Dear Demetrio Frattarelli,
Could you please indicate me where you found this article?
In any case it’s evident that there is a contradiction or inaccuracy in translation.
I am very curios to see this article and find out who published it. Could you send it to me giving me also the information of the source?
After I read this article I could give you an answer.

Yuri Verkhoshansky

Dear Demetrio Frattarelli,

thank you to have discovered this digitations error in the book.

The overload weight in the case of Variant 2 must not be 84 -95%, but 85 – 90%.

Now, the difference between the Variant 1 and Variant 2 is quite obvious:

The main characteristics of the training methods finalised to increase the maximal strength without the muscle mass  increasing are:

1.       high overload weight: that must be gradually increased during the training session;

2.       the muscle could be relaxed between each repetition;

3.       low number of sets;

4.       long rest interval between sets.

The main characteristic of the training methods finalised to increase the maximal strength with the muscle mass increasing are (see page 22 of Manual):

1.       moderate overload weight;

2.       the muscles must not be relaxed between each repetition;

3.       high number of sets (must be used 2-3 local exercises for the same muscle groups);

4.       short interval between sets.

One of these methods could be named as “inverse pyramid” (see page 23 of Manual for coaches):

“The same number of repetition is executed in each sets but with less resistance in each set. For example:

1° set - 10 repetitions with 65% overload weight,

2° set – 10 repetitions with 60% overload weight

3° set - 10 repetitions with 55% overload weight

4° set - 10 repetitions with 50% overload weight.

The rest pause between sets is 1 -2 min.

This method is useful for targeting the small muscle groups which fatigue quickly or when the rest pauses between sets are reduced.”

So, the metabolic effect of this exercise is related with the glicolitic mechanism activation.

For the muscle mass increasing, also the “classic” bodybuilding pyramid could be used.

In the first part of this pyramid the overload weight is increased, in each subsequent set, but the number of repetitions are decreased. In the second part of this pyramid, the overload weight is decreased but the number of repetitions are increased.

This method is finalised not to the glicolitic mechanism activation but to the “exhaustion” of the local muscle group.

You can find more detailed description of this method in the Italian publications of G.Cometti.

Yuri Verkhoshansky

Dear Riccardo Barros,

1. When (year) in Russia the track and field coaches began to used training methods to increase the maximal strength with the muscle mass increasing?

It’s difficult to answer giving you a precise year or period, but in the past none thought that it was possible to increase strength without the muscle mass increasing.

2. When you were an athlete what athletes and coaches thought about the relationship between muscle mass, strength and performance?
When I was an athlete, the traditional ideas about the relationships between muscle mass, strength and performance was following:

1)      strength depend on muscle mass, the overload exercises help to increase strength because these exercises assure a muscle mass increasing;

2)      if you increase muscle mass you increase the body weight, if you increase your body weight you decrease the speed of your body displacements;

3)      if you need to increase the running speed, you must not use overload exercises: “runner need the muscles of Deer, not of Bull”.

So, at that time the dominant idea was that the overload exercises could be used only if you want to be heavy as a Bull.  Only later it has been introduced the idea that the issue of the specific speed and power improvement could be solved not finding out the best training mean (exercise), but using several training means and methods, joined in a system.

Yuri Verkhoshansky