>be at gym
>doing bench press
>doing five reps of 150 pounds
>no spotter
>can't lift it back up on fifth rep
>do the roll of shame
>middle aged guy comes up
>helps me
>I say thanks
>he talks my ear off for ten minutes about how it's scientifically proven that more reps at lower weights reaps the same benefits of fewer reps at higher weights
Was he right, Veeky Forums?
I do both. A warm up set at low weight and lots of reps, then my real sets at high weight, and then my final set is low weight and as many reps as I can do.
Warm up set makes sense, the last set is bro-science on my part.
I do that too because I like too. I call it a burn out set. Feels good.
No, he's not right. There's a neglible difference in hypertrophy between high reps/low weight and low reps/high weight, but low reps/high weight won't make you as strong as high reps/low weight.
How often do people fail sets? I can usually tell how many reps I have left and just go one less.
Fewer reps on a high weight develop your nervous system more, increasing your strength. More reps with a bit lower weight are for volume - hypertrophy.
Mind you, you don't have to be doing some insane amount of reps for that, with heavy enough barbell you can get plenty of volume doing 5x5 for example.
Also don't ever do sets of 6-7 reps, they do literally nothing.
>low reps/high weight won't make you as strong as high reps/low weight.
>Fewer reps on a high weight develop your nervous system more, increasing your strength.
So which one is it?
Yes. That's why 5/3/1 works so good.
They're both valid approaches to bodybuilding. Getting your ass to the gym is the main thing. Veeky Forums would argue about this for ages, I'd say go hypertrophy, but at the end of the day just go to the gym a lot and do anything.
>but at the end of the day just go to the gym a lot and do anything.
>don't ever do sets of 6-7 reps, they do literally nothing.
It's basically the same. So if you want to be just jacked and don't care about strength - why not. It's also easier on joints and to keep proper form
i also do this because of the pump, i usually bench 90kg for 5 reps, but on my last set i drop to 60kg (1pl8) and do about 20 reps, and man it kills my chest, i like to do this on incline bench too but it hurts my shoulder sometimes so i stopped doing it
Low reps/high weight will make you stronger than high reps/low weight, all things being equal. That's not how it works in real life though, more volume is better for hypertrophy and building muscle will make you stronger as well.
The 6-7 rep range thing is just a cheeky meme.
He's right you know, I can do 135lb for 8 or 540lb for 2, it's the same thing
Don't you meme face me you fuck.
...
Lift heavy. Then add one set with less weight and do more reps. Thats how you do it.
And yes. There was aa study that showed no difference between high rep/low weight and low rep/high weight, but that was a 8 week study, and doesnt tak into account strength progression
And as you get more experience you should change between the two of them.
Depends, are you a man or a woman?
Because if you're a man you're recruiting about 95% of your muscle fibers in a movement with high resistance, while women only use about 75-80%.
That means as a man, you're stronger than a woman, you can lift more weight since you're recruiting more motor units at once. However, that means you're also stressing almost all of your motor units at once, therefore fatiguing them at a higher rate.
Women can keep going and going and going since there's always about 20% of their motor units not getting any action and are thus completely rested.
But generally speaking the NUMBER 1 stimulant of muscle growth is and always will be a high resistance/load. You can always add reps whenever need be, but adding 3 reps per set to a 225lbs bench and adding 3 reps per set to a 310lbs bench are DRASTICALLY different in their ability to stimulate muscle growth.
So he's pretty much right, he might have a wrong explanation for why he's right though.
Lol
I can always tell if I do one more set I know I'll fail and kill myself, so I don't.
This isn't correct. Stalling is only a problem if you are training for strength. Look at bodybuilders on this very board like Lotus that constantly repeat this as cannon
This.
Hypertrophy with loads between 60-90% will be the same, but everyone is so stupid they forgot about neuromuscular connection and sarcoplasmic hypertrophy. The study EVERYONE keeps referencing didn't say anything about that.
That's what separates 2-5 and 8-12 reps
I want to smell her stinky, sweaty cunt
I usually get to that point and go for it anyways. It makes the resulting success 100x more rewarding or the resulting failure 100x more motivating.