Reps and sets- General rule for the amount to do
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raven56706
Posts: 918 Member
Did a little search but couldnt find it. Whats the general rule of thumb for reps and sets.
Say for instance, a person who wants to burn fat and gain lean muscle as opposed to someone who wants to get bigger.
3 sets of 12 reps or 5 sets of 5 reps but the heaviest you can do.
Is there a rule of thumb for either?
Say for instance, a person who wants to burn fat and gain lean muscle as opposed to someone who wants to get bigger.
3 sets of 12 reps or 5 sets of 5 reps but the heaviest you can do.
Is there a rule of thumb for either?
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Replies
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5 reps or below is generally associated more with hypertrophy (i.e. muscle growth & getting stronger), using heavier weights.
If you're looking more for general improvements in strength and endurance, the 8-10 rep range may be appropriate - though, a combination of both (heavy on a main lift, lighter on supplementary exercises) is what I find to be the best of both worlds personally. As far as number of sets - 3 minimum, and you can play with the 4-5 set range to see what works for you. Sometimes I like to use the first and maybe second sets as warm-ups to build up towards the working weight I use for the last 3.
Consider adding a METCON (metabolic conditioning) circuit of some sort as a finisher at the end of your workout to help torch fat. That can be anything that gets your HR rate up.
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The general rule of thumb is if you are a beginner you should consider following a program that's already made by a professional.
Building a strength base is a good place to start, which would be a program where the main lifts are lower reps with heavy weight. Overall the most important thing to helping burn fat and maintain muscle is simply following a program that you enjoy and you push yourself to progress in.10 -
rckeeper22 wrote: »5 reps or below is generally associated more with hypertrophy (i.e. muscle growth & getting stronger), using heavier weights.
If you're looking more for general improvements in strength and endurance, the 8-10 rep range may be appropriate - though, a combination of both (heavy on a main lift, lighter on supplementary exercises) is what I find to be the best of both worlds personally. As far as number of sets - 3 minimum, and you can play with the 4-5 set range to see what works for you. Sometimes I like to use the first and maybe second sets as warm-ups to build up towards the working weight I use for the last 3.
Consider adding a METCON (metabolic conditioning) circuit of some sort as a finisher at the end of your workout to help torch fat. That can be anything that gets your HR rate up.
5 reps and below is associated with strength training.
Up to 12 reps is associated with hypertrophy.5 -
raven56706 wrote: »Did a little search but couldnt find it. Whats the general rule of thumb for reps and sets.
Say for instance, a person who wants to burn fat and gain lean muscle as opposed to someone who wants to get bigger.
3 sets of 12 reps or 5 sets of 5 reps but the heaviest you can do.
Is there a rule of thumb for either?
One of the most discussed topics of all time in strength training and you couldn't find information?2 -
raven56706 wrote: »Did a little search but couldnt find it. Whats the general rule of thumb for reps and sets.
Say for instance, a person who wants to burn fat and gain lean muscle as opposed to someone who wants to get bigger.
3 sets of 12 reps or 5 sets of 5 reps but the heaviest you can do.
Is there a rule of thumb for either?
One of the most discussed topics of all time in strength training and you couldn't find information?
thanks for the input. you came here to say this.2 -
You probably couldn't find a general rule of thumb because there isn't one. Reps/sets and the weight you use is all based around the goals you want to achieve. Not everyone has the same goals, so there can't be a general rule for everyone to follow. I recommend honing in on your goals, and then find and follow a program that is based around those.2
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You can usually stick with 3 sets to begin with and assess if you want to add more volume after that.
But reps wise you'd want to aim around- 5-8 for strength (neurological adaptation) and rest about 3 minutes between sets
- 9-12 for hypertrophy (muscle size) and rest about 1-2 minutes between sets
- 12+ for endurance training and rest <= 1 minutes between sets
Where the weight scales up and down depending on rep schemes, i.e. it doesn't mean take a relatively light weight and do 5 reps and stop and rest 3 minutes, or try to lift a weight that's way too heavy for you for 12+ reps and rest less than a minute)2 -
I guess I never answered the question, if you want to burn fat then the diet is the foundation for that and the workout supplements it, all muscles are lean and will show once you've lost enough fat with either the strength or hypertrophy training. You'll get more of the bodybuilder physique with hypertrophy.1
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rckeeper22 wrote: »5 reps or below is generally associated more with hypertrophy (i.e. muscle growth & getting stronger), using heavier weights.
If you're looking more for general improvements in strength and endurance, the 8-10 rep range may be appropriate - though, a combination of both (heavy on a main lift, lighter on supplementary exercises) is what I find to be the best of both worlds personally. As far as number of sets - 3 minimum, and you can play with the 4-5 set range to see what works for you. Sometimes I like to use the first and maybe second sets as warm-ups to build up towards the working weight I use for the last 3.
Consider adding a METCON (metabolic conditioning) circuit of some sort as a finisher at the end of your workout to help torch fat. That can be anything that gets your HR rate up.
You couldn’t be anymore wrong. 1-5 reps is associated with strength 5+ is for hypertrophy.
You cannot TORCH fat. That is not how cardio works. Please don’t peddle snake oil to someone who is generally curious.
OP, I would suggest starting a structured credited program in order to take all of the guess work out of your lifting days.
Many of us know hella lots about lifting, programs, dieting, but still find it more beneficial to follow a program written by someone else. I can easily set up a day to day program, but I know if I want to maximize things, it’s better to leave it to someone who writes and oversees programs for a living.
Just ensure it’s not some muscle head, do 500 reps once a week and take steroids program. Find a beginner hypertrophy program for naturals.
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@jessef593
- One of the previous posts pointed out my mistake with the hypertrophy numbers, and I acknowledged it. So again, agreed, 1-5 reps is strength, more is hypertrophy.
- I wasn't trying to be scientific with the comment about torching fat, but rather using colloquial language as more of a motivation/excitement factor, because I get excited discussing things like this. It's not peddling snake oil. I can look up the articles if needed, but my main source comes from a variety of T-Nation articles WRT adding METCONs as workout finishers. From what I've seen, the articles bounce back and forth (depending on the author), but at least some portion of them agree that it's a good idea to add at the end of a workout. Whether you agree with those sources or not is of course its own matter, but I view them as fairly reputable sources in general.4 -
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Like the charts above show, there's a range of effects for # of reps per set. 8-12) or just 10) is in the sweet spot bet strength and endursnce.
Lower the reps & increase the wt to focus on strength and do the opposite to focus on endurance.
Personally, I see no advantage in lowering the reps below 5, except to test my 1RM for a lift, or doing over 15 (tedious snd boring).
A commonly recommended total # of reps is 15 (Starting Strength 3x5) or 25, (Stronglifts) but 36-40 is also mentoned as desireable numbers but I think the "best" number mainly depends on the weights you're using and how many reps you're doing.
Currently, I'm either doing 3x10, 2x15 or 3x15. But I have done 3x5 (15), 5x5 (25) and 4x6 (24) b4. There is NO rule of thumb. Just do what makes the most sense given your goals and particular circumstances.
The way I equalize the total effort when switching between different reps & wt is to use a 1RM calculator so that the 1RM is the same (about the same) regardless of the # of reps snd wt (or higher if I want to lift more).
This way I always know how much effort I am exerting and can continue my current strengths level (which is currently my main objective) regardless of the wt and sets I'm using, or increase the effort if it seems too easy.
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Like the charts above show, there's a range of effects for # of reps per set. 8-12) or just 10) is in the sweet spot bet strength and endursnce.
Lower the reps & increase the wt to focus on strength and do the opposite to focus on endurance.
Personally, I see no advantage in lowering the reps below 5, except to test my 1RM for a lift, or doing over 15 (tedious snd boring).
A commonly recommended total # of reps is 15 (Starting Strength 3x5) or 25, (Stronglifts) but 36-40 is also mentoned as desireable numbers but I think the "best" number mainly depends on the weights you're using and how many reps you're doing.
Currently, I'm either doing 3x10, 2x15 or 3x15. But I have done 3x5 (15), 5x5 (25) and 4x6 (24) b4. There is NO rule of thumb. Just do what makes the most sense given your goals and particular circumstances.
The way I equalize the total effort when switching between different reps & wt is to use a 1RM calculator so that the 1RM is the same (about the same) regardless of the # of reps snd wt (or higher if I want to lift more).
This way I always know how much effort I am exerting and can continue my current strengths level (which is currently my main objective) regardless of the wt and sets I'm using, or increase the effort if it seems too easy.
It always depends on your goals. I do sets under 5 reps a lot since I like to train for powerlifting so I spend a lot of time in low rep training. Others may want to go beyond 15 for endurance based training etc. I think most people in the gym will be there to do more of a general strength and conditioning routine so will likely be around 8-12 most of the time.
Everything is really going to depend on what you are training for and then programming towards that goal.0 -
follow a program. Even though there are general rules for strength vs size vs endurance, there are a lot of other variables factored into a good program.1
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When I spoke to a trainer about how much weight and how many reps he told me to do 3 sets of 10 with 30 seconds to 1min rest in between with the amount of weight that would make the last to reps hard but not painful to do. This was based on my goals. I am looking to loose weight through my diet but I want to strengthen and build my muscles so I look tone (not bulky) when I reach my goal weight. He told me to stay at that weight until I could do more reps 12 to 15 with the same effort it used to take to do 10 then add 5pbs and repeat.
A few other trainers confirmed this and this person actual had many years experience training and seemed well educated about why. I know not all trainers knowledge is the same1 -
Just...pick the things up. Pick them up 5-12 times. Add weight over workouts. Add reps over workouts. Add sets over workouts.2
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Best bet is to know your goal and find a trainer that can help or use an established program. At the very least, Google "Prilepin's Table" as that tends to be a good guideline for various goals.1
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JAYxMSxPES wrote: »Best bet is to know your goal and find a trainer that can help or use an established program. At the very least, Google "Prilepin's Table" as that tends to be a good guideline for various goals.
You can definitely tell that the original charts are for Olympic lifting since they use low rep ranges.0
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