Making gains is a breeze, especially thanks to the easy-to-follow breakdowns Erin Stern consistently offers her followers. In a recent YouTube video shared on February 6, 2025, Stern revealed her go-to techniques for boosting training, making your workouts more challenging without adding extra weight.
Stern has earned a reputation for being one of the most successful bodybuilders within the Figure Division after securing the title in 2010 and again in 2012. However, Stern was not content with dominating only one category. Instead, she moved into the Bikini division, where she effortlessly secured a win at the 2022 Republic of Texas Pro.
Having acquired a wealth of knowledge throughout her bodybuilding career, Erin Stern has since taken to social media, where she shares her tips and tricks with fans. Whether she is breaking down two exercises to target hamstrings or providing five easy steps to bring up lagging muscles, Stern consistently provides simple guides to assist individuals throughout their fitness journeys.
Erin Stern Shares 4 Advanced Techniques to Boost Workout Gains
In her latest venture, Erin Stern shared her go-to techniques for boosting training and upping the challenge of workouts without increasing weight.
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“I’ll show you how to ramp up the intensity of your workout using advanced techniques that focus on maximizing the effectiveness of each rep.”
- Pause Reps
- Partial Reps
- 1 and 1/2 Reps
- Slow Negatives
Pause Reps
In a recent YouTube video, Stern used the lateral raise as an example to illustrate how to perform pause reps.
“Our first technique is paused reps. This happens to be one of my most favorite things to do. For the purpose of this video, we’re just using the exercise lateral raise because it is straightforward.”
To achieve this, she advised lifters to pause for 1-2 seconds at the mid-rep point.
“With pause reps, what you’re going to do is you’re going to give yourself a one to two-second pause at that mid-rep point. So, on that lateral raise, this is when your arms are perpendicular to the floor or around that mid-point.”
Partial Reps
With partial reps, you’ll stick to a specific range of motion.
“This is an excellent way to really feel the muscle and when you have that feeling of the mind-muscle connection, you’re going to stick within a specific range of motion.”
She shared that you can use partial reps by implementing either half the range of motion or a quarter of the full range of motion.
“Now on that lateral raise, this is typically going to be close to that mid-rep point and with partial reps, you’re either looking at half of the range of motion or a quarter of the range of motion. There’s really no wrong move here. This is to keep more tension on the muscle which is going to help with gains over time” Stern explained.
1 and 1/2 Reps
She credits these advanced techniques for helping her reach failure quicker than not performing them.
“The good news is with these advanced techniques, you’re going to hit it [failure] a lot more quickly than if you were just to rep it out,” she shared. “With one and a half reps what you’re going to do is you’re going to take the exercise to that mid-rep point.”
She also explained that one and a half reps equals one rep, offering advice on how to approach the range of motion.
“You’re going to go back about half of the range of motion, then back to that mid-rep point. Then you’re going to lower the weights back to your starting point. So it’s essentially one and a half reps is going to equal one rep.”
“This is a fantastic way to add more tension, more time under tension to that muscle,” she said.
Slow Negatives
Her final technique is slow negatives. She said it’s best to count when executing slow negatives before exploding up to the mid-rep point.
“Slow negatives. With the slow negatives, yes, you want to count with this. You want to go ahead and feel free to explode up into that mid-rep point and you’re going to pause ever so slightly, and then you’re going to lower that weight for a count of one to three.”
Erin Stern is all about making gains as simple as possible. From maximizing hamstring growth with minimal equipment to three key exercises for creating a smaller waist, Stern takes the guesswork out of getting fit and building muscle.
Erin Stern remains an influential figure in the bodybuilding community, sharing her expertise both on and off the stage. Next time you hit the gym, be sure to keep these four techniques in mind so you can take your gains to the next level all without adding any more weight!
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