How Many Reps Should You Be Doing?
When you head into your Cork gym and use the free weights or the weight machines, how many reps do you do of each exercise?
You have probably heard that having low free weight reps – 6 and below – will be the best option if you want to build mass and strength. You’ve also probably heard that doing high repetitions of 15 to 20 will provide endurance in the muscles and maybe even fat loss. That might be the conventional wisdom, but is it true for you?
The truth of the matter goes much deeper. In fact, it goes deep into the fibre composition of your muscles. Different types of muscles will hypertrophy at different repetition ranges. In fact, they may hypertrophy at multiple rep ranges. What does this mean for your workouts? It means that you don’t want to stick to just one type of repetition schedule with your workouts. You want to keep it varied, just as you would change the weights to vary the workouts. This helps to ensure that you do not have to worry about plateauing and stagnating in the workouts.
Throughout the course of the week, you can simply change up the repetition ranges. During one day of chest exercises, for example, you could use low free weight reps with high weight. The next time you work the chest, you could increase the reps to the 10-12 range, and on the third time you work the chest, you can increase the reps to the higher range of 15-20.
When you come across information that might sound wise, but you aren’t quite sure whether you should follow the advice or not, it’s best to speak with some of the personnel at your gym. They can provide you with the answer that you need to ensure your workouts are the best they can be.
