Posts Tagged ‘weight training’

The absolute fastest way to start a war of words on a weight lifting message board is to ask what are better, high reps of low weight or low reps with high weight. It seems that either people have an unmovable opinion on one side or the other, or they have no clue, asked the question which stated the argument, and walk away even more confused. Let’s see if I can’t shed some light on the topic without loads of hate mail and/or someone trying to crash my site.

First, we need to define what we mean by “better”. Do we mean gives results faster? Or do we want a specific result and want to know if one method provides that result and the other doesn’t? Are we looking for a magic method that is easier than other ways?

Next let’s define what we mean by “high” and “low”. We will consider low to mean 3 -8 reps. High is defined as 12+ reps. Any ludicrously high numbers like 200, and the weight corresponding to do that many reps, can really be considered cardio exercise and doesn’t have a place in this article. The weight for high or low reps should be one that causes you to fail on the final rep. This way the low reps will have higher weight than the high reps. Doing low reps and low weight will give you no result, and high weights will not allow you to get to high rep numbers.

Perhaps the best way is answer the question for several common scenarios and tailor the answer to the situation:

I want to lose weight

Since any exercise you do will result in a calorie burn that can help you lose weight, let’s assume you want the way that will do it the fastest. The mechanism that forces the body to lose the most weight when lifting is muscle repair. This is when the body rebuilds the muscle after a workout, fixing the micro-tears caused by the weight lifting. The greater the stress on the muscle, the greater the amount of repair, the greater the calorie burn.

I want to look toned

What most people mean when they think of “toned” is that they want some muscle definition, without looking bulky. Naturally in order to see the muscle, you need to lose the weight first, so refer to the first scenario if you need to. Both methods will build muscle, by low reps, high weight, will do so faster. Luckily most people don’t need to worry about looking bulky. Unless you are a professional lifter, have good genetics, and a diet geared specifically towards bulky, you are in no danger of gaining the physique of a pro wrestler.

I want to be better at a sport

When training for a sport, the first best thing you can do is work on your fast twitch muscles, this is done through sprinting and other speed drills. The second thing you can do is increase your endurance. Higher rep exercises, force your body to work for longer periods of time. This forces your body to adapt by increasing blood vessel size and count. This allows more oxygen and nutrients to be delivered to your muscles.

Ok, the last workout I put up focused on the upper body so I figured I would even things out and create a workout for the lower body as well.

Its easy to want to skip lower body work, its hard, it hurts, and everyone hates rubbery legs for a few days after a good session of squats. But heres the truth:

You have more muscle in your legs than anywhere else! If you want to lose weight, hit the lower body hard. Lower body exercises will help you build muscle faster and burn weight faster than anything else.

Lower Body Focus

Last week I posted a 5x workout and I thought that some of you might want a workout that focused on specific areas. This week I’ll post a Upper body focus.

Here you go:
Upper body focus

Happy new year!

A lot of people get turned off of weightlifting of doing certain kinds of lifts (mostly leg workouts) because they know the next day it’s going to hurt to even get out of bed. Couple that with some fatigue and you have a genuine excuse for not lifting, or at least not trying as hard.

The Marines love to tell everyone “Pain is weakness leaving the body” and they’re not far off. The soreness in your muscles after a tough workout is your body’s way of telling you that it’s been pushed hard and is responding to that by building up and strengthening its muscles. So it’s a little more accurate to say that pain is strength entering the body… Yeah I know, doesn’t sound as cool.

Either way, unless you’re a sadist, sore muscles are no fun. Here’s a few tips and tricks to keep the pain to a minimum:
• Drink lots of water
• Ibuprophen
• Constant stretching throughout the day
• Gently massage the muscle
• Work out again!

I know when you’re stiff and tired from yesterday’s workout, the last thing you want to do is work out again. But doing some light cardio will get your blood pumping which will keep the muscles from tightening up, and also help flush your system of lactic acid, the stuff which is making you feel sore.

Of course prevention is always better than a cure, so try doing this next time when you work out:
• Stretch before anything else
• Warm up with 5-10 minutes of light cardio, like jogging or jumping jacks
• For new exercises do a first set of extra light reps
• For new muscles being worked, go easy the first few times
• Sip water throughout your workout
• Cool down with 5 minutes of cardio
• Stretch
• Drink lots of fluids after exercising

I wish I could say that there was a simple way to prevent muscle soreness resulting from a good strong workout, but it isn’t really possible. Part of exercising is getting your body to work anerobically. When the body works in that mode it builds up that lactic acid and you will be sore. The best thing you can do is just flush that acid out of your system as quickly as possible.

Given time, and I know this sounds strange, but you may come to enjoy it. Try taking it as sign that you worked hard and for that hard work your body is growing stronger. No need to get all macho and proud, just a simple smile when you stand up and feel those burning quadriceps.