Strength training - how often

irishcailin2012

Hi all

I've started strength training, with arms to start with only about 10mins a day to start with. Question is should I do this every day or every other day? Should I do different exercises on different days? Any input would be great

EJDM

I do every second day and have the weekends off

Monday = Back/Shoulders/Rear Delts
Wednesday = Legs and Calves
Friday = Chest/Biceps/Triceps

Jynus

It's very possible you're not doing strength training. If it's just arms and 10min. Are you doing more than 20 reps? If so you're doing cardio.

That said, when doing actual strength training, every movement needs 48 hours rest if you're actively training to increase intensity. (different movements can be trained daily so like upper body one day and lower the next day, that sort of thing). But if you're just doing the same say full body with no changes to intensity, you can do it daily. (think heavy laborers, they do 8 hours+ of very heavy lifting. But it's routine for them, no muscle overload. So no need for 48 hours rest)

Nessalee77

The New Rules of Lifting for Women book says "once a week is not enough, twice is ok, three times is perfect and four is probably too much"

Highly recommend this book by the way

irishcailin2012

No doing 10 reps. Thanks a million all

dusty8907

For strength the rep scheme should be no higher than 6 reps, splitting up muscle groups is the best way to get the most out of strength rouines. Splitting these up doing a larger muscle group with a smaller is ideal. and give 48 hours minimum between working that muscle again. Depending on how used to volume you are, 3-4 excercises with 2-3 sets of 3-5 reps would be great. If you are not used to much volume start out with 2-3 excercises at 2-3 sets of 3-5. Make sure to warmup on every excercises with 30-40% of your 1rep max

irishcailin2012

Thank you!! Really good advice