I workout in a commercial gym and you are 100% correct that its much more feasible to do than people give it credit for. I do a similar no rest circuit on a cable machine and its great (and very engaging). Only rest is adjusting the height/weight for each exercise. Another tactic is to take advantage of less popular machines. For example I use a incline press machine that is great for going deep but is old (thus unpopular). There's a nearby machine preacher curl thats merely ok but if its free (which is often), I'll superset that with the machine press and cut out the bayesian curls on the aforementioned circuit on the cable machine. Obviously you can superset machine flys with reverse pec dec. Similarly, I do RDLs on a platform (which tends to be less popular than the squat rack) and will superset calf raises on a nearby machine leg press (that isn't overly popular). If you aren't married to "I have do to X exact variation for an exercise because its optimal" you can be even more flexible. There are days where the squat rack or deadlift platform just aren't going to happen, and thats when you hammer extra isolation sets, switch to lunges, machine leg press etc... and you'll probably still come out ahead because you did more productive work rather than spend 30+ minutes just to do a specific variation.
Youre reading my mind, man. Supersets and those overlapping rest intervals are key! I was just talking to clients about it this morning and filmed an example workout for them
I find the best way to do supersets is pairing a high fatigue exercise (squat, bench press, row. etc.) with a low fatigue exercise (lateral raise, skullcrusher, bicep curls, etc.). I don't need to catch my breath to do lateral raises and it only requires a pair of dumbbells to be around.
This is exactly what ive been doing for a month approximately. I go to a pretty crowded gym, but alternating with other people usually gives me a very short rest time. But switching exercises with short rest intervals saves me time and ive not seen any drops in strength in my working sets this way. Example: Today was Push day, so i did tricep dips, then after a 30 second break went on to pec deck flys and this saved me a lot of time because my triceps are ready to go once i finish the flys. Its worth it as long as you take a little rest between sets for your cardiovascular system to catch up.
I’ve been training like this at home because I find it the most effective since I have minimal exercise equipment / weight selection and seeing really good results
I follow this approach menno, it's absolutely great but it requires good amount of cardiovascular conditioning, once a person achieves that this is the best approach, on the other hand I have seen these combo sets to improve my conditioning and you are the best fitness youtuber.
Good points. Most suitable for whole body workouts. I did something similar for years and not only did I combo the exercises, I also clustered them. So I had a specific volume for every exercise, no matter how many sets I needed to achieve it. Combined with periodization of the total volume and percentage of the 1RM I used per cycle, it was quite progressive back when I did that 20 years ago.
Great content. I have been doing combo-supersets for years. Especially for the “older” gym bros (I am 43) this is an excellent mechanism to train efficient. One key benefit that is underestimated is to hit muscle groups early in the training. I combine squats with arms and bench press with arms. Unlike the usual gym behaviour doing first 3 exercises chest or back and hitting arms after when largely fatigued.
Will you make a video in the future about which exercises are biomechanically best for each muscle group? Would be super useful. Repito el comentario porque de verdad sería un video muy interesante y lo necesito con urgencia. Saludos desde Colombia!
To save you time 1) supersets save time but strength suffers and accumulates fatigue - to avoid this make pauses between sets. Saves on fatigue. 2) Dont do overlapping musculature in supersets. 3) Superset (Combosets) lead to equal effort across different exercises 4) Order can be flexible - therefore equipment availability in the gym is less important
What I do is combine combo sets with myoreps on most exercises (except for heavier compounds, there I mostly do super/combo-sets as per this video). For example, doing supersetting bench press to chin ups, followed by a combo set of cable curls, cable OH extension, and cable lat raises (all done with 3 myorep sets, usually 2 rounds). Is there any downside of using myoreps this aggressively across most exercises vs. the more common approach of straight sets + rest?
I’ve found that the longer I’ve been training, the shorter my workouts have become. 20-25 minutes of intense lifting often feels like enough for overall maintenance
Usually people are nice if you ask to work in with them, I've made more friends this way too. I've only been rejected once at the preacher curl machine and worst case is you just do straight sets or only 2 of the exercises in a superset when you planned 3 for a combo set.
So it's better to do supersets like this: bicep curl -> 1 min rest -> tricep exercise -> 1 min rest -> bicep curl etc. than doing just bicep curl -> tricep exercise -> 2 min rest -> bicep curl -> tricep exercise -> 2min rest?
@@GuidoDePalma I bet that you would get more reps done if you would rest 1 min between biceps and triceps vs doing them superset style without any rest. It still takes the same amount of time.
I prefer to do supersets and take a shorter rest (between a minute and two minutes) after finishing said supersets instead of doing inmediately the next set, i still save time because the resting time of two or more excercises is overlapped and also save time because the resting time is shorter than if i did a straight set because the muscles used in the first set are resting while i'm doing the second set.
I find this to be harder when putting several big/ compound exercises together, especially squat, deadlift and leg press which is too taxing (at least for me). But i would highly recommend doing those super/comboset with isolation exercises like arms into calf raises or different shoulder exercises. they can be clustered together more easily without completly wrecking you
What you describe does sound hard. You'd probably benefit from removing either the press or the squat, since they're targeting the same muscles. Superset the remaining two exercises, deadlift first, to optimize your gains in minimal time
hey menno we already know strength caps at 4to 6 stes and no all muscle benefit from strech mediated hypertrophy but why do educated people like nippard and mike isratel mylo wolf preach high volume and over emphasis on SMH??? your thoughts
Dude, not to be a simp, but your "cold, straight to the point, no emotions" approach is very refreshing! Don't change
He is a snake oil salesman under the guise of science. Do not be fooled.
Scandinavian genes. 😅
Zesty statement. But I agree 😅
I on the other hand am a shameless Menno simp. It feels good and I am not ashamed
Menno is AI generated! 🤖
I love it when at first I'm confused but then I get smarter. Thank you Menno!
As an older athlete with an excellent base of muscle & training, this is the way for me! Thank you Menno for taking the time to share this ❤!
I workout in a commercial gym and you are 100% correct that its much more feasible to do than people give it credit for.
I do a similar no rest circuit on a cable machine and its great (and very engaging). Only rest is adjusting the height/weight for each exercise.
Another tactic is to take advantage of less popular machines. For example I use a incline press machine that is great for going deep but is old (thus unpopular). There's a nearby machine preacher curl thats merely ok but if its free (which is often), I'll superset that with the machine press and cut out the bayesian curls on the aforementioned circuit on the cable machine. Obviously you can superset machine flys with reverse pec dec. Similarly, I do RDLs on a platform (which tends to be less popular than the squat rack) and will superset calf raises on a nearby machine leg press (that isn't overly popular).
If you aren't married to "I have do to X exact variation for an exercise because its optimal" you can be even more flexible. There are days where the squat rack or deadlift platform just aren't going to happen, and thats when you hammer extra isolation sets, switch to lunges, machine leg press etc... and you'll probably still come out ahead because you did more productive work rather than spend 30+ minutes just to do a specific variation.
Youre reading my mind, man. Supersets and those overlapping rest intervals are key! I was just talking to clients about it this morning and filmed an example workout for them
I find the best way to do supersets is pairing a high fatigue exercise (squat, bench press, row. etc.) with a low fatigue exercise (lateral raise, skullcrusher, bicep curls, etc.). I don't need to catch my breath to do lateral raises and it only requires a pair of dumbbells to be around.
This is exactly what ive been doing for a month approximately. I go to a pretty crowded gym, but alternating with other people usually gives me a very short rest time. But switching exercises with short rest intervals saves me time and ive not seen any drops in strength in my working sets this way.
Example: Today was Push day, so i did tricep dips, then after a 30 second break went on to pec deck flys and this saved me a lot of time because my triceps are ready to go once i finish the flys.
Its worth it as long as you take a little rest between sets for your cardiovascular system to catch up.
I’ve been training like this at home because I find it the most effective since I have minimal exercise equipment / weight selection and seeing really good results
I follow this approach menno, it's absolutely great but it requires good amount of cardiovascular conditioning, once a person achieves that this is the best approach, on the other hand I have seen these combo sets to improve my conditioning and you are the best fitness youtuber.
Good points. Most suitable for whole body workouts.
I did something similar for years and not only did I combo the exercises, I also clustered them. So I had a specific volume for every exercise, no matter how many sets I needed to achieve it. Combined with periodization of the total volume and percentage of the 1RM I used per cycle, it was quite progressive back when I did that 20 years ago.
Yea. I do this for years. It's hard but saves time.
Great content. I have been doing combo-supersets for years. Especially for the “older” gym bros (I am 43) this is an excellent mechanism to train efficient. One key benefit that is underestimated is to hit muscle groups early in the training. I combine squats with arms and bench press with arms. Unlike the usual gym behaviour doing first 3 exercises chest or back and hitting arms after when largely fatigued.
Will you make a video in the future about which exercises are biomechanically best for each muscle group? Would be super useful.
Repito el comentario porque de verdad sería un video muy interesante y lo necesito con urgencia. Saludos desde Colombia!
I can totally relate to Squats and Deadlifts adding at least 15 minutes to a workout and I am not even that deep into lifting
Yeah more like an hour each lmao
Very useful vid. Thanks!
Good vid. I live on supersets and short circuits of 3 exercise (push-pull-legs)
To save you time
1) supersets save time but strength suffers and accumulates fatigue - to avoid this make pauses between sets. Saves on fatigue.
2) Dont do overlapping musculature in supersets.
3) Superset (Combosets) lead to equal effort across different exercises
4) Order can be flexible - therefore equipment availability in the gym is less important
P90X had this right over 20 years ago and is still an approachable workout plan for most beginners.
What I do is combine combo sets with myoreps on most exercises (except for heavier compounds, there I mostly do super/combo-sets as per this video). For example, doing supersetting bench press to chin ups, followed by a combo set of cable curls, cable OH extension, and cable lat raises (all done with 3 myorep sets, usually 2 rounds). Is there any downside of using myoreps this aggressively across most exercises vs. the more common approach of straight sets + rest?
How to incorporate warmup set in Combo set?
can you do a new video about whats currently the best split for hyperthrophy?
I’ve found that the longer I’ve been training, the shorter my workouts have become. 20-25 minutes of intense lifting often feels like enough for overall maintenance
Would this work well during a minicut? (Big deficit)
Usually people are nice if you ask to work in with them, I've made more friends this way too. I've only been rejected once at the preacher curl machine and worst case is you just do straight sets or only 2 of the exercises in a superset when you planned 3 for a combo set.
So it's better to do supersets like this: bicep curl -> 1 min rest -> tricep exercise -> 1 min rest -> bicep curl etc. than doing just bicep curl -> tricep exercise -> 2 min rest -> bicep curl -> tricep exercise -> 2min rest?
You don’t need any rest between a bi-tri superset with just 1min rest after. Or add a third exercise like a crunch and do a combo like Menno said.
@@GuidoDePalma I bet that you would get more reps done if you would rest 1 min between biceps and triceps vs doing them superset style without any rest. It still takes the same amount of time.
I prefer to do supersets and take a shorter rest (between a minute and two minutes) after finishing said supersets instead of doing inmediately the next set, i still save time because the resting time of two or more excercises is overlapped and also save time because the resting time is shorter than if i did a straight set because the muscles used in the first set are resting while i'm doing the second set.
Maybe I'm overthinking it, but how long is "to catch you breath?" Its kind of vague what the signal might be to start the next excersize.
Apparently "trusting your gut" is just fine. You will not lose gains by slightly over- or underestimating rest time.
Now I know quintuple sets
Thanks coach
I find this to be harder when putting several big/ compound exercises together, especially squat, deadlift and leg press which is too taxing (at least for me). But i would highly recommend doing those super/comboset with isolation exercises like arms into calf raises or different shoulder exercises. they can be clustered together more easily without completly wrecking you
What you describe does sound hard. You'd probably benefit from removing either the press or the squat, since they're targeting the same muscles. Superset the remaining two exercises, deadlift first, to optimize your gains in minimal time
Fyi Menno, you don't pronounce the "u" in circuits.
I do quad circuit.. .. sometimes hex circuit..
hey menno we already know strength caps at 4to 6 stes and no all muscle benefit from strech mediated hypertrophy but why do educated people like nippard and mike isratel mylo wolf preach high volume and over emphasis on SMH??? your thoughts
Because for muscle growth the more the better smh 🤦
I tried supersets... has taken longer then normal because I was so out of breath that I needed longer rest time beteeen the super sets😅
You probably chose the wrong exercises for doing that
Squats then chin-ups?
How? After a set of squats or chin-ups, my heart rate is nearly 160. They’re huge muscles.
No more 2hour powerlifting sessions after this one, i litterly switched to bodybuilding for time related reasons.
This works well but when i do this using drop sets its crushingly hard lol
Or Just do Rest pause
The math isn't mathing. 36% ≠ 50%.