Strength Training - The Basics
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Sarauk2sf
Posts: 28,072 Member
So, I thought I would do a thread on the basics of strength training. It is not intended to be comprehensive, nor is it intended to imply that one form of exercise is better than another. It is purely intended to help those get familiar with the basic concepts and terminology of strength training.
What is strength training?
Well, it is intended to make you strong…yep, pretty obvious. However, there are a few terms that are used interchangeably in everyday use but they really have slightly different meanings such as resistance training and weight training. I will be using the generic term of strength training here to encompass them.
Strength training is a means of stimulating the development and improvement of muscle strength by increasing the ability to resist force through the use of, inter alia, free weights, machines and your own body weight. Strength training is primarily an anaerobic activity.
Benefits of strength training.
When properly performed, strength training can provide significant functional benefits and improvement in overall health, including increased bone, muscle, tendon and ligament strength, increased bone density, increased metabolism, improved body composition and generally making you feel like a badass.
Compound and isolation lifts
Compound lifts utilize more than one joint and as such work several muscle groups at once. For example, squats require the use of the hip, knee and ankle joints. It works a host of muscle groups but primarily glutes, quads and core.
An isolation exercise is one where the movement uses only one joint, such as leg extensions.
Both have their place, however, due to the fact that you are using a number of muscle groups for compound lifts, these often form the foundation of a majority of lifting programs.
Rep ranges
Different rep ranges cause a different type of stress on the body and it reacts differently to each.
The lower rep range (1 – 5) causes neurological adaptations, which is your body developing its ability to activate muscle fibers by increasing the frequency of neural impulses sent to the brain as well as improving intra- and inter-muscle coordination. Basically it makes you stronger but does has a lesser impact to your muscle mass.
The mid rep range (6 – 12) the impact is more on the metabolic and cellular level where you gain muscle mass but strength gains are not as significant as you would get in the lower rep ranges. This is the general rep range for hypertrophy, or mass gains.
The higher rep ranges (13+) stimulate muscle endurance primarily with only a small amount of hypertrophy and very little strength and as such is not considered strength training in the strict sense of the word.
Note, that there is no hard and fast line between the effects of the above, but rather a continuum. Also, the number of sets plays into how much is strength v hypertrophy v endurance. For example, you can do 5 sets of 6 reps for a total of 30 lifts, or you can do 10 sets of 3 lifts for a total of 30 lifts. If you do them to an equivalent level of failure, the time under tension will be the same. The number of sets does not automatically turn it from strength to hypertrophy due to the rest periods between sets, but it does have a bearing on where in the continuum the routine lies.
So, in summary:
1 – 5 reps = strength
6 – 12 reps = hypertrophy
12+ = endurance
So, the appropriate rep ranges really depend on your goals as well as your overall lifting program. Most ‘standard’ programs focus on the upper end of the strength range so benefits of both strength and some hypertrophy are gained.
Some tips:
- Form is of importance all the time. Do not push to increase weights if your form is not good.
- Warm up your muscles before lifting by doing a short amount of cardio (less than 10 minutes). Stretching is not required and should not be done ‘cold’ in any event.
- When you get to lifting heavier weights, with the compound lifts, make sure you do sufficient warm up sets.
- If you want to do cardio in the same session, do it after lifting.
- Put the ‘big’ lifts (heavier strength range compounds) at the beginning of your session.
What is strength training?
Well, it is intended to make you strong…yep, pretty obvious. However, there are a few terms that are used interchangeably in everyday use but they really have slightly different meanings such as resistance training and weight training. I will be using the generic term of strength training here to encompass them.
Strength training is a means of stimulating the development and improvement of muscle strength by increasing the ability to resist force through the use of, inter alia, free weights, machines and your own body weight. Strength training is primarily an anaerobic activity.
Benefits of strength training.
When properly performed, strength training can provide significant functional benefits and improvement in overall health, including increased bone, muscle, tendon and ligament strength, increased bone density, increased metabolism, improved body composition and generally making you feel like a badass.
Compound and isolation lifts
Compound lifts utilize more than one joint and as such work several muscle groups at once. For example, squats require the use of the hip, knee and ankle joints. It works a host of muscle groups but primarily glutes, quads and core.
An isolation exercise is one where the movement uses only one joint, such as leg extensions.
Both have their place, however, due to the fact that you are using a number of muscle groups for compound lifts, these often form the foundation of a majority of lifting programs.
Rep ranges
Different rep ranges cause a different type of stress on the body and it reacts differently to each.
The lower rep range (1 – 5) causes neurological adaptations, which is your body developing its ability to activate muscle fibers by increasing the frequency of neural impulses sent to the brain as well as improving intra- and inter-muscle coordination. Basically it makes you stronger but does has a lesser impact to your muscle mass.
The mid rep range (6 – 12) the impact is more on the metabolic and cellular level where you gain muscle mass but strength gains are not as significant as you would get in the lower rep ranges. This is the general rep range for hypertrophy, or mass gains.
The higher rep ranges (13+) stimulate muscle endurance primarily with only a small amount of hypertrophy and very little strength and as such is not considered strength training in the strict sense of the word.
Note, that there is no hard and fast line between the effects of the above, but rather a continuum. Also, the number of sets plays into how much is strength v hypertrophy v endurance. For example, you can do 5 sets of 6 reps for a total of 30 lifts, or you can do 10 sets of 3 lifts for a total of 30 lifts. If you do them to an equivalent level of failure, the time under tension will be the same. The number of sets does not automatically turn it from strength to hypertrophy due to the rest periods between sets, but it does have a bearing on where in the continuum the routine lies.
So, in summary:
1 – 5 reps = strength
6 – 12 reps = hypertrophy
12+ = endurance
So, the appropriate rep ranges really depend on your goals as well as your overall lifting program. Most ‘standard’ programs focus on the upper end of the strength range so benefits of both strength and some hypertrophy are gained.
Some tips:
- Form is of importance all the time. Do not push to increase weights if your form is not good.
- Warm up your muscles before lifting by doing a short amount of cardio (less than 10 minutes). Stretching is not required and should not be done ‘cold’ in any event.
- When you get to lifting heavier weights, with the compound lifts, make sure you do sufficient warm up sets.
- If you want to do cardio in the same session, do it after lifting.
- Put the ‘big’ lifts (heavier strength range compounds) at the beginning of your session.
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Replies
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ty .. as usual a treasure trove of good info.. I picked up a few things and confirmed that most of what my trainer has me doing is right on target
thanks again so much for posting this0 -
Wonderful post, as always.
I noticed you said stretching isn't necessary prior to lifting. I know better than to cold stretch, but I generally do 5-7 minutes of dynamic stretching, then 3-5 minutes of jumping rope prior to starting warm-up sets.
My question is, since the dynamic stretching generally gets my heart rate up almost as high as jumping rope, would it be safe to assume the combo of dynamic stretching plus jumping rope is a sufficient cardio warm-up?0 -
Wonderful post, as always.
I noticed you said stretching isn't necessary prior to lifting. I know better than to cold stretch, but I generally do 5-7 minutes of dynamic stretching, then 3-5 minutes of jumping rope prior to starting warm-up sets.
My question is, since the dynamic stretching generally gets my heart rate up almost as high as jumping rope, would it be safe to assume the combo of dynamic stretching plus jumping rope is a sufficient cardio warm-up?
I'm interested in the answer to this as well.0 -
Wonderful post, as always.
I noticed you said stretching isn't necessary prior to lifting. I know better than to cold stretch, but I generally do 5-7 minutes of dynamic stretching, then 3-5 minutes of jumping rope prior to starting warm-up sets.
My question is, since the dynamic stretching generally gets my heart rate up almost as high as jumping rope, would it be safe to assume the combo of dynamic stretching plus jumping rope is a sufficient cardio warm-up?
Yes. Really you just need to get the blood flowing (giggity) - how you do that is a personal preference really.0 -
Excellent as always, thanks!
Our garage was a crisp 60 degrees when I went in to workout today so I extended my warm up (incline trainer, steady increase in speed and incline) to 15 minutes today just because it was so damn cold, lol.0 -
Awesome post Sara, very informative, useful, resourceful sooo many things.
Thank you Sara, I'm sure the whole Eat,Train, Progess. group nd I nd many other MFPer's really apperciate it!
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Thank you for the post! As usual, I've been doing it wrong (but it's always good to admit that and learn)0
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This is pretty much the info I've picked up from all the smart people on mfp, but I feel like it's far too far from being common knowledge. The difference between strength and mass seems to be far too much for some people, and I had a trainer at a gym say I had to build endurance on low weight, high rep before I could even try low rep, high weight. I feel like I need an mfp certified trainer if I ever use one :laugh: (or even better: Sara Certified!)0
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Great post and info, thanks!!!0
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Bump for others to see. This is really good information. Thank you for posting!0
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I just read (in SELF mag) that you should NEVER lift more than 3 lbs, and you should do a LOT of reps - like 100. :noway:0
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I just read (in SELF mag) that you should NEVER lift more than 3 lbs, and you should do a LOT of reps - like 100. :noway:
No wonder there are so many misconceptions with such twaddle like that being spewed to the masses.0 -
I just read (in SELF mag) that you should NEVER lift more than 3 lbs, and you should do a LOT of reps - like 100. :noway:
Cancelling my subscription now.......:grumble:
Thanks for posting this Sara! Great info!0 -
Thanks, this clears up a few things I was wondering about. :flowerforyou:0
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I got a question as well - rest periods? i usually do 90 sec between sets - and 120 between heavy sets (and maybe longer if I am to wiped to do it right away) whats the difference?
Also, I do my big lifts 5/3/1 style, and I do power assistance and BBB - but do some assistance like dumbbell rows. I do the rows heavy as i can go for 20 reps/3 sets. Does going heavy for high reps still count as endurance?0 -
I got a question as well - rest periods? i usually do 90 sec between sets - and 120 between heavy sets (and maybe longer if I am to wiped to do it right away) whats the difference?
For the big lifts I just wait until i'm ready, be that 2 minutes or 5 minutes. No point in missing a 1 rep max because you are trying to limit your rest periods.
Hitting the required reps for each set is more important than being anal over rest periods IMO, 90 seconds or 120 seconds doesn't really make any difference as long as you keep them relatively consistent. I find that most of the smaller muscles like triceps, biceps, calves abs etc all recovery pretty quickly anyway.
As for high rep rows, I do them here and there but keep the majority of my assistance work to 8-12 reps.0 -
I got a question as well - rest periods? i usually do 90 sec between sets - and 120 between heavy sets (and maybe longer if I am to wiped to do it right away) whats the difference?
Also, I do my big lifts 5/3/1 style, and I do power assistance and BBB - but do some assistance like dumbbell rows. I do the rows heavy as i can go for 20 reps/3 sets. Does going heavy for high reps still count as endurance?
Re rest periods - I do the same as Hendrix7.
Going as heavy as you can go for 20 reps means it is endurance. Even when doing endurance you should be going as heavy as you can go for that amount of reps.0 -
this makes a lot of sense, thanks.0
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Fab, fab, fab! I wanna feel like a badass and this advice is great!0
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Bump0
