ABS Audio Newsletter: Partial Reps vs Full ROM

Issue 56: What ROM should you be doing your exercises in?

Welcome to the 56th issue of the ABS Audio Newsletter! Today we have a heated duel of sorts. Range of motion (ROM) in exercises has been a widely discussed and critiqued aspect of resistance training. With new studies being done on partial repetition work vs full ROM training this topic has been revitalized. All of this is for good reason as partial work has been shown to be equal or superior to full ROM training in some instances analyzed in these studies. But wait, there might be more nuance to this story.

Current considerations on partials:

• seemingly drives equal or greater hypertrophy compared to full ROM (when placing the target muscle in a loaded stretch position)

• potentially able to perform more total reps per given set

• may be more challenging to standardize technique

• biasing shortened position seems to provide the least hypertrophic stimulus

• evidence in unclear outside of the scope of hypertrophic stimulus

Considerations on full ROM

• easy to standardize repetitions

• works the joint/connective tissue through a greater range of motion

• hits end ranges in both the eccentric and concentric phases

• typically necessary for strength sport like powerlifting with specific lift criteria

• likely better for athletes given the benefits to connective tissue and overall tissue ROM preparedness

Let’s chat a bit more in depth on several of the above considerations.

The outline of our conversation:

1. General intro

2. Partial Ranges

3. Full ROM

4. Which is best?

5. My takeaways and motivational sendoff!

I greatly appreciate your viewership; catch you all in the comments. Stay tuned for the 57th issue next week!

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