Power is the ultimate combination of the two most fundamental human factors of survival: speed and strength. We can hear your brain now: So what? What will being more powerful do for me? Will it help me look better in the mirror?
Here's your answer: The advantage of power training is that if you improve your rate of force development, you inevitably improve neural recruitment, which means you'll activate muscle fibers more efficiently and effectively. In the long run, this means that when you do pure strength or hypertrophy-type training, you'll activate more fibers and increase muscular size. Increasing power is also great for busting through training plateaus, a problem that every trainee is bound to face eventually.
That being said, the following five principles—which we will dish you in installments—will put you on the fast track to maximizing your body's power production. At the end of it all, we'll dish you a sample program that will show you how to tie it all together. Do that and you'll be on the path to more strength and more mass. It's just that simple.
Our fourth principle is the 100% Effort Principle.. Be sure to check back daily for the next in the series.
Click here to read our first installment, The Power Principles: Strength.
Click here to read our second installment, The Power Principles: Speed.
Click here to read our third installment, The Power Principles: Time.
Click here to read our fourth installment, The Power Principles: Plyometrics.
THE 100% EFFORT PRINCIPLE
You've heard this before, but it's never been as true as it is in this instance: To be as powerful as possible, you must work as hard as you can. People often talk about how hard they work when they exercise, but hard work is not measured by how much you sweat, but rather by how much work you perform in a given amount of time.
Working hard can be difficult to measure. In power training, you should never reach failure in a set; if you do, it means the weight is too heavy. At the same time, you shouldn't be able to do more than 10 reps, as this means you weren't moving the weight fast enough. The key is making sure each and every rep is performed at maximum speed, which is dictated by available energy and depends in part on how long you rest between sets. Rest duration has long been debated—and a general rule of thumb is to rest 2-5 minutes between sets when training for power—but here's the best way to determine how long to rest:
