heavy singles, doubles and triples) for their main lifts. When your muscles grow they of course become stronger, however the hypertrophy rep-range is distinctly different to the hypertrophy rep range. Great article. That can be solved by doing extra sets, though, which is where the second problems comes in: lower-rep sets are more fatiguing and can be harder on our joints. Lifting in moderate rep ranges is great for improving our general health and fitness. You get full recruitment from the first rep and enough time under load to optimize th emetabolic processes contributing to hypertrophy. Squatting for five reps is much easier than squatting for ten reps. The first option is to rest longer so that you aren’t bleeding as many reps between sets. myofibrillar hypertrophy – happens from myofibrils splitting off and forming extra contractile items with a muscle fiber. Myofibrillar hypertrophy is an increase in the number and size of the actin and myosin filaments within muscle tissue. Hypertrophy can happen utilizing any rep … Hypertrophy Rep Ranges. Or is it better to use a rep range that’s halfway between strength training and hypertrophy training? It is good to train in this rep range anyway, because it builds strength which can help you build muscle later when you switch to an 8-12 (hypertrophy) rep range. That’s called Reverse Pyramid Training, like so: Set 1: 4 reps with 265 pounds Totally! As a general rule of thumb, that’s why moderate rep ranges are so convenient. Set 4: 8 reps with 225 pounds, 0–1 reps in reserve. After that, we'll keep you updated on the most important muscle-building research, lifting methods, and workout routines. Saying that the hypertrophy rep range is somewhere in the neighbourhood of 6–20 reps means that sets ranging from 6 reps to 20 reps can all be ideal for stimulating muscle growth. This is the point that Mike Zourdos, PhD, makes in Monthly Applications in Strength Sport: While there isn’t necessarily sufficient evidence to say that the 15 reps would yield greater hypertrophy than the 6-rep example when sets are equated, without long-term data, it’s worth considering differential hypertrophy outcomes could occur over the very long term. So the answer to the question is a definite yes, but it’s about programming your workload smartly so that you can take advantage of the added strength that lower reps give you, whilst also maximising your time and volume in the gym with higher rep ranges. What that means is, if you’re making a hypertrophy training program, a workout might look like this: Deadlifts: 4 sets of 6 reps With this type of hypertrophy, not only does the area density of myofibrils increase, but there is a significantly greater ability to exert muscular strength. When we’re doing sets of 1–5, the sets tend to be harder on our joints and connective tissues, they can have higher rates of injury, and they can take longer to recover from. The idea being to start with just a few reps in reserve and finish our final set without actually hitting failure. For instance, doing 4–6 reps per set? With that said, these differences in volume really only start to become significant when comparing rather different rep ranges. One problem with these studies, though, is that they match training volume—total pounds lifted—instead of matching the number of challenging sets. For more content on the building muscle with low reps, nutrition, and workouts, get TRAIN magazine direct into your inbox every month for free by signing up to our newsletter, two groups perform either 3 sets of 10 reps or 7 sets of 3 reps. But if we’re talking about muscle growth per set, better to use moderate rep ranges so that we’re lifting more total poundage each set. But that doesn’t make us stronger, per se, it just helps us specialize our strength for powerlifting. Should You Do Isolation Lifts to Build Muscle? So, first of all, we do have some evidence showing that lower-rep sets don’t stimulate as much muscle growth: These findings indicate that heavy load training is superior for maximal strength goals while moderate load training is more suited to hypertrophy-related goals when an equal number of sets are performed between conditions. So train with both light and heavy weights as different weights give you different hypertrophic results. Schoenfeld: We recently published a meta-analysis on the topic that clearly shows hypertrophy can be attained across a wide spectrum of rep ranges – … And if so, what is it? For instance, instead of doing 3 sets of 12 reps (3×12), we might want to do 5 sets of 5 reps (5×5). This type of hypertrophy is accompanied by strength gains since it involves an increase in the contractile tissue (Zatsiorsky, 2006). Also, reading and researching on your articles, so going to follow other routines after that. Yes. Which Rep Range is Best for Gaining Strength? It’s possible that doing a set of five reps stimulates about as much muscle growth as doing a set of six reps. And even if it doesn’t, the difference is surely quite small. Doing 5×5 on the bench press might stimulate the same amount of muscle growth as doing 3×12 on the bench press, yes, but we also need to consider that these lower-rep sets require longer rest times, that they can be harder on our joints, and that we need to do more total sets to get an equivalent benefit. Funny that this is published. You’ve got a couple options. Probably done over 120 reps in total. In myofibrillar hypertrophy, we see that the myofilaments expand, but the myofibers don’t change in size. This is the problem that a lot of casual bodybuilders run into. Second, taking high-rep sets to failure is so painful that it can make people vomit, give up, or hate training. The exception to that rule is powerlifting, where our strength is measured by how much we can lift for a single repetition. Myofibrillar hypertrophy is the main increase in strength that we see occur in most power-based sports (powerlifting, weightlifting, throwing implements). But lifting in lower rep ranges is quite pleasant and easy. Of course, I’m sure most people would prefer to go with the moderate rep range for fewer sets, for reasons you mention some of later in the article, but this calculation just wasn’t accurate by total volume of reps. Volume isn’t calculated via reps (at least not as far as I’m aware and not in the hypertrophy research I’ve seen). But don’t worry too, too much about always staying above 5 reps. 4-rep sets might not be quite ideal, but you’ve already done an 8-rep set, which is. For everyone else, though, we can measure our strength by how much we can lift in a variety of different rep ranges. Plus, they’re also much easier to recover from. The problem is, we’re spending so much energy on so few lifts that it becomes hard to work all of our muscles. Didn’t even know Outlift was a thing. That’s not quite right. It’s quite common for hypertrophy programs to dip as low as 4 reps per set and fly as high as 20 reps per set, but the main emphasis tends to be in the “moderate” 6–12 rep range. When reps are low, the number of hard sets is not a good proxy for hypertrophy. Myofibrillar hypertrophy usually occurs withing the 6 – 8 rep range (Using a weight that you are only just able to complete 6 – 8 reps per set) Sarcoplasmic Hypertrophy is when the muscles sarcoplasm ( Fluid within the cell membrane) increases. As a result, spending most of your time doing moderately heavy sets of 6–20 reps is often best, occasionally dipping as low as four reps or climbing as high as forty reps per set. The first rep feels almost as strenuous as the last. More intermediate content, and more general health, fitness, and strength content. If so, am I better off reducing the weight on the 2nd and 3rd set only to make sure I never go below 6 reps? An example from my personal workout routine is that I’ll always start with a big, compound movement of around 4 sets of 4-6 reps. All of the exercises after that, I’ll use a rep scheme of around 8-15 reps for the best of both worlds. There are problems with doing sets of 20–40 reps, too. Myofibrillar and sarcoplasmic – both types of muscle hypertrophy are important to grow your muscle size. Some people’s lower backs get beat up with low-rep sets of deadlifts, whereas others get winded before they can finish a set of ten. Practically speaking, you’re right. If we challenge ourselves with the first set, our strength will typically go down a bit on the next set. Muscle size is almost perfectly correlated with muscle strength, so the rep ranges that are best for helping us gain muscle size are also the rep ranges that are best for helping us become stronger. Maybe just stick with that weight until you’re getting 8 reps on all three sets. Within that same 20-minute timeframe, they’ve stimulated the same amount of chest growth, they’ve doubled their triceps growth, and they’re probably still feeling fairly fresh. 2 Michael Gonzales. So instead of doing 6–20 reps for every lift, we want to use different parts of the rep range at different times. You can do that with 2–3 full-body workouts per week or with body-part splits.”. This is the approach we see in 5×5 programs, such as StrongLifts 5×5, and it’s why people will often argue that it stimulates more muscle growth than lower-volume programs like Starting Strength, which uses 3 sets of 5 reps (3×5). I’m training him, he wants to do lighter weights and more reps mainly for his joints. If we look at a systematic review of 14 studies, we see that sets of 6–20 reps stimulate a similar amount of muscle growth per set, provided that we take those sets close enough to failure. By doing fewer reps—anything from one to eight is a good range—and focusing on heavier weight, you’ll cause muscle fiber damage. Should we use different rep ranges for different lifts? It’s easier to do the moderate rep range. Were see. If we take the low end of the low rep range (2×24) we get 48 reps, against (8×13) 104 reps for the high rep range. Pyramid training can work, but it often makes more sense to reverse it, starting heavier and then stripping weight off the bar. Thank you Shane for your response! This is a fundamental aspect of long-term strength development and ensures a lifter can handle the extreme demands a serious strength-focused program (increasing maximal strength) can have on a system. Started working out since January 2020. For growth purposes the best "bang for your buck" rep range is arguably 6-8, or about an 80-85% max load, as it gives the ideal combination of recruitment and metabolic fatigue. Low reps are also effective for stimulating myofibrillar hypertrophy. We can gauge our strength by how much we can lift in moderate rep ranges instead. Most people keep doing their sets in a rep range of 8-12 which is not a very good strategy. 6-12 repetitions known as the “hypertrophy rep range”, is employed by many a competitive bodybuilder to help them build extreme muscle size. How to coach for hypertrophy? 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