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Strength & Hypertrophy: Training Fundamentals

The basics of strength and hypertrophy training and how to design an effective, research-based weight training program.

Heavy Metal

If you were to randomly survey 100 people regarding their favorite exercise methods, you’d receive a wide range of responses. Yoga, bodybuilding, Pilates, CrossFit, running, powerlifting, and cycling would dominate the list, but you’d also see plenty of unconventional activities. This lack of specificity under the general fitness umbrella allows us to simultaneously have fun and improve our health. However, if we want to be good at our favorite exercise activities, there’s less room for improvisation or interpretation. An effective program is structured and specific.

Whether you’re navigating a challenging bouldering route, trying to perfect your alignment transitions in vinyasa, or focused on a new deadlift personal best, strong and well developed muscles are critical for success. As long as exercise selection, intensity, and overall program design are implemented correctly, resistance training is a safe and effective way for anyone to improve their health, look great, and thrive in the activities they love. If you’re a human being capable of physical activity, you should be lifting weights.

This chapter covers the basics of resistance training and is written to help anyone design an effective, research-based weight training program.

Resistance Training for Beginners

Before we dive into resistance training fundamentals, it’s important to first cover some guidelines for new lifters to ensure maximum beginner gains are made before moving on to advanced programs.

If you’re untrained or have little to no recent exercise experience, you’re basically superhuman and most standard resistance training rules won’t apply to you. As a beginner, you’ll make massive weekly leaps in strength, muscular size, and cardiovascular endurance. Good program design or bad, you’ll continue to improve. But the bad habits that initially worked well will eventually become ineffective and impede future growth. To set yourself up for long-term success, take advantage of this accelerated progress phase by properly learning the basics and implementing smart habits.

How should beginners start?

First, set a goal for yourself and have a clearly defined reason to train. Interested in bodybuilding? Great. Want to improve strength so you’re better on the Pilates reformer? Fantastic. There’s no wrong answer here. Be sure to know what you’re working towards. All programs need direction.

Next, focus on building a solid foundation of strength. Strong muscles increase our growth potential and improve the quality of non-lifting activities like running, climbing, dancing, etc. All aspects of your life will improve if you can move with less effort.

Strength is easy to improve at the beginning because initial weakness isn’t caused entirely by a lack of muscle mass. Instead, a novice’s inability to lift heavier loads is typically caused by poor neuromuscular coordination and a lack of motor control. This means beginners have enough muscle mass to lift relatively heavy weight, but their brains aren’t good at communicating with their muscles to produce consistent, controlled force. By treating strength as a skill and practicing it often, new lifters can learn to be strong and simultaneously build a significant amount of new muscle mass with a modest level of effort. That’s a training win-win.

The learning phase for strength is intentionally very simple. Beginners should –

Focus on non-periodized, full body workouts that are performed 2-3 times per week.
Each session should contain 3-4 working sets per exercise.
Each set should contain 5-8 reps with a challenging weight.
Avoid failure and leave 1-2 reps in reserve per set most of the time.
Aim to add a moderate amount of weight (5-10 lbs) to your lifts weekly.

These suggestions mean you can basically do the same workouts every week and only need to focus on adding small amounts of weight when appropriate. Reducing initial program complexity helps beginners develop proper form, spatial awareness, and an understanding of their physical capabilities.

The Fitstra Beginner program follows these suggestions and the first two weeks are listed above. This sample section contains two different weeks where workouts A and B alternate each day. There are only eight different compound exercises in the A/B split, making it an easy routine to learn. Stick to this strength protocol or one like it for at least the first two months and limit high-rep sets that target hypertrophy. There’s a good chance you won’t significantly increase muscle size during this eight week period anyway. The increased volume from high-rep sets may cause muscle damage (inflammation often mistaken for hypertrophy) and unnecessary fatigue, impeding growth.

Why is this strength phase so important?

The more strength you build at the beginning, the heavier your subsequent high-volume work can be. This will help you build more muscle. Think of the strength phase as a slingshot that takes an initial investment of time and energy to build but allows you to rapidly progress when released. Become as strong as possible before you change program variables like rep ranges or exercise frequency.

Finally, early equipment and exercise selection should mirror the program you’re going to follow. If you decide to work with the Fitstra Beginner program or one similar to it, you will use a barbell for many of the exercises. Start with the bar from day one or introduce it as soon as you build enough strength, coordination, and confidence. You’ll feel more comfortable with this piece of equipment each time you use it. In any fitness setting, learning to use the tool is just as important as learning to move the weight. Some studies indicate that external cuing is more beneficial than an internal focus for beginners. This means novice lifters should visualize the bar path and prioritize form rather than trying to activate a muscle. As movements become more familiar, focus on contracting the muscles being worked in each exercise.

Because there’s not an exact duration for the beginner phase, closely monitor your weekly progress to determine when you’ve reached an intermediate experience level. This point is typically defined by a strength plateau. When you’re comfortable with the pieces of exercise equipment in your program and stop improving from the same basic workouts, it’s time to move on to bigger and better things. Some may reach this point after a few months, while others might continue progressing over a year.

Listen to your body, do what’s best for you, move on when you’re ready, but don’t rush things. An extra month spent solidifying your foundation with the possibility of minimal returns is much better than moving on too soon. Don’t leave easy gains on the table.

You now know how to start your resistance training journey. Great. But how do you progress from beginner to intermediate? What is a periodized program? How many reps and sets should you do per workout? To answer these questions, let’s start with the basics.

Defining Strength & Hypertrophy

Strength and hypertrophy can have inconsistent term interpretations within different training circles. To make sure we’re all on the same page and working towards a common goal, let’s take a second to define these two facets of resistance training.

Strength can be defined as the ability to mechanically overcome a large opposing force, resulting in the controlled movement of a heavy object. In the weight room, this is displayed as a low-velocity, high-load, concentric contraction. An individual’s strength level is determined by measuring their top end performance during an exercise. This means strength is lift-specific and success is subjective. Adding more weight to the bar or completing more reps in a set means you’re stronger than you were before. Strength levels relative to personal starting points and natural upper limit potential, not absolute strength compared to others, are what count in noncompetitive fitness settings. Focus on being a stronger version of you.

Your individual level of strength may be unique to you, but we’re all limited by the same physiological factors. Two significant variables that impact our growth and lifting potential are neuromuscular coordination (how well the brain communicates with muscles to produce force and/or movement) and muscle cross-sectional area (the thickness/size of a muscle). If we want to be strong, we need to learn how to move well and increase our lean body mass through hypertrophy training.

Hypertrophy is the growth of a muscle in both length and thickness. Differences in age and sex affect growth rates and total lean mass capacity, but research shows that just about anyone can build a significant amount of muscle with resistance training. Similar to the way strength is measured, hypertrophy progress should be compared to individual starting points and growth potential. There are a few different contributors to overall muscle size, but we are going to focus primarily on the addition of new physical structures called sarcomeres.

As seen above, our muscles are made of fascicles that contain many fibers. A muscle fiber is a muscle cell. Each cell consists of bundles of individual myofibril strands that are formed by a series of linked segments called sarcomeres. Inside every sarcomere is an interlaced arrangement of the contractile proteins actin and myosin. Muscle contractions occur when myosin binds to actin and slides the two structures past one another, drawing each end of the sarcomere closer to the middle of the segment.

When we exercise with resistance training and induce hypertrophy, our muscles get longer by adding new sarcomeres to the middle and/or ends of myofibrils (sarcomeres added in series) and get thicker by splitting existing myofibril strands lengthwise to form entirely new strands (sarcomeres added in parallel). The growth of these new physical structures is called myofibrillar hypertrophy. Myofibrillar hypertrophy occurs through a process called muscle protein synthesis (MPS), and it’s what drives our growth and training progress. The more sarcomeres we add through muscle protein synthesis, the greater our strength output and total muscle mass will be. However, sarcomeres are not the only contributors to size.

We can also experience muscular hypertrophy through an increase in the size of the sarcoplasm of each muscle fiber. This is known as sarcoplasmic hypertrophy. The sarcoplasm is the fluid, nutrient, and fuel-rich interior space of each muscle fiber and it surrounds all of the myofibrils within a cell. While our muscles can grow through sarcoplasmic hypertrophy and this adaptation does offer some great benefits (increased glycogen storage, fuel delivery, and blood flow), it shouldn’t be a priority in our training. A well designed strength and hypertrophy program will inevitably induce sarcoplasm growth, but exclusively chasing the pump with a high-rep, high-damage, inflammation causing, fluid retaining routine can negatively impact overall training progress by limiting strength and size development. By prioritizing the addition of new physical structures over muscle volume, our hypertrophy training can result in long-term functional benefits and size improvements rather than acute aesthetic improvements.

Now that we’re speaking the same lifting language, let’s talk about how strength and hypertrophy training complement one another.

Motor Unit Recruitment & Mechanical Loading

Strength and hypertrophy training vary in program design, but both styles are guided by motor unit recruitment, mechanical loading, and the force-velocity relationship. An understanding of these three fundamentals will help you make consistent progress and greater gains.

For a muscle to contract and produce force, the brain needs to first send a signal down through the central nervous system to a motor neuron. When the neuron receives the message, it flips an On/Off switch, creates an action potential, and all of the fibers controlled by that one nerve cell contract. This linked system of neuron and fibers is called a motor unit (MU).

Depending on exercise intensity, a corresponding number of MUs are cumulatively recruited in an ascending order of size. Motor unit size is determined by the number of muscle fibers a single neuron innervates. The smallest MUs are activated first and primarily contain slow twitch, highly oxidative type 1 fibers. The largest motor units consist of fast twitch, anaerobic type 2 fibers and are recruited last as workload demand peaks. Due to the fiber innervation properties of motor units, most of our muscles have a significantly greater number of small MUs than large MUs. We have fewer large MUs but they innervate many more fibers per unit, making up for the quantity difference. This progressive increase in fiber activation is one of the methods that allows us to control force production.

All muscles have a mixture of fiber types, but type 2 fibers have the greatest hypertrophy and strength potential, so their activation is our number one priority during resistance training. However, because these fast twitch fibers are recruited last and only in response to high output demands, we’ll miss out on growth if intensity isn’t dialed in correctly. We need to regularly surpass recruitment thresholds for the largest motor units and activate their type 2 fibers.

A motor unit’s recruitment threshold (MURT) is the minimum amount of stimulation needed to flip the contraction switch from Off to On. The largest MUs have the highest MURT. This means that due to the ascending and cumulative activation order of motor units, when we stimulate the largest MU, all smaller units before it will also be active. This makes things pretty simple from a strength and hypertrophy standpoint. Activate the largest motor units.

There are two pretty straightforward ways to stimulate high threshold MUs and the type 2 fibers they control. We can perform fast, explosive movements and/or lift heavy weights. Both of these options can activate 100% of the fibers in a muscle and are important for effective strength and hypertrophy training. However, they produce very different results.

The graph above illustrates the force-velocity relationship. In concentric and eccentric contractions, various amounts of force produce consistent and predictable velocities. This principle states that when we concentrically (muscle shortens) contract against a heavy weight, the movement can’t be fast, and if we move fast, the resistance must be low. As seen in the graph, force output decreases as concentric velocity increases.

For example, if you can do a maximum of two concentric reps of a bicep curl with a 40 lb dumbbell, a high amount of mechanical stress (tension) is experienced by the muscle fibers in your biceps relative to their maximum strength levels. The weight moves slowly because the amount of curl strength you possess is barely greater than the total resistance of the weight. You could curl it much faster if you were stronger, but that would result in less tension on the fibers relative to their max strength potential. See the pattern?

Conversely, to produce high levels of force on a muscle during an eccentric (muscle lengthens) contraction, the movement can be fast. You might only be able to curl up 40 lbs for two reps, but you can probably lower 60 lbs for two reps at a controlled speed. 70 lbs would be lowered a bit faster and 80 lbs even more rapidly. The heavier the weight, the faster a muscle is required to lengthen. Eccentric contractions can apply more tension to a muscle, but they recruit fewer motor units despite heavier loads.

Why does this matter?

Although we can achieve 100% motor unit activation through explosive concentric exercises, we don’t get big or strong by exclusively moving fast. High-velocity concentric movements contract sarcomeres too quickly for enough mechanical loading to impact any individual fiber.

In contrast, heavy weights slow us down, extend the rep duration, achieve peak MU recruitment during the concentric phase, and load every fiber with the required mechanical stress to stimulate the signaling pathways responsible for hypertrophy.
When chasing hypertrophy and strength, 100% motor unit recruitment is minimally beneficial if it’s not accompanied by a high level of tension. It’s this application of mechanical stress on a fiber over a longer period of time that stimulates the growth of new structures, not just fiber activation. That’s why it’s important to emphasize heavy lifting.

However, speed and power-based movements are far from useless in strength and hypertrophy training. These two modalities have a significant effect on our size and performance potential. We can lower our motor unit recruitment thresholds and increase the frequency of fiber contractions (i.e. rate coding) through the correct application of power-based training. This leads to improved strength, greater power output, and more work performed per set. Power-based training will be covered later in greater detail.

To summarize this section, effective hypertrophy and strength training aim to stimulate as many type 2 fibers in a single muscle as possible. These fibers have high motor unit recruitment thresholds and require a significant level of intensity to become active. By lifting heavy weights, we stimulate all MUs and load every fiber with enough mechanical stress (tension) to grow new physical structures. These new sarcomeres make us stronger and increase the size of our muscles.

You should now have a very basic understanding of motor units, mechanical loading, the force-velocity relationship, and how they relate to resistance training. When we combine these general principles with current exercise research, we can start the program design discussion. To maintain some level of order, we’ll start with macro subjects like periodization and then work our way down to micro subjects like rep counts and rest time between sets.

Periodization & Progressive Overloading

We can’t max out daily or improvise each workout and expect to make meaningful progress. We need a plan for our gym sessions. Periodization is an exercise structuring method that targets specific goals through the application of cyclic, predetermined variety, progressive overloading techniques, and planned rest within a set time frame.

What does that actually mean?

Basically, periodization is an exercise plan that gives workouts structure and purpose over time with enough added rest to properly recover from the demands of training. This plan consists of easy to follow, skill-specific checkpoints that add intensity and variety as we move toward long-term goals.

Cyclic, predetermined variety means we change variables like volume (total reps, sets, or days) and load (weight) at regular intervals. These modifications follow a sequential pattern that is often repeated after a series is complete. A single cycle can be run multiple times to improve one attribute or slightly modified to emphasize another. The exercise details of quality programs can initially seem chaotic if they cover a wide range of intensities week to week, but they aren’t random. Periodization employs predictable, intentional alterations designed to promote specific adaptations. Variety is important, but the order is key.

When a program increases weight or reps, our muscles and nervous system eventually adapt to these new demands. An incremental increase in training intensity designed to force an adaptation is called progressive overloading (PO) and it’s what determines our variety. Progressive overloading is necessary in a periodized resistance training program because as we add new muscle and become stronger, motor unit recruitment goes down when our muscles are repeatedly placed under the same load. Think back to the concentric bicep curl example.

Periodization provides overall program structure, while progressive overloading allows us to change specific variables with a straightforward and orderly system. Like steps in a staircase, PO is how we move through the periodization schedule and increase our abilities. We load to a certain peak point, rest, then switch things up by adding a little more weight and/or volume to the cycle that was just completed. Rinse and repeat.

The two most popular progression styles we’re going to look at are linear and undulating. These methods are oftentimes labeled as individual periodization options, but I’m going to refer to them as progressive overload techniques instead. A complete program will likely utilize both linear and undulating PO as training components, but these pieces can’t stand on their own and form a whole program. They’re critical parts of the plan, not the entire plan.

Linear progressive overloading is the easiest to implement and is simply the increase of one variable while another decreases, both at a constant rate. When graphed over time, the primary variable is an upward sloping straight line. It’s important to note that a linear progressive overload can be applied to any variable in any exercise setting, but we normally manipulate load and volume in resistance training.

Undulating progressive overloading is the steady rise and fall of two variables that also have an inverse relationship. When this overload style is graphed, two horizontal waves with opposite peaks intersect at regular intervals. These two lines perpetually dance along the X-axis as they travel towards infinity. Undulating, like linear, can apply to any two variables but is most commonly used with load and volume.

Both progressive overloading styles are pictured below.

Look at the graphs above. Do you notice potential limitations with either style? Linear progression implies that we’ll eventually lift all the weight for no reps and undulating has us stuck in an oscillating limbo, doing the same thing forever. Both options are far from ideal in these forms.

If only we had a way to define the beginning and ends of these PO techniques so they could be repeated, rather than continue on for eternity… Periodization!

Adding time parameters to these progressive overloading methods allows us to increase a particular stressor for a certain duration, reset it, recover from it, then reapply it later at a greater intensity. Segment deadlines combined with progressive overloads give us the pattern of improvement discussed earlier.

Most periodization timelines utilize a macrocycle, mesocycle, and microcycle structure. This allows us to have long-term goals, intermediate priorities, and short-term points of emphasis. The image below is an example of a four month macrocycle, where each microcycle lasts one week.

Periodization was originally developed for sports that compete around an annual competition cycle. As a result, recreational fitness has been heavily influenced by popular sports periodization models that follow a yearly schedule, but there’s no set rule for time. Meaning, you could have a complete periodized program that lasts three months or one that extends to four years. It all depends on your goals, personal preferences, and training experience.

Before moving on to some examples, let’s make sure we’re all together.

The main concept from this section is that our goal-oriented workouts need to follow a long-term plan. This plan should incorporate variety through the application of progressive overloading. PO changes at least one variable at predetermined times, and these changes are contained within schedule segments that are long enough for adaptations to occur.

Now let’s throw all of this potentially confusing stuff together and look at two examples of periodization using both linear and undulating PO. Keep in mind these are visual aids to help with concept comprehension, not full programs.

The first periodization example is shown below.

This first example is a five month macrocycle that consists of four mesocycles. Each mesocycle lasts four weeks, is separated by a rest/deload week, and alternates between strength and hypertrophy.

There are four mesocycles in total, but only two months of unique programming. Month three is a copy of month one and four is a duplicate of two. The workouts in months one and three might be the same, but the loads used should increase when that mesocycle is repeated due to strength improvements. Each mesocycle makes us better at a particular skill (strength) and allows us to apply a greater level of intensity the next time we run through it. Same workouts, different weights.

When we look at the microcycles of each month, we can see the two PO techniques in action. The hypertrophy segments follow a basic linear PO pattern with the weight increasing weekly and the volume dropping in response. In contrast, the strength portions steadily change the load and reps each day. Daily changes in a variable are called daily undulation.

This alternating pattern of segments places an equal emphasis on both traditional strength and hypertrophy training methods. It’s really easy to implement and can be incredibly effective for many lifters. Straightforward and uncomplicated.

The second example mixes things up a little bit, but doesn’t deviate too far. Like the first routine, this 15 week macrocycle targets both strength and hypertrophy. This schedule places a greater emphasis on hypertrophy by drawing out the peak hypertrophy load time to two months instead of alternating evenly.

The loads for strength still follow a daily undulating PO that peaks twice a month, but the specific day to day changes are different. As long as a variable is changing daily and progressing towards a certain target, the transition doesn’t necessarily have to be linear (8/6/4/2 versus 8/4/6/2). Both options take us to the same place, but they follow different routes. More room for you to experiment.

The hypertrophy mesocycle change in example two is a longer duration of high volume for more growth. We’re still advancing load with linear PO, but now that transition is spread out over eight weeks instead of four. This doubles the time we spend on a single rep range from one week to two. This 1:2 strength to hypertrophy ratio is a great example of how we can allocate our time to target multiple goals throughout a periodization cycle, but still place an emphasis on the attribute we care about most.

These two examples should provide enough info on periodization and progressive overloading to get you started building your own routines.

So, what’s the best periodization strategy? It completely depends on the individual.

The way you respond to stress and recover from changes in intensity will dictate how quickly you progress and how long a program can remain effective. To dial in the most effective exercise strategy for any one person, a program must be incredibly specific. And the more specific a program is, the fewer people it can help. There’s no one-size-fits-all outline that can perfectly maximize results for everyone. However, I can make general recommendations that work well for most people.

Regarding cycle length, I like to build programs around one week microcycles and four week mesocycles. My macrocycle durations reflect the number of goals a client is working towards, so the total program length varies from person to person. While you have the option to deload in your rest weeks between mesocycles, I suggest you spend recovery weeks out of the gym. Focus on other aspects of fitness and take a break from weight training. Rest is important.

Linear versus undulating? There’s a significant amount of research that compares linear to undulating PO, and most data point towards equal performance, with undulation having a slightly greater effect on highly trained individuals interested in strength. Unless you’re an elite competitive athlete or have been training intensely for 5-10+ years, both options will be effective in your programming. I recommend you use a mixture of linear and undulating PO.

We now have a basic program outline. Let’s fill it in.

Weekly Training Frequency & Recovery

Based on the periodization framework established in the last section, we know that our macrocycle needs to focus on specific, long-term goals and incorporate progressive overloading. But in order to effectively and safely work through a month-long mesocycle, our weekly microcycles need to be constructed to maximize growth, minimize the risk of injury, and allow for proper recovery. In this section we’ll briefly cover how muscle protein synthesis, muscle damage, and nervous system fatigue affect weekly training schedules. We’ll then look at what current research suggests for workout frequency.

When heavy weights load our muscle fibers with high levels of tension, mechanical stress is translated into various chemical signals that instruct our bodies to change. One of these adaptations is the growth of new muscle tissue through a process called muscle protein synthesis (MPS). The new contractile proteins created through MPS are deposited into our muscle fibers, increasing sarcomere count and total muscle size. MPS is how we grow, and it’s a training variable we can easily influence by working out and eating high-protein meals.

How do exercise and diet work together to build new muscle?

The mechanical forces we experience during strenuous weight training sessions make our muscles more sensitive to the presence of amino acids (AA) in our blood, specifically the amino acid leucine. This amino acid sensitivity results in higher protein synthesis activity than normal, leading to growth. MPS occurs to some degree every time we eat protein, but without the catalyst of resistance training to boost production, normal MPS levels result in the maintenance of existing tissue. It’s this increase in MPS that helps us form new muscle mass and why a great diet is so important.

On the opposite end of things, a bad diet and ineffective exercise routine can cause us to lose muscle. Muscle protein breakdown (MPB) is the deconstruction of existing muscle tissue into amino acids. Amino acids are created through MPB and used in various essential metabolic processes throughout the body when dietary protein levels are insufficient. Rates of muscle protein breakdown also rise after exercise relative to an individual’s fitness experience. Beginners benefit from massive MPS spikes after heavy lifting, but they also have to deal with greater levels of MPB. However, this breakdown of lean mass is less concerning than it may sound.

MPB is an essential bodily process, but changes in MPS are generally greater than MPB. We can’t stop muscle protein breakdown from occurring, but we can significantly minimize it with a great diet. By consuming protein-rich meals and incorporating resistance exercise into our schedules, muscle protein synthesis should easily exceed the rate of breakdown. MPB isn’t an insignificant factor in our training, but it’s one we don’t need to stress about.

As seen above, elevated MPS rates can last over two days for beginners, while trained lifters typically see MPS levels return to pre-exercise baselines after 24 hours. This means most of us are passively building new muscle tissue 1-3 days after an effective workout if our diet is dialed in correctly.

The anabolic equation shown above and what we know about post-workout MPS activity give us enough information to form a training frequency outline. We want to stimulate MPS with resistance training when protein synthesis rates drop back down to baseline levels but not before. This allows us to maintain elevated MPS rates without expending energy on unnecessary workouts.

If a great training session can result in up to 48 hours of passive growth, how often should we lift?

Post-workout MPS activity lasts longer for beginners, so trained lifters need to exercise more often to increase strength and hypertrophy. While this general bit of advice points us in the right direction, saying that experienced exercisers need to lift more and beginners should exercise less isn’t too helpful. Taking MPS data alone also implies that there are no impedances to our growth potential. Eventually, more will turn into daily full body workouts, repeated forever. No thanks. To realistically quantify session frequency, we need to factor in recovery by looking at muscle damage and fatigue.

Muscle damage is an exercise induced muscular injury that results in pain, swelling, and a loss in function. Symptoms can range from minor to severe, but are usually present following an intense workout. Damage is typically caused by unfamiliar physical activity and can be exacerbated by high load, eccentric contractions and/or large repetition volumes. Most damage is fully repaired after 5-7 days with standard rest and recovery methods.

Muscle damage is a multifaceted issue, but the main cause seems to be a structural compromise of sarcomeres. Sarcomeres can warp in shape, form tears in their segment links, or completely rupture depending on the injury. Damaged sarcomeres produce weaker contractions, experience less tension due to lower load tolerances, and can ultimately hinder growth when not given enough recovery time. It’s also highly likely that existing damaged tissue needs to be completely repaired before new sarcomeres can be formed. Research suggests that muscle protein synthesis will prioritize fixing a broken foundation over adding new structures if damage is present. Meaning, your workouts might do a great job of regularly spiking MPS, but growth will be limited if you simultaneously deteriorate existing tissue to the same degree.

Muscle damage sounds like something we want to avoid at all times, but it can make us better if used strategically. One of the most significant benefits of muscle damage is its ability to shorten our recovery times due to the repeated bout effect (RBE). The repeated bout effect is a concept that says we adapt to stressors the more often we do them, and exposure to damaging activities teaches our muscles how to protect themselves from subsequent abuse.

As mentioned earlier, unfamiliar exercises can be the most damaging and may require a week of recovery between sessions. But based on what we know about MPS activity, we’ll miss out on growth opportunities if we wait that long. By introducing appropriate amounts of damage at regular intervals, the RBE results in neural and muscular adaptations that help beginners ramp up their training frequency and provides more consistent gains to experienced lifters. The effectiveness of progressive overloading is primarily due to the repeated bout effect and the way it forces our bodies to grow when exposed to the demands of intense exercise.

When implemented at manageable levels, muscle damage can also be a catalyst for the addition of new sarcomeres, costameres, and satellite cells. Costameres contribute to contraction forces and the overall structural integrity of a fiber by serving as anchor points. These anchor points connect myofibrils to cell membranes and assist in lateral force transmission across the muscle. More costameres can mean more strength. Satellite cells are localized muscle stem cells and they assist in the repair and growth of new fibers. They do this by synthesizing new contractile proteins and/or fusing themselves to a fiber, increasing that fiber’s total number of nuclei. More satellite cells can help us regain muscle faster after extended time off.

Costameres and satellite cells may increase in number following a damaging workout, and they can significantly impact our training in a very positive way. But how much damage is enough to improve our training progress? If we want to take advantage of damage, we need to be able to identify its presence and measure its severity.

There are a few different ways to measure muscle damage, but many of them require invasive and specialized techniques that aren’t practical for everyday use. Most people don’t know what segmental fiber necrosis is, have never heard of Z-band streaming, and are grossed out by protein leakage. But just about all of us have experienced a delayed onset of muscle soreness (DOMS) following a brutal workout. This post-exercise pain is our marker for damage.

A soreness self-assessment isn’t a sophisticated measuring method, so there’s no need to complicate things here. We’re going to use a basic 10 point scale. 1 represents an absence of pain and 10 feels like death. This system gives us a simple and intuitive way to assess our recovery status. It’s subjective and definitely has flaws, but its ease of use and reliability make it a great tool to help us dial in training frequency and intensity. Now that we’re aware of muscle damage, understand its significance, and can measure it, let’s combine this information with MPS activity to see more of the big picture.

Starting with beginners, we know that MPS can last over two days and muscle damage can take up to seven to heal if we do nothing to expedite it. That 2-7 day rest window can be narrowed down further by adding in the RBE and our DOMS self-assessment. To capitalize on the benefits of the repeated bout effect, we know that we need to exercise a muscle more than once. If our time parameter for bouts is a one week microcycle, we can conclude that beginners need to exercise at least two times per week. The soreness scale then helps us determine how many days of rest should separate these two sessions as well as their estimated levels of intensity.

For example, if a beginner were to perform a full body workout on Monday, they could use the DOMS scale on Wednesday to determine whether their next session should occur Thursday or Friday. If they choose Thursday but are still really sore (7+ on the DOMS scale), simply backing off on weight and volume will allow them to benefit from MPS stimulation without significantly compounding existing damage. As mentioned in the Beginner section, programming for untrained lifters emphasizes session consistency and strength development, not volume and/or intensity.

The same basic concepts apply to experienced lifters. MPS activity dies down after roughly 24 hours for highly trained individuals, but most non-beginners still need at least 48 hours of rest to recover properly from intense sessions. However, unlike newbies, that two day minimum can be taken advantage of if DOMS isn’t a limiting factor. Experienced lifters can potentially target a single muscle up to four times a week safely. Working the same muscle group every other day is definitely on the high end of weekly frequency options, but this can be an effective method if nervous system fatigue is kept in check.

What is nervous system fatigue and how can it impact our training?

There are two different types of nervous system fatigue, peripheral and central. Peripheral nervous system (PNS) fatigue is a localized decrease in contractile force primarily due to a depletion of energy (ATP and glycogen) and a build up of metabolites (lactate, ammonia, and hydrogen ions) within a muscle following an intense exercise bout. This is the muscular failure we experience towards the end of a difficult working set. With PNS fatigue, the brain can clearly communicate with motor neurons, but muscles are too tired to function. Peripheral fatigue is sudden in onset, debilitating, but brief. PNS fatigue can dissipate in minutes.

Peripheral fatigue may sound terrible, but it’s essential for peak muscle fiber activation. The accumulation of PNS fatigue is primarily what causes our higher threshold motor units to be recruited towards the end of a difficult working set. The first rep of a heavy set won’t require full fiber activation, but the sixth rep most likely will due to a decrease in force output from lower threshold, type 1 fibers. Acute PNS fatigue limits our intra-set work capabilities, but it’s not a weekly frequency factor to worry about.

Central nervous system (CNS) fatigue is the exhaustion of our brain and spinal cord due to repeated overstimulation. This results in altered levels of neurotransmitters and impaired neuromuscular signaling. Unlike PNS fatigue, CNS fatigue can slowly sneak up on us and become a chronic issue if ignored and allowed to accumulate. CNS fatigue should not be confused with overtraining syndrome, which is a serious condition that requires a professional medical diagnosis. When CNS fatigue is present, our muscles are ready to lift heavy things, but their motor neurons can’t produce the action potentials required to stimulate high threshold MUs. Inactive and underworked type 2 fibers result in less mechanical loading, decreased motor unit recruitment, and fewer gains. Central nervous system fatigue is a programming factor that can screw up our gains if not respected.

How much recovery does CNS fatigue require?

The total neural cost of a single workout depends on an individual’s training experience and conditioning. CNS fatigue from some exercises (low-volume strength/power) can be cleared up within minutes for more trained lifters, while other more demanding activities (high-volume hypertrophy/endurance cardio) can affect performance up to 48-72 hours. Like MPS activity and muscle damage, there’s a correlation between training status and neural exhaustion. Untrained lifters should consider resting the full 48-72 hours after high-volume/long-duration sessions.

This basic understanding of nervous system fatigue combined with what we know about MPS activity and muscle damage give us almost everything needed to build a really solid microcycle. To tie it all together, we need to look at some research trends observed in studies that specifically investigate weekly training frequency.

The majority of the data point to the same common conclusions –

There’s a positive dose-response relationship between training frequency and strength and hypertrophy gains. Hypertrophy seems to be affected more than strength.
Strength gains for beginners and intermediate lifters are possibly more dependent on total weekly training volume than frequency. Reaching that volume threshold in one session is possible, but this may result in significant CNS fatigue and damage.
Trained lifters require more frequent stimulation than beginners to see regular progress.
There’s a point of diminishing returns in hypertrophy and strength training as frequency grows. Some data show an upper limit for strength at 3x/wk and hypertrophy at 4x/wk.

When training research is combined with what we know about MPS activity, muscle damage repair, and CNS fatigue, the microcycle training schedule is much more clear.

To increase both hypertrophy and strength –

Beginners should perform full body workouts 2-3 times per week and rest at least 48-72 hours between sessions. This routine promotes MPS activity for up to six days, takes advantage of the repeated bout effect to help repair muscle damage, and provides enough rest time to help CNS fatigue dissipate.
Trained lifters should aim to target each major muscle group 2-3 times per week, rest at least 48 hours between same-muscle stimulation, and aim for a total of 4-6 workouts per week. This routine maximizes individual muscle MPS activity throughout the week, and provides at least 24 hours of CNS rest between workouts.

Both of these approaches are very doable for most people. The hardest part will be assessing your own level of fitness on the untrained-trained spectrum. Dialing in an optimal training frequency will take a little trial and error. If you’re new and unsure of your abilities, it’s probably best to start on the low end of beginner and progressively increase your weekly session count as you adapt. These two examples should provide you with enough freedom to dial in exactly what’s best for your training needs.

With the weekly outline covered, let’s discuss how to order and structure a single workout.

Exercise Order & Concurrent Training

Exercise order is a relatively simple problem to solve compared to other aspects of program design. This sequence is determined by only two factors, fatigue and training goals. If we understand how nervous system fatigue affects our performance and have a clear purpose for our sessions, we’ll consistently be able to build effective and orderly workouts.

Fundamentally complete programs that aim to improve both strength and hypertrophy should incorporate some mixture of strength, hypertrophy, aerobic cardio, anaerobic cardio, and power. However, three of these modalities are new styles we have yet to cover. We need to quickly discuss the importance of cardiovascular conditioning and power-based training within a quality resistance training program. These two styles are often overlooked when pursuing gains, but they can have a massive impact on our progress when implemented correctly.

To start things off, let’s take a deep breath and embrace the idea of cardio. Cardiovascular conditioning is associated with an impressively long list of general health benefits, making it an essential part of any fitness program. Within the context of resistance training, aerobic and anaerobic cardio help us improve our work capacity. Work capacity is the amount of exercise volume we can complete in a given amount of time (per set or per day) and how quickly we can recover from it.

Cardiovascular exercise stimulates protein synthesis similar to lifting weights, but primarily results in the formation of mitochondrial proteins instead of myofibrillar proteins. Greater mitochondrial density in our muscles results in an increased ability to store, produce, and break down energy (ATP, creatine phosphate, and glycogen), an improvement in the efficiency of all three energy systems (ATP-CP, glycolytic, and aerobic), and decreased recovery times between sets/workouts. More muscular energy and faster activity turnaround times give us a greater total workload density. It’s a little counterintuitive, but running can significantly improve strength and hypertrophy.

Let’s compare two different work capacities. In these examples, you only have one hour of free time per day to lift.

A low work capacity may require you to wait 3-4+ minutes between sets to perform your best, limiting the amount of work that can be accomplished in one hour. The more time you’re required to rest, the less time you have to lift. Being out of shape can also cause exercise induced CNS fatigue to accumulate, carry over to the next day, and impact subsequent workouts. In contrast, a high work capacity can drop your optimal inter-set rest times to 1.5-2 minutes, allow you to knock out an extra rep or two per set, and keep you from feeling dead as you walk out the door. More volume can be completed, a greater intensity can be applied, and carryover fatigue is nearly eliminated in the high work capacity scenario.

Running does not directly make us bigger or stronger. However, cardiovascular conditioning does significantly improve our work capacity, and a greater work capacity means better weight training sessions. Don’t be scared of running.

What about the top of the concurrent training pyramid, power?

Power training is another useful exercise modality due to its impact on neuromuscular activity. High-velocity movements can be performed to decrease motor unit recruitment thresholds and increase rate coding. We can attempt to decrease MU recruitment thresholds by taking advantage of an acute phenomenon called post-activation potentiation (PAP). PAP is a theory that basically states our muscles remember how much fiber activation was recently required, and this makes them more likely to recruit at least the same amount of motor units during subsequent, less demanding activities. Post-activation potentiation can result in increased fiber recruitment at the beginning of a set, greater strength output, and more volume completed under heavy loads.

For example, a max effort squat jump doesn’t load our muscles with a ton of weight, but it does require 100% motor unit recruitment. When performed before a heavy barbell squat, the jumps prime our neuromuscular pathways, create a short-term contractile history, and make the motor neurons involved more easily excitable due to their recent activation. Performing one exercise that mimics the MU recruitment requirements of another essentially lowers MU thresholds by decreasing the stimulation needed to create action potentials. Post-activation potentiation is what makes moderate weight feel unexpectedly light when performed after a heavy set.

Studies have shown that this muscular response works with both high-speed, low-resistance (clap push-up to improve bench press) and low-speed, high-resistance (heavy squat to improve sprint time) efforts. We’ll cover plyometrics and PAP in greater detail in Chapter 4.

Rate coding is the second half of the power discussion. Rate coding is a measurement of how frequently motor neurons generate action potentials per second. This is just as important to force production as MU recruitment. When contracting at slower speeds or against lower opposing forces, rate coding is typically low. In contrast, rate coding is noticeably higher when moving fast or lifting heavy weights. High-velocity exercises can increase baseline rate coding frequency and lead to more strength and growth. There are endless ways to add supplemental power training into your existing program. I like it in the warm up and mixed into HIIT circuits, both in minimal to moderate volumes.

We now have a basic appreciation for the roles that cardiovascular conditioning and power training play in strength and hypertrophy development. Let’s talk about exercise order.

As seen in the image above, exercise style is the first determining factor. This is due to fatigue. To keep both CNS and PNS fatigue from interfering with workout productivity, start with strength, transition into hypertrophy, and end with cardiovascular conditioning. This sequence places the most high-volume and fatigue-inducing exercises at the end, and allows us to maximize our strength/hypertrophy training potential before we get too tired. Untrained lifters will be able to get away with any random order they want for 2-3 months, but that ability will fade.

While not pictured, power training occurs before strength for competitive athletes (football, weightlifting, etc.). Fitstra programs include some power in the warm up and cardio sections because most people don’t compete in sports, and therefore, don’t need to prioritize the development of explosive movements. But if lifts like the snatch, clean, and jerk are important to you, do them first. They require a lot of motor control and explosive energy, but produce very little fatigue if volume is kept in check.

The second line of the ordering structure addresses multi-joint versus single-joint exercises. This variable is also primarily influenced by fatigue. Multi-joint movements can feel more tiring than their single-joint counterparts, but isolating individual muscles with single-joint exercises can lead to greater levels of localized peripheral fatigue. This means single-joint movements compromise the integrity of multi-joint movements if they’re performed first. If one muscle in a kinetic chain is weakened, the load potential of subsequent exercises that rely on that chain will also be decreased. Multi to single-joint transition is best in most scenarios, but there are instances where that order is reversed. For example, pre-exhausting triceps before bench press to emphasize chest work.

The last ordering guideline relies on personal preferences and individual program goals. If your daily concurrent structure progresses from resistance training to cardiovascular conditioning and places multi-joint before single-joint movements, all remaining sequence uncertainties should be determined by your preferences and programming focus. This is especially true for untrained lifters.

For example, let’s say you’re doing a lower body routine that includes barbell squat, barbell deadlift, hamstring curls, and an easy one mile jog. The hamstring curls and cardio would be performed last, but the order of squats and deadlifts would be your decision to make. If squats are a weak point, it would be best to do them first. If you hate deadlifts and want to get them out of the way as soon as possible, go for it. As long as the first two points in the exercise order checklist are marked off (concurrent style and joint order), small details can be adjusted to suit your needs. With that said, you would ideally want to alternate between squats and deadlifts (weekly or monthly) in this hypothetical scenario. This ensures an equal emphasis of strength and hypertrophy is placed on both exercises.

To maximize your strength, hypertrophy, and cardiovascular progress, perform each type of exercise in isolation and in the order listed above. Don’t blend things together. Circuit training has its uses and can be an effective way to target certain goals, but it’s not going to give you the best strength and hypertrophy results. Save the circuits for HIIT/anaerobic conditioning.

These exercise order guidelines don’t cover every possible scenario, but they should give you a helpful foundation to start structuring your daily sessions. Let’s move on to exercise selection.

Exercise Selection

With a seemingly endless number of machines and movement patterns to choose from, exercise selection can feel like a massive roadblock. To solve this programming problem, I suggest you stick with common, versatile pieces of equipment and focus on traditional compound exercises. These recommendations leave us with a manageable list of effective exercises that can be performed in most gyms. My suggested equipment is listed below.

If you follow any of the Fitstra programs, these are the tools you’ll need –

Lifting Rack
Barbell + Plates
Dumbbells
Pull-Up Bar

Lat Pulldown
Hamstring Curl
Heart Rate Monitor
Strength Bands

Foam Roller
Parallel Dip Bars
Suspension Trainer
Ab Mat

Fitstra resistance training programs are kept simple by focusing on barbell, dumbbell, kettlebell, and bodyweight exercises. Free weights over machines. These tools support a wide variety of training styles, are functionally consistent, and available in most gyms. Standard pieces of exercise equipment help you form a solid training foundation and continually scale with you as you progress.

I prefer to keep exercise equipment as simple as possible, but you don’t have to. If there’s a specific tool you enjoy using in your routine, keep it. For example, kettlebells aren’t mentioned in the previous list because they aren’t absolutely necessary to run Fitstra programs. However, they can add an incredible amount of variety and challenge to a workout. Feel free to incorporate any extra equipment if it improves the quality of your sessions.

We have our tools picked out. How should we use them?

Our bodies are pretty good at bending, twisting, and contorting in different ways. Being highly mobile is great for most of our daily needs, but not every movement pattern should be trained under a heavy load. An effective resistance training program strengthens a few specific, multi-joint movements and improves physical performance in a wide variety of activities. When targeted equally, these exercises can increase strength and hypertrophy, decrease our risk of injury, and evenly distribute work across all major muscle groups.

Simple, efficient, and effective.

As seen in the table above, the selected movement patterns are separated into Upper Body, Lower Body, and Core categories. The upper limb options are straightforward with presses and pulls performed horizontally (movement perpendicular to the spine) and vertically (movement parallel with the spine). Lower limb patterns add a bit more variety, but are still quite simple with a squat, hip hinge, and single leg emphasis. In the core section, we have rotation, flexion, and a hold (isometric contraction). Planks, carries, and anti-rotational exercises are all examples of holds.

When we perform these movement patterns with the recommended pieces of equipment, exercise selection becomes pretty simple. For example, if we want to press horizontally (perpendicular to the spine), we could pick barbell bench press, push-ups, or dumbbell/kettlebell bench press. Setting limits on the tools we use and how we move allows us to keep our routine simple, focus on the most effective exercises, and practice them frequently enough to become skilled at each one. If we’re relatively strong at every exercise and equipment combination, we probably have balanced joints, good posture, and a solid level of overall strength.

Below are some exercises that fit into each category. This is not a comprehensive list.

From the earlier discussion on training frequency, we know that activating a muscle at least twice a week is ideal, but we didn’t touch on exactly how to train it. I recommend you stimulate each muscle group/movement pattern with at least two different exercises per week instead of doubling down on the same lift. Do this by using a mixture of bilateral (both limbs/sides working together simultaneously) and unilateral (one limb/side working in isolation or in an alternating pattern) movement styles.
For example, weighted chin-ups on Monday followed by unilateral lat pulldowns on Thursday would hit both our frequency and variety targets for the vertical pull (parallel to spine). The exercise selection table above should provide you with enough options to make that possible.

It’s important to note that the exercises provided in this section can be used to build really effective programs, but you will probably want to add in a few extras depending on your goals, limitations, strengths, and weaknesses. You may need to incorporate some corrective exercises to address joint alignment issues, and certain body parts might need more single-joint volume to grow. Do what’s best for you.

We now know what tools to use and which exercises to perform. Great. But how many reps should a set of barbell deadlifts contain? What weights are best for strength versus hypertrophy?

Set Volume, Rest Times, Rep Ranges, & Loads

Because strength and hypertrophy complement one another, we need to look at set and rep details for both to build effective programs. If we understand each extreme end of the weight training spectrum, it will be easier to move our program slider and target specific goals. In this section, we’ll look at optimal set volume, inter-set rest times, rep counts, and one rep max (1RM) loads for strength and hypertrophy.

To start, let’s define reps and sets.

A rep (repetition) is one concentric+eccentric cycle of an exercise, and is normally considered complete when we return to the starting position of a movement. Reps can be short in duration and involve a single-joint, or they can be a lengthy sequence of movements and require multi-joint coordination to complete. For example, one repetition of a bicep curl is the combination of elbow flexion+extension, and is isolated to one joint. In contrast, a single rep of an exercise like the Turkish get-up requires almost every joint in the body and uses a series of different movements.

A set is an isolated collection of one or more reps that occurs between predetermined periods of rest. Sets allow us to attack a certain muscle or movement pattern with structure and intent. A single set can be simple and involve only one exercise, or it can be a complex collection of exercises. In most cases, a set is the rep count for one exercise. For example, if we perform a total of 30 push-ups that are divided into three groups of ten reps, we have completed three sets of push-ups. When reading Fitstra programs and most others, sets precede reps. 3×10 is read as three sets of ten reps.

How many sets are enough?

We know that research shows a positive dose-response relationship between exercise volume and gains for both strength and hypertrophy. However, the optimal number of sets for these two styles vary depending on training goals and fitness experience. More volume is better for size and strength, but we need some idea of what more means. Helpful set volumes that apply to both beginners and trained lifters can be established by comparing available studies. The table below shows optimal weekly strength and hypertrophy set totals for individual movement patterns. This shows that 4-8+ sets per week are ideal when training for strength while 8-12+ sets per week are best for hypertrophy.

Based on this information, hypertrophy gains can require nearly twice as much weekly set volume as strength. This implies it generally takes less time to improve neuromuscular coordination and motor control than it does to grow new tissue. So, if we want to build a program that increases both, it’s probably best to spend the majority of our training time on hypertrophy. But because the studies used to form the table above only tested for strength or hypertrophy, we can’t simply add the two ranges together. The total volume for beginners and most trained lifters would be a bit too high. Instead, we need to operate within set volume ranges that allow us to improve both strength and hypertrophy, without causing unnecessary amounts of CNS fatigue and muscle damage.

I recommend most lifters shoot for 5-10+ total sets per week for each major movement pattern/muscle group. Exact totals should be determined by your training status and program goals. Within this range, 60-70% of sets should focus on hypertrophy and 30-40% on strength. This split promotes consistent growth and provides enough weekly strength work to improve the neuromuscular coordination of new tissue.

If you’re on the beginner to intermediate side of fitness, start lower in your weekly set totals. See how you respond to smaller volumes before making incremental changes. It’s better to be slightly underworked for a week or two than unnecessarily beat up and exhausted. The table below contains my recommended weekly set volume options. These range from beginner to intermediate. Set totals and strength percentages (% of total sets) are listed at the bottom.

An easy way to implement this recommendation is to separate strength sets from hypertrophy sets for all movement patterns and target them on different days.

Let’s revisit the chin-up/lat pulldown example from the Exercise Selection section. If we do weighted chin-ups on Monday, all sets performed for that one exercise can focus on strength. When Thursday arrives, lat pulldown sets emphasize hypertrophy. For a goal of eight total sets of vertical pulling in a week, three sets isolate strength with chin-ups on Monday, and the remaining five sets hit hypertrophy with lat pulldowns on Thursday. This strategy is used in the Fitstra Upper Lower programs. To see how strength and hypertrophy can be combined on the same day, check out the Fitstra Legs Push Pull program. There are plenty of different ways to implement these recommended weekly set splits. Do what’s best for you.

With some optimal set ranges established, let’s make sure we’re able to perform them well. How long should we rest between sets?

Optimal inter-set recovery periods vary quite a bit from person to person due to training experience, age, exercise intensity, work capacity, diet, and goals, but more time is usually better. If allowed to rest longer, we can lift more weight, restore a greater percentage of our baseline energy stores (ATP), remove more of the metabolites (lactate, ammonia, and hydrogen ions) that build up during exercise, increase post exercise MPS, and reduce intra-workout fatigue. Longer rest times between sets also make the workout more enjoyable due to lower ratings of perceived exertion (RPE). If the overall difficulty level of an activity is realistic and sustainable, both emotional satisfaction and program adherence will be higher. This is especially true for beginners.

As seen above, longer recovery periods are associated with increased load potential and decreased PNS fatigue. I recommend inter-set rest times of 1.5-3 minutes when training for hypertrophy and 3-5 minutes for strength. It will take a little trial and error to dial in exactly what’s best for you, but these ranges should work well for most people. If you’re unsure of where to begin, start with longer recovery periods to establish baseline performance levels, then gradually shave off time as you increase your work capacity through cardiovascular conditioning.

Heavier weights require more rest than lighter loads. Nothing too complicated. But what is heavy and what is light?

The loads used in resistance training are typically calculated using a one rep max (1RM). A 1RM is the most amount of weight we can lift for one complete repetition of a single exercise. 1RMs are lift-specific, so your squat will have a different 1RM than bench press, deadlift, etc. If we want our program to be effective and tailored to our individual needs, we need to know 1RM values for the included exercises. But for many people, maximum loads are unnecessarily dangerous. To reduce the risk of injury, we can estimate 1RMs by using a multi-rep max of a lighter weight.

An approximate 1RM of any exercise can be calculated by using the chart above. To find this value, divide the amount of weight lifted by the 1RM% of reps completed.

For example, let’s say you can bench press 135 lbs for a max of six reps before failure. Based on the 1RM table above, we know that any weight we can move six times is approximately 85% of a one rep max. We then divide 135 lbs by 85% (135/0.85) to give us an estimated 1RM of 160 lbs.

Although we can technically calculate a 1RM from any rep count, I recommend a 4-6 rep max. This method is great for beginners and experienced lifters alike, as it does not require a testing week or any type of program modifications to measure strength. Estimated 1RMs can help you determine what loads will be most appropriate for a given rep count, but 1RM percentages don’t need to be followed perfectly. Use these targets as reference points and work at or as close to the suggested 1RM% as you can in your program. In all Fitstra programs, working sets should be performed with the corresponding 1RM% load of reps listed. This results in working sets with intensities (RPE) of 7+/10.

What rep ranges target strength versus hypertrophy?

The top of the 1RM table shows that strength is strongly associated with heavier loads, but fades as we go over the six rep mark. In contrast, hypertrophy starts to creep in around the six rep mark and extends all the way through the table. Like many other aspects of fitness, there’s not a solid line that separates strength from hypertrophy. But there are sweet spots. Studies show that strength gains are primarily made when we lift at or above 80-85% of our 1RM, while hypertrophy can occur at a variety of different loads. These percentages correspond to rep ranges of roughly 1-6 for strength and 6-12+ for hypertrophy. When we reflect on what we know about muscle growth and the learning process of strength, the ranges make sense.

Hypertrophy requires the activation and mechanical loading of type 2 fibers, regular spikes in muscle protein synthesis, and possibly some occasional tissue damage. Because PNS fatigue results in the eventual recruitment of our largest motor units, all of these hypertrophy prerequisites can theoretically be met with heavy or moderate weight. Studies show that hypertrophy can occur at rep ranges up to 30, but I recommend that you cap your hypertrophy range at 12 due to the fiber type-fiber size paradox.

The fiber type-fiber size paradox is a concept that states muscle fibers with the highest oxidative capacity have the lowest growth potential, and attempting to simultaneously increase a muscle fiber’s oxidative capacity and size is less effective than training these two attributes independently. Lighter weights that fatigue us at relatively high rep counts (15-30) rely on highly oxidative, type 1 fibers for the majority of the set. These high-rep sets don’t recruit large motor units until the end of an exercise, resulting in a considerable amount of wasted muscular energy spent on smaller MUs. In contrast, heavier weights (6-12 reps) recruit type 2 fibers much sooner and direct our energy expenditure mainly towards growth. High-rep sets improve muscular endurance, but they are inefficient at targeting hypertrophy and can cause too much damage/fatigue to be worth implementing.

Strength improvements are more one dimensional. To be strong, we need high levels of motor control, fiber activation, and force output. These aspects of strength are skills that need to be regularly practiced and perfected as new tissues are added from hypertrophy training. Meaning, if we want to be proficient at maximum force production, we have to continuously teach existing and new muscle mass how to be strong. Power training can help us lift more, but there’s no substitute for heavy loads. Stick to 1-6 reps, use smart progressive overloading patterns, move heavy things, and teach your body to be strong. Treat strength training like a skill that can be improved with no ceiling, but lost without practice. Stay consistent.

Use these set volumes, inter-set rest times, rep counts, and load suggestions as starting points, then make adjustments as needed to build the best program for you.

Rep Failure & Tempo

At this point in the strength and hypertrophy discussion, we’ve covered just about everything you need to create a simple and effective program. You now know about periodization, motor unit recruitment, training frequency, exercise order, and other important muscle building topics. The big picture of resistance training is pretty clear, but it’s not quite complete. We need to touch on two final topics that dive a little deeper into repetition style and performance. These are set failure and rep tempo.

Failure is a specific point during a set where we cannot complete any more reps due to PNS fatigue. We fail when we can’t generate enough force to overcome external resistance. Reaching or exceeding this level of exhaustion is usually encouraged in training groups to get the most out of every set, but most of us should avoid failure when possible.

By consistently taking our sets to failure, we can increase CNS and PNS fatigue, muscle damage, and necessary inter-set rest times. Repeated set failure also increases our session RPE (ratings of perceived exertion) which can lower emotional satisfaction/enjoyment and cause problems with program adherence. Highly trained lifters and elite competitive athletes may benefit from this style of max effort training when used correctly, but research suggests that both strength and hypertrophy can be improved without reaching failure.

We can’t build massive arms or double our squat max in a single session. We reach our goals by accumulating small, daily victories over long periods of time. The key to success is consistency, but it’s difficult to keep showing up when we’re overly sore, injured, or anxious about the quality of an upcoming session. To help prioritize fun and maintain consistency, I suggest beginners stay 1-2 reps away from failure. If you think, “I probably could have knocked out one more,” as you rack your weights after the last rep, perfect. Work near failure and occasionally experience it, but don’t let it interfere with the quality and consistency of your sessions. Trained lifters may benefit from a one rep buffer between them and exhaustion, but results will vary. Do what’s best for you.

These failure recommendations are easy to implement if we control our rep tempo.

In most resistance training settings, our repetitions should be complete concentric+eccentric cycles of movement, performed in a controlled manner, and taken through a full range of motion. These repetition guidelines allow us to take advantage of regional hypertrophy. Regional hypertrophy is the growth of new tissues in specific areas of a muscle. While both contraction styles can produce similar results, studies show that concentric contractions tend to increase the cross-sectional area of a muscle (proximal sarcomeres in parallel), while eccentric contractions can favor overall fiber length (distal sarcomeres in series). If we can make a muscle longer and thicker, it can be stronger and faster. To get the benefits of both contractions, we need to move through our reps at the right speed.

Most beginner and intermediate lifters should use a simple self-pacing assessment to establish their rep speeds. When moving a weight, do you feel like you’re in charge of the object, or is it imposing its will onto you? Are you moving slowly enough to feel muscular tension throughout the full range of motion? Does your movement speed allow you to hit all of your target reps with the load you’re using? If the answer to these questions is yes, you’re most likely good to go. The absolute best rep speed will be one you can perform consistently with great form and confidence. With that said, I do have some tempo suggestions.

I recommend most lifters spend 1-2 seconds in the concentric phase and 1-3 seconds in the eccentric. Experienced lifters may see hypertrophy benefits from eccentric times of up to four seconds, but the excessive damage from loaded lengthening should be used sparingly. If you’re still unsure of tempo, pay attention to how fast you can move a heavy weight when you’re 3-4 reps away from set failure. Mimic that speed.

That’s it. Let’s put it all together.

Full Program Examples

I’m not going to include program examples here. There are too many different possible training combinations that would need to be covered. Instead, head over to the Programs section and check out all of the workouts listed there. They range in length (2-6 months), target a variety of different training styles, and accommodate all experience levels.

Final Thoughts

Despite the number of topics covered in this chapter, we’ve barely scratched the surface of strength and hypertrophy training. Science points us in a very helpful direction and gives us a ton of wiggle room to play with program details, but there’s always more to learn.

This chapter should give you the necessary tools to start building your own programs. Go lift some weights, build a little muscle, and learn to be strong.

Experiment by manipulating different variables. Find what works best for you. Share what you discover. Have fun.

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