How repetitions effect exercise and fat loss.

One of the most common things I hear related to the amount of repetions done per exercise is "if you want to get RIPPED; you need to do more reps".

Before we get into this article let me clearly define "repetition". A repetition (or "rep") is the act of lifting and lowering a weight once in a controlled manner.

Now when people tell me that they are doing 16 or more repetitions per set to get "ripped" or burn more fat, I think they are a little confused as to

1. What effects the amount of repetitions you do truly have on your body.

2. What it takes to get "ripped" or drop fat.

Let's see if I can help clarify this for you.

How repetitions effect exercise. I am going to break this down in the simplest form I can.

If you are performing 1-5 repetiitons per exercise you are training for strength gains through neural adaption. The most effective way for your body to gain strength is to consistently demand it to move a load that can only be completed 1-5 times. This forces your body to adapt neurally to the demanded weight and promotes strength gains to occur. If you are performing 6-8 repetitions per exercise you are training for a combination of strength gain and muscle gain. If you are performing between 9-15 repetitions per exercise you are trainig primarily for muscle gain. If you are performing 16 or more reps per exercise you are now training primarily for endurance purposes.

Now the one thing that should stand out to you more than anything in the above statements is that if you are performing 16 or more repetitions per exercise you are not training to burn more fat; but for endurance purposes.

This brings us to point #2. What does it take to get "ripped" or drop fat through your resistive exercise routine?

You have to remember that if you are trying to lose fat the goal of resistive training is to build muscle.

There are many factors that need to be looked at when trying to lose fat. You must first have your diet set up so that you are in a calorie defecit.

You must be doing the proper amount of cardio respiratory exercise to burn the amount of calories needed to increase the defecit from your diet to maximize fat loss.

You must take a quality multivitamin to get the much needed nutrients your body will be lacking from cutting back on your food intake.

But, when it comes to resistve training your goal is still to build muscle.

This means that your repetitions per exercise should fall between 9-15.

The more muscle we have; the more calories we burn per day- plain and simple. For every pound of muscle we carry on our bodies we burn on average between 70-90 calories per day.

If our goal is fat loss, our goal is also to burn calories. If gaining muscle is going to burn more calories for you on an everyday basis, then you must gain muscle in order to get "ripped"

Again doing repetitions above 15 per set puts you into more of an endurance training mode. if that is your goal-that is fine.

If you are trying to burn fat 9-15 reps per set is optimal.