Close Ad ×

Muscle & Fitness logo Muscle & Fitness

  • Workouts

    Workouts

    • Workout Routines
    • Workout Tips
    • Fitness
    • Athlete/Celebrity Workouts
    • Exercise Videos
    Find Exercises Targeting…
    • Abs and Core Exercises
    • Arm Exercises
    • Back Exercises
    • Chest Exercises
    • Leg Exercises
    • Shoulder Exercises
  • Nutrition

    Nutrition

    • Healthy Eating
    • Lose Fat
    • Gain Mass
    • Supplements
    • Performance Nutrition
    Female sitting on a kitchen table leaning against a trifecta meal box while looking at her phone

    Performance Nutrition

    Trifecta Nutrition Vegetarian Shiratake Noodles Stir-fry
    Performance Nutrition

    8 Micronutrients Important for Performance and Where to Get Them

    Sarah fitness transformation from the Trifecta challenge
    Performance Nutrition

    Shifting Your Mindset in 90 Days

    5 Must-know Winter Bodybuilding Nutrition Tips
    Gain Mass

    5 Winter Bodybuilding Nutrition Tips

  • Athletes & Celebrities

    Athletes & Celebrities

    • News
    • Interviews
    • Women
    • Pro Tips
    • Behind-the-Scenes
    • Videos
    McGough Memorial
    News

    The Life of Peter McGough (1949-2020)

    McGough
    News

    Peter McGough, Legendary Bodybuilding Writer, Dies

    Olympia-2019-Roelly-Winklaar-Press-Conference
    News

    Roelly Winklaar is Out of the 2020 Mr. Olympia

    Seniors
    News

    It's Never too Late to Lose Weight, New Study Confirms

  • Features

    Features

    • Active Lifestyle
    • Gear
    • News
    • Opinion
    Muscle-And-Fitness-Holiday-Gift-Guide-and-Christmas-Present-Ideas
    Gear

    The M&F 2020 Holiday Gift Guide

    Man applying lotion to his and looking in the mirror
    Features

    The Ultimate Skin Care Guide for Men

    Orthopedic surgeon for the National Basketball Association Benedict Nwachukwu wearing a face mask inside a NBA basketball court and the NBA bubble,Walt Disney World Resort
    News

    What Other Sports Can Learn From The NBA Bubble

    Muscular women and female bodybuilders competing and a bodybuilding competition
    News

    Ms. Olympia Returns: A Tradition Restored

  • Flex

    Flex

    • Olympia
    • Nutrition
    • Training
    • Videos
    Mr. Olympia 2020 Top 5
    IFBB

    2020 Olympia Winners

    Olympia PPV
    News

    3 Ways To Livestream 2020 Olympia Weekend

    Professional bodybuilder George Peterson posing at Olympia 2020
    IFBB

    George Peterson - 212 Bodybuilding - 2020 Olympia

    Professional-Bodybuilder-Derek-Lunsford-posing-at-Olympia-2020
    IFBB

    Derek Lunsford - 212 Bodybuilding - 2020 Olympia

  • Hers

    Hers

    • Workouts
    • Nutrition
    • Supplements
    • Athletes & Celebrities
    • Features
    Kelsey Heenan Trainer
    Hers Workouts

    Total-Body At-Home Strength Workout

    Peter Lee Thomas Trainer
    Pro Tips

    Breathing Tips From Halle Berry's Trainer

    Man's hand holding a cup of coffee in a to-go cup
    Hers Nutrition

    Coffee Linked to Lower Body Fat in Women

    Blond-Tom-Boy-Female-Short-Hair-Stretching
    Hers Workouts

    7 Stretches for a Better Workout

  • Olympia

    Olympia

    • Olympia
    • Buy Tickets
    Mr. Olympia 2020 Top 5
    IFBB

    2020 Olympia Winners

    2019 Olympia Finals Report
    IFBB

    2019 Olympia Finals Report

    Stars Visit the Muscle & Fitness Booth
    IFBB

    Stars Visit the Muscle & Fitness Booth

    2019 Olympia Open Bodybuilding Callout Report
    IFBB

    2019 Olympia Open Bodybuilding Callout Report

Subscribe to YouTube Subscribe to the Newsletter Terms of Use Privacy Policy Cookie Policy Accessibility Statement Manage Cookies
  • Workouts
    • Workout Routines
    • Workout Tips
    • Fitness
    • Athlete/Celebrity Workouts
    • Exercise Videos
  • Nutrition
    • Healthy Eating
    • Lose Fat
    • Gain Mass
    • Supplements
    • Performance Nutrition
  • Athletes & Celebrities
    • News
    • Interviews
    • Women
    • Pro Tips
    • Behind-the-Scenes
    • Videos
  • Features
    • Active Lifestyle
    • Gear
    • News
    • Opinion
  • Flex
    • Olympia
    • Nutrition
    • Training
    • Videos
  • Hers
    • Workouts
    • Nutrition
    • Supplements
    • Athletes & Celebrities
    • Features
  • Olympia
    • Olympia
    • Buy Tickets
  • Resources & Highlights
    • Topics
    • Videos
    • Podcasts
    • Contact
    • Terms of Use
    • Privacy Policy
    • Cookie Policy
    • Accessibility Statement
    • Manage Cookies

Stay Connected

Success!

Thank you for signing up. Your information has been successfully processed!

I want content for...
Facebook Twitter Youtube Pinterest
Open menu button
Open search bar button
×

Search M&F

Featured Articles
Lean Muscle
Healthy Eating

28-Days-to-Lean Meal Plan

With the right plan and the right discipline, you can get seriously shredded in just 28 days.

Read article
Kate Upton Attends the 2016 Vanity Fair Oscar Party
Women

The 20 Hottest Female Celebrities

Talented stars, killer physiques.

Read article
Fit Woman in the Gym
Hers Workouts

The Transformation Workout Plan

This workout combines cardio and weight-lifting drills for serious body-sculpting results.

Read article
The 50 Best Female Fitness Influencers on Instagram
Girls

The 50 Best Fitness Influencers on Instagram

Follow these fit women we're crushing on for inspiration, workout ideas, and motivation.

Read article
Workout Tips

2 for 1: The Best Moves to Shatter Your Personal Records

Use this training method to help your workout reach new heights.

by Maik Wiedenbach
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
Chest Flye 2 View Gallery

2 for 1: The Best Moves to Shatter Your Personal Records

Close gallery popup button
1 OF 9

1 of 9

Chest Flye 2

The Progression Principle

Improving your workout is an endless quest, and can get frustrating. There are certain parameters you must fulfill to improve, mainly adding weight to the bar or squeezing out more reps in the same amount of time. This is were the tried-and-true method of progressive overload comes in where you force your body to constantly adapt to higher weights while taking a deload week every 5-6 weeks.SEE ALSO: The 5-Week Workout for Progressive OverloadThis principle of progression states that your training intensity must progress at a rate that continues to be an overload for your bodies current fitness state. By staying one step ahead of your bodies adaptability, you will continue to see progress toward your fitness goals. In a perfect world we would just get stronger and leaner ad infinitum until we all look like Phil Heath or one of the other physique idols. And in the beginning of everyone’s gym career, things are going great: we are adding weight to the bar pretty much every session while getting leaner and more muscular at the same time.Sounds great but all good things come to an end as progress stalls at some point, for a variety of reasons. Mainly, progress stops because your body hates you. Actually that is not true, your body loves you, indeed so much that it does not want you to become too  lean and muscular. You see from an evolutionary standpoint it does not make sense to carry around 200+ lbs of lean muscle since it is much costlier to feed. Therefore our bodies love to shut down and keep us small and chubby. Depressing, no? Bear with me!

Beating Your Best 

The key to break any plateau is change but not change for the sake of change. First, check your nutritional intake. If you are not putting on muscle, add another 300 calories a day. Secondly, how is your sleep? You should be getting anywhere from 7- 9 hours of good quality sleep. Sleepcycleappp is a great way to monitor the quality of your sleep via your phone. Mediating before bed can also very helpful to improve the quality of your time in bed.From a training standpoint. It makes  sense to add certain advanced techniques  to overcome a plateau such as drop sets, cluster sets or one of my personal favorites, the two for one method. 
The two for one method basically combines two exercises in one   motion. Here is how to do it: during the positive aka concentric phase you are doing the easier exercise, the more difficult one is done during the negative  or eccentricThe thinking behind is the following: your muscle is about 30% stronger in the eccentric ( negative) phase than it is during the  concentric (positive) phase. Because of that, you can not quite fatigue the muscle during a regular set. By the same token, by fully exhausting the negative phase you are setting the stage for further growth down the road since you are priming the nervous system for higher loads. Here is a list of exercises that can be used for the two-for-one method.

2 of 9

Instant Muscle: Two Curls in One

Zottman Curls (biceps)

Here you perform a regular curl on the way up, turn the hand and lower the dumbbell in a reverse curl fashion. By doing so you ll be able to overload the stronger phase.

3 of 9

7 Ways to Torch Your Tri's

Skull Crusher (triceps)

The set up is on a bench, lower the dumbbells in a skull crusher motion next to the ears, push the elbows forward along the body and bring the weight up  in a close grip press. You should be able to use a weight that is 20 percent heavier than your regular extensions.

4 of 9

Dumbbell-Wide-Row

Rows (back)

Here, I use the in vs. out rows. You bring them up in a bent over, parallel row, turn the elbows out for 90 Degrees and lower the dumbbells for a four second count.

5 of 9

Winter Bulk Workout - Dumbbell Flye

Flye/Press (chest)

Combine a chest flye with a press. Lower the dumbbells in a flye motion and, bring them together in a press. Hereby you can overload the flye and maximize the stretch. The additional fiber damage will then result in strength gains.

6 of 9

On Trial: High Reps or Low Reps?

Poliquin Side Raises (shoulders)

Poliquin side raises: Those are evil but very efficient as they allow for a heavier side raise. Here is the the set up: hold the dumbbells next to the thighs, do a hammer curl until you hit 90 degrees in the elbows, then rotate the upper arm up until parallel to the floor. Now move the forearms outward until the entire arm is parallel to the floor, lower for four seconds.

7 of 9

Potent Moves to Power Up Your Wheels

Leg Press (legs)

As for the legs, the choice are more limited as I would not advise to change your foot stance during the squat. The leg press works much better, simply drive the weight up in a wide stance with the feet rather high on the sled. Then bring the feet together so that there is only about a two inch gap between the heels and lower the weight for five seconds.

8 of 9

Leg Extensions 11-19-13 A

Leg Extenstions (quads)

Push weight up with both legs, lower with one leg. Alternate legs on each rep. 

9 of 9

Front Pose

Conclusion: Use 2-for-1 Sparingly

In closing, I would not recommend doing the tow for one method for an entire workout, rather pick one or two lagging body parts and finish the workout with the the exercise I have listed.

Back to intro

The Progression Principle

Improving your workout is an endless quest, and can get frustrating. There are certain parameters you must fulfill to improve, mainly adding weight to the bar or squeezing out more reps in the same amount of time. This is were the tried-and-true method of progressive overload comes in where you force your body to constantly adapt to higher weights while taking a deload week every 5-6 weeks.

SEE ALSO: The 5-Week Workout for Progressive Overload

This principle of progression states that your training intensity must progress at a rate that continues to be an overload for your bodies current fitness state. By staying one step ahead of your bodies adaptability, you will continue to see progress toward your fitness goals. In a perfect world we would just get stronger and leaner ad infinitum until we all look like Phil Heath or one of the other physique idols. And in the beginning of everyone’s gym career, things are going great: we are adding weight to the bar pretty much every session while getting leaner and more muscular at the same time.

Sounds great but all good things come to an end as progress stalls at some point, for a variety of reasons. Mainly, progress stops because your body hates you. Actually that is not true, your body loves you, indeed so much that it does not want you to become too  lean and muscular. You see from an evolutionary standpoint it does not make sense to carry around 200+ lbs of lean muscle since it is much costlier to feed. Therefore our bodies love to shut down and keep us small and chubby. Depressing, no? Bear with me!

Beating Your Best 

The key to break any plateau is change but not change for the sake of change. First, check your nutritional intake. If you are not putting on muscle, add another 300 calories a day. Secondly, how is your sleep? You should be getting anywhere from 7- 9 hours of good quality sleep. Sleepcycleappp is a great way to monitor the quality of your sleep via your phone. Mediating before bed can also very helpful to improve the quality of your time in bed.

From a training standpoint. It makes  sense to add certain advanced techniques  to overcome a plateau such as drop sets, cluster sets or one of my personal favorites, the two for one method. 
The two for one method basically combines two exercises in one   motion. Here is how to do it: during the positive aka concentric phase you are doing the easier exercise, the more difficult one is done during the negative  or eccentric

The thinking behind is the following: your muscle is about 30% stronger in the eccentric ( negative) phase than it is during the  concentric (positive) phase. Because of that, you can not quite fatigue the muscle during a regular set. By the same token, by fully exhausting the negative phase you are setting the stage for further growth down the road since you are priming the nervous system for higher loads. Here is a list of exercises that can be used for the two-for-one method.

Zottman Curls (biceps)

Here you perform a regular curl on the way up, turn the hand and lower the dumbbell in a reverse curl fashion. By doing so you ll be able to overload the stronger phase.

Skull Crusher (triceps)

The set up is on a bench, lower the dumbbells in a skull crusher motion next to the ears, push the elbows forward along the body and bring the weight up  in a close grip press. You should be able to use a weight that is 20 percent heavier than your regular extensions.

Rows (back)

Here, I use the in vs. out rows. You bring them up in a bent over, parallel row, turn the elbows out for 90 Degrees and lower the dumbbells for a four second count.

Flye/Press (chest)

Combine a chest flye with a press. Lower the dumbbells in a flye motion and, bring them together in a press. Hereby you can overload the flye and maximize the stretch. The additional fiber damage will then result in strength gains.

Poliquin Side Raises (shoulders)

Poliquin side raises: Those are evil but very efficient as they allow for a heavier side raise. Here is the the set up: hold the dumbbells next to the thighs, do a hammer curl until you hit 90 degrees in the elbows, then rotate the upper arm up until parallel to the floor. Now move the forearms outward until the entire arm is parallel to the floor, lower for four seconds.

Leg Press (legs)

As for the legs, the choice are more limited as I would not advise to change your foot stance during the squat. The leg press works much better, simply drive the weight up in a wide stance with the feet rather high on the sled. Then bring the feet together so that there is only about a two inch gap between the heels and lower the weight for five seconds.

Leg Extenstions (quads)

Push weight up with both legs, lower with one leg. Alternate legs on each rep. 

Conclusion: Use 2-for-1 Sparingly

In closing, I would not recommend doing the tow for one method for an entire workout, rather pick one or two lagging body parts and finish the workout with the the exercise I have listed.

Topics:
  • Bodybuilding
  • Build Muscle
  • Strength Training
Author picture
Written by Maik Wiedenbach
Also by Maik Wiedenbach
10 Training Mistakes That Kill Progress
Workout Tips

10 Training Mistakes That Kill Progress

Black-Man-Bicep-Curl-Exercise-Technology-Analysis
Build Muscle

8 Exercises To Grow the Most Stubborn Muscles

Stay up to date

Sign up below to receive our newest workout routines, recipes, news stories, and offers from our partners

Success!

Thank you for signing up. Your information has been successfully processed!

I want content for...

Follow us

Facebook Twitter Youtube Pinterest

More news

Bodybuilder-Muscular-Pose-Shoulders-Back
Workout Tips

Train the Olympia Way: Shoulders

Five Sandow-winning champions share their go-to delt moves.

Read article
Strong muscular man measuring his bicep growth using a measuring tape
Workout Tips

6 Worst Things You Can do for Big Biceps

You've got to nail your technique before progress can start.

Read article
Young Arnold Schwarzenegger standing behind a barbell bench after working out
Workout Tips

10 Arnold-Approved Tips For Growing Your Arms

These are guaranteed to grow your guns to their peak shape.

Read article
All Workout Tips
  1. Home
  2. /
  3. Workouts
  4. /
  5. Workout Tips
  6. /
  7. 2 for 1: The Best Moves to Shatter Your Personal Records
Muscle & Fitness logo
  • Workouts
  • Nutrition
  • Athletes & Celebrities
  • Features
  • Recipes
  • Topics
  • Videos
  • Exercise Videos
  • Podcasts
  • RSS Feed
  • 2020 Olympia
  • Buy Olympia Tickets
  • Archives
  • Sitemap
Facebook Twitter Youtube Pinterest

Newsletter Signup

Success!

Thank you for signing up. Your information has been successfully processed!

I want content for...

Muscleandfitness.com is part of A360 Media LLC Fitness & Health Network

Contact Us Terms of Use Privacy Policy Cookie Policy Manage Cookies Accessibility Statement

JW Media, LLC

Copyright 2021 JW Media, LLC, parent company of Muscle & Fitness. All rights reserved.