Alternating Rest-Pause 2.0

A while back, I introduced my Alternating Rest-Pause Program here on JimStoppani.com. Since then, I’ve received great feedback from users of the technique – everything from “I’ve gained five pounds of quality muscle!” to “I’m busting through strength plateaus!”

That’s great, but it’s time to take Alternating Rest-Pause to another level.

My original Alternating Rest-Pause program is a bodypart split that maximizes size and strength gains. My updated version – Alternating Rest-Pause 2.0 – involves all full-body workouts to accelerate fat loss while still being muscle-friendly. You lose the fat, you keep the strength and mass: win-win.

Rest-Pause Refresher

My basic alternating rest-pause method hasn’t changed – only the training split has, more or less.

At the heart of the technique is unilateral training, where you’ll do all one-arm and one-leg movements, switching back and forth (“alternating”) from left to right so that the non-working limb can rest while the other is being trained.

With Alternating Rest-Pause 2.0, you’ll continue to follow the same 3-3-3-2-2-1 rep pattern as before. Using a one-arm row as an example, here’s the protocol you’ll use for each exercise:

>>Choose a weight that allows you to complete about 6-8 reps.

>>Do three reps of rows on the right side, then immediately switch to the left and do three reps there. Repeat this two more times, three reps per side. At this point you’ll have completed the “3-3-3” portion.

>>Immediately after those last three reps, keep alternating back and forth, only with two reps per side. Do this for two sets (2-2).

>>After that, you’ll do one last rep for each side.

>>Your first alternating rest-pause set for that exercise is complete.

You’ll be doing two sets in this fashion for each exercise with this exception: On the second set, instead of doing one rep for each side at the end, you’ll take that last part to failure instead of stopping at one rep. Granted, you probably won’t be able to do much more than one rep per side at this point. If you can,

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