More weight or more reps??? It doesn’t matter!
When I train people I am constantly motivating them to lift more weight or to do more reps. I get asked a lot which is more important, lifting more weight or doing more reps. In other words, if week 1 I did 50 lb DB bench press for 8, do I want to try to move up to 10 with 50 or stay at 8 reps and move to 55 ? What does your need dictate? Everyone has a need, either a need to get stronger, bigger or leaner. So how does your need influence A) your rep selection and B) the weight you use.?
If you are trying to get stronger try to stay at your current reps and lift more weight. That way you will force your body to do more work in the same amount of time.
If you are trying to get bigger try to increase your reps with the same weight. That way you will be performing more work over a larger amount of time.
If you are trying to get lean SWITCH IT UP! The first week go for weight, i.e. 3 x 8 reps at 50 lbs, the 2nd week go for TUT or reps, i.e. 3 x 10 reps at 60 lbs, and the last week go for something drastic, i.e. 50 lbs for as many reps as you can do for 3 sets.
What up with volume (sets X reps X weight)?
You could use volume as a way to figure out what you need to do, so the 3 weeks would look like this:
Week 1: (3 sets X 8 reps) 24 reps X 50 lbs = 1200 lbs
Week 2: (3 sets X 10 reps) 30 reps X 50 lbs = 1500 lbs
Week 3: (13 reps the 1st set, 10 reps the 2nd set and 13 reps the 3rd set) 36 reps X 50 lbs = 1800
So, every week I did more work via lifting more weight, but really what did I accomplish? So I lifted more weight every week, but I could have easily gone into the gym and lifted 10 lbs for 200 reps and totaled 2000 lbs. Did I move more weight? Sure as hell did! Is it going to get me where I want to be in terms of my goals? Hell no! The volume way to look at things only works if you are given strict guidelines and if you understand varying training intensities/loads/rep schemes/etc. The muscle doesn’t understand that today it lifted 300 lbs more than it lifted last week. The muscle knows when it is working, how hard it’s working and for how long. That it. If two people were to both lift a total of 10,000 lbs, who would experience more growth? You have no way of knowing unless you know what their reps were, or for how long they worked. If one guy did it over 8 sets of 5 at 250 lbs vs. the other guy doing it over 10 sets of 10 at 100 lbs, who is going to experience more size gains? Obviously the guy who is working for longer with less weight.
What the take home point?
Every 3 weeks switch your program around. Within each 3 week block try to either lift more weight or do more reps every week. Don’t worry about your volume. Just try to beat your reps and/or weight.
