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What’s an Isokinetic Power Rack? Isokinetic refers to the speed of movement being constant. Researchers, as an example, to test various components of muscle contraction, will do so in, as an example, an isokinetic leg extension and set it, say, at 60-degrees per second. That way all subjects perform the exercise exactly the same to eliminate many confounding variables.

Of course this isn’t the way exercises are performed in “real life” as they’re dynamic, meaning that the speed of movement changes throughout the range of motion. From a training perspective, then, doing isokinetics is of little relevance.

With that said, is there a power rack that you can set the speed of movement so that it remains constant through the range of motion? I’m only aware of Smith machines that are set up that way for research purposes.

-d

James, Like Dan, this is the first I’ve ever heard of an isokinetic power rack, and as long as I’ve been around the iron game, I’ver heard about everything!

I looked over those links and articles and I never seen any info on the design specs of something like this. It would have to be engineered to maintain constant bar speed during a lift. Hopefully, this would be a feature you could adjust depending on the exercise in question. I can think of a couple of ways this could be done. Do you have any pictures of this type of power rack? And if so could you send them to me?

I have no idea if this would have any benefits of enhancing a lift, but it is an interesting concept. Al

I’ve heard of isokinetic training in general as people toss around the idea of accommodating resistance in training, but I would think if this is the goal then a more “all-around” or multi-planar approach would be simply to use bands and/or chains.

If Al hasn’t heard of it, then it’s gotta be rare!

OK, I see what you mean now. Yeah, those are somewhat “isokinetic,” though nowhere near the sophistication of the machines used in exercise science research. With that, I don’t think it appropriate to refer to them as isokinetic and doing so falls into the category of marketing hype.

As I mentioned in the earlier post, using an isokinetic approach to exercise science research holds very important benefits and is, in fact, a must depending on the research question scientists aim to answer. However, as it soooo often goes, you end up with unqualified and scientifically untrained business people, coaches, athletes, etc., seeking to cash in on research by misrepresenting the findings, over generalizing the findings, etc. And so you have these companies that claim greater gains via “accommodated resistance” or “isokinetics,” etc.

Of course researchers have looked at the gains aspect, too, and of course we covered it in past issues of JOPP. In fact, researchers at the University of Kansas (sorry Al…snicker) were one of the first to look at the concept of “accommodated resistance” and similar ideas as far back as the mid to late 90’s and found them to be ineffective in many ways as it relates to training gains, performance enhancement, etc.

Why? A bit difficult to explain in this format. Suffice to say, the human’s nervous system, musculature, lever systems, etc., are not designed to work “that way.” Gravity plays a role, too. So basically, when you do things that screw with nature (like making an exercise more difficult when it naturally becomes easier, keeping the speed of movement constant when it naturally changes throughout the range of motion, etc.), you end up on the shorter end of the stick. It’s really quite silly and exercise scientists have known that for decades. Sadly, most lifters and coaches get caught up in the hype and these myths never seem to die.

-d

I looked at that youtube video and it appears to be just a sliding sleeve mechanism on uprights. What controls the constant speed? It doesn’t appear to have anything to do that – thus how can it be called an isokinetic rack???

I think this is more a “marketing scheme” than an engineered piece of equipment. I would take this off your wish list James! haha Dinoman

I’ve never heard of an isokinetic power rack either and I go back further than almost all of you.

About 50 years ago, Weider advertised squat stands that were pictured as having sliding sleeves. The product that arrived was different from what was in the photo, however, and did not have sliding sleeves. I did use the product for a long time, but in thinking back, it was not completely safe, although I didn’t have any mishaps.

Haha Now the 300# Anvil – that would be on the TOP of my wish list!!

Thom hasn’t said whether he will sell it to me or not. I think he’s holding out for more money.

James, the first thing that comes to mind about mini-gym is…HYPE. Whenever a company presents their product in such a way, I personally get turned off and question their product and marketing approach. But that’s personal opinion.

From a factual perspective, I have to wonder if their machines are truly isokinetic. One of the factors to consider is whether resistance remains the same regardless of speed of movement. You’d need fancy biomechanical machinery to find out for sure. The company doesn’t talk about that. The company does talk about isokinetics, ranges of motion, etc., but make errors and (naturally) leaves out those points that speak against isokinetic training.

So what’s the bottom line? Well, that, like any other athletic pursuit, depends on your goals. That’s the most critical question that any athlete/coach needs to answer with specificity and not just with “I wanna get faster,” I wanna get stronger,” “I wanna get bigger.” So, do you just want to enjoy yourself by doing something different and by using a different piece of equipment? Well, then, go for it.

On the other hand, if you want to increase your maximal strength for one repetition for all-round lifts, you’d be wasting your money…and training time…on a training approach that won’t help you reach your goals.

Hope this helps. And by the looks of it, since you have that 3″ plank, what else do you really need anyway? LOL

-d