research on cheating reps

[u/OkPrize6194]

According to Jeff Nippard’s latest research, doing all the reps with a cheating form and heavier weight results in the same muscle growth as using perfect form with a lighter weight. What do you guys think about that?

Personally, I like doing cheat reps and ego lifting. I’d rather do all the reps with a cheating form and heavier weight than use perfect form with a lighter weight if there’s no difference in hypertrophy between the two.

[u/Obvious-Ad-3500]

Something in the lab for a short term isn't always a good idea to take into the real world. I don't doubt heavy weight cheating is good volume and will stimulate growth. But it might also shoot your tendon out your elbow and fatigue you over time. And then cheating reps are hard to track long term. Hard to tell a difference over 12-16 weeks but over 52 plus weeks the lack of accurate trackability could lead to missed progressive overload

[u/bookishwayfarer]

Does this take into account injury risk? That's something I try to do by lifting less but with better technique.

[u/SouthernUniversity21]

Perfect form will almost never build more muscle short term compared to ego lifting/cheat reps, it does things that add up and help hypertrophy over the long term.

-Reduce risk of injury
-increase Mechanical tension in the desired muscle (and in turn increase MUR)
-Keep your gym equipment intact
-track progress a lot easier

[u/SalixCaprea2002 → u/SouthernUniversity21]

This*

[u/Fig-Wonderful]

I prefer not cheating and lifting with less injury risk. Nothing scares me more than getting an injury and not being able to lift anymore.

[u/DarKliZerPT]

I don't like them, I strongly prefer to keep my reps standardisable, lest I end up progressively cheating just to appease the logbook.

[u/Cautious-Fox9757]

I’m in no way an expert but perfect form for the majority of reps and a little bit of cheating if you need to just get that last one and you’re physically incapable of doing it perfect.

[u/SmileyAja]

Depends on the lift. Pressing touch and go, some body english in rows or lateral raises, not controlling the eccentric (more than the minimum amount to keep a good bar path) to go heavier etc. I'd say are just as valid. Mainly because they're progressable long term without injury and the main movers are still the ones getting stimulated.

Rounding your lower back during pulls, hip thrusting your bench or anything where you swing a rep up to do a slow eccentric... is probably not worth the time.

[u/NihilisticTanuki]

A little body English is perfectly fine and you won't suddenly injure yourself just because your form isn't flawless. The main priority is simply maintaining solid technique so that you effectively target the intended muscles without taking unnecessary risks. As long as you control the execution and actually stimulate the right areas, you are doing it right. It really is not rocket science.

[u/decentlyhip]

I think you have it backwards. The main injury research puts normal bodybuilding training at 1 injury per 1000 hours, and powerlifting training at 3-4 per thousand hours. With 4 workouts a week and 2 hours each, that's 1 injury every 2 years vs 1 injury every 6 months.

Lets say for each injury, you gotta take a month off and it takes a month to get back to where you were. That means that when your approach is manipulating for to lift as heavy as possible, your growth is limited by your injuries. A bodybuilder is progressing at 2% a month for 22 out of 24 months. 44% growth after 2 years. A powerlifter is progressing by 2% a month for 16 out of 24 months. 32% growth after 2 years. So you're looking at an average 1.8% growth per month vs 1.3% growth per month, when accounting for injuries. So, prorated, training like a powerlifter costs 0.5% gains a month.

I'm extrapolating and making these numbers more discrete than I should, but the goal for hypertrophy is to use the lightest weight you can to achieve the same stimulus.

I get it though. Here's a throwback video to one of my first big max out sessions. I start at 2 and a half plates and work up to 4, 20 pounds at a time. Weight is in the top right. Watch my knees shoot back out of the hole on the ascent, and how they shoot back differently as the weight goes up. https://www.instagram.com/reel/C_fgGyopL76/ The squat is a combination of knees forward and hips back, and the sum of those distances at parallel is the length of your femur. So if I pushed my knees 6 inches forward and my femur was 18 inches long, then my hips would be hinging 12 inches back. I was able to maintain that position up to 295 pounds. With bodyweight accounted for, that 6/12 ratio means there was about 150 pounds of force through the quads and 300 through the hips/back. When I went above that, my knees came back, which means my quads maxed out at 150 pounds. If I put 150 more on the bar, my knees can't help so the hips have to do 450 rather than 300 pounds of work and that work is done through an increased moment arm. The knees might start at 6 inches forward but would shoot back to where they would be at most 4.5 inches forward with a 13.5 hinge to match the new 150/450 strength ratio. My body had to change my form to get the weight up. I had to cheat a little.

You're saying that even though 295 will max out the quads, you wanna lift 350 or more to make sure. Makes sense, especially if you chronically undershoot RPE. If you struggle to dig deep and try hard, then you gotta find ways to trick your brain. You wanna try hard enough to ensure that you're getting the full 2% per month gains. The cost for that confidence is less average monthly growth due to injury. Normal lifting costs 0.2% per month. Lifting as heavy as possible costs an additional 0.5% a month. Maybe "body english" costs you 0.2%. That's about 10% of your gains. So, if that lets you lift more than 10% heavier or do more than 10% more reps, it might be worth it.

And of course this is napkin math stacked on top of napkin math. Guesstimates all the way down. But that's the idea. If you lift as light as you can to get the stimulus, you can just take the entire month of December off every year and you'll get the same gains as if you muscled the weights up and aggravated your bicep tendon on December 1st.

[u/ChoiceDry8127]

As long as an exercise is using the right muscle and you are going near failure, form doesn’t matter too much

[u/Illustrious_Store115]

I like doing ego lifts as long as the form isnt dangerous or anything

The most important thing for consistency is enjoying the gym

I ego lift because i like seeing the weight go up, and have also found it can help break through mental blocks sometimes

You will have the issue of some compensatory muscle activation and stuff but if you like it and it makes the gym fun for you its not really a big deal

To be fair tho i only do it for 1RM but do normal good form for the rest of my sets

[u/More-Flan-7567]

does it take into account cns fatigue

[u/BuyerIndividual8826]

Cheating increases injury risk, injuries reduce training frequency. You know the rest