric Training Backed by Research
Eccentric training offers a wide range of benefits, including increased muscle growth, reduced risk of injury, and better coordination.
Extra Muscle Stimulation
One key benefit of eccentric training is that it allows for supramaximal stimulation. Supramaximal training involves performing an exercise with a resistance greater than your regular maximum capacity. Using loads heavier than you can sustain can trigger significant gains by forcing your muscles to adapt to extreme stress. Because muscles can sustain more weight during the eccentric phase than during the concentric phase, eccentric training is ideal for overloading your muscles.
Improved Hypertrophy
Because eccentric exercises have a greater capacity for resistance than concentric exercises, they also have a greater potential for hypertrophy. This improved potential means eccentric exercises tend to cause more muscle damage than concentric movements, providing a greater increase in both muscle strength and thickness as the muscle repairs itself.
Rehabilitation
Eccentric training is commonly used in injury prevention and rehabilitation, and for good reason. Many injuries in strength training occur due to a lack of control in landings or direction changes. Eccentric training strengthens connective tissues, such as tendons and ligaments, and enhances their ability to absorb force. It also requires less energy and muscle activity than concentric training at the same level of exerted force, offering a more efficient workout. This not only helps build muscle more efficiently but also helps preserve muscle mass, particularly in the elderly population.
Mind-Muscle Connection
Eccentric training also improves coordination, as slowing down the lowering phase builds neuromuscular awareness. This enhanced mind-to-muscle connection can improve your form and performance on other exercises.
Programming Eccentric Training for Maximum Gains
Eccentric training has proven effective for its capacity to overload the muscle without excessive fatigue. However, it must be programmed safely and intentionally to avoid injury. There are a few ways to implement eccentric training into your workout routine.
One common method to program eccentric training is to slow the lengthening phase of your strength exercises. Simply perform the concentric exercises you’re already doing, but prolong the lengthening step to 3-5 seconds. This method allows you to increase the time under tension and the stress on your muscles without needing to increase the weight. Because the prolonged time under tension can fatigue muscles quickly, you may not be able to complete the concentric phase as effectively.
While slowing down the lengthening phase is the ideal place to start, you can eventually increase the load on your muscles to boost muscle gains. Because you’re able to perform these exercises with more weight than you normally would, a spotter is necessary to help lift the load during the concentric phase. If you’re exercising a single limb, you can use both limbs to lift the load, then lower it with one. Beginners should begin with bodyweight movements with quick concentric phases and slow, controlled eccentric phases to become familiar with the motions.
Volume and frequency will vary from your typical workout routine. Eccentric training causes greater muscle damage, meaning it typically requires longer recovery time. Start with one session per week and gradually increase to three sessions per week once you’re comfortable. If used for rehabilitation purposes, sessions may be more frequent to stimulate muscle and connective tissue recovery, though the load should be much lower to avoid aggravating an injury.
Remember that this training is not replacing concentric exercises, but rather complementing them. An effective program incorporates both phases for optimized muscle growth.
Eccentric Training for Athletic Performance
In addition to building muscle, eccentric training has other benefits related to athletic performance. Several sports require athletes to stop on a dime, change directions, and explode to compete. These movements rely heavily on eccentric strength.
Eccentric training allows for greater force, building strength quickly for greater power. This is not only useful for using your body in physical sports such as basketball, rugby, or soccer, but also for explosiveness and getting off the mark quickly, such as in sprinting or football.
Eccentric training also develops better neuromuscular control and flexibility for more controlled and precise movements. This improved mind-to-muscle connection improves balance and ensures each motion is efficient. These exercises train fast-twitch muscle fibers that generate high power in short bursts, allowing you to explode and accelerate better. This explosiveness can improve jump height, sprint speed, and agility. Training these fibers also develops quicker reaction times.
Eccentric training improves the connective tissues’ ability to absorb force, reducing the chance of injury when they're under stress. This resilience to strain is especially useful for preventing overuse injuries, such as tennis elbow. A better force-absorbing ability also means improved deceleration, allowing athletes to stop, change direction, and land safely. This enhanced absorption helps athletes control the landing phase for each stride or jump, the change of direction for each deceleration or cut, and the fatigue from repetitive stress.
How Speediance Enhances Eccentric Training
Speediance home gym equipment offers advanced technology that allows you to take your gym experience to the next level. Its digital resistance provides a level of accuracy that’s hard to find with traditional free weights. Speediance also offers real-time metrics that help you improve your performance. Track your tempo, force, and movement quality throughout your workout and receive AI-powered insights for an assessment of your performance.
The Speediance Gym Monster 2 provides an enhanced experience for your home workouts. The smart home gym offers a maximum of 220lbs with adjustable increments of 1lb for pinpoint resistance. The digital resistance makes working out much safer since you don’t need to worry about dropping heavy weights. The gym even has a built-in spotter, recognizing if you’re struggling to lift the weight and lowering the resistance accordingly.
The Gym Monster 2 features an eccentric mode perfect for this type of training. This mode isolates the negative movement phase of a workout, increasing the resistance when you’re lengthening the muscle and decreasing it when you’re shortening it. This mode eliminates the need for a spotter and allows users to use higher eccentric loads while maintaining proper form.
The Speediance VeloNix offers eccentric training in the form of an exercise bike. While some specialized bikes have a motor to push the pedals backward and further engage the muscles eccentrically, it’s possible to train eccentrically on a standard exercise bike, and even more so with VeloNix. Adjust the resistance to your desired level and focus on controlling the upstroke of your pedaling.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Concentric or Eccentric Better for Muscle Growth?
Both concentric and eccentric are essential for muscle growth, though eccentric training has a greater potential for resistance. It produces greater tension and muscle damage, making it more effective for stimulating hypertrophy. Nonetheless, training both concentric and eccentric phases in your workouts is ideal for optimal muscle gains.
Does Eccentric Training Build More Muscle?
Eccentric training can stimulate greater hypertrophy compared to concentric training of the same force. Your muscles can be loaded past their maximum capacity during the eccentric phase, making the phase capable of producing extreme stress, which causes greater damage to muscle fibers and promotes more growth.
How Long Should an Eccentric Be for Hypertrophy?
Eccentric training means focusing on a slow, controlled lengthening of the muscle to be effective. Begin by slowing the eccentric phase to 3 to 5 seconds to ease your body into the exercise. Then, depending on the load, adjust the count to make it easier or more difficult.
Experience Effective Muscle Growth with Speediance’s Advanced Training Systems
Take a break from lifting all that weight and focus on lowering it. While it seems counterproductive, eccentric training can maximize your muscle growth by drastically increasing the load and increasing the time your muscles spend under tension. Enjoy bigger muscles, stronger connective tissues, and better mobility by implementing eccentric exercises into your workout regimen.
See results sooner with top-of-the-line Speediance equipment. Whether you opt for an all-in-one gym or a high-power exercise bike, Speediance offers digital resistance for precise adjustments and AI-driven insights for helpful tips on improving your workouts. Experience a boost in muscle growth with Speediance Gym Monster 2 today.
