Is It Better to Lift Heavier Weights or Do More Reps
Anyone who hits the weight room regularly will inevitably face the question: Should you add more weight and do fewer reps, or use a lighter weight and do more reps?
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Once you've been following a fitness program for a while, you'll eventually hit a fitness plateau - It sucks but it's normal, and happens to everyone.
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Hint: It involves a lot more than lifting super-heavy weight or banging out more reps in isolation. To get out of a rut, you actually need a combination of:
Muscle damage: that hurts-so-good soreness after a workout.
Mechanical tension: the sheer strain of lifting something heavy.
Metabolic stress: that "burn" you feel from your muscle really working
Both heavy-weight and high-rep training check those three boxes to ultimately build strength. Either path you take, you're making gains
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When you pile on the pounds, you typically lift on the lower end of reps; it's as few as 1 to 5 for some people. By doing so, you're increasing your overall maximum strength and greatly improving your ability to lift heavier weights
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In 2016, researchers divided athletes into two groups: heavy lifters who did 1 to 5 reps of moves like squats, lunges, and deadlifts, along with moderate lifters who did 8 to 12 reps of the same set of exercises
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At the end of 8 weeks, researchers found that those who lifted heavier weights with fewer reps had more strength. Makes sense. But it also turns out that the higher-rep, lower-weight folks had increased hypertrophy - aka more muscle-building activity. Trusted Source
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Bulging new muscles aside, when you lift lighter weights for more reps, you're also getting stronger, just in a different way. You're developing "muscular endurance,"" or your ability to exert a certain amount of effort before you fatigue
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There is no wrong decision here, When you lift more weight, add more reps, or do both appropriately with good form, you're nudging your body toward continually improved fitness and strength. Mixing it up a bit to keep yourself motivated and to see progress