What The Heck Does That Mean?!

As requested, this post is just for terms you may not know that have to do with lifting, nutrition, etc. If there is something you didn't understand in one of my posts, just comment it here and I'll add a description! The link to this post will be at the bottom of the blog from now on so you can easily refer back!

Lifting Terms:
1. Reading a Workout Log
ex. Bent over Barbell Row 4x8, 90
Read as: Bent over Barbell Row, 4 sets of 8 repetitions, resting 90 seconds between sets
2. Superset
Performing two exercises back to back, without resting in between exercises. You then rest at the completion of the second exercise
3. Drop Set
Perform your exercise as written, for example, bench press 3x8, and then after the last set you immediately decrease the weight, and then lift until failure.
4. Failure
Pumping out as many reps as you can until you are no longer able to lift the weight one more time. It's controversial, but I'm not getting into that.
5. Negative Set
When you lift you have two main phases: the eccentric and concentric phase. Concentric is the muscle shortening phase while you are overcoming or generating force. So when you do a bicep curl, lifting the bar up is the concentric phase for your biceps. Eccentric phase is the opposite. It is when the muscle is lengthened under tension because there is an external force that is overcoming the force of your muscle. So for the biceps curl example, the biceps are in the eccentric phase while you lower the weight. To think of it simply, when you do an exercise think of the main muscle it is working. The hard phase, the portion where you are pushing or pulling and generating the most force to move the weight, is concentric. When you are returning the weight to the starting position (not always, but most of the time) that's eccentric. So a negative set, is performing the eccentric portion. You can do this by having someone help you lift the weight and then you slowly return. For pushups, you can do negatives by slowly lowering yourself to the ground until you collapse, and then just get back up any way, and do it again (opposite example to me saying return to the starting phase, the pushing back up is the concentric portion, lowering down is eccentric). For my workouts, this usually means that on my last rep, I am doing a negative-- meaning slowly lowering the weight eccentrically and then with a burst I'm going into the concentric position.
6. Rest-Pause
Do a set until failure, rest 5-10 seconds, and then pump out a few more at the same weight. For example, when I was doing my Arnold Presses in week 1, I was doing 35# on the first set. My second set at 35# I was going for 8 reps, but at 6 my left shoulder couldn't do another one, so I had to drop to 30#. Then I did 1 more set at 30, and for my dropset I had to drop immediately to 25#. 25# was WAY to light for me to be doing a drop set. The next time this would happen, instead on my second set, I would lift those 6 reps. Set the weight down and rest 5-10 seconds and then do my last 2 reps at 35# to finish out the second set.