Best Rep Range for Building Muscle - High Reps or Low Reps?
Best Rep Range for Building Muscle - High Reps or Low Reps
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A common question when it comes toweight training iswhat is the best rep range for building muscle?'Some tend to be stuck on low reps for muscle mass and high reps for muscle definition or cutting. There's some truth to this weight training philosophy but if we're talking about building muscle then we must engage in not just bigger muscles but the quality of your muscle mass (which equates to enhancing muscle definition). Let's break down both low reps and high reps.
Weight Training Rep Range: Low Reps
Why does working out with heavy weight and low reps build muscle mass? Well, for starters the key phrase in that sentence is heavy weight. Lifting heavy weight allows you to reach muscle overload breaking down the muscle. If you get the proper nutrition and rest your body needs to rebuild then you're muscles will grow from this.
Weight Training Rep Range: High Reps
Working out in a higher rep range recruits different muscle fibers than training with low reps; and with high reps you also tend to have shorter rest periods between sets. Not that you're doing a cardio workout with weights this training method can help you burn body fat especially if you're training until muscle failure.
Here's the deal; why not incorporate both low and high rep ranges into your weight training workouts? The way you would do this is to perform your compound exercises using heavy weights with low reps in the beginning of your workout followed by more isolation exercises using higher reps towards the end of your workout. By doing so you'll be hitting different muscle fibers and you'll also be building muscle mass and cutting in the same workout. An example of this for a back workout is below:
Low Rep - High Rep Back Workout (Exercise - Sets - Reps)
Barbell Rows - 4 x 4-6
Dumbbell Rows - 3 x 6-8
Seated Rows - 3x 8-12
Lat Pulldowns or Pullups - 3 x 12-15
This is very similar to a powerbuilding style workout which I have another article on. To read more about Powerbuilding check out my article onGetting Bigger and Stronger with Powerbuilding. You can also read more about rep ranges in my article The Irrelevance of Rep Range.