Haven't been able to train due to work related stuff in over a week. Always makes me antsy.
I did get to hit the gym at one of our properties while I was out of town and put in a solid weight lifting session as well as about 20 minutes of active rock climbing on the wall and a 5 minute sprint on one of the fun elliptical type machines. Heart rate topped out at 193bpm. My resting rate is about 55bpm.
Workout looked like this:
Climbing Wall - 20 minutes, some warmup climbs, then 2 traversals. My forearms were killed. Felt great.
Squats - 3x225lbs, 3x225lbs, 2x245lbs, 2x265lbs.
Bench - 3x135lbs, 3x155lbs, 2x165lbs.
Elliptical - 5 minute sprint. HR over 180 the entire time, kept it over 190 for the final 2 minutes.
Back at JiuJitsu Wednesday.
Maybe a stupid question, since I am just learning how to squat and do various olympic lifts with proper form, so I mainly do them bar-only without added weight. And therefore I can do 15 or so in a row, with supervision, to practice. But why do you do sets of only 3 reps? (That's hard to google, and I didn't want to wait till my next training session...)
ReplyDeleteThanks!
That almost deserves a post all of its own.
ReplyDeleteOk, so lifting in various ways has various different physiological affects. If you lift relative light weights (something you can do 10+ times in a row for multiple sets) then you will build additional muscle fiber to handle the load. Pro Body Builders tend to lift in this range in order to help them achieve more size.
If you lift mid weights for mid reps (something that you can only manage 4-5 reps for 4-5 sets) then you get both the creation of additional muscle fiber and the recruitment of additional existing muscle fibers.
If you lift extremely high weights for very low reps (1-2 reps for 2-3 sets) then you will almost exclusively recruit your existing muscle fiber without building any more.
SO, if you want to maximize your strength at your existing weight then you should lift as heavy as possible for 1-2 reps and 2-3 sets. If you want to build additional muscle fiber to gain weight, or for cosmetic purposes, then you would lift much lighter weights for 10+ reps for 5+ sets.
If you are transitioning between the two or don't have any specific aim in mind then lifting in the middle at the 5-8 rep range for 3-5 sets is where it's at.
After starting out in Stronglifts 5x5 back when I weighed 125lbs and moving up temporarily to Wendler 5/3/1 I've settled in on a cyclical lifting pattern. That is similar to Wendler 5/3/1. I spend a week lifting 3x8 at 70% of my max on my lifts, a week at 3x5 at 80%, then a week at 3x3 at 90%. Then a week of deload that is 5x5 with 50%. Then I increase my max and repeat.