On Monday, Tom wrote an awesome blog about women and heavy lifting. I wanted to inform you about a discussion I had with a person who was misinformed about heavy weights. I wasn’t going to blog about this, but I felt that heavy lifting can be easily forgotten and spoken about too negatively.
About a month ago, I was at work talking to a guest trying to get a little insight on what he does for a living. As we began to talk, he decided to vent on how his body ached, felt fatigue, and how much his muscle atrophied over the past year. He told me that he worked out 3-4 times a week with a varying workout regimen, yet he was still over training.
His doctor was prescribing him androsterone to help prevent muscle atrophy. While he was telling me this, there wasn’t much I could say. I couldn’t really say if the doctor was right for prescribing the steroid since I did not know his medical history, but what he said next is what really got my attention.
This guest told me that he was receiving advice from this “OLD TIME” trainer that was telling him that everyone reaches a point that they SHOULD NOT LIFT heavy! I stood there in disbelief. From there I stopped him right in his tracks because I didn’t need to hear anymore. Then I told him the truth….
Don’t allow anyone to tell you that you should not lift heavy! Unless the doctor requires you to stop with the likelihood of further injury, give it a shot! There are studies by NSCA and ACSM stating that heavy lifting is totally fine for the everyday active adult. If you don’t want to lift heavy, that’s fine, but please don’t allow some outdated trainer feed your brain with malarkey.
I am not saying to go out there and try to be the incredible hulk and throw weights through the ceiling. Just throw on an extra 5, push those muscles a bit. See, when you lift heavy, it’s a new workout in and of itself. Anything between the repetitions of 1-6 would be considered heavy lifting.
Also, timing is everything. 3-5 minute rest period is needed when staying in that repetition range. This timing allows full rejuvenation for max effort each set. The fun part of lifting heavy is the low repetitions that you have to complete. I admit it; once I get past ten, I lose focus and start to think about other things which at times will hurt my lift.
This same guy I was talking to was also told by this “brilliant of a trainer” that his repetitions should not be below 20 in any exercise! Muscular endurance is one thing (Will talk about that in later blog) but a cardiovascular workout on bench is……. another.
If you are doing 20 repetitions per set, unless you enjoy that exercise, it’s really not necessary. At that point you become bored, tired, and over trained my friend. Lifting heavy may not necessarily be the answer for every exercise situation, but it is an option.
If you have any questions on lifting, send me a comment. I would really like to answer more questions.
-Phil