If you have been thinking about how you will squeeze in more reps in your workouts before your muscles start to fatigue, you may want to slow down a bit first.
You should try a more effective strength-training exercise that does not necessarily involve speed but rather slow controlled movements.
The technique is referred to as the TUT (Time-Under-Tension) training.
Through TUT training, you can add a variety of workouts to increase its effectiveness.
However, is it as essential as some people make it to be? We are going to look at it and how you can incorporate it into your workout routine.
What is TUT training?
TUT (Time-Under-Tension) is the amount of time that your muscles are usually under strain during the set. TUT helps in the stimulation of muscle fibers hence a more muscular physique.
The main aim of the TUT workout is to help you slow down and carry out your exercise with less momentum instead of focussing on the number of reps.
Exposing your muscles to more prolonged bouts of strain leads to increased muscle breakdown hence a more muscular physique.
Benefits and TUT training
Better mind and muscle connection
Your mind and body need to connect to achieve maximum gains from your gym sessions. The better you connect your mind to your muscles in the gym, the more gains you will achieve.
Better capacity to deal with fatigue
TUT also helps your muscles learn how to deal with higher levels of fatigue. The more stress you put on your muscle during each rep, the higher the chances of depleting resources contained therein hence better ability to cope with fatigue.
Increasing your TUT is the best way to consume your muscle glycogen levels so that you can increase your carbs intake after your workouts.
Better metabolic response
Once you have started with your TUT workout, one of the most evident benefits you will experience will be an increased metabolic response.
This is because of increased growth hormone release, triggered by more extended periods when your muscles are under tension.
In addition, a longer time under tension helps to jumpstart your metabolism since your body is overworking. This results in the creation of a high degree of micro-tears in the tissues.
This will result in the burning of more calories after the workout. These factors are essential in the burning of fat and the increase of muscles.
Making the most of lightweights
A typical gym should have enough weights to satisfy even the best weightlifters. If you train at home and have a limited number of weights and cannot afford more, you can train with a slower tempo and longer durations to get the best results.
Though you could increase the number of reps to 15 or 20, it could soon become boring. Doing it at a slower pace means you can perform moderate rep counts.
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Reduced risk of injury
TUT training gives you better form since you focus more on lifting than what you are lifting. Better form means there is less margin for error and less likelihood of getting injured.
Incorporating TUT into your workout routine
Whether your goals are to increase muscle strength, endurance, or muscle growth, you can incorporate TUT training into your routine. If you want to build endurance, you can perform 5-30 reps in each set with a TUT of around 70-100 seconds.
You can perform 1-6 reps in each set with a TUT of between 4-20 seconds to improve your strength. You can do 8-12 reps per set with a TUT of 40-70 seconds for muscle growth.
Essential tips
- Avoid taking too much time on the easiest part of your exercise (a lift that puts little stress on your muscles).
- Ensure you maintain a steady tempo for each rep.
- Focus on form and avoid partial reps.
- Always maintain a high intensity.
- Slow down the eccentric parts of your lifts.
- Work on increasing your resistance to all movements.
Is TUT beginner-friendly?
A TUT program is not ideal for beginners. It is essential to have at least one year of solid training before starting on a TUT regime.
Disadvantages of TUT training
It is too prescriptive.
Most workouts are performed using reps and weight ranges rather than the absolute levels you have hit because our body energy levels can vary from one exercise to another. Using TUT means there is no room for having a bad day since you need to maintain a specific tempo.
In this case, you might feel your workout to be ineffective when in fact, it is productive even if you do not attain your prescribed TUT.
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Too much to factor in
Lower in five, pause for two, lift in three, pause for two, make sure you breathe, keep your shoulders down and back; that is too much to think about. You might even forget the number of reps that you have done.
Adopting a specific tempo and incorporating TUT is distracting and overwhelming since you get to think about many things at once. You can choose to focus on lifting and lowering instead of TUT.
Different exercises use different tempos.
Most workouts use a similar tempo and TUT for their exercises which is a problem. Some exercises use a wide range of motions, while others use shorter ranges of motion. You will find that a tempo and TUT that work for one exercise may not be effective for another.
Training heavy may not be possible.
If you want to gain more strength, you should lift heavy weights — which involves momentum and acceleration. When you lift slowly, you will achieve very little weight. When you use TUT and a slow tempo, you will have to sacrifice your strength gains for muscle size.
The Bottom Line
Numerous benefits can be realized by incorporating TUT (Time-Under-Tension) into your workout routine. However, many people do not find the exercise critical as it once was thought because working out at a specific tempo does not necessarily translate to more productive workouts.
It only means that you will not lift as much weight hence reducing muscle tension which is essential in building muscle mass. Now that you are armed with the critical information concerning TUT workout to gain muscles, we hope that you can now make an informed decision on whether to incorporate it into your workout routine.
The decision lies with you. Will you incorporate a TUT workout to gain muscles?
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