Your Evidence Based Guide to Building Muscle (Part 5)
Warmups, Reps and Rest
How should I warm up?
Warming up for an effective muscle building workout is incredibly easy. Simply do two or three sets of your first exercise at a lighter weight, building to your first working set. Let’s say your working sets of squats this week are at #225. An effective warm up might be the empty bar for 10 reps, then #135 for 8, #185 for 6, and finally #225. That’s it. You could do 5-10 minutes of cardio if you want, but it’s not necessary. I’m not going to stop you from doing your favorite mobility drills, ‘activations,’ or whatever else you want. But aside from a couple lighter sets on your first exercise and one lighter set on each new exercise after I would not recommend anything else. Muscles don’t need to be activated, that is not how the body works. And if you train your working sets through a full range of motion without using compensatory motion you will reap all the benefits of the best mobility program you could possibly dream of.
How much should I rest?
This is an easy one. The research suggests 2 to 3 minutes of rest in between sets is optimal, but this one is all about performance. If you get 10 reps on your first set to failure and 5 on your second set then you probably did not rest enough. Rest as long as you need so that you can match your performance as well as possible. A drop off of 1-3 reps on each set is expected, but more than that indicates you should rest a little bit longer.
How many reps should I do?
We have excellent evidence that you can build muscle in a variety of rep ranges. The old guidelines for rep ranges are dead. You can build muscle effectively doing sets ranging anywhere from 5 to 30 reps, provided that those sets are similarly close to failure. For the majority of your training, however, I think most people should do sets ranging from 5 to 15 reps, mostly due to practicality. A set of 25 reps on a hack squat is going to be so incredibly painful that it is unlikely you will actually reach muscular failure. Personally, I like doing fewer repetitions as it is easier to stay locked in to your technique. Personal preference is huge here. If you enjoy doing higher reps, provided they are still close to failure, there is no reason for me to dissuade you. However, for strength the rep ranges are still important, so if your goals are to get bigger and stronger, you will see better strength gains from being closer to the lower end of the rep range.
