Taking a quick 2 second rest to squeeze extra reps?

[GangsterFresh]

I was watching Big Ramy workout on YouTube and noticed that sometimes during the set he will take a quick pause between reps and then squeeze extra reps out because of this, I saw him do this for shoulders.

My question to you guys is, is this okay to do? Say my goal is 8-12 reps for lat raise and I got to 7 reps and then couldn't get to the 8th rep, so instead of putting the weight on the ground and taking a full 60 sec reset for the set, I kept the weight in my hands, took a breath in for 2 seconds or so and then pushed out to the 8th rep, was this okay?

Is their any benefit to doing this? What about if I stop at 10 reps and want to get to 12 reps?

Should I only do this for shoulder exercises or is it okay to do for other exercises as well? For example off the top of my head, I remember doing something like this for pull ups, where I would stop at 7 reps, but then dead hang for a seconds to get my breath back and squeeze that extra rep out.

[John Prophet]

I think in the end its just a trade-off. if you are more of a beginner then it would probably be just as good to continue on with a regular cadence until failure or until you were ready to stop. Then just try to get an extra rep next workout or whatever. An advanced guy like Ramy is just trying to squeeze as much stimulation as he can into the workout etc.

To me, the trade off part is this....how many sets are you going to do? So if u do the "pause a few secs for more reps" thing on your first set....you will just be that much more wasted on the next set(s). So to me this is sort of a way to add intensity. If you crank the intensity up too high then you will have to keep the number of sets lower etc

So I think its sort of neither here nor there. it just depends on how you want to structure the overall workout. Now if you are rushed for time and want to get as much as u can into 45 minutes or whatever, then this is an option

if you take this to the extreme then u basically have the 20 rep "widowmaker" squat routine where you take your 10 rep max and basically do 20 reps with it by standing there and taking 5-10 breaths between reps when it gets hard. So if u do that...how do u think the rest of your workout will be??

and if you are trying to get those 10 reps u mentioned and u have to take the 2 second pause to get the 10th...are you going to have to take it from then on??

dunno if you ever heard of Phil Hernon...huge dude from early 90s etc....I ran across this vid last week discussing this very thing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFd1TfEr0H4

[air2fakie]

I don't think it's a big deal, but makes it hard to measure progress consistently if you're doing this technique on sets whenever you fail early, or randomly feel like cranking out a few extra reps.

If you're going to do it each workout, I'd suggest just doing it on the last set of each exercise.

[GeneralSerpant]

If you can improve upon it and it's helping your control to get better form at higher weight, that might be okay.

[GangsterFresh]

I don't think it's a big deal, but makes it hard to measure progress consistently if you're doing this technique on sets whenever you fail early, or randomly feel like cranking out a few extra reps.

If you're going to do it each workout, I'd suggest just doing it on the last set of each exercise.

I think I will do this, just on the last set, not early cos it can mess with my other sets, especially if I am going for something like 4 or 5 sets. What about for 3 sets, is it okay to get extra reps early with the pause method or again just keep it in the last set regardless if I am doing 3 sets or 5 sets

[FurtadoZ9]

Yes, these are referred to as pause reps.

Nothing ground breaking. If you want to do it here and there, go for it.

[Millz12323]

If I need to do a rest pause type of thing to hit my goal weight/reps then I'll do it.

Especially for squats... Taking 5-10 seconds to gather yourself so you can hit your rep target is something I personally do. But it all depends on the context of why you're doing it. Like if you need to do that in the first set to hit your rep target then you're likely going to fail the subsequent sets and your training weight may be too heavy