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Partials

"Assumption is the mother of all fuck-ups."

I was booted off a forum for promoting the value of partials and presenting video evidence to that effect - somewhat amusingly a poster on the forum suggested that I was "genetically gifted". I think you can see from the following that my slug like progress and lightweight build are hardly that of a genetically gifted lifter.

I spent the first 10 years of my training doing full moves. That netted me a 110 kg squat. I spent the next 7 years doing partials... just partials (I did them at first purely to test my power rack design). I then did a 140 kg squat. I now do everything from fulls to lockouts (12 years). I've done a 182½ kg squat. Of course I can also shoulder +1000 lbs in the squat.

The purpose behind this article is to put some sort of rationale behind partials. However it should be clearly understood that using 'rational' argument to justify a system is that of a moron. Only actual evidence should be used. A clever man can use rational argument to justify pretty much anything.

I don't have scientific studies to support the notion that partials are productive. I can quote the evidence for myself, I've also read in Hardgainer magazine that Fred Howells was partial to partials and know that Walter Thomas used partials. Most strength athletes use partials at some point in their training.

In the July 1994 edition of Powerlifting USA an article on Walter Thomas then master 181 lb champion (and previous 5 time world and 9 time national champion) detailed, amongst other things, that his heavy squat sessions consisted of partial squats (12" below lockout) with 300 lbs over his max parallel squat. Hence he would do 1000 lb squats for 4 reps. The reason he did this was because the heavy full squats were aggravating his back. He would follow the partials with 400 lb squats for full reps and sets of 10. In neither case was he 'skill' training his parallel squat (700 lbs) as he was already a master squatter so he already knew how to parallel squat heavy. The partials were presumably for 'strength' and the fulls for 'conditioning'.

I thought I might compare a heavy short range partial to a less heavy longer range partial, both in the same lift;

In the above videos I am doing the same lift with the same stance and both from the monolift - however in the first video I lower the weight to the beams so that the bar stops at 415 mm above the ground and in the second video I lower the bar to 290 mm. The range of motion in the first video is about 170 mm and in the second about 315 mm (20 mm greater than the beam differences because of less bar flex and less body compression).

My max in the first video is 313 kg and in the second video it is 233 kg × 2 reps (lets say I could have got 238 kg for a single);

Work

313 kg × 170 mm = 53210 kg.mm

238 kg × 315 mm = 74970 kg.mm

53210/74970 = 0.709751

Power

53210 kg.mm / 1.900 secs = 28005.3 kg.mm/s

74970 kg.mm / 2.133 secs = 35147.7 kg.mm/s

28005.3/35147.7 = 0.796789

Impulse

313 kg × 1.900 secs = 594.7 kg.s

238 kg × 2.133 secs = 507.654 kg.s

594.7/507.654 = 1.17147

Work Per Millimetre

313 kg/mm

238 kg/mm

313/238 = 1.31513

I'd expected work to be less with a partial because I know from experience that cutting the depth by a certain fraction does not result in an increase in weight by the inverse fraction. Thus a quarter squat means less than four times the weight used.

I thought that maybe power would be greater with the partial but it seems it is less.

Impulse or TUT is greater with a partial, which I didn't expect.

Finally the work per millimetre is of course greater. This might seem to be a simple statement that the weight used is heavier but it shows that for each millimetre that is moved that the muscle work is greater per millimetre for the partial.

More Work Per Millimetre

Of course the more work per millimetre corresponds with the greater amount of myosin-actin overlap of a muscle;

It can be seen that this overlap involves more metabolic work (and more physical work) in that the more myosin-actin heads that are interacting the more of 'something' that must be going on.

If the muscle is stretched there is less myosin-actin head interaction, so presumably the stretched phase of a muscle is not only weaker in terms of force but weaker in terms of a strength stimulus;

I discuss the details of the resultant muscle curves here.

It might be thought that the best thing to do would simply be to use a variable resistance device such as from a machine or via chain or band resistance, however in such exercise the intra-rep fatigue factor must be taken into account.

In other words, as the above muscle goes from stretched to contracted, each myosin-actin head goes through a grab release cycle which involves fatigue - this is discussed here. The table, in that article, shows that for full force to be developed at each point (nm) that the fibres need to be fully rested, which can't happen whilst they are under tension, i.e. a full range move necessarily involves fatigue and weakening by the time contraction is reached. This is why a lifter can often get stuck halfway up in a full lift despite the fact that statically he is much stronger in the partial move;

You can see here in the squat, for example, that I almost come to stop about halfway up, yet from that position I might expect to do a partial of maybe 280 kg... so I've presumably fatigued by about 100 kg (100/280 = 36%) to get to this point.

Neural Drive

I've heard the term neural drive mentioned a number of times - this seems as good a term as any and is a catch all for rate of force development, explosiveness, maximal recruitment, neural fatigue, skill... and so on.

In the August 1994 edition of Powerlifting USA Evgeny Popov talks about his conversion from weightlifting to powerlifting and describes how the maximal strain in powerlifting is 'probably 10 times longer' and that this puts an enormous stress on the nervous system. This strain can be experienced with partials at a far earlier stage in training than if utilising a person's full range strength.

For example Big Alun (who is a natural hercules at 6' 5" and 264 lbs) did some deadlifts and hacks in my rack from 365 mm and managed 185 kg - for his size this was rather small. He was unused to the lift and didn't have the neural drive to lift much heavier. I then put him on the following lift;

He pulled 310 kg (photo) and then donned wrist straps and pulled 350 kg and later described the strain as like 'lifting the world'. The move is such that its low skill means that much greater effort can be put into it, so a lifter lifts to closer to his capacity.

Partials allow a lifter to exert much more neural drive because they are closer to contraction and because they are much easier to learn than full lifts.

Contraction

I've already mentioned the contracted aspects of partials earlier. When it comes to the contracted part of a lift it seems that this position involves more neural drive than the stretched phase particularly in terms of more fibre recruitment. One aspect of this shows up in the ability to cramp a muscle.

Stand up and hold your right arm straight up, keep your elbow high and now flex the arm to contract the bicep. Keep the elbow high and indeed use the left hand to keep the elbow high or indeed push it back a bit. After a few seconds of hard contraction of the right bicep you will find it cramps and contracts on its own. This doesn't happen if the bicep is contracted when the arm is held almost straight.

When doing a partial this same sort of deep 'to the bone' contraction can often be felt in a way that does not happen with full lifts. Its not unusual to do a heavy lift and feel a bit out of sorts for the next few days - its not an energy thing in terms of quantity because not much energy is used, so perhaps it is a 'nervous drain' type thing. This sensation can even be felt in the stretched muscles (e.g. traps) perhaps because this is the only way to get a lot of stress on them.

Learning

The basic powerlifts might look quite simple but it takes quite a bit of time to truly perfect them, indeed without getting strong on them it maybe impossible to perfect them... which presents a conundrum, because if to get good at the lifts requires strength then how can one get good at them without being able to lift heavy.

Partials are one answer because even the most inept of people can lift 'skillfully' on partials and therefore lift heavy. This means a person gets used to the sensation of weight and to the sensation of the position of the centre of gravity.

Usually a beginner with a full lift will lift a very light weight but this light weight limits feedback and puts the centre of gravity of the body and weight in the wrong position. For example a front squat with a light weight is more difficult, position wise, than with a weight but for a beginner a front squat with weight will be too heavy.

One can of course give a heavier weight to the beginner for a full rep but then his mechanics change into that which is more efficient for his unbalanced musculature... which means his muscles don't develop correctly for a more powerful positioning.

Perhaps because partials are closer to the range of motion that non-weight trained people normally support weights, they are more able to adapt quickly to the partial. (In daily life heavy weights tend to be done in the partial range of motion rather than the full lift, for example when lifting furniture people don't usually do a full squat - instead they will tend to stay fairly upright and grab the furniture higher up. I tend to do the opposite because I like to lift the weight well clear of my legs, but I am practiced in full lifts.)

When a person is used to heavy partials he is more able to transfer to fuller lifts because he has the sensations of neural drive from the partials. Partials are easier to learn because they closer in range of motion to 'normal' every day moves and require less flexibility.

Strength Curve

If I were to plot the static strength curve of the positive part of the lift shown earlier;

I might get something like the red line in the following diagram;

This is higher than all the other lines shown because it is the max force at each point when fresh. The blue lines show the the the sort of shape that might be expected from the 2 partials I performed earlier. These lines wave around the weight of the barbell.

The green line shows the sort of force that might come about if the resistance of the barbell were closely matched (via bands/chains) to the static strength curve at the beginning of the move - in this case fatigue is rapid so the green line drops away from the red line.

The orange line shows what might be expected if the initial resistance of the banded/chained deadlift were lower than the static strength curve - in this case initial fatigue is not so great so the overall curve is similar to the red line but lower.

Bear in mind that this diagram is just a schematic... a thought experiment on what might happen.

Determining The Curves

How would I go about measuring the actual curves? If doing the lower and lift method like I show in my videos then I might, for the static curve, lower the weight to the beams and at the point at which I can just lift the bar off the beams then the weight is maximal - I would do this for each beam height (it might take days/weeks/months to get the final curve as I would need to be fresh for each point).

For the blue curves I might just take the weight of the barbell (a straight horizontal line) to be the force - or to be more accurate I could analyse the videos for accelerations to determine the deviation from a straight horizontal line.

For the green line it would take a lot of experimenting with bands/chains to find the point where the resistance was maximal at the beginning but accommodated to the maximal fatigue that this induced for the rest of the move. As with all the other curves I would initiate the move with a negative, to get the same conditions as the original videos.

The orange line is a bit problematic because it is an attempt to produce the highest average force so the bands/chains would have to be adjusted so that this would occur.

How would one then compare the effectiveness of each method? One way would be to compare the the areas under the curves, this represents work from which can be derived the average force of the lift.

Maximal force (work) for the range of motion is pretty much an assumption for HIT - but HIT seems to take no account of the intra-rep fatigue. This is similar to the green and orange lines, which might suggest that the cams would have to be different shapes for different reps and different shapes for different speeds. There again it maybe that each curve is actually the same shape just like smaller circles are the same shape as larger circles and so the cam wouldn't change shape.

Specificity

Is maximal force (work) for the range of motion the most important factor? Perhaps specificity is more important? Banded and chained work is particularly popular with geared (suited/supported) lifters because the bands and chains mimic the powerful assistance at the bottom of a move that support suits provide. Thus you will note that on a suited bench press the first part of the lift is fast because the shirt is strongest there - but it is also fast here because if it was slow the lifter would fatigue fast at the beginning and thus be unable to generate the force to finish the lift. Thus banded/chained lifts are also fast at the beginning.

If one lifts free weights without much in the way of springy support, is lifting free (unbanded/unchained) weights better in terms of specificity despite the (presumably) lesser work output of the free weights compared to banded/chained weights. It is for example noticeable that a free weight is more sluggish than a banded/chained weight.

In terms of specificity bands/chains can be used to vary the resistance to hit weak areas of a free lift. One can even do reverse band lifts to increase the inertia of the weight (this involves hanging heavier than normal weights from bands, the weights are thus more sluggish than weights only). For a discussion on the differences between small and big cams and normal and reverse bands see here.

I have done banded work but I find that regular free weights seem to do the job better... or it maybe that it is just too much of a hassle to set up the bands and then translate the gains back to free lifts.

Sticking Point

In this video I do 8 reps;

As I do more reps I get closer to the sticking point - the existence of a sticking point is proof that a intra-rep fatigue must occur or else a rep would never fail... though in the video I stop short of failure (I rarely go to failure).

Here is what is presumably happening with each rep;

With each rep the potential strength curve gets lower and flatter until at some point the curve hits the actual resistance curve (×) if it goes below this curve the exercise will fail at this point.

As you can see the potential strength curve changes with each rep getting not only lower but flatter, any cam would have to change shape to exactly match this curve. If it did exactly match this curve then the curve would change even more. There again it maybe that each curve is actually the same shape just like smaller circles are the same shape as larger circles and so the cam wouldn't change shape.

It is sometimes stated by machine manufacturers that sticking points in a properly designed cam have been eliminated but this is clearly impossible as it suggests that an exercise would never fail.

There is also the question of what speed should a cam be designed for. With a very slow speed of movement the cam's radius would have to reduce considerably to accommodate fatigue. On the other hand a variable speed of movement such as a fast start with a slow finish would require a bigger radius at the end compared to a slow move.

When it comes to demonstrating strength my own experience shows me that such cammed devices aren't that useful, which from an HIT perspective would be a puzzle (often an HITer will deny such an effect and attribute it to user ignorance) - however variable resistance is used by lifters in the form of bands and chains on the actual lifts themselves (or analogs thereof), I mentioned this earlier and wondered whether it was greater work or specificity which might account for their effectiveness.

An Example

Let's take what I did here;

668 lbs then 701 lbs

With 303 kg I did a positive of 1.8 secs and total rep (and set) time of 3.8 seconds.

With 318 kg I did a positive of 1.5 secs and total rep (and set) time of 3.9 seconds.

An HITer might typically perform a 6 second rep (3 positive, 3 negative) and do 10 reps for a 60 second set.

My assumption is that the single partial rep I did involves a large amount of intra-rep fatigue compared to the sort of reps HIT cams are designed for. I assume these cams are designed to be smooth in a manner analogous to the orange line compared to the red line I showed in the diagram earlier.

BUT should such a cam's shape differ for the sort of reps I do compared to a 60 second set? More generically how does a cam's shape differ for low and high reps and slow and fast reps? Does does a cam's shape differ for the beginning of a set compared to the end or is it a case of the diminishing strength curve is actually the same shape just as small circles are the same shape as big circles?

A partial starts from a point of full restitution whereas a full move must involve fatigue by the time it gets to the same position as the partial. HIT doesn't consider intra-rep fatigue only inter-rep fatigue and as such it is a blind spot.

It doesn't matter how lovely a cam is it can't get away from this intra-rep fatigue effect.

Intensity Is Not The Same As Force

Max force when fresh will involve max myosin-actin interaction, max force when fatigued will not involve max myosin-actin interaction. This is why powerlifting and weightlifting uses % of 1RM as the definition of intensity whereas HIT uses % of momentary ability. The problem with % of momentary ability is that if your ability is only a small % of 1RM then myosin-actin interaction is also small. This is crucial to the productivity of a partial.

Strength training of the sort I do depends on high percentages of 1RMs, fatigue is not a subsitute for this... an HITer would find this hard to accept, indeed it would be a blind spot because it is hammered into HITers that percent of momentary ability is important not percent of 1RM.

The ability to generate max force and the ability to build increasing levels of max force is best trained with high percentages of 1RMs. It is no coincidence that weightlifters and powerlifters thus utilise percentages of 1 RMs rather than the HIT definition of percent of momentary ability. This is not merely a case of me repeating what 'traditional' lifters say, it is something I came to discover for myself.

Thus for example when I did the previously videoed lift, the reason I did it for singles is that over many years I have discovered that singles do the best job for these lifts, i.e. a mere couple of seconds for the positive in this lift at 100% or near 100% of max weight for this height.

It could be argued I suppose that if a partial has the advantage of starting at a point of full restitution then a cam starting from that point might help to extract a bit more work... I don't have any experience to deny this, though I can tell you that pulling such a weight over that range is gut busting enough so I wouldn't have much left to extract.

Posture

When I first started partials I tried the idea of mimicking the full position, i.e at above knee level in a deadlift I would replicate the position that I would be in if I had started from the full position and ascended to above knee level.

I quickly realised, however, that assuming the strongest start position in the partials gave me better results in that not only could I lift a heavier weight in the partial but I got better gains over time. This is not something that happened when I replicated the positions of the full lift.

Practical Considerations

I may do partials, but I can also do fools. Here I am handling 185 kg, it is quite light compared to the 460 kg I have shouldered.

This webpage is all about strength training, however most strength trainees lift in a very limited manner on a limited number of lifts so I would like to introduce you to whole gamut of lifts in the form of partials.

I can modestly say that I am world famous for doing partials (in that I seem to be the only one doing them in such a comprehensive manner), this has lead many people to believe that I therefore cannot or will not do fulls.

From the many comments I have received I can see a number of mistakes being made. These mistakes were the same mistakes I made for many years and which lead to me not making gains for many years…

Let’s see if I can address these issues by replying to some of the questions I have received…

Is my range of motion okay? This sort of question pops up all the time. A lifter needs to start piling on the weight rather than handwringing about whether his squat is 1" too high. The form that should be used is that which allows the use of the most weight. If this means dangerous form then the lifter should reduce the range of motion, for example to a half squat. Over time he can increase the range of motion (if he needs to), for example if he intends to enter a powerlifting competition. Otherwise there is no reason in going for range of motion over heaviness of weight. If a lifter can keep piling on the weight in a half squat whilst maintaining strong form then that is what he should do rather than fretting over an additional 1" or 2" range of motion and feeling superior because he can squat a very light weight over a long range of motion. Weight always takes precedence over range of motion.

What's the point of this lift you say? Well it simulates the pick-up of a Farmer's Walk for a start... or indeed any lift from that sort of height.
I lift full so I will be strong over the full motion! No you won’t. A lifter who squats full with 200 lbs will adapt to being able to handle 200 lbs. Give him 300 lbs for a half squat and he will evert his intestines. In short the lifter will be weak in all range of motions. A full lift is only a partial lift because it ignores 90% the range of motion (if you divide the ROM into 10 divisions). Furthermore if you divide the stance into 3, narrow, medium, wide you are only doing 3% of all possible variations of the lift. If the lifter were now attempt to walk with the 300 lbs he would then have to contend with the full weight through each leg… which is 6 times more than he’s ever handled.

Walking on the spot with a heavy weight more than doubles the stress through each leg that standing with two legs would with the same weight.
Is my form safe? The question should be am I lifting enough weight, is my form the the best for allowing me to lift the most weight? If a lift does not break something the first time round then it is safe. The thing that will kill you is repetition over time, i.e. stress fatigue. Work a lift once a week and you may be perfectly fine. Do it 7 times a week and something will break. Every lift has a weak point, take the squat – for some it is the lower back and for others its is the knees, for some it may be the left side of the lower back, etc. Keep repeating the lift and at some point a weak point will be felt. Ignoring it (because the rest of the body feels fresh) until the weakness becomes a limiting factor and the condition will become chronic no matter how angelic your form is. The solution is to rotate exercises well before such a problem becomes apparent. By rotating exercises, stress on the same weak points is avoided… people then think you are bullet-proof or genetically advantaged.

This is similar to the lift that first got me into partials all those years ago and turned me into a superman.
The fatigue of a full motion will simulate heavy weights! No it doesn’t. Reaching failure at the mid-point of a squat isn’t the same as lifting a heavy weight at the start of a half-squat. Thus use 200 lbs in a full squat and reach failure at the mid-point when if fresh 250 lbs could have handled at the mid-point. This means fatigue has made 200 lbs feel like 250 lbs, but it only feels like it because 20% of the muscle fibres out of the original 100% have become inoperative due to fatigue, i.e. fatigue is due to less muscle fibres operating, thus 250 lbs becomes 200 lbs - strength stimulation requires more muscle fibres, not less.

When I shouldered this I thought it was 360 kg... except it was 460 kg (1014.1 lbs).
But I am working hard for a full rep! Nope. The work per millimetre is less for a full than for a partial. Squat 300 lbs for a full rep and the work per inch is 300 lbs/inch, do a partial squat with 500 lbs for a quarter rep and the work per inch is 500 lbs/inch.

The work per inch on this lift is 1114.2 lbs/in
My bones will break due to the tremendous stresses! That is the whole point of lifting weights. Not to break the bones, but to stress the body so it gets stronger, that means stronger connective tissues which includes the bones. You want stronger bones don’t you?

In a dogpoo filled field in genteel Sussex we did lift a big lump of rubber.
Are you saying I shouldn’t do fulsome lifts? Don’t be silly! I am saying don’t ignore the majority of lifts (partials) in favour of a small subset (fulls) because some internet expert who has never done partials says they are dangerous.

Here I am trying out different grips and different styles of deads from about an inch above 'full', i.e. 245 mm instead of the standard 225 mm. There is really no such thing as a partial or full... just different gradations of lifts.

31^st December 2010