Have you ever wandered about the science behind why we do a certain number of sets and repetitions of an exercise? Well today I’m going to explain it in the simplest terms so that you can review your own training and adjust the relevant variables according to your goal. Last week I talked about your exercise routine and progressive overload, this post provides you with the information you require to use the training variables to achieve progressive overload giving yourself a higher probability of achieving the results you are after.
The resistance training variables are as follows:
- The Exercise
- The Sets
- The Repetitions
- The Load
- The Speed of Lifting
- The Rest
Whilst we won’t look at them in as much depth as the above the order of the exercises, and a periodisation strategy are further variables that need to be taken into account, the latter in particular for sports specific goals.
The three major goals that we will look at today are Muscle Endurance, Muscle Strength and Muscle Hypertrophy.
Muscle Endurance, is the ability to continue lifting a weight over a long period of time.
Muscle Strength, is the ability to exert or withstand great force using the muscles in the body.
Muscle Hypertrophy, is to grow the muscles of the body by lifting weights, making the muscles physically bigger in size.
You will also notice in the table that follows that the weight is expressed in a percentage of 1RM, What does this mean? This means your 1 rep maximum, that is the maximum weight or load you can lift for one repetition. This is an important figure as it determines the loads for each respective goal, for example if your 1RM for the bench press is 30 kgs then the load for endurance would be between 15 and 22.5 kgs and so forth. There is a method for determining your 1RM, if you don’t know it for a number of exercises then I recommend that you seek out a personal trainer or sports coach to take you through it.
The number of reps and sets are fairly self explanatory across each of the goals, so are the recommended rest guidelines, the speed however may need a little further explanation. Let’s take for example if you are a beginner and you are performing a chest press on a machine using a 2:2 tempo, this means that you push away from your chest in 2 seconds and without pausing let the weight come back to your chest in 2 seconds. Alternatively if you are at an advanced level using a 4:4 tempo on a bench press for example you would lower the bar/load in 4 seconds then push it back up in 4 seconds. Whilst I haven’t included this in the table you can also pause at the bottom of the movement for 1 second before pushing back up this would be expressed as a 4:1:4 tempo, this is more difficult and challenging as it places your muscle under tension for a longer period of time.
Resistance Training Guidelines
| Muscle Endurance | Muscle Strength | Muscle Hypertrophy | |
| Load | Light to Moderate50-75% 1RM | Heavy to very heavyBeginners 70-80% 1RMIntermediate/Advanced
80-95% 1RM |
Moderate to Heavy60-85% 1RM |
| Reps & Sets | 15-30 reps1-3 sets | Beginners 8-12 repsIntermediate/Advanced 2-6 reps1-5 sets | 8-12 reps3-5 sets per body part. |
| Speed | 2:2, 3:3 | 3:3, 4:4, 4:3 | 3:3, 4:4, 4:3 |
| Rest | 30-60 sec | 1-3 mins heavy3-5 mins very heavy | 1-2 mins |
| Exercise | Compound | Compound and Isolation | Compound and Isolation |
As mentioned above the other variables, the exercise order, and a periodisation strategy whilst not in the table are also important. The rule of thumb for exercise order is to start with the largest muscle/muscle group first then work your way down to the smallest.
I have included compound exercises for all three categories as this as you may remember from a previous posting is the most efficient use of time as you can train a number of muscles over multiple joints with this type of exercise. Of coarse if your goal is to build bulk and strength in your arms for example you also need to perform isolation exercises such as bicep curls or triceps extensions. Isolation exercises such as the ones mentioned can be done at the end of your program if time permits. Remember that in compound exercises of a pulling nature such as lat pulldowns your biceps are exercised and in a pushing compound exercise such as a bench press your triceps are getting a workout anyway.
A periodisation strategy is important particularly for those of you who participate in a specific sport. Periodisation is a whole topic on its own, suffice to say here that to keep making gains in performance it is necessary to increase the amount of work being performed, a theme that you have consistently heard throughout my posts. This means that you design a program over a number of weeks that focuses on increasing the load to achieve a specific goal, a complete periodisation program consists of three phases preparation, competition and transition, a topic that I will address in a future post. For those of us who are training to keep fit and healthy our periodisation strategy should be to vary our program every 6-8 weeks so that our body keeps experiencing new movements and as such will produce results and keep you from getting bored to boot.
I hope that the above helps you out with your resistance training, as always however I urge that you take care and if you are in doubt about any aspect of how the above can benefit your training please ask a fitness professional such as a personal trainer or sports coach for further clarification. I welcome any comments on the above topic and look forward to providing you with more information in subsequent posts.
Zol
Fitness Moves