When discussing training with a new client who wants to increase muscle mass, the most common mistake I hear is trying to stop my client going hammer and tongs from set 1.
They aim to work to failure every set in order to get the ‘biggest bang for their buck’ time wise.
However, there is a very strong argument for looking at pacing yourself when trying to design a muscle building weights session.
I always tell muscle building clients to distinguish their training strategy when training for either hypertrophy (muscle building) or strength training.
Traditional thinking is:
Hypertrophy rep ranges* – 6-12 reps
Strength rep ranges – 1-6 reps
*There is plenty of evidence to suggest you can build muscle with both lower and far higher rep ranges.
Ideally you should approach strength and hypertrophy in different ways.
Strength training is akin to an all out sprint. Push every set to its max effort. Strength training is about maximal intensity.
Hypertrophy is like a marathon. It requires pacing strategies in order to get the maximum return.
If you have read my other article on muscle building on my website you will see that hypertrophy is about increasing total volume, (assuming you are lifting above around 65% of your 1 rep max load).
Therefore your mindset when going into a hypertrophy session should be ‘How can I lift the most volume by the end of this session?’.
This is assuming you are following a training program where you will be doing the same exercises and aim to complete the workout in the same time as last time.
The Role of Reps Left in Reserve (RLR)
Taking a leg workout as an example and assuming your routine involves performing 5 sets of 10 reps with a 90 second recovery.
We know that if you push a set to failure it will take longer to recover. However, leaving a rep or two in reserve may mean you can recover both quicker and fuller.
Reps left in reserve are exactly what they say. They are the number of reps you could still do when you complete a set. So if you set 3RLR, and your routine tells you to stop at 10 reps, you could have done 13 reps but stopped at rep 10 leaving some energy in the tank. It may mean lifting a little less weight but have a look below for the effect this may have on volume:
I had a client who was performing 5 sets of 10 reps of squats. His rest period was approximately 90-120 seconds but he was fatiguing by set 3. He had one hour to train so could not continually increase his rest period or it would mean completing less sets and therefore doing less volume.
Reluctant to drop the weight he was squatting we allowed him to do his usual routine (seen on the left) and the forced him to reluctantly drop the weight and leave 2 RLR at the end of the first 3 sets.
Below are the results:
Leaving 2 RLR actually increased total volume by 515kg which equates to a 12% increase in volume!
This also shows that if you are serious about putting on size, logging your workouts and reviewing volume is a critical component of your workout.
All my clients who are serious about building muscle get an Excel spreadsheet to input their reps and sets and this sheet automatically tells them both their volume of each exercise, their average load per lift per exercise (important when strength training) and the total volume of each session.
It is surprisingly easy to accidentally find your volume decreasing because you didn’t feel like pushing that last set or last rep. Logging this will tell you want your volume trend is and prevents you inadvertently de-training yourself when you thought you were actually increasing.
Hopefully you will see from the table above that sometimes holding back and not pushing yourself to failure, (by leaving a couple of reps in reserve) allows you to have more endurance towards the latter part of each session. And that is where you often find the differences in success lie…in the last 15-20 minutes of your session when you are tired and your mind starts wandering. Having some strength left here allows you to push those extra couple of reps and that’s ultimately what gives you the increase in volume from your previous block.
As a quick bonus for those readers who are still with me…RLR can be used very effectively as part of a periodised training plan. For example:
By reducing the reps left in reserve, you can increases load, volume and stress on the body in a linear fashion week by week giving your body something to try to adapt to…and that is what your body loves to do!
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