It is great to have a training partner motivate you and to give you a spot while you are training. The thing that isn’t so good is having a training partner, is when you have one who is a bit to keen to help you with your reps. By over keen, I mean that they try and support you with virtually ever rep that you do. Although they are obviously trying to help you, you need to be completing as many reps as you can on your own to truly monitor your progress. Even just the sightest support can make a huge difference to how hard you are working to lift the weight.
The main reason I have brought this up today is because of a training session I had last week and then an observation I made in the gym today. I usually train on my own, mainly due to the fact that I like to keep my training time short and to focus on my own workout (sounds a bit selfish I know, but if I train with a partner I’m the worlds worst for chatting away!) Anyway I was working my chest in this particular training session, and at the time I was doing the raised dumbell press. A kind passer by had offered to pass the weight to me, and then proceeded to spot me during my set. Although this was very generous of him, he was a bit keen with his spotting and was pushing my elbows in on every rep. Not wanting to seem ungrateful I didn’t say anything and just carried on and ended up doing alot heavier weight for alot more reps than I would do on my own to try and compensate. Now you may think that I’m just an ungrateful whiner, but the reason for my moaning is that I couldn’t tell if I had done more than in my last session, as I was being helped a bit too much. For muscle gain you need to continually progress with the weights you lift and the repitions you complete, and if you have someone doing some of the work for you it becomes really hard to monitor your progress.
My other story was from being in the gym again today. I noticed a couple of lads shoulder pressing some huge weights, but the were hardly moving the weight at all and the other friend was taking most of the weight. For the best results you should be performing every exercise with proper form, which means completing the whole movement. So combining bad technique with someone else doing all the work for you, really isn’t very good at all.
The job of someone who is spotting you is mainly a safety role, they are their to make sure that you don’t end up crushed under a heavy weight! They can help you by lifting you the weight and supporting you while you steady yourself, but for maximum results you should be doing all of the work yourself. Only when you come to failure and you can’t move the weight any more should they come in to assist, and maybe even for one more rep out with you.
So don’tlet your friend do all the work for you, the harder you work the better the results you will see.
