Raising The Set Point

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In last Monday's post I brought up the term "set point" in regards to a potentially intended outcome of Muscle Activation Techniques™ sessions being to raise it.  I never really explained what the term "set point" means, though.

Set point is an idea that I was first introduced to during the MAT lower body mastery course back in November.  Essentially, it was explained as more or less the current maximum level of force that can be applied to a contractile tissue and not have that tissue's contractile efficiency decrease.  An example of exceeding the set point would be if somebody had a passing AMC&S test for the straight head of rectus femoris and then they performed seated knee extensions, only to retest that position and then no longer be able to hold it.  However much force the tissue had to handle between the two tests exceeded that tissue's set point level and subsequently the person was unable to maintain the corresponding testing position.

As I discussed last week, MAT is part of an exercise process of stimulation and potential response, ideally leading to desired adaptation.  One of these adaptations may be the ability of the tissue to tolerate greater and greater levels of force without diminishing its contractile efficiency, i.e. raising its set point.  In fact, this is one of the most common week by week changes I see in clients.  In terms of where a client is on any given day, a lot more goes into this than whether or not we met the previous week, but in general, from one session to the next I have tended to see upward trends of clients being able to have greater quantities force applied to them and still be able to hold the AMC&S testing positions.

Side note:  By greater quantities of force I am talking about both in terms of magnitude and duration of application.  The tissue's ability to tolerate inertial effects as well as different levels of positive and negative acceleration should also be included in this.

Compare this to a tissue's maximum threshold, which, as explained to me by Greg Mack, is more indicative of the material qualities of the tissue rather than it's contractile efficiency.  In other words, exceeding a tissue's threshold for force tolerance ends in rupture of that tissue.  Tissue threshold will more than likely always be greater than or equal to the tissue's set point, simply because if the tissue itself ruptures, it is highly unlikely that it would still be able to contract efficiently if more force was applied.  Quite frankly I'm not sure how that would be measured anyways, so I guess unless I find out otherwise I'll say that threshold will always be greater than or equal to set point.  That being said, both values can be raised through appropriate force application and not necessarily raised in a linear fashion or by relatively equal amounts, either.

So, why is this important?  For one, whether you are a regular exerciser, competitive athlete, weekend warrior, wanting to get back into exercise, or just need your muscles to help you get through your everyday life, having somewhat of an objective marker of what your neuromuscular system can actually tolerate at this moment in terms of force can be valuable information.  Do you really want varying levels of discomfort, illness, and lethargy to be your only indicators that what you are doing might be too much for you right now?

Second, by establishing a baseline of where you are at now, you can a) plan your workouts and life accordingly so you aren't constantly playing a game of digging yourself into a hole and then scrambling to get out before it is time to start digging again, and b) have a positive marker by which to measure improvement and progress.  In other words, instead of noting that you are experiencing less of a negative (soreness, fatigue, being worn down, etc), you will be able to put things in terms of a positive (able to hold more positions, able to tolerate greater magnitudes of force and for greater durations without compromising contractile efficiency) at a frequency that may be greater than your ability to notice increases in gross torque production capabilities or changes in appearance or improved conditioning levels, etc.

Third, having a means by which to potentially raise the set point of your contractile tissues means you potentially have a greater ability to do what you want to do, when you want to do it at more frequent intervals and higher levels of performance.  Plain and simple.  Whether you enjoy running, gardening, recreational sports, walking your dogs, home improvement projects, or whatever else you can imagine using your muscles for, this is a way to potentially improve your ability to do that as well as do that later and later into your life.

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What activities do you enjoy doing?  Do you want to be able to do those better?  Do you want to be able to do those as you continue to age?

Inter­ested in find­ing out more? Check out the “Mus­cle Acti­va­tion Tech­niques™” page.

Inter­ested in set­ting up an assess­ment time or dis­cussing this sub­ject fur­ther? E-mail Char­lie at charlie@selfmadefitness.com.

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