Entry 11: strength programming basics

 Hey guys,

Another Sunday, another blog post. 

So continuing on the theme of trying to make this blog as helpful as possible for people, this week I thought I'd chat about the basics for strength programming. 

Believe it or not, the number of reps and sets your trainer is telling you to do isn't just made up for fun.

Whether you're training for endurance, hypertrophy, strength or power, there are recommended set and rep ranges to work in to achieve these adaptations. 

When we are training for strength, we want to be pushing our body pretty damn hard in order to get the right physiological adaptations that result in increased strength. 

And this is reflected in how many sets and reps we program, as well as our rest time, training frequency and percentage of our max lift amount. This will all make sense once we start unpacking it and you will also start to see how they are all very much connected. 

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Sets

So let's start with the number of sets you'll be doing.

Because we are working in a lower rep range, we want to be doing more sets than we might do for hypertrophy or endurance training. 

You'll see in the literature that 3-5 sets are recommended for strength training and this is a pretty good range. 

For me personally, I generally do 4 sets but it depends on what I'm training.

When I'm focusing on increasing strength in a particular area or a particular lift, I tend to opt for 5 (not including a warm-up set). The reason for this is that it allows me time to get to my working sets without going all guns blazing straight away and hurting myself. 

Say you want to increase your deadlift and your max lift is 50kg. You aren't going to go straight into lifting 50kg, you'll build up throughout the sets and then settle on your working sets which are normally a percentage of your max. 

I also find personally that my body responds better to 5 sets. You might find that you only need to do 3 sets to get great results or you need 6 sets - we are all different - but I think starting with 4 is a great building point. 

Reps

Okay so reps for strength training - 2-6 reps per set 

This is very much connected to the weight you're lifting and the effort you're putting in. So you'll often see people start out their set with higher reps (5-6) but drop down to 2-3 as they get towards the meaty end of it and the weight is much much heavier. 

I tend to start with 6-8 reps as a warm-up at a lighter weight and progressively decrease reps and increase weight from there, normally landing at about 2-3 reps of a pretty heavyweight. 

Again, this is dependent on the individual but 2-6 reps per set is what is recommended across the literature. 

Intensity

So the intensity of your lift essentially refers to how much effort you're putting in/is required to complete the set/rep and it can be quantified in a few ways. 

One way is to use the rating of perceived exhaustion (RPE) scale. This is a 1-10 scale with 10 being your max effort and 1 being super easy. 

In relation to strength training, we generally want to be working at a high RPE, so sitting around 7-9. 

You can also consider what percentage of your max lift that you want to work at. Theoretically, if you were to lift your absolute max, that would be a 100% percentage and this should also equate to an RPE of 10. 

So when you/'re trying to figure out what weight you should be lifting, we want to aim for about 70-90% of your max weight, so you can work out the percentages to give you a starting point. 

Then, you can consider the RPE scale during your sets to see if the percentage matches up with the RPE. If you're lifting at what should be 90% of your max lift but it only feels like a 5/10 RPE, then your max likely isn't actually your max and you need to up the weight. 

I know some of you may be wondering why you would lift less than your max when wanting to improve strength and this is definitely a common question surrounding this topic. Typically you wouldn't lift your max during your sets as the research indicates that 70-90% is sufficient to improve strength over time and as you work through your training and apply progressive overload, your max will increase.

Rest time

Rest is a really important factor in strength training. 

Because we are working at a really high RPE, we are pushing our bodies really hard. In light of this, we want to rest for about 2-3 minutes. 

A lot of people will say that you should rest just long enough so that you're recovered enough to go again but we also need to keep in mind that we need to give our body enough time to replace energy stores. 

In particular, we are thinking of ATP - adenosine triphosphate. This is a major fuel source in our body, one that we use for high-intensity exercise and activities but it runs out quite fast (generally about 8-12 seconds). And then on the flip side, it takes approx. 2 minutes to replenish. 

This links back to the rest time and why we need it - if we are going to be repeatedly exerting max effort, we need to make sure we have enough energy to do so. 

So hopefully by now you're starting to see that the reps, sets, and rest time link back to the science and body processes that happen when we train for strength. And maybe its just me but I think its pretty bloody interesting! 

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Now I totally get that this might seem like a lot of factors and it is, especially when you consider that there are many other different training styles.

But once you start to consider how to structure your workout or exercises, it should come together quite quickly given how connected they all are. And you are probably already following some of these concepts without even realising it!

Having said that, novice lifters tend to significantly underestimate how many reps they have left in the tank. They might get 7 reps in and think wow that's all I can do, when in reality, they have 3-5 more. Its generally not until you have more experience with lifting and listening to your body that your judgement improves - experienced lifters can generally get within 1-2 reps left, if not actually working to complete failure. 

So, like lots of things, it takes time and it is a learning process but it can be a really fun one! For me personally, it has been a journey of truly understanding my body and what it responds best to - because remember we aren't all the same and sometimes we respond better to ranges outside of what you see in the literature - and after doing this for years, I know myself better than I thought I ever could.

I hope that this might be helpful to you guys but like always, if you have any questions or need any support, flick me a message or leave a comment - I'm here to help! 

- Alex