Doug McGuff sounds like a combination of Mike Mentzer (inventor of HIT) and Arthur Jones (inventor of the Nautilus line). The quality data and studies refute HIT. Whether to use machines or not is more a question of what you're trying to do. Squats don't really build legs the way machine hack squats and leg presses do, but if you're training for strength you don't care. If you're training for hypertrophy, you do. Rip trains people for strength, not size. Eventually, most people get bored with that and want their muscle size to match their strength and simply want more variety of exercises in different rep ranges. In one of his latest videos, Alan Thrall explains why he started training more like a bodybuilder even though he was a SS coach and exclusively trained for strength earlier in life.
The fact that you got injured squatting has far less to do with your skeleton and far more to do with your perception of danger of the exercise. I'm not saying injuries don't happen - they do. But they're pretty rare with these exercises done in rep ranges of FAHVE and above. Rather, if you perceive an exercise is dangerous, your brain will cause pain.
With that said, there's no reason you have to train the way Rip says or use only free weights to get the benefits of weight training. I highly recommend Renaissance Periodization.
I agree that HIT lacks evidence for being the *best* method of hypertrophy. The literature seems to indicate that any method that goes reasonably close to failure is effective, with none obviously better. I endorsed HIT because it's the least likely to cause injury and very time efficient. I'm going to be 45 next year, and it's extremely important not to miss weeks in the gym because sarcopenia can start erasing years of gains quickly. The three times I injured my back (these occurred within a 3-4 year span with years or months between) with free weight squats and conventional deadlifts were extremely painful and harmful to general productivity, even with a full recovery. And each time I upped my conservatism with the movements, yet they still happened, so I do believe there are anatomical differences between people that make them better able to handle the stress such movements produce in the back. I also think there is a long-term risk to wear and tear on the joints with any momentum-containing movement.
All that said, I think the Tonal machine I use makes injury less likely across all rep ranges to failure, since there is near-zero momentum, so I will probably experiment with some periodicization next year.
Doug McGuff sounds like a combination of Mike Mentzer (inventor of HIT) and Arthur Jones (inventor of the Nautilus line). The quality data and studies refute HIT. Whether to use machines or not is more a question of what you're trying to do. Squats don't really build legs the way machine hack squats and leg presses do, but if you're training for strength you don't care. If you're training for hypertrophy, you do. Rip trains people for strength, not size. Eventually, most people get bored with that and want their muscle size to match their strength and simply want more variety of exercises in different rep ranges. In one of his latest videos, Alan Thrall explains why he started training more like a bodybuilder even though he was a SS coach and exclusively trained for strength earlier in life.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yUZ5pb7UA0
The fact that you got injured squatting has far less to do with your skeleton and far more to do with your perception of danger of the exercise. I'm not saying injuries don't happen - they do. But they're pretty rare with these exercises done in rep ranges of FAHVE and above. Rather, if you perceive an exercise is dangerous, your brain will cause pain.
https://www.amazon.com/Explain-David-Butler-Lorimer-Moseley/dp/0987342665
With that said, there's no reason you have to train the way Rip says or use only free weights to get the benefits of weight training. I highly recommend Renaissance Periodization.
Thanks for the comment!
I agree that HIT lacks evidence for being the *best* method of hypertrophy. The literature seems to indicate that any method that goes reasonably close to failure is effective, with none obviously better. I endorsed HIT because it's the least likely to cause injury and very time efficient. I'm going to be 45 next year, and it's extremely important not to miss weeks in the gym because sarcopenia can start erasing years of gains quickly. The three times I injured my back (these occurred within a 3-4 year span with years or months between) with free weight squats and conventional deadlifts were extremely painful and harmful to general productivity, even with a full recovery. And each time I upped my conservatism with the movements, yet they still happened, so I do believe there are anatomical differences between people that make them better able to handle the stress such movements produce in the back. I also think there is a long-term risk to wear and tear on the joints with any momentum-containing movement.
All that said, I think the Tonal machine I use makes injury less likely across all rep ranges to failure, since there is near-zero momentum, so I will probably experiment with some periodicization next year.